Guardian-NYRB Author Tour

With the election only five days away, regime change at home will be among the subjects discussed at this multi-author event arranged by The New York Review of Books and the Guardian America Web site. In addition to Seattle’s favorite whiskey-voiced British expat, Jonathan Raban, regular NYRB contributors Michael Tomasky and Thomas Powers will appear. From The Guardian, Martin Kettle will provide an English perspective on our peculiar American system of choosing a president. In the current NYRB election issue—printed weeks before current polls—Tomasky argues that Barack Obama benefited from not responding to every loony charge in the blogosphere, and that during the first debate he “deliberately eschewed several opportunities to hit McCain with a zinger of the sort generally thought to define winning these affairs.” Or elections. Then there’s the war, the subject of Powers’ The Military Error: Baghdad and Beyond in America’s War of Choice (NYRB, $14.95). Whoever wins on Tuesday, he writes, “Unless something quite unexpected happens, four years from now the presidential candidates will be arguing about two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, one going into its ninth year, the other into its eleventh.” So let’s not gloat. Town Hall, 1119 Eighth Ave., 652-4255, www.townhallseattle.org. $5. 7:30 p.m. BRIAN MILLER

Related Content

Thu., Oct. 30, 7:30 p.m., 2008