"The pursuit and wielding of power is one of America's most consuming passions. Now, in this new book, John M. Barry, award-winning author of Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How It Changed America (1997), uses his unusual vantage point as both a former Washington journalist and a onetime major college football coach to find common threads in the pursuit, exercise, and abuse of power in the media, in politics, and in sports.".

"The Washington Post has said that Barry's work has "the potential to change the way we think." In Power Plays: Politics, Football, and Other Blood Sports, he once again makes us see the world differently." "Power Plays tells the compelling inside story of how House Speaker Newt Gingrich engineered the downfall of Speaker Jim Wright, a story in which Vice President Dick Cheney, Senator Trent Lott, and Representative David Bonior played major roles."--BOOK JACKET.