Politics Government Books

The Supreme Court is governed by humans, and humans do make errors."The Dirty Dozen: How Twelve Supreme Court Cases Radically Expanded Government and Eroded Freedom" is an examination of these mistakes that have cost America dearly. Pointing out cases in which the Supreme Court has bumbled and allowed the federal government to interfere with private contracts or political support, detain prisoners charge, wrongfully seize property, and other misdeeds of the court, "The Dirty Dozen" is an expertly crafted and harsh criticism of the courts. Highly recommended for community library law collections.

This book is a good complement to Randy Barnett's _Restoring the Lost Constitution_. _The Dirty Dozen_ looks at twelve bad Supreme Court decisions that have effectively erased some of the explicit constitutional limits on the federal government and reduced individual freedom. The preface by Richard Epstein expresses a few minor disagreements about some of the cases chosen, and the end of the book explains why Roe v. Wade and Bush v. Gore didn't make the cut. Those that did include Korematsu v. United States (1944), which said that the U.S. program of internment for Japanese Americans was constitutional, Kelo v. City of New London (2005), which said that governments can seize private property in order to give it to other private hands, Home Building & Loan Association v. Blaisdell (1934), which said that the government can unilaterally void parts of private contracts despite Article I Section 10's explicit language to the contrary, and Bennis v. Michigan (1996), which said that government can use civil forfeiture to take property without compensation that is involved in a crime even if the owner of the property has no involvement in that crime.

"Regrettably, the [Supreme] court has too often taken the plain wording of the Constitution and interpreted it to mean exactly the opposite of what the Founding Fathers intended. By that process the Court profoundly altered the American legal, political, and economic landscape."

So begins Richard Epstein's forward to this truly remarkable book.

The authors, Robert Levy, of the Cato Institute, and William Mellor, of the Institute of Justice, have chosen twelve Supreme Court cases they believe "changed the course of American history".

The book is not written solely for lawyers. In fact, it is written for the citizen concerned with the expansion of government at the expense of individual freedom.

The tragedy of this book is that it will be read by so few people when it should be read by every citizen, regardless of political persuasion, who is concerned the fate of the United States.

These twelve cases are considered by the authors to be the worst decisions of the Supreme Court of the modern era. In most cases, they also list a runner-up. Events move quickly, so it is quite likely that the authors would add Boumedienne v. Bush, the incredible decision that grants a variety of rights to terrorists. Personally I think that Boumedienne will vie with Dredd Scott as being the most lunkheaded decision ever made by the Court. U.S. v. Miller, 1939 case about the Second Amendment, has been resolved by the very recent decision in District of Columbia v. Heller. (One can see how endangered the Constitution is by the 5-4 vote of the Court in Heller.)

The authors (unsurprisingly) relate each of the cases to a specific topic. The book consists of two parts, the first on how the Court has allowed government to expand far beyond the intentions of the Founding Fathers and the second on how the Court's decisions have eroded freedom.

The topics and "dirty dozen" cases are:

Promoting the general welfare (Helvering v Davis)
Regulating Interstate Commerce (Wickard v. Filburn)
Rescinding Private Contracts (Home Building & Loan v. Blaisdell)
Lawmaking by Administrative Agencies (Whitman v. American Trucking)

Campaign Finance Reform and Free Speech (McConnel v. FEC)
Gun Owner's Rights (United States v. Miller)
Civil Liberties Versus National Security (Korematsu v. U.S.)
Asset Forfeiture Without Due Process (Bennis v. Michigan)
Eminent Domain for Private Use (Kelo v. City of New London)
Taking Property by Regulation (Penn Central v . New York)
Earning an Honest Living (U.S. v. Carolene Products)
Equal Protection and Racial Preferences (Grutter v. Bolinger)


As you can see, critical liberties we take for granted are covered, such as what most people consider their "right" to earn an honest living. In fact, as the authors point out, more than 20% of jobs are subject to regulation or licensing requirements - and no matter how stupid or anti-competitive the restrictions, the Court has given the states free reign to restrict your right to earn a living. This chapter is frightening - but so are all the other chapters. Once you see how the Court has truly altered the intent of the Constitution in the past seven decades, you will worry about tomorrow and what could happen if more left-wingers are appointed to the Court.

If you are concerned for the future of the United States and its Constitution, read this book. I suspect that after reading it, you - like me - will be suggesting to everyone you know that they read it too.

Jerry

I have read the Constitution several times and it has always been a mystery to me how many (if not most) laws are permissible by our courts and deemed congruent with our founding fathers vision. This book no only addresses my confusion but does it in a clear entertaining style free of Latin and other confusing "legalese". I highly recommend this well written engaging book.

I listened to Robert Levy on Harvard Book Club. The man is brilliant. To the extent that the book claims that the Supreme Court failed to interpret the constitution in a reasonable manner, the book is one-man's opinion of what the constitutional law should be. Levy criticizes the notion of a "living, breathing" constitution because it encourages "judicial policy-making." Yet, this is what the law interpreters have done since Roman and Norman times. Law has never been a fixed rule, in our common-law system. The law is a reasonable interpretation within the established structural and doctrinal framework to fit the evolving standards of decency. This book is just one political opinion of what the constitutional provisions are. My fear is that a non-lawyer, reading this book, will inevitably get an idea that the Supreme Court is not upholding the constitutional principles. Nothing could be farther from the truth. For those non-lawyers, that are intrigued by the book, I can not stress enough the following: You must read many more judicial opinions to get a glimpse on how the Supreme Court operates and how laws evolve and devolve. For example, legal students have a benefit and duty of reading casenotes and comparing many opinions on a narrow topic; which the non-lawyer readers of this book do not.

This book is not very thick and when I took my history class I learned that the professor chose this book because the class was going to be based on allot of lecture and note taking. If you take a history class and they require this book, hope for the best that you get an easy teacher but really be prepared for allot of lecture and note taking.

It was shipped out fast because I needed it for my history class. It is not my subject at all, but I liked it. I have it for sale to sent out PRIORITY MAIL!! At no extra charge look it up and buy!!

I read this book for a college class on Social Work, and although Loeb tells many meaningful and powerful stories, this is the same text I have heard before. If you read the first and last paragraph of each chapter you basically get the point. It's an easy read, and some may find it powerful, but I just found it repetitive and over-told.

I read Soul of a citizen which inspired me to action. I am now a volunteer activist in my neighbourhood and have formed a group of concerned citizens to negotiate and participate in our city's development plan. We have made an impact in the corporation and even had a few small successes along the way.

As many other reviewers I was asked to read this book as a part of a college course. My wife was recently assigned the reading in her MSW program. I do believe it has some value, but to a specific generation and type of activist. The book rarely (if at all) discusses a model of activism outside of that born from the peace and love movement of the 60-70s. If you are from these eras, by all means this is the book for you. If you are or will soon be a college student you will likely find little to connect with in the book. I suspect that its over use in courses at this time is a result of faculty promoting a book they feel applies to them greatly without thinking of how it applies to younger generations.

