The Choice - Hardcover

Woodward, Bob

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0684813084 ISBN 13: 9780684813080

Publisher: Simon & Schuster, 1996

Synopsis

Based on a massive body of original reporting and documentation and on hundreds of interviews with firsthand sources, The Choice is the behind-the-scenes story of President Bill Clinton and Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole over the last two years. It is the personal and political story of how the nation's two top leaders prepared themselves to square off for the 1996 presidential election.

Never before has political reporting provided voters with so much authoritative, in-depth information on the candidates before a presidential election. The Choice sets the stage for the November 5, 1996, election with a study of the contenders in action-- their decisions, their conversations, their private assessments, their disappointments, their anger and triumphs, their definitions of themselves and their evolving understanding of national purpose.

Included in this wide-ranging political history is exclusive new material on the Republican primary contest; the White House and congressional budget battles; thetop secret Bosnia strategy sessions in the White House; the influence of Vice President Albert Gore, Jr., and House Speaker Newt Gingrich; the role of political money; the uses of public opinion polling and advertising; former General Colin Powell's decision not to run; and the strategies of both campaigns, including Dole's decision to leave the Senate and his consideration of possible running mates.

Woodward has dug deeply into the personal and political relationship between Clinton and Dole, revealing their private conversations as these most tested products of the American system attempt to balance political gain against the welfare of the country. The Choice is also a character study of the two men and their wives, Hillary Rodham Clinton and Elizabeth Dole.

About this title

Review

No one gets the inside story like Bob Woodward, the reporter of the Watergate scandal who has made a career of investigating -- and writing about -- the inner workings of the highest levels of government. In The Choice he has produced a look at the two candidates for the 1996 presidential race, Bill Clinton and Bob Dole, published before the two parties' political conventions. The book details the political maneuvers endemic to the current climate: strategies, sessions, spins and ads aimed at repositioning and re-focusing either of the candidates in the light most favorable to the latest poll. It is the private not the public faces of our politicians that engage Woodward's skeptical gaze.

About the Author

Bob Woodward is an assistant managing editor of the Washington Post.

About this edition

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0684813084
• ISBN 13: 9780684813080
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 464