Fault Lines: A History of the United States Since 1974 in The Majority Report Podcast Goodreads Group

Feb 28, 2019 Jacob rated it really liked it

Shelves: history, non-fiction, politics, digital, read-but-wishlisted, zrockwall-lib, zgarland-lib, american-history, aa-to-notes, aa-to-highlight

Based on hearing Kruse and Zelizer interviewed, and following Kruse on Twitter, I'm quite to the left of Kruse. With that said, it would be tough to parse their partisan/ideological leanings based on a majority of this book, which is quite impressive. Really, all that stands out is the Trump chapter. And, of course, discussion of him is nearly impossible without revealing your ideological proclivities. People who tend to like him just will not cop to certain facts about him, and people who don't Based on hearing Kruse and Zelizer interviewed, and following Kruse on Twitter, I'm quite to the left of Kruse. With that said, it would be tough to parse their partisan/ideological leanings based on a majority of this book, which is quite impressive. Really, all that stands out is the Trump chapter. And, of course, discussion of him is nearly impossible without revealing your ideological proclivities. People who tend to like him just will not cop to certain facts about him, and people who don't like him will quickly point them out. The objectivity bubble bursts with Trump, that's part of the reason the "objective" media has so much trouble covering him. They basically have to distort what he says so that they never can be accused of being polemical.

This is all strange coming from me anyway, as I don't really like a book attempting to be objective, but this book does it about as well as I've seen it done. Stemming from that, though, is a heavily fact and event-based writing that not everyone will enjoy. Kruse and Zelizer speed through modern American history at lightspeed with no narrative and little addition of their own. To some, it might read like a textbook. I enjoyed it though.

The authors lay out a few main points about each administration, from the Nixon administration (Watergate-era) on: 1) big ticket policies, 2) major events, 3) elections, 4) media, and 5) the electorate. It's pretty standard but solid fare. And don't look for a deep dive, it's a quick hit and then go operation that basically serves as a timeline of events with short explanations sprinkled with some good anecdotes. In a good way.

On the thesis: the argument is that polarization was a natural occurrence of political history since 1974 combined with the breaking of media into informational bubbles. The authors rely on the events to speak for themselves for the most part. As a lens to look at the history through, it's not quite as powerful as I think they might have been hoping for. My other issue is, I'm not quite sure that the polarization is as inherently negative is it as normally portrayed, but that's neither here nor there.

If you are well-versed in American history, this book is probably not of much interest to you, as I imagine much of the information will be redundant, but I will leave that judgment to you.

My normal criticism to most non-leftist foreign policy discussions always applies: get extra context for the foreign policy stuff, the authors seem to make the mistake of relying on American outlets as sources in this area. Again, this is all explained so quickly that I'm not sure how much can be covered, but it's always something that irks me. ...more

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