Politics Government Books

This is a great book on the timeless principles of freedom. I highly recommend reading it.

As I operate [...] and focus on monetary issues I must say that the section on money and currency could have been expanded.

I would only add some basic monetary theory. Gold and silver are not mere commodities but essential checks and balances in the political machinery of the United States. Sound money protects against despotic inroads by governments. The use of bills of credit in violation of the Constitution allows for confiscation through inflation without due process of law.

What are the 28 Principles of Freedom incorporated into the Constitution by the Founding Fathers? This inspirational book should be included in every school curriculum. Put this on your "must read" list.

I found this book very well written and easy to read. America is a great nation but must stick to the principles laid down by the founding fathers, or else it will fall behind.

The book is well researched and should be read by every American citizen!

The constitution, what does it mean anymore? This document changed the course of the world and this book will tell you why the United States of America changed the world in 200 years. Sadly, it is also pointing out why we are loosing what has made us so strong.

This book yes, should be required reading.

Do you want a book that will honestly change your whole way of thinking about American Government, are you willing to be challenged? Take the dare, you will not regret it.

If you are a liberal, Democrat or Republican, how about, just an American, this book is for you.

Are you new to the concepts of Natural Law? This is a good jumping off point.

The book is an easy read, easy to grasp for the beginner, yet I believe an advanced reader will still find it fascinating. It is a new perspective of our country, or rather just highlighting the original intent which seems to be new in this day and age.

There is a type of people in the world today, which has always existed and which will always exist. This type of person honestly seeks wisdom, honestly works, honestly deals with his fellow beings because he knows any type of happiness you get from anything except these things is a false, temporary happiness. This type of person is a person of reason, is person of justice, of integrity. This type of person tries as best as they can to increase their knowledge and tries to figure out the secrets and hidden things of this world and this universe. Those types of secrets and hidden things are only uncovered through a constant quest for knowledge. They realize that the extent to which you are free is the extent to which you know. The most bound person is the most ignorant person because they do not even know of their bond. Every person is bound to some extent. To the extent they lack knowledge of how the world works and how the universe works.

This book is of course called The Five Thousand Year Leap for a reason. The reason being is that in the last two centuries this world has made more progress in every dimension of life than the last fifty centuries combined. That type of progress is not accidental. This book goes into great detail about the economic, political, philosophical, natural, and even religious ideas about why that is so.

America and the world owes a great debt to the founding fathers and authors of the Constitution of the United States of America.

I can promise you that you will not regret reading this book.

Very readable book that raises a lot of points you won't find in a conventional American history book. Most thought-provoking was the discussion of whether Lincoln legally should have let the southern states secede. Should be required reading for voters.

I really enjoy history and my home proves that well. This book is simple and truthful and I'm so glad that it has been written. I only wish it went into more depth.

"...and it's no secret that Stalin starved his people." maybe it's no secret. neither is it a secret that mao murdered millions of innocent chinese. but it is very un-pc to acknowledge such things, because it leads into dangerous un-pc areas the progressive thought police want to keep you away from. Students might get the wrong ideas about unimportant things such as communism and communist aggression, mccarthyism, nationalism, american sovereignty, private property, freedom and gun ownership; things which really aren't issues in today's world in which we are all citizens of the global village.

I am a history lover and always want to hear the truth. A lot was left out of my history classes when I was a kid. I am glad to see a book like this on the market. It is past time to get the truth out to the children of today instead of the watered down information that is out there now.

Our perception of history shapes our view of politics and economics. So, it should come as no surprise that US history textbooks of the past hundred years have portrayed the strong national government as a laudable development in the evolution of modern politics.

Professor Woods casts a critical eye upon the state sanctioned history as told by leftist/rightist historians and focuses on the simple truth.

The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History is informative, well written, and academically rigorous.

My one criticism of the book is its length. The publisher set an 80-thousand word limit for Dr. Woods, and since his writing style is such a joy to read, one is left wanting more...much more.

But fear not, one of the greatest contributions of this work is Professor Woods' 10-page bibliography filled with reference works and resources that will help you continue your studies.

Some of the highlights of 'The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History' include:

1. The origins of religious freedom in the colonies
2. The founding fathers weren't the Godless radicals of the french revolution...in fact, they were conservatives, seeking to preserve ancient rights
3. The states ratified the constitution with the understanding that they could leave the compact at will.
4. The Tenth Amendment - Cornerstone of the Constitution
5. The roots of big government - the "general welfare clause" was NOT a clause at all.
6. What was the difference between the Republicans and the Federalists?
7. Did Lincoln fight to "save the union?" or "free the slaves?"
8. Why big business is good
9. What did Wilson do that got us into WWI? Why did he want war?
10. The truth about the Great Depression and the New Deal...Roosevelt was NOT a student of economics.
11. FDR, an imperial president that lied to get us into war.
12. Commies in the government? You mean McCarthy was actually RIGHT?..."at long last sir, have you no decency?"
13. Who was the real JFK?
14. Why LBJ and the "great society" wer both miserable failures.
15. The '80's...charitable giving during the "decade of greed"
16. Why Michael Milken was the good guy.
17. Budget cuts were a myth
18. "The era of big government is over"...Yeah, whatever!