Paul is an outstanding voice in our world. Fantastic book helping bring hope to a difficult time for those of us who aspire to service. It is a challenge to keep engaged in service and Paul does provide hope. I also appreciate his newsletter and recommend it to those who appreciate his work. Great insights.

Must we indulge yet another collection of tripe in the guise of self-help? Didn't we get this sort of nonsense out of our systems a long time ago?

If you are the type who hangs around in the self-help section of Borders looking for something you haven't yet read, hoping the nice-looking man ordering the latte isn't as bad as your ex-husband, well, sure, pick this up. You can read it a few hours later after you've snuck that man past your sleeping children's doors and out to his car, and feel good about yourself and how wonderful a person you are for reading something like this.

For the rest of us that live with a real sense of morality, well, we know books like this are just excuses - a mechanism by which the anointed democrat leftists sanctify themselves. Now that I think about it, I'm not sure why I wrote this review. If it offended you, you're beyond help. If it rang true, you already know you don't want to get anywhere near this book.

The Middle East will continue to dominate American security concerns regardless of who next occupies the Oval Office. Record oil prices, terrorism, Israel's security, Iraqi stability, and Iran's nuclear ambitions will top the new president's foreign policy agenda, whatever his ideological outlook. With A Path Out of the Desert (Random House, 592 pages, $30), Ken Pollack, a former CIA analyst and Clinton-era National Security Council staffer, has penned a thoughtful rejoinder to those who, frustrated by President Bush's failures, might throw up their hands in frustration and walk away from the region.

Mr. Pollack is a good writer and his narrative is clear. He begins by outlining America's interests in the Middle East, dedicating separate chapters to oil, Israel, America's Arab allies, and nonproliferation. His acknowledgment of Israel's safety and security as a fundamental American interest is refreshing, given statements made by his colleagues at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy, where Mr. Pollack is director of research, and given an increasingly large bloc within the Democratic Party that now argues the opposite. He does not include terrorism, political Islam, and instability in countries such as Iraq as American interests per se, but rather as threats that emanate from other problems, a semantic construction that allows Mr. Pollack to argue that American policy should better address the root causes of the Middle East's troubles.

These he outlines in chapters examining socioeconomic problems and the crisis in Middle East politics. Mr. Pollack's omission of the treatment of women as a major social issue may surprise half the region's population, but his emphasis on the Middle East's "crippling educational method" is long overdue, as anyone who has ever sat through a university class in Egypt, Iraq, or Iran can attest. To his credit, Mr. Pollack condemns the tendency to mix education and politics--unfortunately an import now plaguing Middle Eastern studies in America--but the issue is worth more than the two pages he gives it here. A discussion of press incitement to violence, unfortunately missing in Mr. Pollack's analysis of the region, would also have been worthwhile. Arab broadcasting of hatred and agitation to murder has undermined peace efforts under both Presidents Clinton and Bush, yet too many diplomats happily ignore it.

In his policy proposals, Mr. Pollack bends similarly to the political winds; the position he stakes out in A Path Out of the Desert reflects a tendency to allow the mistakes of the Bush administration to crowd out the experience of his predecessors. This is especially apparent in his discussion of the root causes of terror and instability: He underplays the importance of Islamist ideology as a cause, in favor of an overemphasis on political and economic factors.

Mr. Pollack argues that political Islam "is not necessarily a threat to the United States," though he acknowledges that "neither is it unrelated to the threats we face from the Muslim Middle East." Later, he declares that "Islam is not the reason for the rise of Islamist movements, nor is it the cause of the terrorist threat that the United States faces." True, many Muslims may not accept the radical scriptural interpretations offered by fundamentalists, but it is wrong to argue that religious motivation, no matter how twisted the exegesis, isn't a chief motivating concern of Islamists.

In his effort to understand Islamism, Mr. Pollack has drawn on the work of a Sarah Lawrence College professor, Fawaz Gerges, whose work, if not quite apologetic for political Islam, is nevertheless superficial. Economic, political, and social grievance is only half the Islamist story: After all, most suicide bombers are not poor and dispossessed, but middle-class and educated. Perhaps Mr. Pollack is correct that suicide terrorists are not sociopaths, but what did mold them psychologically? Anger and despair are not explanation enough: Sub-Saharan Africa does not breed global suicide bombers like the Arab world. Nor do radical interpretations rise from grass roots; often Saudi funding for radical mosques plays an essential role.

Mr. Pollack is also too trusting of adversaries. He believes the former Iranian president, Mohammad Khatami, was sincere in his Dialogue of Civilizations, but the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate exposed the program as a cover for an accelerating covert nuclear weapons program.

With 20/20 hindsight, Mr. Pollack takes issue not with the Bush policy of pre-emption, but rather with the assessment of threats that brought about the war in Iraq. Nor does he oppose transformative diplomacy, just the incompetent way in which it was undertaken. He parts ways with liberals who ironically insist that democracy cannot take root in the Middle East's infertile ground. Former fellow travelers will be disappointed in his argument that economic liberalization--including, presumably, foreign direct investment--must come to the Arab world's socialized economies.

When he looks forward, Mr. Pollack's prescription--legal and educational reforms--should provoke little argument, and he is correct that the next administration must repackage its approach because of the stigma left behind by the Bush administration's whiplash reversals and poor policy implementation.

In an effort to rehabilitate the reputation of democracy promotion, Mr. Pollack traces its history to Clinton hands such as Madeleine Albright, Richard Holbrooke, and Dennis Ross, and "reasonable and moderate" Bush administration officials such as Richard Haass. This is hogwash. Bush administration implementation was both sloppy and spastic, but little in the historical record suggests the Clinton administration grasped transformative diplomacy as anything more than window dressing for their belief that autocracy equals stability.

Ultimately, there is very little new in the "grand strategy" Mr. Pollack suggests should replace the failed policies of the past. Indeed, while he describes himself as a liberal internationalist, A Path out of the Desert is little more than a neoconservative manifesto uncorrupted by the bluntness of Richard Perle or the arrogance of Douglas Feith.

His strategy consists, essentially, of implementing the George W. Bush doctrine as it was articulated during his first term: actively aiding reform in the region on the principle that short-term stability and long-term security are very different things.

Mr. Pollack might have contributed more had he also addressed how to reform the bloated and ineffective State Department and international organization bureaucracy, which impeded the implementation the first time around. Foggy Bottom is inept at international development, and the World Bank spends far more on its own administration than it does on micro-loans. Some proposals beg more realism. Creating regional security architecture sounds great in principle, but expecting Arab dictators to abandon their antipathy of Israel in order to solve regional problems is tilting at windmills. It is hard to judge, from this vantage, the merits of the Bush doctrine, since it was never implemented properly or competently, but as a vision of change in the Middle East it remains a compelling project. If Mr. Pollack's grand strategy gives the Bush doctrine a second wind, both the Middle East and long-term American national security will be better for it.

