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Devil's Bargain: Steve Bannon, Donald Trump, and the Storming of the Presidency Hardcover – January 1, 2017

by Joshua Green (Author)

2,633 ratings

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The instant #1 New York Times bestseller.

From the reporter who was there at the very beginning comes the revealing inside story of the partnership between Steve Bannon and Donald Trump—the key to understanding the rise of the alt-right, the fall of Hillary Clinton, and the hidden forces that drove the greatest upset in American political history.

Based on dozens of interviews conducted over six years, Green spins the master narrative of the 2016 campaign from its origins in the far fringes of right-wing politics and reality television to its culmination inside Trump’s penthouse on election night.

The shocking elevation of Bannon to head Trump’s flagging presidential campaign on August 17, 2016, hit political Washington like a thunderclap and seemed to signal the meltdown of the Republican Party. Bannon was a bomb-throwing pugilist who’d never run a campaign and was despised by Democrats and Republicans alike.

Yet Bannon’s hard-edged ethno-nationalism and his elaborate, years-long plot to destroy Hillary Clinton paved the way for Trump’s unlikely victory. Trump became the avatar of a dark but powerful worldview that dominated the airwaves and spoke to voters whom others couldn’t see. Trump’s campaign was the final phase of a populist insurgency that had been building up in America for years, and Bannon, its inscrutable mastermind, believed it was the culmination of a hard-right global uprising that would change the world.

Any study of Trump’s rise to the presidency is unavoidably a study of Bannon. Devil’s Bargain is a tour-de-force telling of the remarkable confluence of circumstances that decided the election, many of them orchestrated by Bannon and his allies, who really did plot a vast, right-wing conspiracy to stop Clinton. To understand Trump's extraordinary rise and Clinton’s fall, you have to weave Trump’s story together with Bannon’s, or else it doesn't make sense.

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About the Author

Joshua Green is a national correspondent for Bloomberg Businessweek and a CNN political analyst. Previously, Green was a senior editor of the Atlantic, a weekly political columnist for the Boston Globe, and an editor at the Washington Monthly. He has also written for the New Yorker, Esquire, Vanity Fair, and other publications. Green regularly appears on CNN’s shows, HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher, and PBS’s Washington Week and Frontline.

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Penguin Pr
Publication date ‏ : ‎ January 1, 2017
Edition ‏ : ‎ First Edition
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Print length ‏ : ‎ 272 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0735225028
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0735225022
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.2 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.5 x 1 x 9.75 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #856,736 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #213 in Elections
- #1,025 in Political Leader Biographies
- #1,762 in United States Biographies

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Joshua Green

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Joshua Green is author of the #1 New York Times bestseller, "Devil's Bargain: Steve Bannon, Donald Trump, and the Storming of the Presidency" (Penguin), a national correspondent for Bloomberg Businessweek, and a CNN political analyst. Previously, Green was an editor at the Atlantic and the Washington Monthly, and a political columnist for the Boston Globe. He's also written for the New Yorker, Esquire, Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair and other publications. Green regularly appears on CNN's shows, HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher, and PBS’s Washington Week and Frontline.

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Customers find this book to be a must-read for those closely following the administration, with well-researched insights into Steve Bannon's background and character. The writing style is engaging and easy to read, while the reporting provides a believable balance. Customers describe it as a spellbinding story that masterfully puts everything into perspective, with one customer noting how it captures Bannon's eccentricities perfectly.

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Readability Insight Writing style Insight into steve brannon Illuminating Storytelling Scariness level Reporting quality

198 customers mention "Readability"191 positive7 negative

Customers find the book engaging and worth their time, particularly noting that the first half is very good and considering it essential reading for those closely following the administration.

"...The book is good on the campaign, but it also explains Bannon's long-term objectives and his political ideas...." Read more

"A strong, well written story about the background, inspiration and behind the scene actions of Steve Bannon that contributed a lot to the..." Read more

"...It is a really good book about how Bannon's efforts to defeat all the Clinton's had been going on for years, even decades...." Read more

"...Mostly the book is laudatory, and gives much of the credit of Trump’s success to Bannon: Some quotes: “..." Read more

161 customers mention "Insight"151 positive10 negative

Customers find the book insightful, well-researched, and thought-provoking.