This is a rousing read. Historical truth is infinitely more fascinating than the propaganda of mainstream history textbooks currently treated by the academy as "textus receptus."

If you are a would-be student of American history, you should pick up a copy of this book. It will let you put your 'foot in the water' so to speak, and start you down a path of joyous discovery. Well, let me amend that slightly...not all the discoveries I've made have been joyous. But the unvarnished truth is better to be had than the lies that cost the lives of millions.

I WON'T WASTE THE READER'S TIME PRAISING HOFFSTADTER--HE WAS ONE OF THE GREATS. THIS IS NOT A BOOK YOU WILL CUDDLE UP WITH ON A RAINY DAY. IT IS THOUGHT PROVOKING AND THOUGHTFUL. IT DELVES INTO STATESMEN OF ALL STRIPES AND DOESN'T MINCE WORDS FOR POLITICAL CORRECTNESS. THIS AUTHOR GIVES US A FRESH INSIGHT TO OUR HEROES AND MAY DISTURB US BY EXPOSING CLAY FEET THAT ARE NORMAL FOR ALL HUMANS GREAT AND AVERAGE. IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN AMERICA'S PAST AND FUTURE READ THIS BOOK.

The classic story of American History, as told by Richard Hofstadter, has rightly come to be thought of as a masterpiece of American history since its original publication in 1948. This well deserved reputation comes from the rich storytelling, attention to detail, and thoughtful and complete narrative Hofstadter puts forward in this book.

Hofstadter takes as his guide one figure from each generation starting from the beginning of the Republic, and through biographical sketch describes both the historical figure and the time period he is depicting. Beginning with Jefferson and including people such as Jackson, Lincoln, Teddy and Franklin Roosevelt, Hofstadter demonstrates how a combination of the great men and the times they lived in shaped what have come down to us as the leading tradition in American politics: the belief in American greatness, individualism, and compassion.

The most significant contribution of this book is to show how these men, who have come down to us as legendary and nearly mythological figures were very much political animals. Just like Bill Clinton and George Bush make decisions today based on political calculation, so to do Lincoln and Jefferson. That these men were not demigods but in fact mere humans makes their achievements that much more incredible.

This wonderful book fills a hole in American history that's been open too long. Instead of treating great figures as saints or unapproachable geniuses Hofstadter gives a realistic picture of what they believed and what they stood for. More than that he points to the philosophic and cultural continuity that these figures embodied, struggled with, and sometimes redefined. It's as much about how the greater American view on work and indivdualism evolved from the founding as about the men who made it. Also, kind of inadvertantly, the author weaves in a history of the American liberal idea and how Jeffersonian liberalism stressing free markets, small business, and individualism, was transformed into New Deal liberalism. He argues that the transformation wasn't a betrayal but was instead a development based on necessary responses to an economically and socially changing world. Enjoy!

Therefore, I'll average it out at 3. I greatly enjoyed this book up until the last two chapters. The language was excellent, the characterizations vivid, the stories engrossing, and the information pertinent. The personalities of great American political minds jumped out of the page and were revealed in their genius and human fallibility. The chapters on Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt I thought were particularly good.

What a shame then that the last two chapters interjected so much socialist bias. I will say at the outset that I am politically conservative, and thus will not hide my own interpretive lens. However, I would like to believe that even the most staunch liberal would find the biased charges leveled at Hoover, and the unmitigated praise heaped on New Deal politics, to be distracting. Indeed, to the less disciplined reader it may ruin the book. Luckily it didn't for me, but it came close.

I understand that during the writing of this book Hofstadter was very sympathetic with socialist doctrine and a member of the Communist Party. His political leanings are evident in his interpretation of modern events. For example, in reference to Hoover he asks: "Could he have seriously believed that free enterprise might be restored to the post-war world?" (p. 308). Hofstadter betrays his historical determinism and love for the notion of a planned economy in arguments such as: "That there was anything natural, not to say inevitable, about this trend toward managed economies was a conclusion Hoover could never acknowledge..." (p. 309).

I agree with the previous reviewer that it would have been interesting to see Hofstadter's reaction to the rise of Goldwater economics and the Reagan era. It also would have been interesting to see his explanation for the recent elections of economically conservative administrations in Germany, France, and Scandinavia. Unfortunately he died before he could witness this reversion to more unfettered economic policies. Would he have referred to these events as the most "heroic setting-back of the clock" in world history, as he did somewhat sarcastically in regards to Hoover? (p. 308). I would like to believe that he would have realized the fallacy of the planned economy and the potential for prosperity in a free-market system, but there's no way to know for sure.

I would recommend the first 9 chapters of this book to those interested in American history. They are truly excellent. After chapter 9 I would stop, unless you're prepared to read with a several (large) grains of salt. I would also recommend "The Age of Reform" as a relatively more insightful and less biased Hofstadter work, although it only covers the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

"American Political Tradition" became an immediate milestone in the field of American political study, propelling author Richard Hofstadter to the frontal ranks of historians at the age of 32 upon its publication in 1948. The history professor at Columbia University would ultimately win 2 Pulitzer Prizes before dying at the age of 54 in 1970.