Michael Rubin
New York Sun
July 22, 2008

As Michael Rubin expressed in The Sun, the Middle East will continue to dominate American security concerns regardless of who next occupies the Oval Office. Record oil prices, terrorism, Israel's security, Iraqi stability, and Iran's nuclear ambitions will top the new president's foreign policy agenda, whatever his ideological outlook. Ken Pollack, a former CIA analyst and Clinton-era National Security Council staffer, has penned a thoughtful rejoinder to those who, frustrated by President Bush's failures, might throw up their hands in frustration and walk away from the region.

Mr. Pollack is a good writer and his narrative is clear. He begins by outlining America's interests in the Middle East, dedicating separate chapters to oil, Israel, America's Arab allies, and nonproliferation. His acknowledgment of Israel's safety and security as a fundamental American interest is refreshing, given statements made by his colleagues at the Saban Center for Middle East Policy, where Mr. Pollack is director of research, and given an increasingly large bloc within the Democratic Party that now argues the opposite. He does not include terrorism, political Islam, and instability in countries such as Iraq as American interests per se, but rather as threats that emanate from other problems, a semantic construction that allows Mr. Pollack to argue that American policy should better address the root causes of the Middle East's troubles.

These he outlines in chapters examining socioeconomic problems and the crisis in Middle East politics. Mr. Pollack's omission of the treatment of women as a major social issue may surprise half the region's population, but his emphasis on the Middle East's "crippling educational method" is long overdue, as anyone who has ever sat through a university class in Egypt, Iraq, or Iran can attest. To his credit, Mr. Pollack condemns the tendency to mix education and politics -- unfortunately an import now plaguing Middle Eastern studies in America -- but the issue is worth more than the two pages he gives it here. A discussion of press incitement to violence, unfortunately missing in Mr. Pollack's analysis of the region, would also have been worthwhile. Arab broadcasting of hatred and agitation to murder has undermined peace efforts under both Presidents Clinton and Bush, yet too many diplomats happily ignore it.

In his policy proposals, Mr. Pollack bends similarly to the political winds; the position he stakes out in "A Path Out of the Desert" reflects a tendency to allow the mistakes of the Bush administration to crowd out the experience of his predecessors. This is especially apparent in his discussion of the root causes of terror and instability: He underplays the importance of Islamist ideology as a cause, in favor of an overemphasis on political and economic factors.

Mr. Pollack argues that political Islam "is not necessarily a threat to the United States," though he acknowledges that "neither is it unrelated to the threats we face from the Muslim Middle East." Later, he declares that "Islam is not the reason for the rise of Islamist movements, nor is it the cause of the terrorist threat that the United States faces." True, many Muslims may not accept the radical scriptural interpretations offered by fundamentalists, but it is wrong to argue that religious motivation, no matter how twisted the exegesis, isn't a chief motivating concern of Islamists.

In his effort to understand Islamism, Mr. Pollack has drawn on the work of a Sarah Lawrence College professor, Fawaz Gerges, whose work, if not quite apologetic for political Islam, is nevertheless superficial. Economic, political, and social grievance is only half the Islamist story: After all, most suicide bombers are not poor and dispossessed, but middle-class and educated. Perhaps Mr. Pollack is correct that suicide terrorists are not sociopaths, but what did mold them psychologically? Anger and despair are not explanation enough: Sub-Saharan Africa does not breed global suicide bombers like the Arab world. Nor do radical interpretations rise from grass roots; often Saudi funding for radical mosques plays an essential role.

Mr. Pollack is also too trusting of adversaries. He believes the former Iranian president, Mohammad Khatami, was sincere in his Dialogue of Civilizations, but the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate exposed the program as a cover for an accelerating covert nuclear weapons program.

With 20/20 hindsight, Mr. Pollack takes issue not with the Bush policy of pre-emption, but rather with the assessment of threats that brought about the war in Iraq. Nor does he oppose transformative diplomacy, just the incompetent way in which it was undertaken. He parts ways with liberals who ironically insist that democracy cannot take root in the Middle East's infertile ground. Former fellow travelers will be disappointed in his argument that economic liberalization -- including, presumably, foreign direct investment -- must come to the Arab world's socialized economies.

When he looks forward, Mr. Pollack's prescription -- legal and educational reforms -- should provoke little argument, and he is correct that the next administration must repackage its approach because of the stigma left behind by the Bush administration's whiplash reversals and poor policy implementation.

In an effort to rehabilitate the reputation of democracy promotion, Mr. Pollack traces its history to Clinton hands such as Madeleine Albright, Richard Holbrooke, and Dennis Ross, and "reasonable and moderate" Bush administration officials such as Richard Haass. This is hogwash. Bush administration implementation was both sloppy and spastic, but little in the historical record suggests the Clinton administration grasped transformative diplomacy as anything more than window dressing for their belief that autocracy equals stability.

Ultimately, there is very little new in the "grand strategy" Mr. Pollack suggests should replace the failed policies of the past. Indeed, while he describes himself as a liberal internationalist, "A Path out of the Desert" is little more than a neoconservative manifesto uncorrupted by the bluntness of Richard Perle or the arrogance of Douglas Feith.

His strategy consists, essentially, of implementing the George W. Bush doctrine as it was articulated during his first term: actively aiding reform in the region on the principle that short-term stability and long-term security are very different things.

Mr. Pollack might have contributed more had he also addressed how to reform the bloated and ineffective State Department and international organization bureaucracy, which impeded the implementation the first time around. Foggy Bottom is inept at international development, and the World Bank spends far more on its own administration than it does on micro-loans. Some proposals beg more realism. Creating regional security architecture sounds great in principle, but expecting Arab dictators to abandon their antipathy of Israel in order to solve regional problems is tilting at windmills. It is hard to judge, from this vantage, the merits of the Bush doctrine, since it was never implemented properly or competently, but as a vision of change in the Middle East it remains a compelling project. If Mr. Pollack's grand strategy gives the Bush doctrine a second wind, both the Middle East and long-term American national security will be better for it.

The formulation of any strategy is dependent on knowing the goals which the strategy is to achieve. In this excellent book, Pollack identifies two goals that he sees as the purpose of his so-called Grand Strategy for the Middle East. The first goal is to ensure the flow of oil from the Middle Eastern and to protect its petroleum reserves. The second goal is to ensure the national security of the State of Israel. The first goal is based on the fact that the U.S. (and world) economy currently is dependent on petroleum. The second goal is based on the fact that the very value system of the U.S. demands that the nation support the Israeli State. Of the two the second is the most important since it is directly related to what the U.S. means as a nation-state.

Pollock then identifies how he believes the U.S. can achieve these goals. In his thinking, if peace, prosperity and the rule of law can be implanted among the Islamic states of the Middle East some form of democracy and regional stability will follow. Ironically peace, prosperity, and rule of law are also what the Islamic fundamentalist (including the Salafi extremists) wish to achieve although they appear to wish a theocracy rather than a democracy. Also Pollock understands prosperity to be a direct function of a free market economy and a secular, but functioning legal system. He therefore advocates a sensible implementation of a long term strategy involving diplomatic, economic and social operations designed to move the Middle East in this direction. And he realistically sees this implementation as running over years if not decades.