"...This media outlet was instrumental in bringing down Hillary. The author continues on describing how Bannon aided Trump...." Read more

"Let me say, first, that this is a well-written book and contains a lot of information helpful to understanding the Trump-Bannon-Mercer nexus...." Read more

"...This is one of those well-composed books on the absurdity of politics which manages to capture the true absurdity without sounding condescending in..." Read more

"...Sack, Hollywood producer and being extremely rich are admirable and impressive. I like his moxie and street fighter mentality...." Read more

87 customers mention "Writing style"79 positive8 negative

Customers praise the writing style of the book, finding it well written and easy to read, with one customer noting it was written while the events were still fresh in the minds of the sources.

"...He has read a lot of history and can quote Plutarch. His political views often shock the political establishment...." Read more

"A strong, well written story about the background, inspiration and behind the scene actions of Steve Bannon that contributed a lot to the..." Read more

"Let me say, first, that this is a well-written book and contains a lot of information helpful to understanding the Trump-Bannon-Mercer nexus...." Read more

"...Bannon, Donald Trump, and the Storming of the Presidency", is a well written, non-partisan look at Donald Trump and his campaign and victory,..." Read more

47 customers mention "Insight into steve brannon"44 positive3 negative

Customers appreciate the book's insights into Steve Bannon's background and character, describing him as an extremely intelligent and fascinating figure, with one customer noting how it captures his eccentricities perfectly.

"...The book is good on the campaign, but it also explains Bannon's long-term objectives and his political ideas...." Read more

"...This is a great history of Steve Bannon and shows you his roots and how cunning he can be. But IMO his role with Trump wasn't a "Bargain"...." Read more

"...Bannon had cycled through multiple marriages and was rich, brash, charismatic, volcanic, opinionated, and never ruffled by doubt...." Read more

"...the Storming of the Presidency", is a well written, non-partisan look at Donald Trump and his campaign and victory, with particular emphasis on..." Read more

28 customers mention "Illuminating"26 positive2 negative

Customers find the book illuminating, providing a deeper look at the subject matter and masterfully putting everything into perspective.

"...It gives a pretty good perspective even today, with Bannon's departure from the White House...." Read more

"...And he squeezed in “next to Ivanka Trump.” It’s quite the image, the corpulent, sweaty Christie pushing himself into the personal space of the..." Read more

"...this book and I found the exploration of his background to be quite illuminating...." Read more

"..."Devil's Bargain" is very good for a deeper look into Bannon's background and the experiences that likely make him tick...." Read more

26 customers mention "Storytelling"19 positive7 negative

Customers appreciate the book's storytelling, describing it as a spellbinding and honest portrayal of history, with one customer noting how it provides background on campaign contributors.

"...The central character of the book is Bannon and it provides a brief biography. Bannon grew up in a working class, Irish-Catholic family in Virginia...." Read more

"...Simply stated, Joshua Green has created a spellbinding story of how two humans from highly-dissimilar backgrounds merged each’s distinct subset of..." Read more

"...But then he ends the book with non-factual and bias conclusions as to what will happen in the future with Trump, even though it's still early, like..." Read more

"...The documentation in this book is precise, the story is told with little embellishment, and the overall effect, amazingly sobering...." Read more

23 customers mention "Scariness level"18 positive5 negative

Customers find the book frightening and disturbing, with one noting it provides great insight into a very dangerous man.

"...Fascinating and disturbing to understand all that was going on behind the scenes." Read more

"The narrative looking back on the election is both revealing and frightening...." Read more

"...Sad and frightening at the same time." Read more

"...to start because the portrait it paints of the man is truly, truly frightening...." Read more

10 customers mention "Reporting quality"10 positive0 negative

Customers praise the reporting quality of the book, describing it as balanced and excellent, with one customer highlighting its coverage of the wild campaign.