The point Hofstadter consistently made is how important pragmatic considerations were in the evolution of the great political shakers and movers of American political annals. He rejects the view of historian Charles Beard and others about the impact of economic determinism in the foundation and shaping of early America. Hofstadter does not discount its impact, but cites the pragmatic necessity of studious compromise involving the interests of important American sociological groups which were often disparate, such as the manufacturing interests of the north and the rural farming interests of the south, as well as slavery and anti-slavery interests. The need for compromise influenced Thomas Jefferson in constructing a U.S. Constitution, which relied on the separation powers doctrine of English philosopher John Locke and that of separation of powers advanced by French social scientist Montesquieu.

The chapter on Franklin Delano Roosevelt is fascinating as a study in political pragmatism. Roosevelt ran on a Democratic Party platform for 1932 which rivals one of the most conservative doctrines ever put on paper by an American political party. He initially criticized incumbent President Herbert Hoover for spending too much money in dealing with the Depression and its related effects. Once in office he changed his mind and forged a government activist agenda embraced by progressive reformers.

Abraham Lincoln is studied in detail as well within the framework of a very astute political figure with his eye squarely on success in that arena from the beginning, where the "railsplitter" image played well with voters. He purposely straddled the fence on the slavery issue since there was much controversy surrounding the issue even within the fledgling Republican Party which he joined after the Whig Party folded, despite its reputation for being an essentially anti-slavery party.

Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson are evaluated as two important political figures who perpetually juggled conservative basic instincts against the need they believed existed for certain progressive systemic reforms. For Roosevelt this meant anti-trust legislation and conservation, while Wilson, whose traditional Virginia conservative roots left him unwilling to budge in the field of race relations, nonetheless undertook mighty electoral reforms embraced by William Jennings Bryan and the populist movement. Bryan is another figure covered in the book.

The chapter of Herbert Hoover is also fascinating. Hofstadter envisioned him as the last of the laissez-faire American presidents. In the wake of the great upheavals occurring in America, particularly related to the Great Depression, a political pragmatism later advanced by Roosevelt to stem the tide of unrest was eschewed by Hoover.

The interest in a book about the Taliban is obvious, and Ahmed Rashid brings certain undeniable strengths to the subject: he is a Pakistani journalist who has travelled extensively throughout Southeast Asia and conducted many interviews which make this a truly unique and indispensable book. I am not aware of any other history with the same access to sources that Rashid enjoys.

But the execution of the book is poor. First (and this isn't Rashid's fault), it is badly out-dated. It was published before the Taliban assassinated Ahmed Shah Massoud (which probably would have changed many of his predictions), before 9/11, and before the U.S.-led coalition invaded.

Second, the organization is odd, and the book gets tedious as a result. The first third is a military-political history of the Taliban from its first appearance in 1994 until its military actions in central Afghanistan between 1998 and 2000. The second section deals with religious and cultural aspects of life under the Taliban, in both Pashtun and non-Pashtun areas. These first two sections are both readable, informative and useful. The final section deals with foreign relations issues, such as regional competition over oil and gas pipelines, proxy wars fought by regional powers like Pakistan, Iran and Saudi Arabia, and problems like drugs and smuggling. This final section is poorly-written and arranged, so that the reader is constantly jumping around in chronology and geography (unless you already have some background in the geopolitics of the region, I imagine the rapid-fire discussion of names and places can quickly become impenitrable). In addition, Rashid's background as a journalist, which serves him so well in recounting the history and culture of the region, does little to aid him in his economic analyses and prognostication.

Rashid relies heavily on the usual cliches, such as traditional Afghan independence. For example, "Throughout Afghan history no outsider has been able to manipulate the Afghans, something the British and the Soviets learnt to their cost. Pakistan, it appeared, had learnt [sic] no lessons from history while it still lived in the past, when CIA and Saudi funding had given Pakistan the power to dominate the course of the jihad" (p. 185). Rashid makes no attempt to explain the apparent contradiction between his claim that Afghans resist outside influence, and his simultaneous claim that Pakistan heavily influenced the Afghans.

Indeed, Rashid (and many others) like to extrapolate from British and Soviet military defeats in the region a lesson about Afghan independence that is contradicted by all the other evidence. Throughout the colonial period, Afghan rulers played the British against the Russians for concessions, which was replayed again in the 20th century between America and the Soviets, each of whom aggressively competed with one another for development projects. Afghan leaders have been heavily influenced by Western thoughts (such as Amanullah's modernizing reform attempts, and heavy Soviet influence after the communist revolution), and Afghan citizens were educated in Soviet- and French-style universities, or in Saudi-funded and Pakistani-run madrassas. During and after the Soviet invasion, the mujahideen groups competed with each other for foreign equipment and training.

Finally, and most bizarrely, at the end of the book when Rashid proposes a plan to resolve the conflict (all badly out-of-date after 9/11), he inexplicably suggests that only further intervention by regional powers and especially by the U.S. is the only way to bring lasting peace and stability. Why such foreign influence is the best prescription by the end of the book, when he hectored Pakistan's naivetee only a few chapters before, must remain a mystery.

Despite its flaws, the book is valuable, and I recommend the first two-thirds as possibly the definitive work on the subject -- at least until Mullah Omar writes his memoirs.

It's hard to think of a book that was published with as much good timing as Ahmed Rashid's Taliban. The book itself is heavily academic and therefore largely unexciting, but remains the best treatment of the Taliban up to 2001. Readers wanting analysis of events afterward will obviously have to look elsewhere.

