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Statecraft As Soulcraft: What Government Does
The conservative thinker and columnist reflects on the fundamental beliefs of American political theory, questioning the sufficiency of the principle of competing self-interests as a basis for society and arguing for a more broadly based interpretation of the role of government
186 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1983
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About the author
George F. Will
71 books194 followersGeorge Frederick Will is an American newspaper columnist, journalist, and author. He is a Pulitzer Prize-winner best known for his conservative commentary on politics. By the mid 1980s the Wall Street Journal reported he was "perhaps the most powerful journalist in America," in a league with Walter Lippmann (1899–1975).
Will served as an editor for National Review from 1972 to 1978. He joined the Washington Post Writers Group in 1974, writing a syndicated biweekly column, which became widely circulated among newspapers across the country and continues today. His column is syndicated to 450 newspapers. In 1976 he became a contributing editor for Newsweek, writing a biweekly backpage column until 2011.
Will won a Pulitzer Prize for Commentary for "distinguished commentary on a variety of topics" in 1977.[6] Often combining factual reporting with conservative commentary, Will's columns are known for their erudite vocabulary, allusions to political philosophers, and frequent references to baseball.
Will has also written two bestselling books on the game of baseball, three books on political philosophy, and has published eleven compilations of his columns for the Washington Post and Newsweek and of various book reviews and lectures.
Will was also a news analyst for ABC since the early 1980s and was a founding member on the panel of ABC's This Week with David Brinkley in 1981, now titled This Week with George Stephanopoulos. Will was also a regular panelist on television's Agronsky & Company from 1977 through 1984 and on NBC's Meet the Press in the mid-to-late 1970s. He left ABC to join Fox News in early October 2013.
Will served as an editor for National Review from 1972 to 1978. He joined the Washington Post Writers Group in 1974, writing a syndicated biweekly column, which became widely circulated among newspapers across the country and continues today. His column is syndicated to 450 newspapers. In 1976 he became a contributing editor for Newsweek, writing a biweekly backpage column until 2011.
Will won a Pulitzer Prize for Commentary for "distinguished commentary on a variety of topics" in 1977.[6] Often combining factual reporting with conservative commentary, Will's columns are known for their erudite vocabulary, allusions to political philosophers, and frequent references to baseball.
Will has also written two bestselling books on the game of baseball, three books on political philosophy, and has published eleven compilations of his columns for the Washington Post and Newsweek and of various book reviews and lectures.
Will was also a news analyst for ABC since the early 1980s and was a founding member on the panel of ABC's This Week with David Brinkley in 1981, now titled This Week with George Stephanopoulos. Will was also a regular panelist on television's Agronsky & Company from 1977 through 1984 and on NBC's Meet the Press in the mid-to-late 1970s. He left ABC to join Fox News in early October 2013.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
April 1, 2020
Statecraft as Soulcraft was the right book at the right time for me. I've been thinking deeply about politics and the structure of our society, and this book put in the most articulate and complete terms what I feel I've been chewing on. I don’t think I’ve ever underlined or starred a text quite so much—often to the detriment of my reading speed.
First, Will makes a great effort to point out that it is not a matter of whether or not statecraft should be soulcraft—that our laws and government should shape the moral sentiments of a nation—but that statecraft is soulcraft—it is an unavoidable fact that the structure of our society shapes its values. He is not proposing a new regime of government intervention but recognizing that, even in its most laissez faire form, government plays a gigantic role in society both in its commissions and omissions. He makes a point of this to litigate the conservative idea that somehow government can be totally irrelevant to our daily lives, that it can play an imperceptibly small, inconsequential role. We aren’t choosing between government and no government, Will argues, but good government and bad government. The state is here to stay, so let’s work with it.
Will’s central argument is that government should consider the values, virtue, and character of its people in the process of governing and should make efforts to instill the beneficent attributes of moderation, social sympathy, and a willingness to sacrifice private desires for public ends. Rather than giving particular policy prescriptions, Will suggest that this should be a general concern of policy makers—a lens through which they evaluate policies, not a consolidated program of bills to pass. It is less tactical and more strategic.
