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    First in Line: Presidents, Vice Presidents, and the Pursuit of Power
    First in Line: Presidents, Vice Presidents, and the Pursuit of Power
    First in Line: Presidents, Vice Presidents, and the Pursuit of Power
    Audiobook10 hours

    First in Line: Presidents, Vice Presidents, and the Pursuit of Power

    Written by Kate Andersen Brower

    Narrated by Fred Sanders

    4.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    From the author of the New York Times bestsellers First Women and The Residence, an intimate, news-making look at the men who are next in line to the most powerful office in the world—the vice presidents of the modern era—from Richard Nixon to Joe Biden to Mike Pence.

    Vice presidents occupy a unique and important position, living partway in the spotlight and part in the wings. Of the forty-seven vice presidents who have served the United States, fourteen have become president; eight of these have risen to the Oval Office because of a president’s death or assassination, and one became president after his boss’s resignation. John Nance Garner, FDR’s first vice president, famously said the vice presidency is ""not worth a bucket of warm piss"" (later cleaned up to ""warm spit""). But things have changed dramatically in recent years. In interviews with more than two hundred people, including former vice presidents, their family members, and insiders and confidants of every president since Jimmy Carter, Kate Andersen Brower pulls back the curtain and reveals the sometimes cold, sometimes close, and always complicated relationship between our modern presidents and their vice presidents.

    Brower took us inside the lives of the White House staff and gave us an intimate look at the modern First Ladies; now, in her signature style, she introduces us to the second most powerful men in the world, exploring the lives and roles of thirteen modern vice presidents—eight Republicans and five Democrats. And she shares surprising revelations about the relationship between former Vice President Joe Biden and former President Barack Obama and how Vice President Mike Pence and President Donald Trump interact behind closed doors.

    From rivals to coworkers, there is a very tangible sense of admiration mixed with jealousy and resentment in nearly all these relationships between the number two and his boss, even the best ones, Brower reveals. Vice presidents owe their position to the president, a connection that affects not only how they are perceived but also their possible future as a presidential candidate—which is tied, for better or worse, to the president they serve. George H. W. Bush and Ronald Reagan had a famously prickly relationship during the 1980 primary, yet Bush would not have been elected president in 1988 without Reagan’s high approval rating. Al Gore’s 2000 loss, meanwhile, could be attributed to the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal and Bill Clinton’s impeachment. Current Vice President Mike Pence is walking a high-stakes political tightrope as he tries to reassure anxious Republicans while staying on his boss’s good side.

    This rich dynamic between the president and the vice president has never been fully explored or understood. Compelling and deeply reported, grounded in history and politics, and full of previously untold and incredibly personal stories, First In Line pierces the veil of secrecy enveloping this historic political office to offer us a candid portrait of what it’s truly like to be a heartbeat away.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperAudio
    Release dateJun 5, 2018
    ISBN9780062848277
    Author

    Kate Andersen Brower

    Kate Andersen Brower is the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller The Residence, First Women—also a New York Times bestseller—and First in Line. She is a CNN contributor who covered the Obama White House for Bloomberg News and is a former CBS News staffer and Fox News producer. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, Vanity Fair, and the Washington Post. She lives outside Washington, D.C., with her husband and their three young children.

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    Reviews for First in Line

    4.5/5

    31 ratings5 reviews

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    • 5/5
      la pousuite du pour c est trop top parlante..mais il faut comprendre qu il plaise a la volontee politique-economies pour diriger l administration general et territoriale..tres cordial /gda/uncc
    • 5/5
      Good. I enjoyed it. I enjoy historical books. I hope for more
    • 4/5
      Very informative and direct piece of work on Vice Presidents, going back to Nixon and moving up to Pence. The early chapters being out of continuity but the later ones detailing each administration's. This was a thoughtful and poignant work on possibly the most unsung worker in DC; the vice president, and their curious relationship to the current president.

      All of them stand a heart-beat away from becoming the President of the United States; yet most of them are treated so far beneath contempt and disdain that a new word might need be used for it. Some of the relationships (Obama-Biden) were better than others; but some (Johnson-Humphries) were far far worse (or even Eisenhower-Nixon).

      There is a large amount of 'backstage gossip' and that mostly drives the book. Its not so much policy and history as the relationships of President/VP and of VP and the staff and aides of the White House and the Observatory. While much of this is fascinating, we only get a real look at their time(s) in office at the end during their personal chapter, and sadly its not as deeply informal or enriching as could be.

      Luckily much of the book refrains from political bias and both Democrat and Republican VPs (and Presidents) are treated fairly the same. (Though Trump might take a fair bit of criticism, though much warranted in a way).

      Definitely worth a read for anyone interested in White House politics or VP's in general (or even Presidents).
    • 4/5
      I picked this book up because of its relation to my desire to read at least one biography of each U.S. President. Although it is clearly about the Vice-Presidents they served, it did give a peek at the Presidents themselves.“Of the thirteen men in this book who’ve served as vice-president, four became president [Johnson, Nixon, Ford and H.W. Bush], three received the highest civilian award this country has to offer [Rockefeller, Humphrey, and Biden], and one has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize [Gore, for his work on climate change].”It is a very readable book…I’m glad I read it!
    • 5/5
      This is a look back through history at the office of the vice president as well as the occupants from Nixon under Eisenhower to Pence under Trump. It is well written, insightful and filled with information I was not aware of. I found it fascinating. I am going to look at other books written by this author because I was so impressed with this one!