While some books are requested for review, others arrive on their own. Armageddon is one of the latter, and it sat in our in-box for months before the growing election season piqued our curiosity. Inside, writer Eileen McGann speaks for Dick Morris who is a well-known political commentator and former Clinton advisor. He knew the Clintons well, until his unceremonious dismissal after being discovered that he let a prostitute overhear a phone conversation with the President Bill Clinton. It suffices to say that no one in this book is an angel. This is not a debate about Clinton in the classical sense, and there is no rebuttal from the Clinton point of view.

The book begins by outlining twelve reasons why Mrs. Clinton should not be president, ranging from her legendary temper to her right-up-to-the-chalk-line behavior with the law. Most of this information has circulated during the election year. He paints the picture of a candidate who is virtually unable to address controversy in a straight-line manner and therefore must constantly reformulate her truths in order to survive.

Beyond the general deceits that we anticipate from any politician—only the frequency and severity varies—Morris points out two troubling factors. First, since leaving her husband’s oval office, Clinton has become much more hawkish on war. During her period as Secretary of State, the Middle East destabilized, an American embassy was attacked under suspicious circumstances, and a general mood of international chaos has risen with more encouragement than mitigation. Second, Clinton is not charismatic like her husband. Nor is she a creative thinker. This brings up perhaps the only new insight in the book. According to Morris, Clinton relies heavily upon idea men who Morris calls gurus. Morris identifies himself as one such guru from 1995 to 1996. He claims that she becomes transfixed by her gurus, following their advice word for word, instead of incorporating it into her own ideas like Kennedy or Reagan. This behavior has even led at times to campaign staff rebellions, but more importantly, it poses the question: Who will be Clinton’s guru as President? In other words, who will be influencing her direction of the country?

In 1787 as Dr. James McHenry of Maryland exited the last day of the Constitutional Convention, he stopped one of America's true originals and freethinkers, Dr. Benjamin Franklin, to pose a simple question, “Well, Doctor, what have we got—a Republic or a Monarchy?” Franklin replied, “A Republic, if you can keep it.” Today our government behaves more like a bananas republic than that which is stewarded by its people. This transformation did not happen overnight, and we are all to blame for tolerating its creeping decline and the men and women who populate its halls. Morris and McGann could have posed the most important question: Which candidate can halt or even reverse our slippery road to perdition? And while we are at that task, if we are of the mind, it would be almost impossible not to raise the level of civil discourse given its current residence in the gutter.

No candidate is perfect or the best fit for the job, while some are better suited for the times. A case could easily be made that Clinton would deliver more of the expected in government, while Trump is a product of the times, the wildcard that occasionally appears in history. Not every wildcard is successful. In fact most are not. They are more influential than ultimate leaders. Ironically, Bill Clinton was one such wildcard who surprisingly won the presidency in 1992. Today, Morris presents the case that Hillary Clinton would further current causes, while deepening existing flaws in government, such as its propensity for questionable military action and the reckless course of the national debt. Morris is not necessarily interested in Trump. He wants to defeat Mrs. Clinton. One also has to temper his commentary with the fact that he has been forced to watch the Clintons from the outside for two decades.

Armageddon borders on the sensational, and its veering into Chelsea Clinton's dealings should have been avoided. It would've been effective to see Trump vs. Clinton, point for point, making it the easiest for people to see the contrast and decide on their own. Still, the book does not claim to be a fair and balanced presentation—a phrase employed often by Morris’ former employers at Fox News. The book is of two parts: first, Morris' personal assessment of Hillary Clinton, which should be sprinkled liberally with salt, and second, his strategy for exposing the weaknesses in her campaign rhetoric. Mostly, it's a passionate plea to take a look at the woman behind the campaign slogans.

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