If there is a villain in this treatise, it is the intellectual strain of individualism and self-interestedness that has—in Will’s mind—run amok over the last 200 years. This intellectual tradition beginning with Machiavelli and Hobbes runs counter to the philosophies of the ancient Greeks. Whereas Aristotle asked, “what is the highest calling of man and society?,” Machiavelli was more interested in the acquisition, maintenance, and application of political power, while Hobbes spoke of the nasty, insecure state of nature and man’s desire to join into political union out of rational self-interest—not any devotion to higher ends. From these two men sprout the Western political philosophy of Locke, Paine, Jefferson, and the like. They argue that the goal of government (and I’m painting in broad strokes here) is to design and manage a system that 1) protects individual freedom 2) purposes the self-interestedness of man towards the common good. We assume poorly of human nature and try to work around it.
This philosophy manifests itself in a system of capitalism where the invisible hand of the market, driven by the accumulated decisions of the self-interested, pushes society towards ever higher standards of prosperity and opportunity. But, it is a philosophy that cannot exactly come to grips with the abuses within the system. If it is a virtue to allow man to pursue his self-interest, then how can we judge his actions (if they are self-interested)? Will points out that this debate came to its great crescendo in the mid-19th century with Stephen Douglas and Abraham Lincoln. Douglas argued that it was the South’s right to pursue its self-interest through the institution of slavery—just as it was Illinois’ prerogative to not do so—while Lincoln contested that self-interest must be subordinate to the moral values of a nation, in this case those of the Declaration of Independence. Freedom can only exist within the confines of virtue and individual discipline.
But what allowed the American experiment to proceed so successfully for 200 years if we were in fact trapped by a system doomed for failure? Will points out that the republic has been guided for generations by the moral values and virtues he says are essential for prosperity. Put simply, we had a people who would police themselves. Yet, as liberalism has pushed us forward, our shared sense of national identity has fractured and our moral tradition has faded. The fact of this is plain to see. The family structure, both nuclear and extended, is crumbling. Faith in and reliance on institutions are decreasing. Citizens no longer feel tied to their ancestors or communities. A “meritocracy” that honors the rich and famous reigns, while the provincial values of neighborliness and moderation are ignored. We see it in our divided politics and rising rates of depression and anxiety. The sinew that has made our nation prosperous spindles away before our eyes.
To be clear, Will doesn’t say that the capitalist system should be thrown away; he is very much in favor of markets as a way of allocating resources and creating wealth. Rather, we should be aware so as not to slay the goose that lays the golden eggs. We must understand that man’s highest billet cannot be consumer and producer, but that these things are subordinate to what makes a prosperous life.
As a final note, I was researching Will online to get a sense of the rest of his career, and I was shocked to the degree to which has become somewhat of a self-described libertarian. Most of his award winning writing was penned in the 1980s and 1990s, and I can’t help but wonder if he has suffered the fate described by Ross Douthat: most opinion columnists only have one or two good decades in them before they become stale.
First, Will makes a great effort to point out that it is not a matter of whether or not statecraft should be soulcraft—that our laws and government should shape the moral sentiments of a nation—but that statecraft is soulcraft—it is an unavoidable fact that the structure of our society shapes its values. He is not proposing a new regime of government intervention but recognizing that, even in its most laissez faire form, government plays a gigantic role in society both in its commissions and omissions. He makes a point of this to litigate the conservative idea that somehow government can be totally irrelevant to our daily lives, that it can play an imperceptibly small, inconsequential role. We aren’t choosing between government and no government, Will argues, but good government and bad government. The state is here to stay, so let’s work with it.
Will’s central argument is that government should consider the values, virtue, and character of its people in the process of governing and should make efforts to instill the beneficent attributes of moderation, social sympathy, and a willingness to sacrifice private desires for public ends. Rather than giving particular policy prescriptions, Will suggest that this should be a general concern of policy makers—a lens through which they evaluate policies, not a consolidated program of bills to pass. It is less tactical and more strategic.
If there is a villain in this treatise, it is the intellectual strain of individualism and self-interestedness that has—in Will’s mind—run amok over the last 200 years. This intellectual tradition beginning with Machiavelli and Hobbes runs counter to the philosophies of the ancient Greeks. Whereas Aristotle asked, “what is the highest calling of man and society?,” Machiavelli was more interested in the acquisition, maintenance, and application of political power, while Hobbes spoke of the nasty, insecure state of nature and man’s desire to join into political union out of rational self-interest—not any devotion to higher ends. From these two men sprout the Western political philosophy of Locke, Paine, Jefferson, and the like. They argue that the goal of government (and I’m painting in broad strokes here) is to design and manage a system that 1) protects individual freedom 2) purposes the self-interestedness of man towards the common good. We assume poorly of human nature and try to work around it.