"...This book is an excellent piece of reporting and explains muc about the Trump/Bannon alliance...." Read more

"Quick and enjoyable read. Surprisingly balanced - the author def makes it a point to give Bannon and Trump credit where credit is due...." Read more

"...There is a reasonably level of believable balance to the tale Mr. Green weaves." Read more

"...I felt it was well-balanced and had no obvious agenda other than honestly portraying history." Read more

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Randolph Eck
An Excellent History of Trump and Bannon
Reviewed in the United States on September 2, 2017
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If you were wondering how Donald Trump secured the White House, Green will show you just how Steve Bannon was a critical instrument of that process. In his campaign, Trump channeled Bannon’s conspiratorial worldview. Yes, that view includes Clinton’s dark web of moral and intellectual corruption, the banks, the media, and financial titans (left wing, of course). The message was of a global power structure that was responsible for economic decisions that funneled money to a handful of large corporations and political entities, thus stripping the country of its wealth

According to the author, “you have to go all the way back and begin with Steve Bannon, or else it doesn’t make sense.” We are also introduced to some of the other players who were instrumental, such as David Bossie, Rodger Stone, Kellyanne Conway, and others; but the greatest influence on Trump was Bannon. What Bannon built was a “vast right-wing conspiracy” designed to tear down Hillary – Trump just happened to be the fortunate beneficiary of this elaborate plot. Green delineates the history that brought Bannon to this point: his experience as a naval officer, his dissatisfaction with President Carter, his admiration of Reagan, his time at Harvard, his stint on Wall Street, his time in Hollywood, his time as head of Breitbart News. At Breitbart, he marshaled the online armies of trolls and activists that infiltrated national politics that gave rise to Donald Trump.

There were other factors as well. Trump’s time on The Apprentice increased his popularity among black and Hispanic audiences. Then there was the Mercer family that without a doubt was very important in helping Trump win the presidency. We learn of four organizations that Bannon had a hand in building, and which was funded by the Mercers. These were Breitbart News, the Government Accountability Institute, a film production company called Glittering Steel (this company produced a movie version of Clinton Cash), and lastly, Strategic Communication Laboratories. By the time Clinton launched her campaign, all four of these entities were up and running like the machine they were envisioned to be.

The first organization Breitbart News according to its founder “was always to build a global center-right, populist, anti-establishment news site.” This media outlet was instrumental in bringing down Hillary. The author continues on describing how Bannon aided Trump. We see Stephen Miller and later Paul Manafort enter Trump’s campaign. Later the Mercer family gets Trump to bring in Steve Bannon and Kellyanne Conway. With Bannon at the helm now, we see “a nationalist, divisive campaign in which issues of race, immigration, culture, and identity were put front and center. Bannon exhumed the nationalist thinkers of old to build an intellectual basis for Trumpism” or what the author labels American Nationalist-Traditionalism.

Green concludes saying, “But in the end, it’s hard to imagine that Bannon and the legions he spoke for will wind up as anything other than the latest partners disappointed when their deal with Trump turns sour.” Before I finished reading this book, Bannon was fired.

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David Lindsay
Explains the background and political views of Steve Bannon
Reviewed in the United States on June 15, 2018
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Devil's Bargain is a fascinating book written by Bloomberg journalist Joshua Green. It details the short-lived partnership between Donald Trump and Steve Bannon. Green interviewed Bannon at length and he takes you inside the Trump campaign. Green argues that Bannon, who first met Trump in 2011, offered the future president two services without which Trump could never have won the 2016 election: “a fully formed, internally coherent worldview…about trade and foreign threats,” and an “infrastructure of conservative organizations” that had spent years attacking and hating Hillary Clinton.

Bannon has a habit of taking credit for everything that went right on the Trump campaign. Green makes a persuasive case: that Trump “seemed to recognize” that it was “Bannon alone” who could get Trump elected. The book argues that Trump's win is largely due to Bannon and Trump became a vessel for Bannon’s nationalist ideas. The book is gossipy and very readable and helps explain how Trump managed to get elected.

