Description:
One of the unintended consequences of this memoir by Vermont senator James Jeffords is a blunt reminder that the tides of history are relentless. While its narrative wends inexorably towards Jeffords's courageous defection from the GOP in May 2001 (a move that denied Republicans control of the Senate and threatened the conservative agenda of the George W. Bush administration), that drama was ultimately undercut by the midterm elections of '02, which unexpectedly threw control of both houses of Congress to the Vermont senator's former party before his book was even published. But cruel historical fate hardly detracts from Jeffords's story of a life driven by conscience, courage, and true compassionate conservatism. Indeed, its plainspoken, often self-effacing tone may make one yearn for more politicians naïve--or committed--enough to put long-term public policy ahead of lockstep party politics. The senator may have risen from the privileges afforded the son of the Chief Justice of the Vermont State Supreme Court (meager though they seem in his telling), but his conscience and sense of duty seem more informed by his state's own rich historical traditions and a distinctly Capra-esque view of politics and human nature that's as full of optimism as it is anachronistic. Political passions--education, the environment, health care, equality for the disabled--are tempered by disappointments of a more human scale, his exile from the Singing Senators (a quartet that included now-Attorney General Ashcroft and Senator Trent Lott) but one example of a political pettiness Jeffords views as more worthy of a grade school playground than the halls of Congress. As insiders' tales go, it's low-key and virtually dirt-free, a folksy reminder that Machiavelli was definitely not from Vermont. --Jerry McCulley
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