This was a great novel, go buy Detained Differencesby J. Robert Rowe. It is about Detainee Operations inside Afghanistan.

This fellow is an arm chair quack. He grew up in Pakistan, but that's all about it. Now he makes his living saying cocophony about Pakistan and that region of the world on US TV networks. And with so many networks looking to fill up their airtime, he is having no trouble making this living. He has no clue of what the conditions are on the ground in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Says that Musharraf could have 'nipped the evil in the bud' if he had acted sooner in Swat. If Musharraf had done that, then Mr Rashid would have accused Musharraf of being trigger happy. So if you can see, Mr. Rashid is just a monday morning quarter back. All he is doing is second guessing whatever Musharraf does. And in a couple of months he'll be doing the same with the new govt. in Pakistan, because that's what the US TV networks want him to say.
Why would you pay to read baloney from such a quack?

If you want to understand Afghanistan latest history, this is a great choice. The narrative is center on the Talibans of course, how this group was invented after the end of the cold war and after fighting against the Soviets in a united front known as the Mujaheddin. It is clear to all of us that the Taliban are Islamic Fundamentalist and that its presence on Afghanistan has rendered the country on a violent and unstable path.

Again we found here the endemic problem of some countries of the middle east and central Asia: several ethnics groups with different Islamic religion flavours, Sunni and Shi'ite, with external players trying to consumate the country to a sole religion, and I am referring to external players like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan representing the Sunni side and Iran defending shiism. This is the pitiful case of Afghanistan and in this book all these importants facts are depicted by the author so you become aware of the difficult geography of this country, the ethnics groups that inhabit it and the relation to neighbouring countries, especially Pakistan and Iran.

In my opinion, a worthy person that had the character, education and leadership to run Afghanistan future was the Lion of the Panjshir, Masud, but he was also killed either by the pickup warriors or by Bin Laden terrorist, with the latter the most likely. Now president Karzai, has a very difficult task to deal with, to pacify the country and the spirits, finish the war against the Taliban, improve the economy and the relations with their neighbours and of course help the people of Afghanistan. Is my belief that in order to do that, external aid is absolutely needed for a long time, in particular from the UN which must include more countries apart from the current ones. It is important to improve education for all, so these people do not based its life only on religion and to stabilize the country so Central Asia Energy projects can successful be realized, using Afghanistan as a transit for the gas and oil to South East Asia. I hope Afghanistan finally choose Peace as its way of living and get accustom to it.

Moyer's is the epitome of what's wrong with modern journalism: leftist ideologues shaping current events to fit their agenda. He tries to take the wooden spoon to Rush Limbaugh's behind as some kind of curse on humanity, while Rush is 100% upfront about what his agenda is people like Moyer try to pass themselves off as unbiased, non-agenda driven truth-sayers. And Rush as a nag, please, Moyers lives off the red meat of telling people what's wrong with this country. There's seemingly never any good in this country other than the capability of maintaining the lofty Utopian dream Moyers has in his head.

And that's where a good chuckle comes in when he starts talking of personal responsibility. Is it the personal responsibility of taking charge of your own path in life, or, taking personal responsibility for everything that the government hasn't relieved you of under the nanny state that he so desires.

Moyers believes the Bush administration has eroded the foundations of the republic. And Bush has been far from perfect, but bet the farm that the Founding Fathers would be much more in line with Bush's vision of America than they would Moyers.

Bill Moyers has a clear insight to many of our countries urgent problems and the causes of them. This book is a fantastic read. Worth the money! I bought a second copy to pass around.

Title Moyers on Democracy
Author

Bill Moyers
Rating *****
Tags democracy, politics, religion, civil rights, speeches

This is a collection of Moyer's speeches over many years that touch on the subject of democracy. If I could, I'd give a copy to everyone in the world to read. Forget Nicholas Cage movies, Bill Moyers is THE National Treasure.

Mr. Moyers probably doesn't believe in reincarnation - though he would respect my right to do so - but I think in one of his previous lives he must have been a bard, and in another one of those court jesters who was the only person to tell the king the truth. For he has both the journalistic integrity to be dedicated to finding the truth and to sharing it with the public. The speech he gave on Hubert Humphrey is one of the best pieces of writing, fiction or non-fiction, I've ever read in my life, and many of the other pieces are of similar quality.

It is hard to give a sense of the book, because it wanders many places in talking about democracy. There are obituaries here, to such people as Barbara Jordan, William Sloane Coffin, and Fred Friendly. There is a commencement address. Issues of media, politics, and religion are discussed. And always, Moyers gives us history, often history of the relatively unknown and their struggles to be free. It is an inspirational book, one that sets the mind alight to preserve and restore freedom and its handmaiden, responsibility.

Publication Doubleday (2008), Edition: 1, Hardcover, 416 pages
Publication date 2008
ISBN 0385523807 / 9780385523806

Bill Moyers writes with passion and outrage about the current state of affairs in America. The speeches in this book were given over a period of years from 1987 to 2007. Each speech is introduced with a current comment. Unfortunately the issues addressed haven't changed with time other than being more in need of change.

My favorite speeches were the eulogies which he was asked to give for people he came to know and greatly admire - Lady Bird Johnson, Barbara Jordan, William Sloan Coffin, and Fred Friendly. Moyers sums up their lives and greatly honors them with his words.

