The White House Tapes: Eavesdropping on the President

by John Prados

Book Overview

A book and CD set, the first collection that permits Americans to listen directly to their presidents as they speak not in the studied phrases of speeches but in the real heat of the moment, based on transcripts of the conversations

The White House Tapes: Eavesdropping on the President is a fascinating portrait of eight recent American presidents--including Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, and Reagan--as they...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1565848527
• ISBN13: 9781565848528
• Release Date: November 2003
• Publisher: New Press
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 3.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 2.4" x 6.4" x 10.3"

Customer Reviews

good content, bad audio

I absolutely loved this collection. The content is wonderful. I want more!I would give it five stars if it weren't for the audio quality.There are eight disks plus a disk called "the white house tapes: the president calling". This last disk was just wonderful with good audio quality. You can listen to this online at the american radioworks website. It will get you hooked.However, the other disks were hit or miss because they can be really difficult to hear. Many disks "Truman, Roosevelt and Eisenhower", (and to a lesser extent Kennedy and Nixon) were completely unintelligible in the car. Think old-time PA system in a concrete room. Johnson was very good, although there were repetitive sounds from the tape recorder. Ford was good too. I guess listening on a home stereo or with headphones might be a different story.Maybe the recording technology on many of the tapes just wasn't there. You figure with today's technology there would be some way to clean up the audio, especially when you're paying so much for the collection.

a great, great thing...

okay... this is fantastic. Its great listening to all this stuff! I first heard it on NPR, and then went out to buy the CDs... I absolutely loved it! (it aired again recently, I think... for president's day) So why the 4 stars, instead of 5? Its pricey. But I promise, it's totally worth it too. You just have to bite the bullet on this one.