He addresses the issue of terrorism with equal good sense. He implies, but does not state that the U.S. will never be entirely safe from terrorist attacks simply because of the nature of terrorism as a function of the disaffected. But he maintains that Islamic forms of terrorism are less probable in a prosperous and just society. In the same manner a prosperous and just Middle East will not solve the problems of Israel and the Palestinian question, but it may make them easier to resolve for all concerned.

Now this all should sound pretty familiar since this is more or less the strategy that the George W. Bush administration espoused as the main reason for Operation Iraqi Freedom. Pollock supported this action, (see The Threatening Storm, 2002), but believes that the Bush administration so mismanaged post-war Iraq and demonstrated such monumental incompetence as to give this strategy a permanent black eye. Pollock sees this as a tragic consequence and argues that with intelligent and thoughtful implementation this strategy is truly the way to bring the Middle East as a whole into the fellowship of prosperous and just societies. He may be right.

Here is The Economist's Review of Path Out of the Desert.

The Economist
Books and Arts
America and the Middle East
How they got in, how to get out
Jul 24th 2008
From The Economist print edition

Foresight and hindsight in the world's bad places
A Path Out of the Desert: A Grand Strategy for America in the Middle East
By Kenneth M. Pollack
Random House; 539 pages; $30

A Choice of Enemies: America Confronts the Middle East
By Lawrence Freedman
PublicAffairs; 624 pages; $29.95. Weidenfeld & Nicolson; £20

HOW did America get into its current mess in the Middle East? And how can it get out again? Kenneth Pollack's book is all about the second question but he starts by making a confession relevant to the first. He was a champion of the invasion of Iraq. In 2002, in an influential book entitled "The Threatening Storm", he argued the strategic and moral case for removing Saddam Hussein. Mr Pollack admits now that the intervention a year later was a fiasco, and that after such a disaster the inclination of most Americans is to turn away from the region completely and focus on problems at home. But that is not his view. His latest book is a powerful argument for continued, and perhaps even greater, American involvement in the Middle East.

As befits a former CIA analyst and member of the National Security Council, Mr Pollack builds his case on a hard-headed examination of America's interests in the region. Of these, the most important is oil. If a big percentage of it were suddenly to be removed from the market, the shock of higher prices could on some estimates spark a global recession akin to the Great Depression. American policy, he concludes, should therefore be designed principally to prevent "catastrophic oil disruptions". This means guarding against possibilities such as a revolution in Saudi Arabia or a massive terrorist attack on the oil-supply network.

You might expect a book that starts this way to dwell mainly on how America can maintain military forces in the region. Mr Pollack, however, wants nothing less than "an integrated grand strategy" to secure American interests for the long run. Such a strategy, he admits, may take "many decades", just as it took nearly half a century for America to help Europe and East Asia repair themselves after the second world war. For this grand strategy to work, he says, America will first have to harmonise its separate policies towards Iraq, Iran and Israel. It must also transform the region's politics and economics. That is to say--let no one accuse the chastened Mr Pollack of imperial hubris--America must help along the efforts of the locals, since outsiders "cannot possibly know how to change the society of another people".

But do the people of the Middle East want what America wants for them? Given the growth of political Islam, and the fact that Mr Pollack deems many Arab countries to be on the point of revolution, perhaps not. Nonetheless, a policy of continuing to prop up repressive regimes is like "playing Russian roulette" with foreign policy, as America discovered when the shah's fall turned Iran from staunch friend to implacable foe. Far better, he says, to encourage the region's governments to address popular grievances by embracing political freedom and social equality.

This will not be easy, not least because of the hated Bush administration's insincere or at least incompetent pursuit of this very policy. But Arabs tell pollsters that they want both democracy and Islam, and Mr Pollack reckons these two are compatible. Quoting an Egyptian activist who says that what her countrymen need is a job and a voice, he thinks America must find its path out of the desert by helping all Arabs get both.

A simple summary of Mr Pollack's main ideas does scant justice to this thoughtful and informative book. None of its prescriptions is especially novel. The patient promotion of reform, careful containment of the spillover from Iraq, a policy of carrots and sticks (but no military pre-emption) for Iran, building the sinews of a Palestinian state: to all except isolationists and the few surviving neocons, this has become a fairly conventional prospectus for America's post-Iraq policy in the Middle East. But Mr Pollack binds the strands together deftly and imparts a good deal of learning and wisdom along the way.

Sir Lawrence Freedman is less interested in how America should proceed after Iraq and more in working out how it tied itself in such knots in the first place. As an historian, he is more tolerant than Mr Pollack of George Bush, noting that after September 11th this president faced a challenge more complex in some ways than the one Franklin Roosevelt had to deal with after Pearl Harbour in 1941. Whereas Roosevelt knew who the enemy was and what America would have to do, Mr Bush had to choose and name an enemy in a new sort of war without obvious rules, aims or front-lines. He did so, moreover, in a region where no power had exercised a consistently sure touch, and where America had long been torn between an underlying dissatisfaction with the state of affairs and the traditional instinct of a great power to protect the status quo from aggressive states or radical movements.

It is instructive to read these books together. Sir Lawrence's aim is not to lay out a policy. He has no grand unifying theory of the Middle East. His aim is only to render the "most credible" account possible of momentous events such as the fall of the shah, the three wars in the Persian Gulf, invasion and jihad in Afghanistan, Jimmy Carter's half-success at peacemaking at Camp David in 1978 and Bill Clinton's failure there two decades later. All these and more formed the treacherous backdrop of American interests and alliances against which Mr Bush had to formulate his response to the attacks on the twin towers. Sir Lawrence's subtle narrative is a marvel of concision, even over more than 500 pages. By the end it cannot but make the reader wonder how realistic it is to advocate, as Mr Pollack does, an "integrated grand strategy" capable of being sustained for decades in such a violent and unpredictable part of the world.

To that Mr Pollack has a simple answer, in the form of a question. What is the alternative? Thanks to its energy needs, America is locked into the region for the foreseeable future, even though the future is so hard to foresee in the unhappy Middle East. Since there are no quick fixes, it had better reconcile itself to the long slog. And although unexpected events will continue to knock it off course, it is more likely to succeed if it can cling to at least some general sense of where it is trying to go.

The Earth does not revolve around the U.S.; Pollock, however, writes as though it does. China is rapidly taking an important (often lead) NON-JUDGMENTAL role in resource-rich nations; meanwhile, Muslims within the Mid-East take an increasingly jaundiced view of the U.S. (involvement in overthrowing Iranian leaders, support for autocrats, flaunting American customs within holy Muslim lands, invading Iraq, prisoner abuse), while others tire of our constant self-interested meddling in their internal affairs while failing to correct our own problems - eg. political domination by vested business interests, an over-extended military, an obvious bias towards Israel, enormous federal and trade deficits, unwillingness to cooperate in solving global warming, a lack of a credible energy policy, and out-of-control health care and education systems.

The principal theme of Pollock's book is that America must take a long-term, internationally-assisted, strategic view of the Middle East aimed at encouraging these countries to pursue gradual political, economic, and social reform from within.

