When America Stopped Being Great
A history of the present
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4.4 • 19 Ratings
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- $15.99
Publisher Description
The presidency of Donald Trump is commonly seen as an historical accident. In When America Stopped Being Great, Nick Bryant argues that it was almost historically inescapable.
In this highly personal account, drawing on decades of covering Washington for the BBC, Bryant shows how the billionaire capitalised on the mistakes of his five predecessors – Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama – and how also he became a beneficiary of a broken politics, an iniquitous economy, an ailing media, a facile culture, disruptive new technology and the creation of a modern-day presidency that elevated showmanship over statesmanship.
Not only are we seeing the emergence of a post-American world, Bryant fears we are witnessing the emergence of a post-American America. The aftermath of the 2020 presidential election, when Donald Trump refused to accept defeat and incited his supporters to storm the US Capitol, revealed the country’s chronic state of disunion.
The history of Donald Trump’s rise is also the history of America’s fall.
'An elegant and insightful dissection of how a great nation lost its footing and the world’s respect. The tragedy is made all the more stark by the genuine love of America in Nick Bryant’s writing' – Leigh Sales
'Nick Bryant writes like a dream, and is one of those very rare things on TV – a man who makes you want to turn up the sound. His eye for description is sublime, and he has a way of showing you what you’ve been missing from the whole story, whilst never leaving you feeling stupid' – Emily Maitlis
‘Bryant is a genuine rarity – a Brit who understands America’ – The Washington Post
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
BBC foreign correspondent Bryant (Confessions from Correspondentland) delivers a revealing outsider's perspective on the roots of America's current state of "disunion." Recalling his first trip to the U.S. as a 16-year-old in 1984, Bryant describes falling in love with "the bigness, the boldness, and the brashness of this land of plenty," yet notes that the seeds for the Trump era were then being sown by President Ronald Reagan, "who elevated the stature of the presidency also ended up dumbing it down," and by the country's rampant consumerism and "winner-takes-all ethos." As a student at MIT during the 1988 presidential campaign, Bryant was shocked by the effectiveness of George H.W. Bush's negative campaign ads against Michael Dukakis, which accelerated the trend of "candidates deliberately to divide the country." Bryant also critiques President Obama for failing to push back forcefully against Republican obstructionism in Congress, and casts himself with other journalists who missed the clues—including increased racial divisions and lack of enthusiasm for Hillary Clinton—to Trump's victory in 2016. Though he trods familiar ground, Bryant's pithy observations (" was a revivalist who did not specify precisely what he was trying to revive") offer fresh insight. This well-informed portrait of American dysfunction hits home.
