Days of Fire Pdf Summary Reviews By Peter Baker

Days of Fire: Bush and Cheney in the White House Pdf Summary

In Days of Fire, Peter Baker, Chief White House Correspondent for The New York Times, takes us on a gripping and intimate journey through the eight years of the Bush and Cheney administration in a tour-de-force narrative of a dramatic and controversial presidency.

Theirs was the most captivating American political partnership since Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger: a bold and untested president and his seasoned, relentless vice president. Confronted by one crisis after another, they struggled to protect the country, remake the world, and define their own relationship along the way. In Days of Fire, Peter Baker chronicles the history of the most consequential presidency in modern times through the prism of its two most compelling characters, capturing the elusive and shifting alliance of George Walker Bush and Richard Bruce Cheney as no historian has done before. He brings to life with in-the-room immediacy all the drama of an era marked by devastating terror attacks, the Iraq War, Hurricane Katrina, and financial collapse.
     The real story of Bush and Cheney is a far more fascinating tale than the familiar suspicion that Cheney was the power behind the throne. Drawing on hundreds of interviews with key players, and thousands of pages of never-released notes, memos, and other internal documents, Baker paints a riveting portrait of a partnership that evolved dramatically over time, from the early days when Bush leaned on Cheney, making him the most influential vice president in history, to their final hours, when the two had grown so far apart they were clashing in the West Wing. Together and separately, they were tested as no other president and vice president have been, first on a bright September morning, an unforgettable “day of fire” just months into the presidency, and on countless days of fire over the course of eight tumultuous years.
Days of Fire is a monumental and definitive work that will rank with the best of presidential histories. As absorbing as a thriller, it is eye-opening and essential reading.

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Days of Fire Review

Amber

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Non-Partisan Chronological Account of the Bush Administration

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 10, 2014

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My goal for this review is to make it non-partisan. I am a political blogger and most people I blog with are labeled conservative or liberal. I am one of the few handful of bloggers that has voted both Democrat and Republican, and tend to look at the issues and candidates carefully before I vote. On the political blogging sites, I know whom is liberal and whom is conservative, and I have to take their comments and opinions with that in mind. With that said, I voted for George W. Bush. Twice. In the end I just felt safer under Bush. Although he was aggressive with foreign policy, I re-played 9/11 over in my mind and didn’t want to go through another terrorist attack. I also voted for Obama. Twice.

Prologue: Days of Fire is a chronological account of the Bush and Cheney days in the White House. In the prologue, Peter Baker addresses the elephant in the room, which is the rumor and speculation that Dick Cheney heavily influenced Bush’s decisions and policies. I always see “President Cheney” on blogs, and I was curious as to whether that was true, or just media-spinned rumor. After the prologue, you are then free to make that determination for yourself, which is the main reason I awarded 5 stars. I didn’t feel influenced or persuaded, just informed.

Media Falsehoods: I am guilty at times of reading media accounts and taking them at face value. Almost daily on blogging sites do you see the claim that WMD were actually found in Iraq. Days of Fire gives a credible version of events leading up to the false intelligence that claimed WMD existed in Iraq, and the reports that followed the War that Iraq’s weapons facilities were destroyed and never rebuilt after the first Iraq war in 1991. The media also fueled speculations that Dick Cheney was the one calling all of the shots. It also fueled the negativity of certain troops actions in Iraq (Abu Ghraib) and the handling of prisoners after 9/11. Although those are a stain on the military and government, Days of Fire addresses what actually happened and why, along with how many people were actually affected.