Of Barbara Jordan:"The founders would have been lucky to have had her in that Constitutional Convention. If she had been present, it would have taken far less time for Barbara Jordan to be recognized as a whole person in the sight of the law, or for this country to fulfill its promise.

As it is, the good fortune has been yours and mine. Just when we despaired of finding a hero, she showed up, to give the sign of democracy."

Bill Moyers new book, like Mr. Moyers entire career, illustrates what's wrong with modern liberalism: there is nothing wrong with the goals or the sentiment, but the arrogance of the mindset leads to an inability to understand any objections to their agenda and a lack of the foresight needed to consider the ramifications of it. This is a perfect illustration of what Talleyrand said about the Ancien Regime: "They forget nothing and they learn nothing."

Perhaps it is too harsh to attach much significance to what is, after all, a repackaging of ephemeral writings, designed to make a few bucks for Mr. Moyers and to throw some red meat to the less thoughtful of his fans, but my own particular run in with Mr. Moyers is illustrative.

A few years ago, The Wall Street Journal ran an account by a federal judge of J. Edgar Hoover's secret files, among which the judge found a request by Mr. Moyers shortly before the 1964 election, requesting the FBI to provide him with a list of homosexual Republicans which he could use in a smear campaign. This was worse than anything that went on at Watergate, since the nation was not at war and Moyer's targets were not public officials capable of defending themselves but average citizens who weren't.

Shortly after that, a cultural institution, of which I was a member, announced that it was awarding a lifetime acheivement award to Mr. Moyers. Angry at the timing, I resigned from the institution and sent a letter explaining my reasons to the Board of Trustees, a copy of which was quite properly sent to Mr. Moyers. Mr. Moyers sent me a letter of justification and asked me to forward it to the Board, which I did. His letter was contradictory: he smeared the judge, then, admitting the charges claimed that it was old news and finally offered a totally implausible excuse for what he did. But here's the kicker: he had one of his minions investigate me, as was clear in references to my background in his letter.

It takes an unusual kind of arrogance to defend yourself against spying by spying on your accuser. Mr. Moyers originally studied for the ministry before he found the attractions of mammon more to his liking. Rigid belief in doctrine and blind true believer faith in one's creed are virtues in a man of the cloth, but when you turn to the things Jesus told us to render unto Caesar, those virtues become character flaws.

Prof Dilorenzo does a great service with this important book, offering welcome relief from what Edmund Wilson called the "romantic and sentimental rubbish" of the Lincoln idolaters. The veil of myth is lifted and underneath we see the father of the centralized leviathan, hypocritically hiding behind emancipation as an excuse to destroy the republic of the Founders.

I highly recommend you purchase multiple copies and distribute them to friends and family in time for the Lincoln bicentennial in February 2009.

I am not as enamored of Lincoln as most. He mismanaged an unnecessary way. His northeast industrial backers urged the war for their commercial purposes. The textile mills and their bankers were in the north and wanted cheap southern cotton, which would go up in price if sold to the French and English. Industrial manufacturing and banking, including gun factories, was in the north and the bankers would benefit from a booming war economy. The South was agricultural.
I find it interesting that these same northeastern bankers and merchants wanted to seceed from the union in 1812 if the United States went to war again with England, because it would have hurt their shipping and other commercial interests.
Lincoln at the beginning of the war did not intend to free the slaves because his backers were afraid they would come north seeking employment and lower average wages, putting many of the existing population out of work. The Emancipation Proclamation had little effect in the midst of a war and was of questionable validity, but was a needed political statement at a time when the war was going badly and an election year was approaching. A politician doing political things put on a pedestal.
Slavery in the South had been decreasing for more than a decade because it was not economical to own slaves after the invention of the cotton gin, in addition to changing values in the South just as in the North. The northern Abolitionists made a lot of noise but like many protest groups of the 20th century were small in number.
Could another President have done better? Fewer deaths in Americas most deadly war. Avoided a war and its aftermath of Reconstruction and post-reconstruction. The methods used by Shermans during his march to Atlanta would probably qualify him for a place in the Hague today. I am not sure where that leaves Grant and Lincoln.
I mention the above because history is always less clear than it seems and is often in the eyes of the beholder. Ask one of the following to described the last hundred years of their history. Irish-English: Palestinian-Israeli: Pole-German-Russian: Serb-Croat-Albanian. It takes time for a proper perspective to develop.

The wonder is that more of this type of scholarship didn't surface a century ago. History being written by the victors, it isn't really surprising that it didn't appear sooner than that, but for the myth to be so prevalent, so unchallengeable, for so long, is a distressing mystery. Recently I read Eric Larson's Devil in the White City, a great book, and noted that a common reaction to much of the historical detail in it is, "why didn't I know this." That is the reaction here, but an order of magnitude greater and in a more important subject area. The surprise in this book is how much help it is in understanding today's political landscape. DiLorenzo doesn't just go back to the founding fathers, he goes back to Mercantilism and Adam Smith, and ties it all together. Required reading.