This philosophy manifests itself in a system of capitalism where the invisible hand of the market, driven by the accumulated decisions of the self-interested, pushes society towards ever higher standards of prosperity and opportunity. But, it is a philosophy that cannot exactly come to grips with the abuses within the system. If it is a virtue to allow man to pursue his self-interest, then how can we judge his actions (if they are self-interested)? Will points out that this debate came to its great crescendo in the mid-19th century with Stephen Douglas and Abraham Lincoln. Douglas argued that it was the South’s right to pursue its self-interest through the institution of slavery—just as it was Illinois’ prerogative to not do so—while Lincoln contested that self-interest must be subordinate to the moral values of a nation, in this case those of the Declaration of Independence. Freedom can only exist within the confines of virtue and individual discipline.
But what allowed the American experiment to proceed so successfully for 200 years if we were in fact trapped by a system doomed for failure? Will points out that the republic has been guided for generations by the moral values and virtues he says are essential for prosperity. Put simply, we had a people who would police themselves. Yet, as liberalism has pushed us forward, our shared sense of national identity has fractured and our moral tradition has faded. The fact of this is plain to see. The family structure, both nuclear and extended, is crumbling. Faith in and reliance on institutions are decreasing. Citizens no longer feel tied to their ancestors or communities. A “meritocracy” that honors the rich and famous reigns, while the provincial values of neighborliness and moderation are ignored. We see it in our divided politics and rising rates of depression and anxiety. The sinew that has made our nation prosperous spindles away before our eyes.
To be clear, Will doesn’t say that the capitalist system should be thrown away; he is very much in favor of markets as a way of allocating resources and creating wealth. Rather, we should be aware so as not to slay the goose that lays the golden eggs. We must understand that man’s highest billet cannot be consumer and producer, but that these things are subordinate to what makes a prosperous life.
As a final note, I was researching Will online to get a sense of the rest of his career, and I was shocked to the degree to which has become somewhat of a self-described libertarian. Most of his award winning writing was penned in the 1980s and 1990s, and I can’t help but wonder if he has suffered the fate described by Ross Douthat: most opinion columnists only have one or two good decades in them before they become stale.
April 3, 2014
I enjoy reading older books more than new books, because it's like getting two books in one:
- A book about whatever the author meant to write about;
- A book about the time period in which the author wrote.
George Will's book is largely directed at early Reagan-era conservatives, who were pushing an almost libertarian line about government not being in the business of shaping behavior. Will rejects this posture, insisting that governance is unavoidably "soulcraft"--the shaping of habits of the self. Will's position was that government should foster the virtues that allow for democracy and capitalism to flourish. He disdained a particularly political construction of this soulcraft in favor of more older-style conservative concepts like virtue, moderation, community, and honor.
I found Will persuasive. Will offered many memorable turns of phrase and by the end of it, his argument seems essentially inevitable: government cannot avoid policing morality on some level. I've spent a fair bit of time with the writings of Benjamin Disraeli in my academic endeavors, and this is clearly out of that tradition: the British Tory tradition, as opposed to the American conservative tradition. (It is hard to be a true "conservative" in America, in the European sense of the word. For his part, Will divided politics into Massachusetts liberals--the post-Carter Democrats--and Manchester liberals--Reagan and his allies.)
I would absolutely love to read a new foreword to this book from Will circa 2014.
- A book about whatever the author meant to write about;
- A book about the time period in which the author wrote.
George Will's book is largely directed at early Reagan-era conservatives, who were pushing an almost libertarian line about government not being in the business of shaping behavior. Will rejects this posture, insisting that governance is unavoidably "soulcraft"--the shaping of habits of the self. Will's position was that government should foster the virtues that allow for democracy and capitalism to flourish. He disdained a particularly political construction of this soulcraft in favor of more older-style conservative concepts like virtue, moderation, community, and honor.
I found Will persuasive. Will offered many memorable turns of phrase and by the end of it, his argument seems essentially inevitable: government cannot avoid policing morality on some level. I've spent a fair bit of time with the writings of Benjamin Disraeli in my academic endeavors, and this is clearly out of that tradition: the British Tory tradition, as opposed to the American conservative tradition. (It is hard to be a true "conservative" in America, in the European sense of the word. For his part, Will divided politics into Massachusetts liberals--the post-Carter Democrats--and Manchester liberals--Reagan and his allies.)
I would absolutely love to read a new foreword to this book from Will circa 2014.