The book is good on the campaign, but it also explains Bannon's long-term objectives and his political ideas. The central character of the book is Bannon and it provides a brief biography. Bannon grew up in a working class, Irish-Catholic family in Virginia. He joined the Navy, got a master’s degree from Georgetown. He went to Harvard Business School and then to Goldman Sachs. He specialized in media and made deals between movie studios and TV companies and then became a film producer. Having acquired wealth, Bannon began focusing on politics. Before meeting Trump, Bannon had advised Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann.

Bannon became the chairman of Breitbart News. Bannon described his ideology to Mother Jones as "nationalist" and claimed that Breitbart News was the "platform for the alt-right". The alt-right has been demonized by the liberal intelligentsia. The New York Times described it “as a loosely organized group of mostly young men who believe in white supremacy; oppose immigration, feminism, and multiculturalism; and delight in harassing Jews, Muslims, and other vulnerable groups by spewing shocking insults on social media.” The alt-right is often described as neo-Nazi by the left because they view them as racists. Bannon is adamant that populism and fascism ‘are not even related’. On economic policy, he may be right. In the 1930s Hitler's regime was closer to the totalitarian rule of Stalin than it was to the laissez-faire capitalism of Herbert Hoover. Hitler rejected the market economy, embraced socialist policies and government intervention. Like the communists, he also believed in world domination.

Breitbart News helped Trump dispatch his Republican competitors. Bannon became Trump’s campaign manager in August 2016 at the behest of the Mercer family, which funds right-wing causes (including Breitbart). Bannon took a leave from Breitbart while working for Trump. The book claims that Bannon was the architect of Trump’s populist campaign message. Green believes that Trump was never really a nationalist, but instead, was an opportunist who wanted to get elected and Bannon's ideas seemed to be popular.

Bannon views himself as a political philosopher. He has read a lot of history and can quote Plutarch. His political views often shock the political establishment. He does not believe in virtue signaling or political correctness. He believes in a coming great-powers clash with an axis of the ancient Turkish, Persian and Chinese civilizations. According to Michael Wolff, Bannon told former Fox News CEO Roger Ailes that "China is where Nazi Germany was in 1929 to 1930.” Bannon believes “we’re at economic war with China” and only one will be a global hegemon in 25 or 30 years. He views China as an existential threat and argues that the US is losing the economic war. He has also predicted a military conflict in the South China Seas within 5-10 years.

Bannon is critical of Wall Street. He believes that by 2008 Wall Street firms had become "highly leveraged hedge funds" and they had "wrecked the economy." He believes in capitalism and does not believe that taxpayers should bail out Wall Street. Strangely, Bannon suggests that liberal/left wing ideas have corrupted Wall Street. He believes in protectionism and has criticized Wall Street for promoting free trade and helping to outsource American jobs.

According to Green, Bannon is worried about globalization. He believes that the rise of populist movements in the U.S., Europe, and Japan represents a return to tradition. Bannon believes you have to control: the border, the currency, the military, and national identity. People are finally coming to realize that, and politicians will have to follow.

Bannon believes the EU and Angela Merkel plan to abolish the nation-state and create a world without borders. German nationalism caused a lot of problems in the 20th century, so Merkel's fears are understandable. However, Bannon views the EU and Merkel as twin threats. Bannon fears the EU is trying to eliminate national culture through immigration. Bannon has often spoken favorably about European populist movements that want to preserve the nation-state and he has supported nationalist movements in Europe. Helping to get Trump elected has given him credibility with European populists. The left-wing London Guardian has described Bannon as an evil genius.