For my entire life I was a hard-core Republican. I loved Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh. I read DiLorenzos terrific book How Capitalism Saved America but I still remained a neo-conservative. I hesitated to get this book, but boy am I glad I did. Since then I realized that I have been lied to my entire life. I started reading DiLorenzos and Thomas Woods archives at LewRockwell (dot) com and became a Libertarian. I have bought this book for all of my friends and relatives. I converted my Republican brother and friend who are Civil War re-enactors. As my friend said, "I have only read two chapters and am convinced!"

By the way, one historian reviewed the book and said that a quote is out of context in the book where Lincoln supposedly said blacks can't be equal, only Siamese twins can ever be equal. DiLorenzo has said that he went back and found that the quote is out of context because he got it from a secondary source, and the secondary source got it wrong, so he will remove the quote if there is a future edition of the book. That should tell you that DiLorenzo is honest, and that all of his other quotes are in context.

At the height of his influence, many deemed him to be one of the worst tyrants the world had ever seen. He incarcerated 15,000 of his fellow citizens because they disagreed with his war policy. He had his army shut down newspapers and destroy the presses for any papers that wrote against him. He declared martial law and arrested political opponents without a warrant or trial and kept them locked up for years. His Secretary of State bragged that he could have any citizen jailed "at the snap of a finger." He had one Congressman who disagreed with him deported to another country. Then oversaw a war that led to 620,000 deaths...all within his own country. When half of the country sought to escape, they were forced to remain in the Nation.....or be slaughtered in mass for seeking liberty. In essence they were forced to remain citizens at the point of a bayonet. He ordered cities to be burned. Farms to be destroyed. Civilians, including women and children, to be bombed and executed. He was one of the most hated men in history.....and one of the most beloved. His name? Abraham Lincoln.
If the above paragraph shocked you, then you might consider reading a book entitled The Real Lincoln: A New Look at Abraham Lincoln, His Agenda, and an Unnecessary War, By Thomas Dilorenzo.
While Lincoln is perhaps not as evil as this book presents, one can't escape the reality that Lincoln took some very harsh and unnecessary measures during the Am Civil War. Ironically, the majority of Americans in both the North and South were in favor of a peaceful secession in 1860. The North wanted separated from the South just as bad as the South did from the North. Yet Lincoln would hear nothing of it. Dilorenzo makes a rather compelling case for the economic motivations behind the war, given the fact that the South was paying roughly 80% of the Nation's expenses through tariffs, while the North was reaping the majority of the benefits in terms of bridge and railroad construction.
Furthermore, in Lincoln's first inaugural address, he stated clearly that he had no interest in freeing the slaves in the South and had no constitutional right to do so. When he reversed course and issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, he confided to his cabinet that it was simply a "war measure" meant to spark a slave insurrection in the South. Though most people don't realize it, the Emancipation Proclamation only granted freedom to slaves in the South. Slaves in the North were not granted freedom because their Masters had been loyal to the Union. William Seward, Lincoln's Secretary of State bemoaned at the time that the act was worthless having "freed slaves that we no longer have jurisdiction over...while keeping in bondage those slaves that we do." Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and even parts of Louisiana were under Federal control by 1863, and were thus allowed to keep their slaves. That seems to be one of those quirks of history that has been forgotten. Or as Dilorenzo contends....glossed over by the victors.
Dilorenzo, who is an Economics Professor at Loyola College (Maryland), writes in a very readable style as he makes his case that slavery should have been abolished by compensated emancipation as done in Britain, Brazil, and many other countries during the 1800s. The forward to the book was written by Dr. Walter Williams, Economics Professor at George Mason University, and frequent fill in host for Rush Limbaugh (and incidentally, an African-American). Furthermore, he contends that the South should have been allowed to secede peacefully....as our colonial fathers did when faced with an overbearing British taxation system. Had this happened, Dilorenzo contends that the North would have been forced to change their overbearing tax structure, and eventually North and South would have reunited with a much more solid and efficient government. But what in fact did happen was the centralization of federal government power to the extent that the Constitution was repeatedly ignored leading to the Federal albatross that exists today.
The argument between a massive Federal government vs. individual state sovereignty goes back to our founders. Thomas Jefferson was famous for saying that the government that "governs best is the one that governs least." In other words, the Federal government's job is to protect the citizens and insure they're given the freedom to purse life, liberty, and happiness. Jefferson's primary opponent was Alexander Hamilton, who sought to have a strong Federal government that dictated things to the individual states and the citizens thereof. Jefferson's followers fought against this (rightfully so), given the fact that they had just escaped tyrannical government control from Britain during the American Revolution.
As the course of our Nation progressed, the Hamiltonians, led by Lincoln, eventually gained control and vastly expanded the Federal government during the Civil War. By 1865 and the end of the Civil War, states right's had virtually ceased to exist, and the Federal government, which was CREATED BY the states, had become the ruling King of American government. Ironically, the states had created a monster and now that monster would rule over them for the next 143 years (and counting).
The great irony in all of this is that the two predominant political parties have swapped sides in the area of government control. Today, it is the Democrat party that seeks higher taxes and more Federal control over the lives of its citizens. While the Republicans seek a smaller government with more individual liberty.
In conclusion, I would heartily recommend the reading of this book. Its insights into our Nation's history are illuminating to say the least. You may not agree with every position taken, but the book does promise to make you think long and hard about governmental and constitutional issues. And it gives a pretty clear road map for the bureaucratic mess that we find our federal government mired in today. History kind of has a way, sometimes, of making people seem better (or worse) than they really were. I suspect this is true of Lincoln as well. While he had some admirable qualities, he was certainly not above political posturing or deceit, as is documented in this work. So check out a copy of The Real Lincoln...and prepare to be challenged.