August 31, 2020
Fantastic book looking at what the core of conservatism really is, unencumbered by the ideologue’s zealotry. I have often been put off by Will’s columns in recent years, which often come across as both condescending and cantankerous. But this younger Will is wise indeed. Highly recommended.
October 17, 2013
"For me, a life-changing introduction to a classical conservatism that predates the Movement as it became known in midcentury America."
- Scott Galupo
- Scott Galupo
May 29, 2021
George Will packs a lot into this thin volume as he argues the United States has lost - or never had - the "public spiritedness" necessary to preserve the values that undergird a republic. He writes that the United States needs to recover that key part of the Western tradition to balance out the hyper-individualist nature of the late twentieth century and the people living within it. My sense is that he is correct in that we need to restore some semblance of balance to the fight between the individual and community. He also makes a really good point in writing about how statecraft is soulcraft, whether conservatives believe it should be or not. The reality is that this is a fact of government, therefore, shouldn't government be directed towards cultivating the good, through supporting the little platoons (churches, nonprofits, schools, social clubs and organizations) that grow community and cultivate virtue?
It would be interesting to sit with Mr. Will and get his perspective on this book three decades later. It doubt it would be an optimistic conversation.
One of my favorite quotes: "Democracy and capitalism are compatible only as long as the habits of political and economic self-restraint (deferral of gratification, industriousness; thrift) reinforce one another. The question is what happens when the ethics of a commercial civilization - the relentless manufacturing of appetites, and the incitement to gratify them on red - undermines self-restraint in political and economic behavior? The essence of childishness is an inability to imagine an incompatibility between one's appetites and the world. Growing up involves, above all, a conscious effort to conform one's appetites to a crowded world. By so thoroughly taking our political, hence our moral, bearings from the low but strong and steady passions, are in danger of lingering in perpetual childishness? A society that seeks a steady expansion of desires and a simultaneous satisfaction of them may be, at least in the short run, a great place for advertising account executives and manufacturers of small appliances. But over time, it must be unstable domestically and vulnerable internationally."
It would be interesting to sit with Mr. Will and get his perspective on this book three decades later. It doubt it would be an optimistic conversation.
One of my favorite quotes: "Democracy and capitalism are compatible only as long as the habits of political and economic self-restraint (deferral of gratification, industriousness; thrift) reinforce one another. The question is what happens when the ethics of a commercial civilization - the relentless manufacturing of appetites, and the incitement to gratify them on red - undermines self-restraint in political and economic behavior? The essence of childishness is an inability to imagine an incompatibility between one's appetites and the world. Growing up involves, above all, a conscious effort to conform one's appetites to a crowded world. By so thoroughly taking our political, hence our moral, bearings from the low but strong and steady passions, are in danger of lingering in perpetual childishness? A society that seeks a steady expansion of desires and a simultaneous satisfaction of them may be, at least in the short run, a great place for advertising account executives and manufacturers of small appliances. But over time, it must be unstable domestically and vulnerable internationally."
December 11, 2018
Not the book I expected from George Will. He argues government should play an active role in establishing proper moral standards in our society. He says traditional conservatism cannot be merely a defense of industrialism and individualist free-market economics. Instead, conservatism is about the cultivation and conservation of certain values. He goes so far as to argue that conservatism needs an affirmative doctrine of the welfare state to ensure social cohesion and national strength.
July 4, 2025
Lots of good material. I have questions about some of the specifics, but food for thought!
July 3, 2025
George Will’s ambitious work challenges the modern foundations of the American republic, advocating a European conservatism rooted in classical and Christian traditions. Though Will has distanced himself from this book, and I have my disagreements, his perspective is forthright: he rejects the modern view of human nature as driven by self-interest and politics as a coercive mechanism to channel ambition. This perspective, originating with Machiavelli’s realism and systematized by Hobbes, found its first major application in James Madison’s constitutional design, where ambition checks ambition for mutual benefit. Will deems this a degraded view of human nature and politics, favoring instead the natural society of Aristotle, Cicero, Aquinas, and Burke, where the state is a horizontal extension of social bonds oriented toward a highest good.
However, Will’s reliance on Burke is complicated. As Leo Strauss argued, Burke’s skepticism of reason and pragmatic Whiggism align him more with Locke and Hume than with classical traditionalists. Will, though not citing Strauss or Jaffa, echoes a Straussian narrative: the United States, founded on Machiavellian principles, was redeemed by Abraham Lincoln, a philosopher-king who reoriented the nation toward higher ideals. Yet Lincoln, steeped in the philosophy of Jefferson and Paine, prioritized national unity, compromising with slavery to preserve the Union, which undercuts Will’s idealized portrayal.
