Trickle Down Tyranny

February 6, 2012
It’s difficult to exaggerate Savage’s animus toward Barack Obama. For the conservative radio host, Obama is a “naked Marxist,” who, if re-elected, will make himself “president for life.” Savage (Trickle Up Poverty) tries to lacerate many areas of the Obama administration’s domestic and foreign policy, as well as alleged instances of malfeasance and corruption in the Justice Department and elsewhere. Unfortunately, he clutters his narrative with charges such as the claim that the Occupy Wall Street movement is characterized by “public nudity, masturbation and sexual intercourse... carried out daily.” Worse, the book is marred by name-calling (even Newt Gingrich is seen as a “fat, frumpy, unprincipled charlatan”) and McCarthyite smears (Savage calls the Jewish Funds for Justice, a liberal philanthropic organization, “a communist-socialist group”). Savage’s sources prove flimsy; for example, he bases his statement that Michelle Obama went on a “2½-year $10 million vacation spending spree” on an article in the Daily Mail, a British tabloid. Savage engages his fans with wild allegations and conspiracy theories, such as the claim that Obama is “determined to give our southwestern states to Mexico”: shrill fearmongering that his listeners have come to accept from a hardened ideologue. Agent: Ian Kleinert, Objective Entertainment.

June 15, 2012
One of talk radio's most inflammatory voices fires a damp squib at the president, the liberal media and society in general. Renowned for exploding into fits of vulgar profanity at the slightest provocation, Savage (Trickle Up Poverty: Stopping Obama's Attack on Our Borders, Economy, and Security, 2010, etc.) has long inspired theories that his rabidly conservative posturing is an elaborate put-on. Whether or not his radio persona is a calculated ruse, it is clear that his books are an afterthought, a sideshow with no other aim than generating profit. To say that Trickle Down Tyranny was phoned in would be too generous to a man who has made a fortune by shouting apoplectically. Most of the book reads like a high school intern combed through a year of his transcripts and deliberately selected the most soporific snippets, stitching them together at random into a manuscript-length document. Equally sure that he's sharing secret knowledge that no one else has the courage or wherewithal to state and that everything he says is just common sense, Savage provides little substantiation for his assertions. He delves deeply into arcane conspiracy theories involving the Trilateral Commission, George Soros and the Weather Underground. The author vaguely sorts his fiery statements ("The Occupy Wall Street demonstrators have one important characteristic in common with Barack Obama and Adolf Hitler: They're blatantly anti-Semitic") and rhetorical questions ("Is Holder going to pardon the Gitmo terrorists...and then release them with compensation because they were freedom fighters...? Is this part of Obama's overall plan to grant amnesty to illegal aliens in order to get reelected?") into sections dealing with finance, foreign policy, energy and so on, but no other organization or structure is in evidence. Fans of Savage's radio program should stick to the genuine article; opponents of President Obama should turn to someone whose sympathies are not so mercenary and self-serving.

COPYRIGHT(2012) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

November 1, 2011

Host of the No. 3 radio program in the nation, heard by nearly eight million listeners a week and syndicated across the United States in over 300 markets, Savage continues his rant against "Barack Lenin." Not a book to make everyone happy, but the 250,000-copy first printing and one-day laydown on April 3 indicates that the audience will be large.

Copyright 2011 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.