Pollock correctly alleges that autocracy, patronage, bloated bureaucracies, stifling of dissent, inadequate education, unemployment and underemployment all predominate in the region. He also admits that efforts to work with the region's autocrats failed in the 1990s because of public anger at the U.S. vs. Israel. Yet, he still blithely proceeds with the conclusion that the U.S. has a moral debt to support the creation of Israel because of the Holocaust (I thought Nazi Germany was responsible!) and that Israel further deserves support because of their "democratic" nature - unless you're an Arab within Israel, or worse yet, a West Bank Palestinian constantly subject to property expropriation and roadblocks that make earning a living difficult. (Pollock also forgets that democracy in the Mid-East has not worked out well for either the U.S. or Israel - witness the results in Lebanon, Palestine and Iraq. Similarly, elections in Croatia, Rwanda, and Serbia were manipulated by depots who whipped up long-standing ethnic sentiments to launch ethnic cleansings.)

Pollock's recommendations for increased cultural exchanges and commerce between the Mid-East and America make sense - encouraging their acquisition of consumer goods would reduce feelings of hopelessness and futility, and provide a disincentive for violence (eg. towards Israel). However, this will not accomplish nearly as much as desired.

Pollock forgets that China's power and respect is quickly rising due to their rapidly improving economy - standards of living are on track to improve 100X within a human life span. Further, their non-judgmental approach to relationships with other nations, non-attachment to Isreal, and strong currency are likely much more attractive to the Mid-East than our own involvement. As for current U.S. domination of important institutions such as the IMF, World Bank, and U.N. Security Council - these are not likely to last after China becomes the world's most powerful economy by 2050; regardless, China has worked its miracle without them. Finally, U.S. credibility as a mentor was severely damaged when we "helped" Russia's initial reform efforts, reducing their GNP 45%, increasing crime, and lowering health levels.

The U.S. obtains only a minority of its oil from the Mid-East, and China represents the greatest opportunity for increased oil demand. So, why should the Mid-East put up with more aggravation from us when the Chinese pose a more attractive alternative?

Bottom Line: Pollock is living in the past. The U.S., preceded by Britain, has made a mess out of the Mid-East. Hopefully, China's future involvement will lead to significant improvement.

Anyone involved in running for a congressional seat, working on a congressional election or just interested in national politics will find this book enormously interesting. It's short. It's down to earth. It's up-to-date. And, it's one of the best on the subject. Professor Jacobson's book features pertinent analysis of national survey data plugged into long-term electoral trends. It covers all you need to know about how to make a run for Congress, calculating your odds and the chances of knocking off an incumbent. It is a unique blend of academic effort and practicality that is continually useful. It is the very best on what to expect in congressional elections for the U.S. House and Senate.

This is one of the best and most valuable political science texts I have ever read - and, as a political science major, self-confessed politics junkie and activist, I've read most of them. Gary Jacobson's research is unmatched and his findings are essential to anyone who wants to get involved in Congressional campaigns. His assessment of the role of money in such campaigns is astounding and discomforting. While the going gets dry at times, overall the book is a good read with very practical applications today.

--Bill Arnone

This book is hilarious satire, and it reminds me of why I used to love the Daily Show. The show always did a great job of satirizing current events, and this book picks up where the show left off, satirizing things that don't fall so neatly into the "current events" category. It is probably funnier if you have at least some knowledge of American and World history, because you just won't get some of the jokes if you don't. Also, I'd like to add that you can enjoy this book even if you aren't a left-leaner, because it was written before the 2004 election - in other words, before Jon Stewart sold out his comedic integrity for partisanship and changed his show from picking on America to picking on Republicans.

I'll make it quick. It is a book, which makes you at least giggle, or laugh aloud from the first to the last page. It is a great satiric masterpiece, on the american policy, of the new century !!! Do not forget to buy two dice. That is the only thing NOT included in this book. Have fun.

Just like a book from Barnes & Noble. Perfect Quality. No issues. No complaints. Delivered before it was supposed to be and arrived early. Great!

I love this book. It's a great laugh and makes learning about the government fun. Jon Stewart is funny and his sarcasm is wonderful

If you come accross this book expecting an honest discussion about politics then you will be surely dissapointed. The nuances of the Federal government are cut open for all to see. Then if that weren't enough the authors go ahead and pour salt in the wounds by humiliating these supposedly pious fools. It only gets four stars because it is entirely to liberal biased (before i get 500 conservatives calling me a great american i must clearly state that I am a liberal myself)it would have been nice to see a conservatives corner or something to that affect so that they could poke fun at their counterparts.

Noam Chomsky writes about the first 9/11 which took place on Tuesday September 11th 1973 in Chile when the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende was overthrown by the military forces of Augusto Pinochet. The coup had full backing of he US government and an estimated 3200 people where killed(although figures are believed to be twice as high) and over 30000 people tortured. The government of Pinochet started collaborating with other right wing dictatorships in the South american region creating an international state terrorist program called "Operation Condor". This program "killed and tortured mercilessly in the region and branched out to terrorist operations in Europe and the United States".

Pinochet was greatly honored by both Ronald Reagan and Thatcher. But worse terror was to come in both Argentina and the central American region by "the current incumbents in Washington and their immediate mentors". It was really the American fear of the independent nationalism of Chile that sparked this coup. The fear was based on the fact that Chile might become a "conttagious example", as Henry Kissinger called it, for other nations to follow. Therefore Americas obssession with Cubas successfull "defiance of the master" or even with Irans defiance with their overthrowing of the Shah in 1979. This was the real reason for the US intervention in Vietnam as well, because the country could become a "virus infecting others" (notably resource rich Indonesia). This could eventually destabalize the entire region putting the resource interests of US corporations and the British at risk . In other words, it was necessary to "justify destruction of parliamentary regimes and imposition of murderous dictatorships throughout much of the world in order to guarantee stability and control of vital resources". The virus had to be destroyed.

Public fear would have it that the domino theory would be put into effect. Ho Chi Min would conquer South East Asia, and the successfull rebellion in Nicaragua would create many similar states in central America spreading the communist scourge all over the world. Therefore it was important to sell the idea that you where fighting the Soviets, when in fact it was democracies pursuing national interests that where being crushed to ensure the safeguarding of access to resources. The Soviets have now been replaced by narco trafficers, Al-qaeda or just terrorists in general. These have all become legitimate excuses for interventions and "democracy promotion", the latest example of course being Iraq. As the pipe dream of weapons of mass destruction became apparent, the high flying ideal of democracy promotion was put forward by the Bush II administration. This would surley lead to a democratization of the whole region. The truth is that it has had quite the contraty effect, actually it has promoted the spread of terrorism in the region. This was now turned into an "idealistic war" based on Americas "messianic mission" to bring democracy to the middle east.