The book’s standout chapter, “Conservative Political Economy,” can be read independently and argues for a paternalist state over laissez-faire or populist alternatives. Drawing on Bismarck and Disraeli, Will envisions a conservative welfare state that incentivizes virtue and discourages vice through policies like Nixon’s proposed family income or Bush Jr.’s compassionate conservatism. This assumes a culture worth preserving and a ruling class with noblesse oblige. Yet, as Dan Moynihan noted, culture, not politics, drives societal success, and politics can only guide an existing cultural will. Without such a foundation, statecraft cannot “craft souls,” and libertarian and populist currents have since eclipsed Will’s vision.
Will’s organicist view of society, which sees the state as a natural outgrowth of human bonds, finds echoes across epochs: in the 19th-century French positivists like Comte, who emphasized social cohesion through scientific progress; in the German idealists like Hegel, who viewed the state as the culmination of historical spirit; and in contemporary sociobiologists like E.O. Wilson, who ground social cooperation in evolutionary biology. Yet his call for “idealpolitik” suits philosophers more than reformers. Socratic philosophy and Christianity rely on voluntary belief, not coercion, and history shows philosophers failing to establish ideal states. Practical statesmen, operating from lesser motives, have often outperformed idealists in statecraft. Strauss, wary of conservatism’s defense of prejudice over universal truths, recognized this. Machiavelli’s sin, per Strauss and Will, was not discovering realist principles—long practiced—but proclaiming them openly. Modernity, driven by upheavals in religion, social order, and science, complicates Will’s nostalgia for pre-modern ideals.
The American republic, far from a purely realist project, sought to justify government on principle, blending Aristotle’s mixed polity with Enlightenment ideas. Locke and Montesquieu advocated moderate governance, not strict separation of powers, and Madison’s system was fortified by Hamilton and Marshall’s innovations. Yet sustaining a republic demands virtues—patriotism, piety, self-restraint—that often yield to self-interest and enmity. The Founders, aware of these challenges, relied on compromises, but the republic has evolved into a de facto democracy grafted onto republican structures.
Will’s critique is a compelling intellectual exercise, but his vision struggles against the realities of human nature and political practice. While his call for a higher politics resonates, the modern world—born of necessity and pragmatism—resists the soulcraft he champions.
However, Will’s reliance on Burke is complicated. As Leo Strauss argued, Burke’s skepticism of reason and pragmatic Whiggism align him more with Locke and Hume than with classical traditionalists. Will, though not citing Strauss or Jaffa, echoes a Straussian narrative: the United States, founded on Machiavellian principles, was redeemed by Abraham Lincoln, a philosopher-king who reoriented the nation toward higher ideals. Yet Lincoln, steeped in the philosophy of Jefferson and Paine, prioritized national unity, compromising with slavery to preserve the Union, which undercuts Will’s idealized portrayal.
The book’s standout chapter, “Conservative Political Economy,” can be read independently and argues for a paternalist state over laissez-faire or populist alternatives. Drawing on Bismarck and Disraeli, Will envisions a conservative welfare state that incentivizes virtue and discourages vice through policies like Nixon’s proposed family income or Bush Jr.’s compassionate conservatism. This assumes a culture worth preserving and a ruling class with noblesse oblige. Yet, as Dan Moynihan noted, culture, not politics, drives societal success, and politics can only guide an existing cultural will. Without such a foundation, statecraft cannot “craft souls,” and libertarian and populist currents have since eclipsed Will’s vision.
Will’s organicist view of society, which sees the state as a natural outgrowth of human bonds, finds echoes across epochs: in the 19th-century French positivists like Comte, who emphasized social cohesion through scientific progress; in the German idealists like Hegel, who viewed the state as the culmination of historical spirit; and in contemporary sociobiologists like E.O. Wilson, who ground social cooperation in evolutionary biology. Yet his call for “idealpolitik” suits philosophers more than reformers. Socratic philosophy and Christianity rely on voluntary belief, not coercion, and history shows philosophers failing to establish ideal states. Practical statesmen, operating from lesser motives, have often outperformed idealists in statecraft. Strauss, wary of conservatism’s defense of prejudice over universal truths, recognized this. Machiavelli’s sin, per Strauss and Will, was not discovering realist principles—long practiced—but proclaiming them openly. Modernity, driven by upheavals in religion, social order, and science, complicates Will’s nostalgia for pre-modern ideals.
