From the Bookshelf of Non Fiction Book Club…

Playing with Fire: The 1968 Election and the Transformation of American Politics

Lawrence O'Donnell

Start date: July 1, 2025

Finish date: August 31, 2025

Discussion: Books of the Month

Why we're reading this: July / August 2025 — received votes from Rosalyn, Brad Adams, Julia, Amanda, Patrice, Emma, Claudie, Jord…more
[close] July / August 2025 — received votes from Rosalyn, Brad Adams, Julia, Amanda, Patrice, Emma, Claudie, Jordan, Julie, K, Ron, Melanie, Janice, Ryan, Franklin, Alanna, Tracy, Cynda is preoccupied with RL, Rachel, Brooks, Kirk, Elena, Christopher, Oleksandr, Monica, Katy, and David

Find A Copy At

Libraries

Group Discussions About This Book

Showing 2 of 0 topics — 313 comments total

Books of the Month

September / October 2025 BoTM - Over My Dead Body: Unearthing the Hidden History of America’s Cemeteries
By spoko , un monsieur triste en costume · 24 posts · 28 views

last updated Sep 10, 2025 08:09AM

September / October 2025 BoTM - Everyone Who Is Gone Is Here: The United States, Central America, and the Making of a Crisis
By spoko , un monsieur triste en costume · 6 posts · 18 views

last updated Aug 29, 2025 12:21PM

showing 6 of 6 topics view all »

What Members Thought

Aug 18, 2025 Becky rated it it was amazing

Shelves: audiobook, library-books, non-fiction, reviewed, year-2025, highly-recommended, library-phl, politicalish, social-justice

Incredible book. O'Donnell definitely put the time in to research this book extremely thoroughly, and to show what a wild and multi-faceted election cycle this was. I wasn't alive then, and even my parents were just kids, but the repercussions of this election can still be felt to this day.

One of the things that struck me was the anti-war movement, and how it impacted the election cycle. I kept thinking of the parallels between the 1968 cycle and the 2024 cycle, and how the conflict in Gaza imp Incredible book. O'Donnell definitely put the time in to research this book extremely thoroughly, and to show what a wild and multi-faceted election cycle this was. I wasn't alive then, and even my parents were just kids, but the repercussions of this election can still be felt to this day.

One of the things that struck me was the anti-war movement, and how it impacted the election cycle. I kept thinking of the parallels between the 1968 cycle and the 2024 cycle, and how the conflict in Gaza impacted the US election. The protests at Harris rallies and in the streets and such. I know that wasn't the ONLY factor impacting it - there was also the fact that Harris was a woman, was Indian & Black, was picking up the campaign/candidacy late (by today's standards anyway), and so on... but I cannot help but think that Gaza was a wedge, and that the perfect was made the enemy of the good, and the result is further harm under the administration we ended up with. Again.

And I am INCREDIBLY conflicted about this aspect. I am anti-war. I am for peace. I am for justice and equality and fairness and freedom. But I'm also a realist and a pragmatist, and to me it was so easy to see that this division only served those who don't care about Gaza at all. Sigh.

I commend Eugene McCarthy's desire to run to facilitate ending the Vietnam war - especially after learning about the manipulation that was used to get us into it. Wanting to end needless death is never a bad idea. But politics is ugly and greedy and self-serving, and with a crowded field, a bunch of wishy-washy, will-he/won't-he contenders, his commendable policy based intentions were never going to be enough. I cannot believe how many different people were in & out and how convoluted and messy it all was, and then for it to end in such a violent convention! Really crazy.

I was so surprised that Johnson kept undermining his own party in so many ways by giving Nixon inside info and asking him to not act on it. Like, I know I'm a jaded cynic who has lived with the repercussions of what politics have become since then, but I was internally screaming at Johnson's lack of sense. Ugh.

I found myself really feeling for McCarthy, and I can tell that O'Donnell really respects him. Not only for the fact that his decision to run really opened the flood gates for the 1968 election contention and showing that the status quo can be impacted and changed, it is not set in stone, but for doing so because he felt that it was the moral and ethical thing to do if nobody else would do it. Sometimes it doesn't turn out as hoped, but even that is still progress.

O'Donnell's epilogues at the end really reframed the perspective for me in a way that the rest of the book didn't. The whole time as I was listening I was disappointed in how much of a chaotic mess it was, and how it was all for nothing and we ended up with Noxious Nixon and 5 more years of war anyway - exactly what McCarthy was trying to avoid... And yet, O'Donnell's framing is one of gratitude and hope and optimism.

Without McCarthy's courage to run against his own party's incumbent, would the same attention have been brought to the war? Would the same pressure have built to push for ending it, saving who knows how many lives? Likely not.

This was an incredible book, and I definitely see myself re-reading it at some point.
...more

5 likes · Like · see review