8 responses so far ↓

• 1 LP // May 15, 2007 at 12:54 pm

  I dunno — I do this, too, when somebody I need to impress (like at a job interview) asks me what I’ve been reading. I think back over the books I’ve read recently, and select a couple of titles that will be at least a little familiar to the asker. Naming a more esoteric work will get you pegged as someone who reads weird things and is probably out of touch with the mainstream, and the person asking will feel stupid for not knowing the book (and probably feel, deep inside, that you’re trying to make him look bad). These are both bad outcomes if you’re trying to get a job, or get elected.

• 2 Julian Sanchez // May 15, 2007 at 1:01 pm

  I dunno, assuming these are strategic answers, there’s surely a huge body of AP English sort of classic novels or popular policy tomes or biographies that would’ve both been familiar and conveyed sufficient gravitas.

• 3 Josh // May 15, 2007 at 1:56 pm

  Well McCain is reading a classic.

• 4 LP // May 15, 2007 at 2:01 pm

  Except that AP English kinds of answers are easily recognizable as strategic — they’re the kind of answers most people give at a job interview to this question. So this might be second-order strategy — “these must be honest answers, because if they were going to make something up, they’d make up something more prestigious.” Of course, the underlying premise here is that people want their presidents to be basically just like them, only more charismatic. If this isn’t true, then the ‘NYT bestseller list’ strategy is no good anyway.

• 5 Eric Hanneken // May 15, 2007 at 2:02 pm

  John McCain is reading A Farewell to Arms? Good for him. I read that just last month, after Good-Bye to All That. Maybe it will moderate his enthusiasm for war.

• 6 Kevin M // May 15, 2007 at 4:55 pm

  I’m more troubled byuthe fact that Hillary Clinton doesn’t know the meaning of the word “fiction.” As far as I know, Abraham Lincoln was a real person and Doris Kearns Goodwin’s book about him was non-fiction (perhaps not original non-fiction, given the source, but non-fiction all the same)

• 7 Amy Phillips // May 16, 2007 at 2:33 pm

  You’re assuming that the American people want gravitas in a presidential candidate. If the last 8 years have shown us anything, it’s that a lot of Americans want a president who is a “regular guy.” I bet that some of these candidates have read many very impressive books, but their strategists told them to prepare some answers that were more “relatable.” And that means John Grisham.

  And frankly, you’re not one to talk. You read Harry Potter.

• 8 LP // May 16, 2007 at 3:02 pm

  Amy-

  Same thing I was getting at. And, it’s not a matter of whether you read Harry Potter, it’s a question of whether that’s the best answer when somebody asks a potential candidate for US President what books they’ve read lately.