Britain created modern day Iraq to ensure control over its oil resources after the fall of the Ottoman Empire after world war 1. The Iraqi wealth remained in the hands of a few wealthy landowners, sheiks and of course the British. Their colonial rule and its brutally repressive society lasted up until 1958 when Abdul Karim Kasim overthrew the British colonial rulers. Both the British and the Americans reacted immediatley fearing the Qasims actions would spread like a virus among other Arab states in the region. It had to be stopped and president Eisenhower went as far as to say that Qasim was trying to "get control of the middle east oil to get the income and the power to destroy the western world". Of course this virus had to be stopped and in 1963 the CIA under the Kennedy administration organized a regime change in Iraq, in collaboration with a young Saddam Hussein and the Baath party. The CIA provided the Baath party with lists of suspected Communists and leftists and the slaughter began. National security council staffer Roger Morris writes about this time saying "The Baathists systematically murdered untold numbers of Iraqs educated elite" including "hundreds of doctors, teachers, technicians, lawyers and other professionals as well as military and political figures."

Americas actions during the Reagan administration in El Salvador during the 1980s became a model for Iraq. Here the administration saw to it that "technically credible elections" where held but that the Christian democratic candidate won. The administration "could not concieve of an El Salvador in which the military was not the dominant actor, the economic elite no longer held the national economy in its hand" ..."the US government had no real conception of democracy in El Salvador." As the "democracy promotion" commenced in El Salvador the state sponsored terror expanded within the country, all the while supported by Washington. The opposition was slaughtered in the 10s of thousands, the independent press was completley destroyed, and torture, rape and other atrocities where rampantly commited by government sanctioned death squads. In the words of the (surviving) jesuit priests of the country "alternatives that differ from those of the powerfull" didnt stand a chance.

John Negroponte is serving in the current Bush administration in charge of counterterrorism. He worked as ambassador to Honduras during the 1980s. Here he was also in charge of, at the time, the worlds largest CIA station. Negroponte "was essentially managerially in charge of the Contra war in an extraordinary way for a diplomat". Negroponte denied the atrocitiés being commited in Honduras so as to assure that the military aid kept flowing to the international terrorist operations he was running. He was closely associated with General Alvarez who was the chief of the Honduran armed forces, Negroponte praised his "dedication to democracy", the infamous Honduran batallion 3-16 was one of the most brutal and vicious groups of Latin American killers and they where on the CIA payroll.

America has overthrown many democratically elected governments and installed brutal military dictatorships in their place. Some examples include: Guatemala, Iran, Chile, Brazil and a long list of others. All in the name of "democracy promotion". But instead of promoting democracy, democracy has been subverted. Client states have instead been created, designed to serve the privledged elites and creating "favorable interests for her(Americas) private overseas investment". Communism was often used as a cover term for the threat of independant development. So infact the "virus" that has been repeatedly destroyed has been popular democracy.

Noam Chomsky describes two diagramtically opposed faces of his own country; one relating to what its government does and another relating to what his fellow citizens know. In between there is a compliant press that is not good at being impartial. The government of the USA seems to be an oligarchy that leans to the far right and less far right alternately, and the press seems to be its propaganda machine. I am not a communist, not even a socialist. I merely belive in an intrinsic dignity of humanity that needs to be more assertive. While he may not have all the answers, Noam Chomsky helps us ask more questions.

Ever since learning about Ron Paul last January, my interest in politics, especially those of the libertarian position, have increased approximately 800%. I considered myself a libertarian a good year before learning about him and his campaign but once I got into his message and delved deeper into the foreign policies of the likes of McCain, Obama, Hillary, and past figures such as Reagan and Bill Clinton, I was revolutionized and cured of any and all political apathy I had. Of course my libertarian views don't just rest on foreign policy, but it is a large part of my concern.

So though I generally do not agree with Noam Chomsky on economics and private property, I understand where he's coming from and I know he means well; I generally agree with the rest of his views, including his foreign policy views which are similar to Ron Paul inasmuch as he views the United States' arrogance with nation-building and intervention as a key problem in the world today. This is actually the first Chomsky book I have read and will not be the last. Presented almost in the manner of an extended thesis paper (quotes and citations are in the thousands in this book), it makes for a stimulated if occasionally dry read as Chomsky begins by dissecting America's interventionist "democracy promoting" policies in Iraq, Vietnam, and elsewhere as well as our supreme hypocrisy with propping up brutal regimes in places such as Indochina and elsewhere. He mentions that as conflicts such as the 1999 NATO bombing of Serbia raged, brutal dictators elsewhere were left unscathed, as our economic and resource interests lay abound with the support of many of these brutal regime. Chomsky proves in a very academic sense how few (and possibly none) of our foreign policy intrusions since Woodrow Wilson (and dating back to John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson) have been for much more than empire-building, resource claiming, and the removal and/or propping-up of dictators who are against our interests (in the former's case) and who will be an aid to our interests (in the latter).

Though I found Chomsky to be somewhat of a dry writer (like I said, the book assumes you have a vast knowledge of American foreign policy history past and present), he is brilliant. When I say dry I mean that it is very clinical and not written in a way that might grab the average reader, but for readers like myself with an attention span and an interest in the subject it is a blast to read. I found myself marking pages and highlighting a lot so I could go back and do further research upon completion.

In short, this is an excellent read for anyone curious about America's disastrous and insanely hypocritical and arrogant policies towards our fellow nations. Neocon republicans (and some Democrats who worship the likes of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama) will be brought to rage by its brutal honesty, but in the end will not be able to intelligently refute any of it. Highly recommended.

This is the first time I have felt compelled to write a review. Perhaps I need to read earlier books, but Failed States seems extremely biased, lacking focus, incoherent, and having a weak structure. I don't necessarily disagree with the conclusions in it, but I find the presentation of his ideas inadequate toward convincing a non-biased audience.

The book throws facts, figures, and data at you at an impressive rate, but doesn't try to build that information into a convincing whole. The authors obvious familiarity with the topics matters little when an unbiased reader is confused by his casual references and statements of fact with minimal support. Information without structure and context is very suspect. In particular, his claims of what the American people really want seemed to be casually talked about.

Even so I enjoyed reading criticism of American foreign policy. Concerning that criticism, the author doesn't offer a foil by comparing it to those Failed States that the US is being compared to. Nor, despite the authors claims to the contrary, does he really offer much advice upon specific changes. I believe he thinks changes needed are evident by what he chooses to attack. They weren't obvious to me besides "Stop doing the horrible things I am telling you about." That isn't telling anyone what they should be doing instead.

I'm a bit curious if the authors believes he is influencing open-minded people with the book. Obvious bias weakens credability. I am forced to hazard the guess that this is simply written for those who already agree with his stances.

When he stuck-to books on Transformational grammar,the Noamster was an interesting academic.[Providing insight into so-called Language Acquisition Mechanism...triggered in children in all languages by exposure to mother's "baby talk"and her function as LANGUAGE LOGOS...and a complementary READING Acquisition Mechanism(which is not-quite-as "automatic"(cf~Frank Smith UNDERSTANDING READING~A Psycholinguistic Analysis of Reading & Learning to Read)and can be(has been)driven into latency by too much of the Plug-in Drug(TV)and Digital stupor(Computer gazing & BATMAN violent/mindless video games;cf~The DUMBEST GENERATION by Professor Mark Bauerlein]...