Bannon has a habit of biting the hand that feeds him. He often makes controversial statements that upset even his allies. Bannon seems to have fallen out of favor with Trump and the Mercers. The Wall Street Journal believes that Trump feels “betrayed” depicting Bannon as a self-promoter who inflated his importance in the president’s election victory. Rebekah Mercer has said that Bannon, “took Breitbart in the wrong direction.” However, Bannon has not gone away and he is turning his attention to Europe where populism is on the rise. He appears to be trying to cobble together an international front of far-right and neo-fascist political parties. Many of his ideas seem to resonate with ordinary people because their views are often ignored by the elites. The establishment in Europe is starting to view Bannon as a potential threat to stability. Some conservative commentators in London believe that Bannon is a racist who has crossed the line into fascism. We are waiting to see what Bannon does next.

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ChrisD
Must read about the success of misinformation in the age of the Internet
Reviewed in the United States on August 4, 2017
Verified Purchase
A strong, well written story about the background, inspiration and behind the scene actions of Steve Bannon that contributed a lot to the presidential victory of Trump. I learned a lot of new details and was reminded of others. The book is just right. Not too slim on details while not being too tedious.
The book gives you a clear sense of the power of behind the scenes money and propaganda to influence who rules the USA and the world. You learn once more that very little of politics is a means towards betterment of lives of people. Rather it is a grand game to be won no matter what. Maybe we can be awakened by the book and work towards more noble and honest goals. An important point the book illustrates is how the recent economics of news delivery has promoted sensationalism and led to the demise of old school investigative reporting and analysis of facts that are truly relevant news. The author, Joshua Green, provides detailed accounts of how Steven Bannon and rich people financing his efforts have cleverly taken advantage of this change in information delivery to win big. It is unfortunate that their motives and winnings benefit them and almost nobody else. A lot like Trump wanting to win a health care victory even though he has no interest in what the actual details are. Win, win, win. Tell people whatever you think will get them excited. Promote anything into a big story using the power of the Internet.
The book does also indicate how stupid and ineffective the mainstream Democratic party was. I can admire Bannon's cleverness and hard work. What a story. What a waste of human cleverness and hard work. And that's the way it is in the year 2017.

A good related book to read is Dark Money by Jane Mayer. For a positive story read Al Franken, Giant of the Senate.

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BlueGreenOD
Simply brilliant
Reviewed in Australia on August 25, 2017
Verified Purchase

Joshua Green has written an absolute political classic, a resource that will be relied upon for years to come for those trying to work out how Trump became President. In the meantime, Green's research and analysis is being employed by countless commentators as if it is their own work. What really stands out in this book is it simply a joy to read, it is genuinely one of those books you cannot put down

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Cliente Amazon
President Bannon
Reviewed in Spain on October 6, 2018
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La obra te atrapa desde la primera página. Trump no sería presidente sin la ayuda de Steve Bannon. Muy recomendable.

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Peace & Quiet
Bof!!
Reviewed in France on July 17, 2019
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Boring. Don't bother. They're not worth it and should be ashamed of themselves-

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ＪＫ
トランプ大統領の大逆転を追う。
Reviewed in Japan on August 14, 2017
Verified Purchase
２０１６年最大のサプライズ、トランプ氏の大統領選での逆転勝利、それを導いた選挙参謀スティーブ・バノンの戦略は何だったのか？われわれ日本人には計り知れない首都ワシントンでの米政治の内幕、ロビーストの存在、トップ富裕層の選挙への関わり、共和党の強さと民主党の脆さ。これらが分かり易く記述され、大統領選挙の実体が暴かれていく。キンドル版は人名検索が容易なのでストーリーへしっかり付いてていける。

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GarethGray
Bannon is cool but he is on the wrong side
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 3, 2017
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I can’t remember a book keeping me up all night reading before, but this one did. It felt to me like an urgent despatch from a dangerous and encroaching front line. In making notes on the Kindle I had to force myself to say something, anything other than “Holy Cow!”.

The star of the show is Bannon. Trump, I think, we get. Narcissist, egomaniac, etcetera – all the usual epithets. But Bannon? I found it thrilling in a disturbing sort of way that someone like him even exists in the opaque, mechanistic world of Anglo-American politics, and not only exists, but proved able to throw his foul clog into the machine and seize it up.

