Product Description

A REVELATORY AND DARKLY COMIC ADVENTURE THROUGH A NATION ON THE VERGE OF A NERVOUS BREAKDOWN—FROM THE HALLS OF CONGRESS TO THE BASES OF BAGHDAD TO THE APOCALYPTIC CHURCHES OF THE HEARTLAND


Rolling Stone’s Matt Taibbi set out to describe the nature of George Bush’s America in the post-9/11 era and ended up vomiting demons in an evangelical church in Texas, riding the streets of Baghdad in an American convoy to nowhere, searching for phantom fighter jets in Congress, and falling into the rabbit hole of the 9/11 Truth Movement.
Matt discovered in his travels across the country that the resilient blue state/red state narrative of American politics had become irrelevant. A large and growing chunk of the American population was so turned off—or radicalized—by electoral chicanery, a spineless news media, and the increasingly blatant lies from our leaders (“they hate us for our freedom”) that they abandoned the political mainstream altogether. They joined what he calls The Great Derangement.
Taibbi tells the story of this new American madness by inserting himself into four defining American subcultures: The Military, where he finds himself mired in the grotesque black comedy of the American occupation of Iraq; The System, where he follows the money-slicked path of legislation in Congress; The Resistance, where he doubles as chief public antagonist and undercover member of the passionately bonkers 9/11 Truth Movement; and The Church, where he infiltrates a politically influential apocalyptic mega-ministry in Texas and enters the lives of its desperate congregants. Together these four interwoven adventures paint a portrait of a nation dangerously out of touch with reality and desperately searching for answers in all the wrong places.
Funny, smart, and a little bit heartbreaking, The Great Derangement is an audaciously reported, sobering, and illuminating portrait of America at the end of the Bush era.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1427 in Books
• Published on: 2008-05-06
• Released on: 2008-05-06
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 288 pages

From Publishers Weekly
With his trademark mordant wit, journalist Taibbi explores the black comedy of the American polis, where a citizenry shunted out of the political process seeks solace in conspiratorial weirdness and Internet-fueled mysticism. Trained from birth to be excellent consumers, Americans have become experts in mixing and matching news items to fit [their] own self-created identities, according to the author, who embeds himself in these pockets of people as he travels to the Congress press gallery, Iraq, meetings of the 9/11 Truth Movement, and goes undercover at a Christian Retreat. He pillories born-again Christians and the 9/11 conspiracy theorists, concluding that despite their differences: Both groups were and are defined primarily by an unshakeable belief in the inhumanity of their enemies on the other side; the Christians seldom distinguished between Islamic terrorism and, say, Al Gore–style environmentalism, while the Truthers easily believed that reporters for the Washington Post, the president and the frontline operators of NORAD were equally capable of murdering masses of ordinary New York financial sector employees. Thoughtful Democrats, Republicans and independents will find common ground in this book that punctures pretense, hypocrisy and know-nothingness. (May 6)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review

PRAISE FOR
THE GREAT DERANGEMENT

“The Great Derangement is a scabrous, hilarious vivisection of our disintegrating nation. An unstinting reporter and sensational writer, Taibbi shines a light on the corruption, absurdities, and idiot pieties of modern American politics. Beneath his cynical fury, though, are flashes of surprising compassion for the adrift, credulous souls who are taken in by it all. I loved this book.”
—Michelle Goldberg, author of Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalism

“Matt Taibbi is the best American journalism has to offer. As The Great Derangement shows, he has absolutely no shred of fear in confronting the corruption that plagues our government and exploring the desperation that is rising in America. And somehow, he pulls it off while making us simultaneously weep in sorrow and laugh our asses off.”
—David Sirota, author of Hostile Takeover: How Big Money and Corruption Conquered Our Government—and How We Take It Back

“Where other mainstream news sources fail, Matt Taibbi madly embraces his role as an honest political observer/writer/citizen in a democracy. I would also like to take this opportunity to ask for Matt’s hand in marriage.”
—Janeane Garofalo

About the Author

MATT TAIBBI is a roving national reporter for Rolling Stone and a columnist for rollingstone.com. He's the author of Spanking the Donkey, a collection of his writings about the 2004 election. He lives in New York City.

Customer Reviews

"Seem like every time you stop and turn around, something else just hit the ground"
An anecdote in journalist Matt Taibbi's book THE GREAT DERANGEMENT proves a snapshot of what's wrong with America. Covering the United States Congress in action, Taibbi witnesses legislation that is nothing more than a gift to well-off campaign contributors. Without shame, lawmakers approve it. The author attends a press conference regarding the bill where journalists ask zero tough questions, leaving the public they purportedly serve to figure out there's nothing in this for them except the tab they have to pick up.

The United States government is letting the moneyed interests from which it should protect citizens run it. And with corporations owning more than 95% of media and not about to report what they pilfer, too many Americans do not get the news they need to know.

In THE GREAT DERANGEMENT author Taibbi frames political debate as liberal-conservative, just as the corporate media does. He should pick up on populist writer/commentator Jim Hightower, who says the real struggle is not left-right but up-down, between the wealthy and poor. History and the world today are little more than the moneyed interests stealing from and dominating the people.

Taking it to the streets in THE GREAT DERANGEMENT, Matt Taibbi reports from the front lines of everyday citizens. The affluent divide and conquer the middle class and poor with red herrings and straw-man arguments. Mega-church pastors who must read Bush White House talking points more often than the Bible sway congregations to doubt global warming. The corporate media does not investigate why the Bush administration ignored over fifty 9/11 warnings (most famous the August 6, 2001, "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in the U.S." memo to Bush), resulting in a frustration-driven movement claiming the U.S. government orchestrated the attacks. Stress, fear and confusion from thirty-plus years of declining wellbeing for most Americans turn citizens against one another when instead they ought to unite and march against injustice. Divided, America falls.

Read THE GREAT DERANGEMENT.

Not that good, No bang for the buck.
Kind of a blah book with no continuity or anything positive to say. Very cynical and I didn't enjoy it...I'm selling my copy on ebay for 1.00

Just a Great Read
This book had me rolling with laughter and crying like a baby! What Taibbi exposes in a wild and hysterical way is the idiocy of the general public. The stuff about Hagee's "church" is frightening and funny. C'mon, throwing up the "demon of anal fissures"! How is that not funny!? That people can be so easily fooled and led like sheep is scary. And the 9/11 truthers - just go need to go away. What Taibbi exposes about how Congress really works is just plain sad. This country is in it deep and we may never recover. Buy this book and get a dose of reality! Awesome!