As political commentator,however,Chomsky has consistently manifested himself as intolerant,intellectual inbred(disagree with NC at MIT seminar and you'll fail the class,or be thrown-out). His appeal is to relics of Marcuse-GrouchoMarxist/epoch who take their spoiled,privileged lives in the USA for granted like petulant brats they have" become like that which they behold & are beholden to." Chomsky's pol-raving is often unreadable dreck, popularized by Heideggerians and PM claque. If you want to read what you "think" you're reading in Chomsky,start with Czeslaw Milosz's THE CAPTIVE MIND. The United States is the most successful experiment in Res populi in world history. If you don't concede this,you need to visit a Worker's Paradise.(Second:read DARKNESS AT NOON by Koestler before you go~~it may keep you from getting shot by those you fawningly worship from safety of this wonderful nation.Or read some--now defunct--USSR history. Here's your murderous KGB/OGPU-power abusing FAILED STATE)...

Marion Nestle is an amazing researcher that worked diligently to unravel the truth about Lobbyists for the food industry, and their effect on the Food Pyramid. Americans are eating today based on the misnomers of a politized Congressional debate. It is the most fascinating read I have ever had. It will not only inform you, but change the way we eat and the way we feed our families. This book has had a tremendous impact on my life and I'm sure it will have the same effect on yours. Since the "Super Size Me" experiment of Morgan Spurlock, who called Marion Nestle his mentor, Americans are more concerned about our food source. Marion Nestles research will not oly help you to understand the problems of food labeling, but teach you what questions we should be asking our selves before we choose what we eat. I have attached a copy of the link to her book. It is a must read. So, be sure to treat yourself and your loved ones to a whole new understanding of how "Political" food truly can be. http://www.amazon.com/Food-Politics-Influences-Nutrition-California/dp/0520254031/ref=cm_cmu_up_add_glance

There's much to say about Nestle's "Food Politics" and "What To Eat," but the overarching message is that the food industries lie compulsively in order to maximize profits. There's no reason to assume that food-company profit maximization would lead to any desirable outcome: they will produce more food every year in the quest for profit growth, and that food will be as artificial and toxic as the laws will allow them. They will resist any food labeling that might harm their sales. This includes:

* "organic" (which implies that some foods are better than others)
* warnings about toxicity (e.g., methylmercury in tuna)
* the USDA food pyramid, which explicitly places junk food at the top and low-profit vegetables near the bottom

They offload the regulatory burden onto consumers: if you're getting fat, it's your own fault. Of course, they say this while they fight tooth and nail against any labeling requirement that might help you choose. And they fight against any regulation that might make you safer at their expense.

And of course there's the advertising. The same companies that tearfully demand your 'freedom to choose' with hand over heart are the same ones that target your children: everything from Saturday-morning cartoon ads to McDonald's sponsorship of Teletubbies to Coca-Cola branded baby bottles. In-depth psychological research understands exactly what will make your child tug at your sleeve in the grocery store and beg for the most profitable sugary cereal. So you have the 'freedom to choose', defended by companies that do all they can to deny it.

Marion Nestle's magisterial books prove these points in extraordinary detail, yet they pull off the trick with an eloquence that makes them read like novels. The basic premise, though, is beyond dispute: food companies exist to maximize shareholder return. Their investors demand growth every year. There's no reason to expect that this demand will work in your favor.

Marion Nestle has a lot of useful and important information in this book; however, her style is very clinical and mundane. I found myself working to stay awake whenever I read the book. I did finish it, because I think it's good knowledge to have, but a better writer could have made the material pop.

When I came back to USA in 1990 from Japan after 10 years, I was a little shocked. It's there are so many obese. I stop seeing proportionate people as I admired once before (since I'm from Japan; we were small and rather plain looking.) What happened! I thought it's that soda-pop as I always watch the countless gallon bottles my next customers are buying at the every grocery shopping. As I was wondering, this nation sued tobacco companies. So I kept wondering, why don't they blame major soda-pop companies for obese. Soda-pop companies are not the sole culprit, but I was surprised to find that tabacco companies and sweet companies are somehow related. Anyhow, whatever the policy that the government had or have, if any, failed. I really hope to do something to improve American diet. Sooner is better. (I go to large Oriental Grocery Store at least once a month. You will be amazed how much size of green section they carry. It's almost 10 times of what Giants or Safeway carries, for example.)

I found this book to be very informative about the political workings of the food industry. I agree with several other reviewers that it is a little dull and in an factual style (kind of reminds me of a history book. However I like that kind of reading, so it doesn't bother me.)

This book's basic premise is that the food industry's purpose is to sell as much food as possible. The food industry doesn't care about its consumers and encourages them to eat more than they need, produces lots of useless, cheap, junk food, and will do whatever it can within the political system (mostly legal, but sometimes illegal. The author documents one such example of price collusion) to set up an environment that is the most favorable to its interests.

The book documents how the FDA, Congress, and government agencies are influenced by the food industry. It provides details about the food industry's lobbying, studies and research grants funded by various segments of the food industry, the food industry's attempts to gain brand loyalty though school contracts, conflicts with the school lunch program, and attempts to maximize sales through bonuses for the schools. It chronicles the rise of the supplement industry and their involvement with the FDA.

The author does seem to have a somewhat leftist agenda in the last chapter in giving recommendations; but with that exception, I thought the overall tone of the book was neutral and strictly documentary. It's good solid book which people who are interested in their health or the American food industry should read.

A great, independent book that's neither to the left or the right in politics. This book was my favorite read of the year, and worth reading regardless of political or philosophical beliefs. Approachable and easy to read, but not "dumbed" down.

I could hardly get through this ponderous tome. Unlike his book "The Revolution: A Manifesto". This is not concise. Rather it is prolix. This book consists of nearly every speech given by Ron Paul from the house floor. Although I am not sure he is correct in his beliefs, he has shown a remarkable consistency through the years.

This book is not an easy read. It contains a very large portion of Ron Paul's congressional speeches and his own post-speech commentary on the meaning of the speeches and comments on the timeliness of them. This book affirms his stellar voting record and is interesting to see his forecast of current problems we are facing on every front as a nation. If only congress could slightly awaken to these types of founding principles that our nation was built upon, maybe we would have a much healthier nation today. This book is an excellent resource for anyone who wants a historical look at Paul's congressional actions.

This book explains in Ron Paul's own words the reasoning for avoiding "entangled alliances." It is absolutely amazing how for 30 years this man has beat the same drum for our liberties here in our homeland. It shows just how tireless Ron Paul is in spreading the message of peace and liberty. His speeches given on the House floor are full of history (showing how we got where we are today) with a bit of almost "prophetic" wisdom of where this country is heading with the continuation of our poor foreign policy. In one speech in particular (NEOCONNED!) he names names. His personal diary entry at the beginning of the Iraq invasion...well it shows the man. Ron Paul will be in the history books. That is unless WE allow those who are in charge of writing them now to remain in power.

In A Foreign Policy of Freedom, Ron Paul presents his thoughts on foreign policy in a very logical manner substantiated by both reason and history. Paul provides a collection of his statements to congress over the last thirty years that will be eye opening as many of Paul's cautions that went unheard later came into fruition near exactly how he predicted.

