Politics Government Books

If you're a cynic about where we are in America, this book is up your alley. As I am certainly a cynic and a card-carrying member of the ever-squeezed middle class, this book hit home for me, confirming what I've believed while supplying facts that show that no matter how much our politicians and many in the media want to paint people like me as "negative", we really are in a bad state right now and our government has a lot to do with it.

If you're not a cynic, and like our political leaders, CEOs and many in the media believe that things are just fine and dandy, this book will hopefully be a wake-up call - but I wouldn't hold my breath on that.

At the heart of it all is the reality that our government is bought and paid for by big business. He mentions that some consider lobbyists the fourth branch of government, and as you read the book, you get the feeling that's not just an inside joke. This is why we have things like rampant outsourcing, a bankruptcy law whose rationale has no basis whatsoever in reality and serves only to line the pockets of the banks who have paid for campaigns left and right, corporations paying little to no taxes during times of prosperity and getting away with it, CEOs making millions while their companies lose even more money and lay off workers, and illegal immigration remaining unchecked as it provides a source of very cheap labor to big companies so that CEOs can further line their pockets. All of this is an attack on the vast majority of Americans, who certainly haven't shared in the prosperity of the post-dot-com bust.

The loser in all of this? Your average American, about 80 percent of the population. Dobbs shows how the government we have now is not on of the people, by the people or for the people, but rather, "the best government money can buy" as it is bought and paid for by corporations who practically make the laws nowadays. It is no accident that many Americans consider the government to be out of touch with citizens; this book demonstrates how it got there. And reading it, one also comes to understand that our present-day problems in the economy - things like constantly rising home foreclosures, a record federal budget deficit, fast-rising health care costs that are bankrupting families with anything more than a minor illness or injury, and middle-class Americans being squeezed left and right - are no accident.

The real kicker comes near the end. In the book at the end is a copy of the text of the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and its Amendments. He says we all should read them, and I did after finishing the book. As I read the Declaration of Independence, I couldn't help but echo what he said earlier about how the principles in America right now don't resemble this at all.

In brief, Lou provides yet another "eye-opening" series of essays in extended support of his ealier, "Independence Day" and "Exporting America". Surely recommended reading for ALL free-thinking Americans, and IMHO, should be Required Reading for ANY American weilding his 'right to vote'..... The Lou Dobbs Hour on CNN certainly provides daily 'back-up' to these three very well thought-out and researched editions.

This book and its author are as pompous as the subtitle: "How the Government, Big Business, and Special Interest Groups Are Waging War on the American Dream and How to Fight Back." Dobbs presents page after page after page of statistics, poll results, anecdotes, testimonials and self-important posturing, but almost no analysis and no solutions. Cripes, a third of the book is given over to reprinting the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights and the Constitution!

Dobbs has not so much written a book here as rendered a bunch of charts and graphs into prose paragraphs. After ticking off 200 pages of what's wrong with Reaganomics -- and although not mentioned by name that's exactly what it is -- Dobbs devotes one skinny little chapter to "Taking Back America." His advice? "Every working man and woman in this country must fight back against the powerful forces -- political, economic, and social -- that threaten our way of life." Wow, deep.

The rest of the book is repetitive and self-aggrandizing. Example: page 8 says "My commitment is to getting the facts and the truth wherever and whenever possible. That's what my audience expects, and my audience also expects to hear my opinion on the events and issues that matter most to them." Compare to page 78: "Each night, my audience expects me to deliver the news that is most important to them and the lives they are leading. They expect debate, and they expect me to take a position." No ego here!

It's too bad this book is such a stinker. The subject certainly needs discussion and a higher profile in the public arena. Ever since Bartlett & Steele's 1992 "America: What Went Wrong?" economists and non-aligned politicians (like Robert Reich) have warned against the decline of the Middle Class caused, intentionally or unintentionally, by forcing Americans to compete with labor in the Third World nations. Opponents of globalization and so-called Fair Trade laws foresaw this result, but whether or not it could have been avoided is an open question.

