I asked Todd Moss for a (more or less) politically authentic thriller, and he recommended David Igantius’ Body of Lies.
The thought of returning to CIA headquarters was depressing. It wasn’t the flat, linoleum feel of the place, or the instantly dated, 1960s “modernist” look of the architecture. It was the civil-service culture that permeated the corridors like dry rot. Ferris had heard the elite, band-of-brothers rhetoric when he joined. The agency had to be less smugly bureaucratic than Time, Inc., he reckoned, but he had been wrong.
It was worse. It was a culture that had been lying to itself for so long that people had lost the ability to differentiate between what was real and what wasn’t. Failure wasn’t acceptable—so, as far as the agency was concerned, the CIA never made mistakes. These were people who believed their own PowerPoint presentations.
Don’t worry, there is also a secret crack CIA team under a parking lot at Langley. Count that on the “less” side of authentic, I think. Nonetheless, I am satisfied.
8 Responses
“These were people who believed their own PowerPoint presentations.”: I asked Todd Moss for a (more or less) p… http://t.co/Uvwu99xCgk
Harder to spot as such in the wild than to label as such in print.
What are you going to say when they ask you to give a TED talk, Professor B?
RT @cblatts: “These were people who believed their own PowerPoint presentations.” http://t.co/XHL6P366YW
“These were people who believed their own PowerPoint presentations.” http://t.co/XHL6P366YW
At this rate, you are going to surpass last year’s income from amazon by May.
RT @cblatts: “These were people who believed their own PowerPoint presentations.” http://t.co/Aeunhfbuvk
@cblatts @toddmoss Brings one of my favorite New Yorker cartoons to mind: http://t.co/obU4Tt62u7
RT @cblatts: “These were people who believed their own PowerPoint presentations.” http://t.co/Aeunhfbuvk