Nobody saw him coming. As Green notes, in 2015, “Trump was still considered a carnival sideshow, Breitbart News a site for trolls and crazies, and Bannon a fringe figure who wouldn’t possibly factor into something as large and important as a presidential race. These were all assumptions the Clinton brain trust would come to bitterly regret.” Me too.

Bannon was an inventive, committed, skilled propagandist with a vivid, compelling and urgent world historical narrative, and a plan. And a drive to see it through that bordered on the insane.

One of the eye-openers was that what drives him is not racism, exactly, but Traditionalism. He has sussed that a vast swath of Americans crave psychological comfort and validation, and his prescription for this ill is Traditionalism, an anti-liberal, medieval programme of deliberate de-civilisation. It seeks to harness the power of shared experience, myth, clan and national identity. It needs a mortal enemy, and it needs shrill, grating, persistent, schema-violating propaganda. Putin’s doing it, Erdogan’s doing it, Xi’s doing it, so why shouldn’t Trump, especially since Trump was so willing, and amenable? Trump was the mouthy mouthpiece; Bannon supplied the world view.

Bannon didn’t just make speeches, though. He proactively created his constituency (losers in the liberal economic order) with patience, intelligence and determination. He set up real, interlocking mechanisms to validate and give voice to these losers. Breitbart was one mechanism. The Government Accountability Institute (GAI) was another. Funded by weird plutocrats like the Mercers, the GAI’s Peter Schweizer holed Clinton below the waterline with his book, “Clinton Cash” (Harper, 2015), conceived and produced under Bannon’s guiding hand. Cambridge Analytica was another, and Bannon’s film company, Glittering Steel, was the fourth.

By the time anyone in the Clinton camp worked out what was going on, it was too late. All they had was the sick realisation that Bannon was smarter, more cunning, more talented, more connected, and – crucially – more ready to use tactics they would never even dream of using.

Like Satan in Paradise Lost, Bannon is cool but he is still on the wrong side. As Green catalogues, one of the thinkers he absorbed to derive his world view is Baron Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola (1898-1974), better known as Julius Evola, one of the saltier adherents of the Traditionalist school, and darling of Mussolini and the Nazis. Bannon’s ends are dark, and so are his means – mob-anger, deceit, ruthlessness.

Devil’s Bargain is a wake-up call. The thing about us liberals is that we don’t even recognise ourselves as “liberals” in the pejorative sense of Bannon and Breitbart. But we are. We are elitist, cosmopolitan beneficiaries of the global economic order. We have faith in “progress”, in the free market’s benign invisible hand, and in the promise of technology to keep us rich and happy and to save the planet. The problem is we may be wrong, and we are vastly outnumbered. And, thanks to Bannon, we lost control of the debate. To take it back, we may need to study Bannon’s methods.

P.s: A really interesting companion to Devil’s Bargain is Pankaj Mishra’s Age of Anger, which, disorientingly, might leave you less liberal and more sympathetic to Traditionalism.

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Devil's Bargain: Steve Bannon, Donald Trump, and the Storming of the Presidency Hardcover – January 1, 2017

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Top reviews from the United States

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5.0 out of 5 stars An Excellent History of Trump and Bannon

4.0 out of 5 stars Explains the background and political views of Steve Bannon

5.0 out of 5 stars Must read about the success of misinformation in the age of the Internet

Top reviews from other countries

5.0 out of 5 stars Simply brilliant

5.0 out of 5 stars President Bannon

1.0 out of 5 stars Bof!!

5.0 out of 5 stars トランプ大統領の大逆転を追う。

5.0 out of 5 stars Bannon is cool but he is on the wrong side

An Excellent History of Trump and Bannon

Explains the background and political views of Steve Bannon

Must read about the success of misinformation in the age of the Internet

Simply brilliant

President Bannon

Bof!!

トランプ大統領の大逆転を追う。

Bannon is cool but he is on the wrong side