Confessions of a Political Hitman: My Secret Life of Scandal, Corruption, Hypocrisy and Dirty Attacks That Decide Who Gets Elected (and Who Doesn'T)

Describes the author's role as a political hitman who dug up scandal on opposition candidates for the Republican Party, his growing disillusionment with politics, and what goes on behind the scenes in American political campaigns.

Part memoir, part industry exposé, Marks's account relates how he became a Republican Party operative digging up dirt on Democratic candidates. His field goes by the name opposition research. It is mostly legal, according to Marks, but usually secretive and, by his own evolving standards, frequently immoral. Marks drifted into the field during the first half of the 1990s and became a true believer in the GOP cause. The book names names and cites examples, from local races to statewide campaigns (Jeb Bush vs. Lawton Chiles) and includes contests for the U.S. Senate (Jesse Helms vs. Harvey Gantt) and U.S. House of Representatives, as well as presidential elections (Bob Dole vs. Bill Clinton and John Kerry vs. George W. Bush). Marks began writing the book after coming to doubt his vocation's ethics. Despite this turnabout, he is not an admirable whistleblower with a likable personality. Marks's tone and language drip with sleaze heightened by passages about his womanizing. In fact, that and often poor treatment of candidates and staff members might lead readers to conclude that Marks fell lower than his clients. Marks has written an important book that fills a gap in the popular literature about American politics, but it is not a pleasant read. (Jan.)
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The public professes to hate it, advocates of civil dialogue deplore it, yet no political campaign unilaterally dispenses with digging up derogatory dirt on its rivals. Describing how such research is conducted, Marks illustrates the process through his political adventures on behalf of the Republican Party from the 1990s forward. Reading files in county courthouses and newspaper back issues in libraries makes up the basic legwork, Marks explains, and then higher-ups in the campaign strategize if, how, and when to drop the load on the target. To these vocational elements, Marks adds his personal political migration from liberal Brooklynite to Reaganite Republican to independent—disillusioned, he says, by Republican hypocrisy on family values, among other disappointments. Marks’ vantage point within the Republican ascendance from 1994 to 2006, along with his raft of war stories, will entertainingly educate politicos about the underside of battling their adversaries. --Gilbert Taylor