Shelby Steele's omissions of facts and critical thought are atrocious. These are a few issues that Steele fails to mention in his book. Withholding the truth is the same as lying.

1) Eisenhower had a lengthy affair with Ann Sommersby
2) The times of Eisenhower wouldn't have allowed the equivalent of $60 million dollars spent on what a president does behind closed doors. Especially since the country was nowhere near as partisan as it is today.
3) He mentioned the L.A. riots but doesn't mention the impact of the unjust verdict on the event.
4) Steele mentions global racism but doesn't mention America's impact on Latin America and Africa.
5) Steele doesn't know what racial experience every black has on a college campus. A friend of mine at U. of Maryland has the first black college president and received numerous death threats which were covered on national media.
6) Steele's "basketball to books" analogy doesn't point out that the parameters of basketball are the same for all players whereas educational achievement has very subjective limits.
7) Mark Fuhrman lied about his use of a racial slur in court. The slur was about the race of the primary suspect, OJ Simpson. Fuhrman was the lead investigator on the case. Could an investigator, who used racial slurs then lied about them, taint evidence? That possibility was brought into play.
8) Johnnie Cochran's job as a defense attorney is to get his client found innocent. Period!
9) According to the Labor Dept., WHITE women are the largest beneficiaries of affirmative action programs.
10) A person having to do an act, such as Steele quitting his job as a bus driver, to show their blackness shows more of a person's inner identity crisis. A true black person is black no matter what they do and need no validation of that fact.
11) Blacks have been at the bottom of most social indicators before and after the "Great Society" was even a concept. Hence, a constant underclass
12) Steele states, "Clarence Thomas has more moral authority on racial issues than Maureen Dowd." He gives no reason why he feels that way; hence, he must feel that way only because Thomas is black. Looking at Thomas' voting record, his moral authority is up for serious question.
13) Dowd's opinion is shared by most blacks and Thomas' qualifications were in question during his whole confirmation in the Senate.
14) Whites let blacks participate such as Jackie Robinson, the Tuskegee Airman, and Charles Drew among others not out of guilt but because those blacks were supremely talented to their white counterparts.
15) It is almost impossible to have individual wealth for the masses without fighting for social justice first.
16) Most black leaders have been asking for equal protection under the law and equal pay for equal work, not a hand outs from the government like Bear Sterns, Lehman Bros. Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac do.
17) Dick Cheney keeps his job when his chief of staff was guilty of perjury and obstruction of justice. Steele doesn't bring that up with his comparison to Bill Clinton.
18) You can only measure reform by results. Steele doesn't bring up other ways that reform can be measured either.
19) Steele doesn't mention on one page the plight of black women in our society.
20) If you feel guilty, you did something wrong.

Not saying that every white person feels guilty but Steele insinuates that feeling.

This is a superbly wtitten and well argued book that views the impact of the sixties from a vanatge point that is often occluded by the almost universal excitement, attention, and interest that surrounds an intense time in American life--and is made problematic by the din of much generational noise trying to make sense of what was happening in American society and on the college campus.

As a New York City baby boomer who came of age at the time I have been following the differing interpretations of what this may have meant for many of us. Steele's informal (yet informative) sytle is very refreshing. I have also been at a loss to understand or explain what I would call "tyrannies of the left", namely, much of the misguided cant and shoddy scholarship that seems to be the standard fare in many college English departments. My particular gripe is how so many well intended people basically destroyed the CUNY system.

Once the hope of many who, like myself, couldn't afford higher education in the private "free market" but who knew that, with good grades and hard work, there was a place that offerred world class teaching and opportinities absent the requirement of tuition. It was once the crown jewel of "The Big Apple." No more. Open admissions and escalating fees have basically gutted what it once meant to have have access to a genuine higher education via meritocracy. Faculty were first rate and the students were among the brightest in the city.

Alas, the English department also has a right wing. My first exposure to this creature. Since I share Professor Shelby's concerns over what might be called "curricular rot", i.e., non-academic offerings posing as the genuine article, the politicization of damn near everything and, in general, the obscenely priced extension of high school that now passes for "college", I read his book with much interest. Sadly, it was a letdown of the highest order. His explanatory variable is "White Gulit": a new adventure in metaphysics.

The appeal of this concept is that it is a seductive illusion. Tantalizing, but impossible to operationalize and serving as a magic catch-all for whatever seems to trouble you. Like "black invisibility", its more irritating cousin, it clearly generates discomfort but is impossible to nail down because "black" and "white" are simply code words for very complex social realities. The drama they conceal is universal: What is the proper relation between freedom, the individual, and the state? Who benefits from this dialogue? The social sciences deal directly with these issues but neither a proper understanding a full formulation are available as slogans or suitable for bumper stickers.

It is not clear to me what Professor Shelby (as a "black conservative"--a term he clearly dislikes, yet champions) wishes to conserve. Before World War II , and absent the dissent of the sixties, the American higher education system did what all such system do: preserve class privilege for those who are favored. We have come full circle: college can now cost the price of a house.

