Rating: 
Summary: Makes the Presidents Human
Review: A great politician has to be able to relate to people. Make them laugh, feel their pain, understand their wants and desires. For the most part, however, a history book or text will only discuss the dry political or military parts of our leaders. Here, at last, one can learn about the more "human" parts of our leaders, what makes them laugh. In particular, in his third book, Mr. Dole discusses how funny some of our leaders really were. I especially enjoyed Lincoln's wit. For example one general, apparently tired of Lincoln's interference and micro managing, sarcastically wired to Lincoln and informed him that he had captured six cows. "What should I do now? He asked. Lincoln wired back - "Milk them." Arranged by funniest too humorless, over and over this book can and probably will make you laugh and marvel at some of our prior leaders. However, I would like to see a little better organization. As it is, this book almost useless for a source book for speeches and the like as there is no indexing. In addition, what is here is good, but there isn't a lot. As such, if you don't have a lot of money to spend, you may want to think twice before you purchase this book. But, don't worry, Bob Dole doesn't need your money. He is doing all those Viagra commercials.
Rating:
Summary: Makes the Presidents Human
Review: A great politician has to be able to relate to people. Make them laugh, feel their pain, understand their wants and desires. For the most part, however, a history book or text will only discuss the dry political or military parts of our leaders. Here, at last, one can learn about the more "human" parts of our leaders, what makes them laugh. In particular, in his third book, Mr. Dole discusses how funny some of our leaders really were. I especially enjoyed Lincoln's wit. For example one general, apparently tired of Lincoln's interference and micro managing, sarcastically wired to Lincoln and informed him that he had captured six cows. "What should I do now? He asked. Lincoln wired back - "Milk them." Arranged by funniest too humorless, over and over this book can and probably will make you laugh and marvel at some of our prior leaders. However, I would like to see a little better organization. As it is, this book almost useless for a source book for speeches and the like as there is no indexing. In addition, what is here is good, but there isn't a lot. As such, if you don't have a lot of money to spend, you may want to think twice before you purchase this book. But, don't worry, Bob Dole doesn't need your money. He is doing all those Viagra commercials.
Rating: 
Summary: Anecdotes and witticisms that add a human touch
Review: After the success of "Great Political Wit", Senator Dole followed up with this book. It is a book full of witty sayings of and anecdotes about our Presidents. He has grouped the Presidents from the wittiest descending to the point of having good stories about those Presidents that weren't particularly funny. Mr. Dole even provides his own ranking of the Presidents as wits from #1 - Lincoln down to #41 - poor Millard Fillmore. These stories and witty sayings are generally quite good. Some you will want to remember. He even has a last section on George W. Bush and Al Gore. You will remember some of these from your own reading of the news and watching Letterman and Leno. What I like about these little stories is the human touch they add to the too often formal and impersonal view we have of our Presidents. We see their pictures, memorize a couple of dates and maybe some key legislation or war during their time in office and that will be it. We seldom get to know them as people. These stories, in just a few sentences, show their character and view of themselves, their time, and the world in which they lived. Sure, too much can be made of them. But they do add something useful and a chuckle or two never hurt anyone's day. This is a bit larger volume than the first book, but it doesn't read long. And, like the first one, it is fun to just dip into now and again.
Rating:
Summary: Anecdotes and witticisms that add a human touch
Review: After the success of "Great Political Wit", Senator Dole followed up with this book. It is a book full of witty sayings of and anecdotes about our Presidents. He has grouped the Presidents from the wittiest descending to the point of having good stories about those Presidents that weren't particularly funny. Mr. Dole even provides his own ranking of the Presidents as wits from #1 - Lincoln down to #41 - poor Millard Fillmore. These stories and witty sayings are generally quite good. Some you will want to remember. He even has a last section on George W. Bush and Al Gore. You will remember some of these from your own reading of the news and watching Letterman and Leno. What I like about these little stories is the human touch they add to the too often formal and impersonal view we have of our Presidents. We see their pictures, memorize a couple of dates and maybe some key legislation or war during their time in office and that will be it. We seldom get to know them as people. These stories, in just a few sentences, show their character and view of themselves, their time, and the world in which they lived. Sure, too much can be made of them. But they do add something useful and a chuckle or two never hurt anyone's day. This is a bit larger volume than the first book, but it doesn't read long. And, like the first one, it is fun to just dip into now and again.
