Vote First or Die

February 15, 2017
To win the presidency, you have to win a primary, and to win a primary, you have to carry New Hampshire, powerful all out of proportion to its size or population.Reporting from the front lines of "a small but essential island of virtue and discernment adrift in the vast sea of contemptibility that consumes our public life every four years," producer and documentary director Conroy (co-author: Sarah from Alaska: The Sudden Rise and Brutal Education of a New Conservative Superstar, 2009) ponders how New Hampshire could have so much sway over the nation's presidential politics. He doesn't provide much in the way of a firm answer, but he does allow that New Hampshire is small, ethnically and culturally undiverse, and used to participatory government, meaning that candidates who brave its borders find themselves having to talk to real people, mostly older and mostly white, about real issues. Instead, Conroy delivers vignette moments along the trail. It's easy from his account to see, for instance, why New York-born Bernie Sanders fits in so well in the politics of New England; his impatience with small talk and delay ("God help you if he was ready to go and you weren't") is perfectly in tune with the brisk pace of getting it done that New Hampshirites embrace. Conroy can sting nicely, as when he writes, "Rand Paul proved to be neither the most interesting man in politics nor the most interesting man in his own family," and he gets in a few digs on points that have since become cliches ("Trump shot back, extending his tiny hands as far to his sides as they would stretch"). The narrative never goes deep, but it runs broad, covering the last campaign while drawing on a couple of its predecessors and not letting anyone come out unscathed. It's not Fear and Loathing or even The Boys on the Bus, but Conroy turns in a quirky, well-observed account of how electoral politics works.

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March 15, 2017

New Hampshire (NH) takes its politics as seriously as most states take their football, as verified by the more than 50 percent of NH voters who participated in their 2016 primary, compared to a 30 percent average of other primary state voters, says Conroy (coauthor, Sarah from Alaska), the executive producer of Embeds on Verizon's go90 platform. This lively and gritty narrative recounts the author's 2015 jaunts to the granite state's diners, watering holes, and Dunkin' Donuts while covering the primary beat for the Huffington Post. Here, Conroy interviews many citizens along with most of the candidates. These interviews convey voters' independent streak, as the author reveals that widespread disgust with politics as usual led to victories by two game changers: Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. Conroy faults the media for bending to rules set by Trump because he was a ratings magnet. Not much good is said about Clinton's presence, which was half-hearted at best. In addition to parsing the 2016 primary, Conroy also includes chapters on other recent NH primaries. VERDICT Although this lively, energetic account will appeal mostly to anti-Trumpsters, it provides special insight into how Trump hijacked and divided the Republican Party and how Sanders exposed Clinton's weaknesses that would hound her throughout her campaign.--Karl Helicher, formerly with Upper Merion Twp. Lib., King of Prussia, PA

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