Serious stuff. Solutions, however, will not be forthcoming from the English depaertment. Its left wing is currently enamored of French philosophers, and its right seems to be fixated on racial stereotypes. I'll leave it to the psychologists to figure out if Shelby' concerns fall within their purview. It used to be that when one studied college English one learned something of that subject matter and how to clearly express one's ideas. Oh, I forgot, that was in the "decadent" sixties when we all were less enlightened and were so foolish as to take our teachers seriously. I was never able to discern any political agenda in their course assignments where, I recall, the professors worked as hard grading them as we tried to muster the energy necessary to meet their expectations. Was that a dream? Was it a magic carpet suspended only by nostalgia? One never knows, after all, when looking back at the sixties.

Explains clearly, through the experience and scholarship of a black who came of age in the 1960s and had a ringside seat for the civil rights era, how we all went wrong. Since its purpose is not equal rights but "dissociation" of whites from accusations of racism, affirmative action is itself racist, as it assaults the uniqueness of all Americans by reducing them to generic blacks and generic whites. Hard reading, but is only 181 relatively short pages and will reward your effort. Can also be expanded to various other problems, such as the oversupply of handicapped parking spaces and the rising reverse sex discrimination in business.

The result of all this may be no less than the destruction of American strength, an end to the valued status of "personal responsibility, hard work, individual initiative, delayed gratification, commitment to excellence, competition by merit, the honor in achievement" (p. 109), and, with it, an end to American greatness. We need a national dialogue on how we can reverse it - Barack, are you ready? In the meantime, all Americans should read this book.

"White Guilt" by Shelby Steele is well worth your time. If you're wondering how race relations in this country have become so poisonous, Shelby Steele has a significant part of the answer. Here's how toxic race relations are in this country right now: it's significant (even though it should not be) that Shelby Steele is black.

Steele describes how guilt-motivated bad behavior on the part of white people has enabled anger-motivated bad behavior by black militants (e.g. Al Sharpton), to the point that the "conversation on race" that everyone talks about is difficult-to-impossible. Black or white, if you say the wrong thing, you're in big trouble.

I hope a lot of people read this book. It might help.

Here are some other books that might also help:
Losing the Race: Self-Sabotage in Black America
Come On People: On the Path from Victims to Victors

At first I was confused as to where he was going with the introduction but then as I read on it made a little more sense. I found that he seemed to do a lot of double talking that made some of his points difficult to understand. Along with the difficulty understanding the basis for some of his arguments, I did tend to agree with him on some occasions. If you like reading essay formats so to speak, this is a book for you. I tend to prefer a bit more of a story when I read.

Mark Lowenthal, a long-time veteran of the Intelligence Community, is the author of "Intelligence: From Secrets to Policy," a superb introduction into the American Intelligence Community and its transition from the long Cold War against the Soviets to the current battles against rogues states and transnational terrorists.

Lowenthal writes at the survey level for an audience with a general understanding of American history and governmental processes but limited knowledge of how intelligence fits into either. In sequencial steps, Lowenthal explains what intelligence is supposed to be, how U.S. intelligence developed, and how the Intelligence Community operates. He reviews the intelligence process, the major collection disciplines, and the moving parts of subcomponents such as analysis, counterintelligence, and covert action. The last chapters explore the difficult issues of interaction with policy-makers, oversight, and transformation.

Lowenthal's narrative is remarkable on at least two counts. He appreciates just how challenging it is to produce timely, accurate, and useful intelligence, and he is exceptionally even-handed in describing all the things that can go right or wrong in the process. While no one topic is covered in significant depth, his coverage of the whole is very solid and perfectly suited to entry-level classes on intelligence and its interaction with policy. A nice selection of anecdotes and examples help provide depth to what might otherwise turn into dry narrative.

"Intelligence: From Secrets To Policy" is very highly recommended as an introduction to the intelligence business for use at the collegiate level and for the general reader.

This is a very good primer on US intelligence. It is the 3rd edition.

We used this book as a core reading material for US policy and intelligence course

I was assigned this book for a class I teach and have learned a great deal about the intelligence community through reading/prepping for class. While much of the IC has changed since publication, the concept is detailed enough for even my most novice students to grasp and for more practiced professionals to get a firm grasp on how the different aspects of the IC operate independently and together with policy makers.

This is as good a primer on the US intelligence community as you're likely to come across in open literature. Mr. Lowenthal is well qualified to provide insights into the IC, though I'd have to caveat it by saying his CIA-centric view often shows up in the text. As someone who sees things from the DoD perspective, I'll agreeably disagree on some of his observations regarding roles and missions. The 3rd edition is good with most of the recent changes in the IC, though some even more recent changes have not been reflected in the book.

Dr. Lowenthal has done an excellent job of introducing the reader to the field of intelligence in general (what it is, what it isn't), and to the United States' Intelligence Community in particular. He devotes a few chapters to the broad topic of intelligence and its history, the current makeup and structure of the Intelligence Community (IC) in the United States, and future iterations and problems for the IC (particularly in the United States), then transitions into an in-depth discussion of the various aspects of intelligence, such as collection disciplines, analysis, and policy implications. I'd strongly recommend this to anyone who has an interest in the field of intelligence, from a novice to a seasoned analyst.