Personal Impact in Politics: (This section may be classified as a spoiler… I don’t really think so, as what I discuss is a part of history and my own opinions. But I wanted to point out that I mention some events that were covered in this book.) I’ve had this idea/revelation floating around in my head for a few weeks now. It started with a post from a blogger that is extremely liberal on 99% of topics. The 1% was a surprise to me when a post of his illustrated his anger towards women who demand equal rights. He stated he thought the “war on women” was a joke and women were controlling and manipulative in order to achieve their goals. Wow! Where did that come from Mr. “Fair” Liberal? It turns out he is recently divorced. How is this related? Days of Fire addresses Dick Cheney’s opinions and responses to his daughter’s sexuality. Early in the book there is a paragraph that discusses everything Dick Cheney has voted for/against in his career. (I shook my head in disbelief that somebody could be so rigid!) It is apparent that his politics are on the far right of the political spectrum. However, when it comes to gay rights, he is liberal. That tells me many politicians make decisions and policies on things that do not directly impact them. Once something impacts them directly and they have to walk a mile, they often have a change in heart. This concept also shows when George Bush pledged billions of dollars to the fight against AIDS and other diseases in Africa. His sister died of leukemia and he was forever sensitive towards disease and disease research. I think it would be fantastic to have politicians that have walked a mile in others shoes, and never vote on something that they have no identity with. I realize this is improbable, but Days of Fire illustrated the complexities of government, and put out some fires that were fueled by the media and misunderstanding of the hard choices that had to be made. I sympathize a bit more with George Bush and saw a much more complex figure than I initially thought. I also shook my head numerous times during the book, as I couldn’t believe how many avoidable mistakes were made.

Conclusion: I think it’s important to read books like Days of Fire. I have this feeling that with the rise of ISIS and the emergence of more world powers, that our days of war are far from over. If anything, Days of Fire will help you see that its not just the push of a button, and decisions are not always black and white. Today it was announced that Chuck Hagel (Obama’s Defense Secretary) is resigning. Its good to ignore the rumors and Op-ed’s, and wait for the full story. I have also learned that each administration is filled with tough choices and difficult times, regardless if liberal or conservative. We should always remember GW made his decisions and policies in response to 9/11. We shouldn’t forget how scary and awful that was.

Uri Pilichowski

4.0 out of 5 stars The Real Picture of President Bush and Israel
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 12, 2016

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Warning: If you’re a blind fan of President Bush and his approach to Israel, you won’t enjoy this.
I just finished reading Peter Baker’s “Days of Fire,” the authoritative critical book on the Bush administration. Baker had unrestricted access to almost all administration officials and the book reads almost as an in the room day to day diary of each moment of the eight years of the Bush administration. I’ve also read President Bush’s Decision Points to gain a balanced perspective (among other books on the Bush presidency.)
It is clear from Baker’s accord that the two Bush terms demonstrated two different philosophies on everything from Iraq to the economy. The first Bush term saw the President, Vice President and advisors approach Al Qaeda, terror, Afghanistan, Iraq and the economy in an ideal way. Faced with things not working out in the way he planned, Bush adjusted to meet the new realities, often giving up on his idealism.
In his first term Bush was the ideal Pro-Israel President. He refused to meet Yasser Arafat and told the world that when the Palestinians elect a new leader he’d meet with them. Bush rarely criticized Israel and was exactly the hands off President our community appreciates.
As the second term rolled around, Bush didn’t take the same helpful approach to Israel. President Bush let Israel down no less than four times. There was one administration official who didn’t share President Bush’s approach to the Middle East, National Security Advisor and later Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. While President Obama and Hillary Clinton take the blame for the Iran deal, with Bush’s approval Rice lead the effort, ironically against Russian objections to negotiate a deal with Iran. In fact, Rice led the way to allow Iran to move forward with its sponsorship of terror and nuclear weapons program, while American military assets were in proximity to stop both. In a private meeting in her own home Rice sold the plan to skeptics in the administration. President Bush’s (and later President Obama’s) Secretary of Defense even refused Saudi Arabia’s request that America bomb Iran, saying that “America is never going to bomb Iran.” If President Bush had stopped Iran, even done half of what he did in Iraq, there’d have been no Iran deal and no Iran threat at all.
In August 2006, Israel went to war with Hezbollah. After Israel began winning the war, international pressure began mounting to force Israel into a ceasefire. This ceasefire would seriously hamper Israel’s ability to protect itself. Vice President Cheney argued, “We need to let the Israel’s finish off Hezbollah. “ Rice strenuously argued against Cheney. Bush sided with Rice, abandoning the Israelis because siding with Lebanon would put the Iraq effort at risk and jeopardize the chances of a Palestinian State.
In 2007 Israel discovered and conclusively proved that North Korea had helped Syria build a nuclear weapons program. Israel formally asked the United States to bomb the Syrian reactor. Once again, President Bush sided against Israel and refused to bomb it. Bush claimed he couldn’t justify an attack on a sovereign nation (!) This was while his troops were stationed in Iraq.
Towards the end of his Presidency Rice convinced Bush to stage a meeting between Palestinians and Israelis in Annapolis. President Bush’s biggest Israel supporters tried convincing the President not to host the meeting, fearing that Palestinian sovereignty would just turn into a Palestinian State, but once again Bush didn’t put Israel first and hosted a failed meeting.
The greatest abandonment of Israel at Bush’s hands was his unilateral decision to create a Palestinian state side by side. At the time of Bush’s announcement of his commitment to a Palestinian state, Israel advocates cheered for Bush said the commitment was conditional upon a change in Palestinian leadership. What the Pro-Israel community didn’t realize was the President Bush had changed American policy from pursuing a peace process for the Israelis and Palestinians to pursuing a two state solution and creating an independent Palestinian state. This became America’s policy.
Was President Bush good for Israel? He allowed Iran to advance its terror activities unchecked, develop its nuclear weapons program, forced Israel to prematurely end its war with Hezbollah, refused to stop Syria’s nuclear weapons program, held a failed meeting between Israelis and Palestinians and solidified the notion of a Palestinian state and the two state solution. I think President Bush is a principled patriot with the most laudable of intentions, but I think he gave up on those principles and failed at efficiently carrying out his plans in his second term. I’d choose Bush term one over almost any other candidate, but wouldn’t want Bush II.