Certainly a country without a prosperous Middle Class is rotted from within and cannot sustain itself. Roosevelt's New Deal policies (1933-38) together with the Marshall Plan (1947-51) and NIDHA (1956) proved that government could be used to stimulate economic growth (rather than hinder it), and resulted in the largest growth in standard of living in the history of the planet. Reagan and his advisors systematically started dismantling his generation's greatest achievement, capitulating to the same monopolistic forces that caused the stock market collapse of 1929 and the Great Depression that followed it. "Those who do not know history...."

So, two stars for subject, none for treatment.

War on the Middle Class: How the Government, Big Business, and Special Interest Groups Are Waging War on the American Dream and How to Fight Back

Lou Dobbs lists and adds credible support to each subject: How American workers are breezily replaced by pennies a day foreign workers, our frightening health care situation : "American citizens who need health care assistance shouldn't need a post-college education to figure out how to enroll in Medicare," how big pharma reaps the lion's share of dollars which change hands, fleecing American taxpayers, while middlemen lobbyists dish out pharma goodies to "our" out-of-touch, "Who, me? I only work here" Congress, who are obsessed with pocketing extortion dollars to finance their TV re-election ads, thus again placing the American Middle Class citizen last on any help genuinely earned, deserved and needed. Lou Dobbs writes of how, when the Clinton Administration presented a health care proposal, "More than $100 million was spent to convince the American public that the proposed reform was a bad idea." WOW! I did not know that! Did you?

Outrageous costs of insurance, payments for medical necessities and the newly acquired poverty families with catastrophic illness must suffer block honest citizens from daring to dream any American Dream.

I could not reveal the book to you if I tried and I did not try. There is much, much more.

We are reminded how corporations are becoming the kings of life and death for Americans. You may wonder, "how can these things be?" And maybe, after reading "War On The Middle Class", you will want to keep Congress in "a state of constant gooseflesh" (Dr. Spock's immortal phrase).

Very few genuine Americans do not have a work ethic. Yet, too many middle class jobs have been outsourced. A reasonably paying job, holding family life together, has all but morphed into mist.

Mr. Dobbs writes the details of firms and people comprising and compromising today's America.

Because of the massive content of this brief, "easy-read" book, I have only reviewed some of its wealth, summarizing Mr Dobb's appraisal of the catastrophy of US health care, i. e., who IS captain of this ship of too many machines and prescriptions with sometimes questionable outcomes?

His coverage of other disasters are: the government's glut of lawyers, the Iraq disaster, "When Congressman John Murtha (D-PA), a decorated Marine Corps veteran, stood up on the floor of the House of Representatives to call for an orderly withdrawal of our troops from Iraq, the Senate and House Democratic leadership (and the rank and file)were silent." To a thoughtful reader, this silence on the Bush/Cheney rush to preemptive war, (Sen Byrd's wise eloquence on even considering such an undertaking was reflected by a few others in Congress, the lone Republican, Ron Paul, is included. Byrd's far-reaching wisdom was brushed aside like a pesky summer housefly,) my own opinion. Mr. Dobbs writes on this hot button subject that there is "still no demand for an accounting of the Pentagon's general staff for what has now been a three-year failure to defeat the insurgency."

Also painstakingly covered are the suicidal (my words)trade deals, the frightening dive of our educational system, the lack of adequate inspection of each container which comes into our ports and the needed manpower and will to safeguard our Mexican and Canadian borders.

In short, Mr. Dobbs outlines what a grown-up, mentally developed person's use of taxpayer money would be, in contrast to how a drunken sailer and his cronies are trashing our money supply, not their own, (my words, not Mr. Dobbs's.)

How did Lou Dobbs ever find so many revelations? I have heard that he is a reporter!

