Nearly 70 years later, 'All the King's Men' shows not much has changed in politics
Every week, The Thread recommends a book that offers a fresh perspective on the news.
With the 2016 presidential race already dominating the news, let's talk about one of the best novels ever written about politics: "All the King's Men" by Robert Penn Warren.
When it was published 69 years ago, The New York Times declared: "The summer fiction doldrums are over!"
Warren modeled his central character, Willie Stark — a charismatic, amoral, ruthless political boss — after Louisiana's corrupt governor Huey Long.
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Now, I'm not suggesting that any of our current presidential hopefuls resemble Stark. That's too simple.
It's more that Stark's towering contempt for democracy may feel familiar in this era of billion-dollar campaigns and the-ends-justify-the-means political shenanigans.
Fred Wertheimer, founder of Democracy 21, recently wrote that America's presidency is being "perverted" by big money. Citizens don't have a chance, he said.
He added that Super PACs enable big donors to virtually buy elective office all under an umbrella of secrecy.
Willie Stark would have loved that.
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