Whether one agrees with his views and is in search of validation, or completely disagrees yet is willing to test one's reasoning against some weighty questions, one will find this book fully delivers. I have always believed that if I truly am committed to any position, entertaining the thoughts of an opposing position will serve to strengthen my views as it holds up under full investigation. What I found is that when fully scrutinized, Paul's position on foreign policy is the only logical position that leads to a stronger and safer America in the long run.

Paul prefers armed neutrality to international intervention, leaving many of his detractors asking whether armed neutrality equals isolationism, which could not be further from the truth. Critics of this policy who consider an international military presence essential to our safety will discover many revealing details throughout history that suggest otherwise.

For those tired of the hypocrisy of the right wing that views government domestically as incompetent and dangerous yet somehow able to bring freedom and democracy to any other land (or conversely the hypocrisy of the left wing that prefers the polar opposite), Paul's message will resonate with you immediately. Paul displays an understanding of history that few politicians can match and aptly displays the negative results of continuously supporting "our enemies' enemies as our friends" over the last half century. Consider that "for decades we have been both allies and enemies of Saddam Hussein, Osama bin Laden, and the Islamists in Iran. And where has it gotten us?" It is interesting to note as Paul points out that we have had the same vision for decades regarding the Middle East and yet things are as dangerous and precarious as they have ever been.

Is it so unexpected that we should at the very least be asking ourselves critical questions about our foreign policies? If we disagree, would asking such questions not merely strengthen our resolve? Ron Paul poses these questions that every voter and taxpayer in the US should be asking themselves; and Paul addresses all of them.

"Most Americans do not want to appear weak; they enjoy expressions of strength and bravado. They fail to understand that self-confidence and true strength of conviction place restraints on the use of force, that peaceful solutions to problems require greater wisdom than unprovoked force." Are you among those that place pretense over result, or are you willing to get passed the foolish notion that any opposing ideas to mere aggression are unpatriotic or weak. If you find yourself in the latter, there is no book I am aware of on the issue of foreign policy that I recommend higher than A Foreign Policy of Freedom.

If you want to read a book of significance, look no further. While it may be a difficult read it is one of the most influential and important books ever written.

There were only 9 reviews on this book . . . what can one say. . . either something brings you to this book or it does not. . . if you are reading these reviews, then buy it.

This book is one of the most important and influential works on ethics. It is dense, not an easy read, the structure is loose and troublesome at times, but it is groundbreaking and brilliant.

There are many internet resources to guide you along the reading,. so do not be intimidated. Much of future work will rest on the contributions by Kant.

This version of the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals provides a clear and concise introduction. You will find it useful to understand how Kant's moral philosophy fits within his general philosophy and to get acquainted with some of the debates around his work. Although this book is rather expensive for what it is, it is useful and worth buying if you are really interested in this topic.

As translator H.J. Paton states in his introduction, 'Kant's "Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals" is one of the small books which are truly great' despite the unapproachability of the title. Many rank this book alongside Aristotle's 'Ethics' and Plato's 'Republic'. Its main topic is the supremacy of morals and moral action, and Paton gives a section by section analysis of Kant's book. The purpose of this work is not to work out all of the implications and difficulties with the a priori part of ethics, but rather to set a foundation of the supreme principle of morality.

The centerpiece of the Groundwork is Kant's most famous proposition, the Categorical Imperative. While this is often equated with the Golden Rule (do unto others as you would have them do unto you), the Categorical Imperative argues for a more universal set of moral action - for example, if one does not mind being lied to, then lying does not become a problem, according to the Golden Rule, but for Kant, this would be unacceptable as it is a violation of the rational principles of what morals are.

Kant proceeds to look at issues of law, duty, free will and the good will, and autonomy of action. Kant argues strongly for the need for philosophy to guard against whim, taste and personal desire from becoming normative agents in the way we construct the moral universe. He argue for objective principles to govern the will, and categorises these as either hypothetical or categorical. 'All imperatives command either hypothetically or categorically. Hypothetical imperatives declare a possible action to be practically necessary as a means to the attainment of something else that one wills (or that one may will). A categorical imperative would be one which represented an action as objectively necessary in itself apart from its relation to a further end.'

Kant goes from this discussion to the formulation of universal law and the way in which rational agents should formulate and view this kind of law. The final section of this work introduces ideas that will be more fully developed in Kant's 'Critique of Practical Reason', the second of his three-volume Critiques. He also covers some of the arguments from 'Critique of Pure Reason', but not very fully; as Paton states in his analysis, 'Kant cannot assume the elaborate arguments of the "Critique of Pure Reason" to be familiar to his readers nor can he attempt to repeat these elaborate arguments in a short treatise on ethics.' The finite, rational person must regard himself or herself both as a member of the world of experience/perception and also as a member of the world of ideas/rationality. This is the essence of the Empiricist/Rationalist split that Kant synthesises together in the first Critique.

This is not easy going - the original 'Groundwork' had 128 pages, contained here in less than 100 (allowing for type-face differences as well as translation). Paton's version has 40 pages of analysis, endnotes, an index, and a statement about the translation - it is the 40 pages of analysis, keyed to section-by-section sequence, that makes this a very useful edition. This is perhaps the best first text of Kant to read to get a sense of his style, thought, and the foundation of what has become known as his most important principle.

'Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals' by Immanuel Kant is easily the most important work devoted exclusively to thinking about morality in the history of Philosophy, especially considering it's size.

The cornerstone of the work, and the end result of Kant's analysis is the categorical imperative which says that a moral law are only those for which you can state should be true of all people.

In one fell swoop, Kant marginalizes all thinking about relativism in morality and at the same time distinguishes moral from religious thinking.

If you pair this up with St. Paul's statements in his letter to the Romans (3:19-28) which states strongly that adherance to the law has virtually nothing to do with salvation, it should make things pretty clear to all concerned.

Unfortunately, things are rarely that simple. As important as Kant's conclusion is, it is necessary but not sufficient for a complete analysis of morality.

One excuse may be that this work is really Kant's version of 'Cliff Notes' to his moral argument. His full presentation comes in the 'Critique of Practical Reason', which, however, is not often read.

Note that contrary to another review of this edition, the translator and commentator is the noted Kant scholar of 70 years ago, H. J. Paton.

To people who are not used to reading philosophy, I will not hide the fact that Kant is tough going. He may not be quite as tough as Hegel, the Existentialists, or the ancient Greeks, but he is definitely harder to understand than any modern nonfiction book I can think of.

The biggest argument against the 'Groundwork' and the categorical imperative is usually the fact that it does not rule out trivial rules, such as 'you must always eat a starch at least once a day'. This rule is physically possible for anyone living anywhere in the world, yet it is certainly not a moral law. It is not even a very good dietary law, but that's neither here nor there. A second argument is that Kant's argument seems a bit circular, when he says that the only thing which unqualifiedly good is a good will.

For anyone who has been vexed by moral questions, an honest reading of this work will at the very least give you hope that with the right amount of thought, one can make sense of moral issues.

A truly great book.