The radical far middle strikes back again!
Lou Dobbs writes again, instead of just ran-
ting. But even the weekly evening rants are
quite proper. We may quibble with Lou on cer-
tain words or pharses he uses that aren't ex-
actly precise, but he still has a very strong
platform to speak from and I for one am all
for his books.

...provided you're Democratically- (as opposed to democratically-) inclined. Glenn Greenwald's object in life appears to be to take the fight to the right-wing Republican loonies, to repossess the ground that they have taken and dominated for so long, namely, the ideas that Republican men are real men, Republican women are real women and Republican little furry green creatures from Alpha-Centauri are real little furry green creatures from Alpha-Centauri, and only they can be trusted to bring security, low taxes, free gas, high morality and family values, and to have a direct line to God (who, as everyone knows, votes Republican, if He knows what's good for Him). On the other hand, Democrats are faggotty, wimpish, limp-wristed, girly men, their womenfolk are dragons, harridans and dykes, and they're friends of terrorists, poofters, global warming liars, Big Government, Satan and Richard Dawkins (the last-named two possibly being one and the same).

Mr. Greenwald mercilessly (but somewhat repetitively - a Greenwald trait, it seems) exposes the lies, distortions and utter humbug of these appalling people, starting at the archetypical American hero John Wayne, ultra-hawk, who, like his distinguished successors Bush, Cheney, Wolfowitz, Kristol (Sr. and Jr.), etc., etc., furiously struck heroic poses but strenuously avoided combat, and were happy enough to send others off to do the dying. Remember Dubya's contribution to the Iraq War; he gave up golf, poor baby. I did love the contrast between the disgusting San Francisco liberal and potential civilisation-ender Nancy Pelosi (one husband, children and grandchildren) and that sterling defender of family values Newt Gingrich (multiple wives, sordid divorces, multiple affairs).

To me, as a limp-wristed, cheese-eating, domineered, surrender Yurpeen, the most worrying thing of all is that a book like this needs to be written at all. Those of us outside the USA can see it all clearly and how silly it all is. The scary thing is that so many in the USA apparently can't or won't. They ignore substantial issues and concentrate instead on trivialities, and that these trivial issues decide who will be the leader of the world's most powerful armed forces, with his or her finger on the trigger of a major nuclear arsenal. If John Edwards had good positions on issues facing the country, I would be interested, regardless of the facts that he spent $400 on a haircut and combed the results for half an hour at a time (funny that nothing is made of John McCain's taste for seriously expensive Italian shoes), and, yes, even the occasional infidelity (he wasn't the first and he assuredly won't be the last - besides, The Holy Newt leaves him totally in the shade).

Has US political dialogue and the things that determine elections really sunk so low? As I write, John McCain (basically a fine and honourable gentleman, I believe) has unleashed the Rovian Republican attack dogs whose job is to dig up dirt for an easily-conned (or willing to be conned) electorate. One can sense the desperation that this is his last chance at The Big One and that he'll stoop to any dirty trick to get it. As Mr. Greenwald says, Mr. McCain is More Of The Same. And you'd think that the US electorate could see through it all by now. Apparently not :-(

Trouble is, you just know that, if the pendulum were to swing the other way, the Democrats would become just as rotten, corrupt, petty and downright dishonest. The system itself is at fault. If Mr. Greenwald's book wakens America up to the fact that it needs major surgery on its institutions, in order to move away from being the world's largest banana republic, it will have done a great service.

