Wednesday, March 12, 2014
“The Selling of the President 1968" changed everything. We see politicians differently, and political reportage was never the same after. Read "Selling" side by side with Theodore White's "The Making of the President: 1968" and see what the difference looks like. Both men had access, but Joe McGuinniss knew that what he was seeing was the commoditization of the candidate-- and reported it. Nobody'd done that before, and now we take it for granted. He must have been an interesting cat- to be that ingratiating, first with the Nixon people, who were famously defensive about the press, and had every reason to be, then, later, with Jeffrey MacDonald. Janet Malcolm may have thought that "Fatal Vision" was an act of betrayal, but I've never been comfortable seeing it that way. Now he's dead.
// posted by Bill @ 8:01 AM 
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