Rating:
Summary: It Takes One To Know One
Review: Bob Dole is really funny! A few weeks ago the Doles and Clintons gave speeches in Washington D.C. and I happened to hear them on C-span. Dole's dead pan humor and hilarious one liners actually made me laugh out loud! Later that day I purchased this book which is quite good. After researching all the American presidents, Dole rates them from the funniest to least funny. Some of the best lines are from prominent people other than the president. There is a saying (not in this book) "Blessed are they who can laugh at themselves, for they shall never cease to be amused"!Some of our presidents, fortunately, have been likeable, intelligent and quite witty. This fine collection of humorous quips and anecdotes makes an excellent gift for all ages. Bob Dole's remarks are right on! My reason for the 4 star rating is for one reason only: Since most of us remember the faces of only a few past presidents, a small picture of the president being quoted at the beginning of each chapter would have been a nice touch. Dates are included which is helpful as we relate to each presidential term while reading. The introduction to this book is entitled " Backbones and Funny Bones" In this intro, Bob Dole expresses his views on presidential humor with rare insight and he provides us with his "Dole poll of presidential wit and humor" in a non-partisan way. 41 presidents are rated as humorists along with a brief discription of why. This is a gem.
Rating:
Summary: It Takes One To Know One
Review: Bob Dole is really funny! A few weeks ago the Doles and Clintons gave speeches in Washington D.C. and I happened to hear them on C-span. Dole's dead pan humor and hilarious one liners actually made me laugh out loud! Later that day I purchased this book which is quite good. After researching all the American presidents, Dole rates them from the funniest to least funny. Some of the best lines are from prominent people other than the president. There is a saying (not in this book) "Blessed are they who can laugh at themselves, for they shall never cease to be amused"!Some of our presidents, fortunately, have been likeable, intelligent and quite witty. This fine collection of humorous quips and anecdotes makes an excellent gift for all ages. Bob Dole's remarks are right on! My reason for the 4 star rating is for one reason only: Since most of us remember the faces of only a few past presidents, a small picture of the president being quoted at the beginning of each chapter would have been a nice touch. Dates are included which is helpful as we relate to each presidential term while reading. The introduction to this book is entitled " Backbones and Funny Bones" In this intro, Bob Dole expresses his views on presidential humor with rare insight and he provides us with his "Dole poll of presidential wit and humor" in a non-partisan way. 41 presidents are rated as humorists along with a brief discription of why. This is a gem.
Rating:
Summary: Bob Dole may make it as a writer
Review: Bob Dole may not have had a successful run at the presidency of the United States, but he is enjoying a wonderful career as a writer. In "Great Presidential Wit ( . . . I Wish I was in the Book)," Dole gathers together a wonderful, ragtag bunch of presidential anecdotes. From the familiar (JFK saying that Washington, DC had "all the efficiency of the South and all the charm of the North") to the undiscovered gem (General William Tecumseh Sherman giving Ulysses S. Grant the uneasy compliment that, "Grant stood by me when I was crazy, and I stood by him when he was drunk, and now we stand by each other"), Dole has done a masterful job of pulling together numerous items on every single president. My favorite story in the book refers to a man who was in the running for a cabinet position. The president's friend (I won't tell you which president or which friend) urges him not to hire this bozo, calling the man dishonest. "How bad is he?" inquires the president, to which the friend immediately replies, "Well, he wouldn't steal a red-hot stove . . . " The cabinet nominee finds out about the insult and demands a retraction, prompting the president's friend to say, "Fine, you WOULD steal a red-hot stove!" One of the most fun features of the book is Dole's categorization of each president into different roles. Under "And You Always Thought They were Dull," he lumps Ike, Jimmy Carter, and Rutherford B. Hayes. Under "Yankee Wits," just Calvin Coolidge and JFK share space. Dole generously includes Bill Clinton under the heading of "Funnier Than the Average President" (along with John Adams, George Bush, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson). This would make a terrific gift not only for your favorite politico, but for anyone who enjoys genuine good wit.