The American republic, far from a purely realist project, sought to justify government on principle, blending Aristotle’s mixed polity with Enlightenment ideas. Locke and Montesquieu advocated moderate governance, not strict separation of powers, and Madison’s system was fortified by Hamilton and Marshall’s innovations. Yet sustaining a republic demands virtues—patriotism, piety, self-restraint—that often yield to self-interest and enmity. The Founders, aware of these challenges, relied on compromises, but the republic has evolved into a de facto democracy grafted onto republican structures.
Will’s critique is a compelling intellectual exercise, but his vision struggles against the realities of human nature and political practice. While his call for a higher politics resonates, the modern world—born of necessity and pragmatism—resists the soulcraft he champions.
January 2, 2010
A few quotes from the book:
"Statecraft as soulcraft should mean only a steady inclination, generally unfelt and unthought. It should mean a disposition, in the weighing of political persons and measures, to include consideration of whether they accord with worthy ends for the polity." (pg. 94)
"Will diverse and even noble characters flourish in a society in which the political order takes its bearings from the low but predictable passions of men?" (pg. 101-102)
"Political philosophy is about "the polity", which is much more than governmental institutions. It includes all the institutions, dispositions, habits and mores on which government depends and on which, therefore, government should strive to have a shaping influence. No country is "a thing of mere physical locality." A hotel is a physical locality; hotels have residents. Countries do not have residents: they have citizens. Democratic government must be a tutor as well as a servant to its citizens, because citizenship is a state of mind." (pg. 24)
"Statecraft as soulcraft should mean only a steady inclination, generally unfelt and unthought. It should mean a disposition, in the weighing of political persons and measures, to include consideration of whether they accord with worthy ends for the polity." (pg. 94)
"Will diverse and even noble characters flourish in a society in which the political order takes its bearings from the low but predictable passions of men?" (pg. 101-102)
"Political philosophy is about "the polity", which is much more than governmental institutions. It includes all the institutions, dispositions, habits and mores on which government depends and on which, therefore, government should strive to have a shaping influence. No country is "a thing of mere physical locality." A hotel is a physical locality; hotels have residents. Countries do not have residents: they have citizens. Democratic government must be a tutor as well as a servant to its citizens, because citizenship is a state of mind." (pg. 24)
February 26, 2013
It's amazing that Mr. Will was allowed to maintain his "conservative" credentials after publishing this book. Certainly, the tea-party crowd circa 2010 would have stripped him of such pretense had the book appeared more recently.
The book is nothing less than an assault on pure libertarian philosophy (think Ayn Rand and company). In the course of the attack, many of the current conservative bromides fall. It turns out that some conservatives don't believe that government is always THE problem. Some of them believe in a social safety net, and many think that the President should be more than the reigning CEO. I KNOW! This is shocking stuff.
Revelation or not, this is classic George Will. If you enjoy and agree with his columns and television commentary, you will almost hear his voice. If you feel somewhat estranged from current Republican orthodoxy, you might also find solace in this book.
The book is nothing less than an assault on pure libertarian philosophy (think Ayn Rand and company). In the course of the attack, many of the current conservative bromides fall. It turns out that some conservatives don't believe that government is always THE problem. Some of them believe in a social safety net, and many think that the President should be more than the reigning CEO. I KNOW! This is shocking stuff.
Revelation or not, this is classic George Will. If you enjoy and agree with his columns and television commentary, you will almost hear his voice. If you feel somewhat estranged from current Republican orthodoxy, you might also find solace in this book.
July 26, 2020
The essence of the book is well captured by Mr. Will’s brilliant structure but, nevertheless, I must consider this book a disappointment as it does not fully capture Mr. Will’s brilliance. The book felt like a recollection of quotes. One after the other. It felt like an extensive google search with Mr. Will’s narrating the reader through them.
July 17, 2016
This is a very important book. My head is still spinning. I am going to defer for now, writing a review. I need to think about it more. I know this much. I did not really consume this book when I read it the first time.
February 21, 2009
Still a go-to primer on electoral politics.
September 4, 2013
Lots of really great thoughts mixed with some dross.
June 22, 2019
A bit dated in spots, but in others eerily prescient of the Age of Trump.
Read
November 7, 2013Hardback
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews