‘Grand Theft 2000: Media Spectacle and a Stolen Election’, by Douglas Kellner
(Lanham, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield,
ISBN 0-7425-2103-6, paperback, xxi + 242 pp., European price approx. EUR 29.38
As historical amnesia is one of the more unfortunate phenomena of our time, those with truncated memories may already have forgotten the chequered saga of the United States’ Election 2000, with its paraphernalia of superannuated voting machines and hanging, dimpled and pregnant chad – let alone the bizarre spectacle of the planet’s sole superpower suddenly falling victim to ‘banana-republic’ gibes. It does immediately have to be added that, less than a year later, the tragic events of 9-11 intervened, casting the Bush presidency in a different light. However, some still believe that nothing that happened afterwards, however appalling in itself, can actually erase the significance of the US Supreme Court decision of 12 December 2000; and for …