Rating: 
Summary: Funny really great
Review: Buy it, you won't be disapointed!
Rating:
Summary: Historically Funny
Review: Here's an entertaining little book that could have been a real blockbuster. The best aspect of this book is that it presents the various personalities of our former presidents, so you get to know them in a personal way instead just a boring listing of their accomplishments. It also reveals how incompetant and ill-equiped for office some of them were. Although worth the time, this tidy book could have been so much more.
Rating:
Summary: Who knew Silent Cal was such a funny guy?
Review: I really enjoyed reading Senator Bob Dole's entertaining look at the humor of the American presidents from George Washington to the present. While this book is certainly entertaining, it is also instructive in its own little way. Some former presidents seem to exist in name only, if that, in today's world, and Dole's little collection of quips and stories actually brings a little life into these important men of history. While Dole does not explore the agendas and politics of each president, the sense of personality that comes through in the case of even the most inscrutable of our top public servants is often rather informative. A sense of humor, while far from a qualification for the office, can be a great aid to any president, and Dole emphasizes the point that our greatest presidents have possessed both a funny bone and backbone. Each president gets his own little section of the book, wherein Dole has assembled a number of presidential quotes and stories alongside a number of comments made by politicians and humorists about each president in turn. I can't say that every reference here is funny, but there are some amazingly good zingers included, and I, as a whole, found this book highly entertaining. Dole is a pretty funny man in his own right, and his sense of humor shows in these pages. Dole goes so far as to rank the first 41 (counting Grover Cleveland only once) elected leaders of the free world in terms of their humor, and the fact that the top ten consist of five Democrats and five Republicans is evidence of the total lack of partisanship Dole brings to this endeavor. Topping the list is Abraham Lincoln, and rightfully so; there are plenty of pages detailing the wit of our sixteenth President, a man who said "I laugh because I must not try" during the terribly difficult days of the War Between the States. Second place goes to Ronald Reagan, the Great Communicator and master of the one-liner. Third and fourth place go to Franklin and Theodore Roosevelt, respectively. These top four really stand a world apart from their White House cohorts. Fifth place goes to none other than Calvin Coolidge. Now, this came as something of a surprise to me, but as Dole demonstrates, Silent Cal was indeed quite a jokester and humorist; in fact, the funniest episode recorded in this book, at least in my opinion, is attributed to Coolidge. Kennedy, Truman, Lyndon Johnson, Hoover, and Wilson round out Dole's top ten. As one proceeds through the book, the material for each president significantly decreases; there just isn't a lot of humorous material to work with for those presidents ranking at the bottom of Dole's charts: Taylor, Harding, Van Buren, Buchanan, William Henry Harrison, Pierce, Benjamin Harrison, and poor Millard Fillmore who seems destined to bring up the rear in just about every kind of presidential survey one can devise. If these men ever said one thing funny, Dole includes it, but there are definitely slim pickings here. As for other presidents who may be of special interest to readers, George Bush (number 41) is twelfth, Washington fifteenth, Jefferson sixteenth, Clinton seventeenth, Carter twenty-second, and Nixon twenty-fifth. Since the results of the 2000 election were not known when this book went to the publisher, Dole has included a final chapter devoted to both George W. Bush and Al Gore. Basically, Great Presidential Wit is one of the few politics-related books that both conservatives and liberals can both enjoy equally and civilly, as laughter knows no political party affiliation.
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