Matt Taibbi writes a fast reading, thought-provoking book that I often learned from, more often than not agreed with, and sometimes was upended by. He says that journalists these days are less likely to be the blue collar writers of the past (eg, Mike Royko of Chicago), and in his view, spend more time ridiculing crowds that support Trump, rather than investigating why they support Trump. He presents a case for the news being a consumer product which keeps us coming back for more, as if we were addicted, no matter which side of politics we find ourselves on.There are anecdotes from Taibbi's interviews as well as observations he had while covering political campaigns for Rolling Stone magazine. One of the chapters that I found most memorable was when he compared news coverage to sports coverage. I thought that was spot-on. Some of his conclusions, though, worked to cast doubt on some of my heroes on the liberal side of the political spectrum, like Adam Schiff and Rachel Maddow. What surprised me most was how hard it was for me to keep my mind open in all directions while I read this book.
As a bonus, there is an interview with Noam Chomsky in an apprendix, which makes me want to read more of Chomsky's work.