bill

4.0 out of 5 stars Struggling within the Beltway ‘Swamp’
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on November 29, 2016

Verified Purchase

Much about Dick Cheney seems enigmatic and this is the first book I have found that brings real focus on his policy influence during the Bush II reign. It is most informative on the invasion of Iraq, and is neither a revisionist memoir nor a tome from one of Cheney’s White House colleagues. Perhaps surprisingly Bush comes out of it quite well, considering what he was having to content with, including regular stand-offs between senior staffers (Cheney vs Powell, Rumsfeld vs Rice).

It chronicles in detail many of the decision processes and gives the lie to the idea that Bush was not his own man, especially during his second term. He seems to have made fewer misjudgements rather was often misled by his executive promoting narrow agendas, such as on the matter of Saddam’s WMD. There seems to have been a tendency to paranoia among neocon war-mongers such as Cheney’s coterie (eg Abrams, Bolton, Edelman, Wolfowitz – were they in support of the US weapons industry, or simply trying to undermine a perceived serious military threat to Israel?), who applied regular pressure on Bush to take ‘action’. Wolfowitz was regularly ‘making the case for going after Saddam…although he presented no evidence’, which made Bush incensed, saying ‘How many times do I have to tell you we are not…?”

Cheney rather selected himself for the position of vice-President, and seems to have envisaged it as a way to shape policy, working for a relatively inexperienced C in C through his established network of loyal staffers, without having to waste time raising funds and campaigning to stay elected.
At critical times during the invasion of Iraq Bush would be diverted to urgent domestic policies, especially tax cuts, and so Cheney could take the lead on important policies such as stalling (as a former CEO in the Oil Sector), US participation on Kyoto, or trying to rescue his CoS Libby being imprisoned for revealing the name of a CIA operative (one of many deliberate ‘leaks’). This book written by a leading journalist is an excellent read.

About Peter Baker Author Of Days of Fire pdf Book

peter baker
peter baker

Peter Baker Author Of Days of Fire pdf Book has been a journalist for the Washington Post and the New York Times. He covered President Bill Clinton’s impeachment trial, resulting in the book The Breach. As the Post’s Moscow bureau chief, he wrote the book Kremlin Rising. He is married to the journalist Susan Glasser. 

Days of Fire pdf, Paperback, Hardcover Book Information

days of fire pdf book
days of fire pdf book
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Doubleday; First Edition (October 22, 2013)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 816 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0385525184
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0385525183
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.46 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.3 x 1.75 x 9.75 inches
  • Best Sellers Rank: #385,111 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #648 in United States Executive Government
  • #906 in US Presidents
  • #10,762 in United States History (Books)
  • Customer Reviews: 4.5 out of 5 stars    371 ratings

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