Thank you Mr. Greenwald for shining a light on the truth of the hypocrites who call themselves, America's Value Patriots. When in fact they are the panzies who run from America's needs ! Self-proclaimed patriot John Wayne was not a very good actor, but instead a fellow who was a hypocrite in all aspects of his life, as you point out. As a kid I thought he was "slow", like a buddy of mine was in real life.
Also your book points to Ann Coulter as being a "talk-a-lot-do-nothing". But in reality, she's just making a buck and couldn't care less about Republican politics......Mr. Murdoch publishes her books, I used to work for his publishing house.
Keep up the good work with the truth telling in your future books, and maybe America will get a chance to throw out the bad guys and heal itself.
I beg anyone who seeks the truth to read this book, and I still hold out hope that Republicans and Independents who have the courage to read this great book are enlightened by your tome, and will convert to the true American ideals. Thus we can rid our land of the fakes like Limbaugh and Hannity, and all of those hypocites underlined in this book.
You'll thank yourself for buying and reading this book - I bought four as pre-election gifts for family members who lean to the right.

I counted 62 hypocrites described in this book and each is well-singed by Greenwald. However, for me, the most important part of the book addressed the right-wing dirt peddlers. Does everyone know that Matt Drudge, a disciple of Rush Limbaugh, influences much of TV and print-media "news"? Editors of the recently-formed internet newspaper, The Politico, are quoted: "Matt Drudge rules our world....With the exception of the Associated Press, there is no outlet other than the Drudge Report whose dispatches instantly can command the attention and energies of the most established newspapers and television newscasts." Wow! Greenwald describes Drudge as "the lie-spewing, dirt-wallowing, right-wing Internet gossip."

Does everyone know and find it acceptable that The Politico, which is given great credibility on TV news, is almost completely underwritten by a right-wing Washington fixture, Joseph Albritton? Now we know why so much Anna Nicole Smith, LIndsay Lohan, etc. get so much coverage, and why substantive issues get so little coverage. Can we expect better? Not as long as the MSM is controlled by Neanderthals.

Greenwald writes an online column for Salon, which if you haven't read, you must. He consistently provides razor sharp insight simply not available in traditional media, such as astute criticism of said media. This book is an unflinching dressing-down of the ridiculous myths that exist out there about "conservatives," from John Wayne to John McCain. No need to list them here--if you're even looking at picking up this book, you already know what they are, and are outraged by them. My only criticism of Greenwald is that he can from time to time be repetitive in his observations and points, taking, for example, 15 pages to say what could be said in 12. That's all that keeps me from giving this 5 stars. But don't let that stop you. Buy this book. And start reading him on Salon.

Glenn Greenwald is the writer for our time. I think historians will use Glenn's writings as a milestone beginning the end of the corporate propaganda era. Glenn has few sacred cows except the truth, which we all know has a liberal bias. This book is another in his impressive catalog exposing the Hypocrites in the corporate media and corporate bought government. Conservative apologists and the gasbags in the media will hate it as it is filled with bonafide facts.

I was pleased with the purchase. The item came fast and in the promised condition.

Weimer's "Policy Analysis -3rd edition" provides a well-organized, widely-covered, and easily-understandable introduction to policy analysis. Although we have to seek for other materials for an in-depth analysis of some topics, the book helps us start with Public Policy, Policy Analysis, and even economic policies. This is especially good for undergraduate level, since this provides how to study, investigate, and write policy paper.

This is 'the' book when it comes to public policy analysis. I have read the 3rd and 4th editions and both are great foundational books for anyone looking to do public policy analysis as a practitioner or academic researcher.

This is one of the very best textbooks in the study of policy analysis.

The first part of the book sets the context. It provides a neat case study of the Canadian salmon fishery to give an example of basic policy analysis. Following this are chapters on the nature of policy analysis and the professional ethics related to the endeavor.

One of the most important elements of this book is the next section--the economics of policy analysis. The text discusses the logic of economics, why government intervention through making policy can make economic sense under certain conditions, and the danger of "government failure" (when governmernt actions may work against good economic sense).

The following section focuses on the variety of policy options available to government to address problems. Some "solutions" are market-based; others include regulations and taxes. The volume goes on to explore techniques such as cost-benefit analysis. Two case studies of policy analysis round out the substantive chapters. The last chapter focuses on the responsibility of policy analysts to both "do well" and to "do good."

Not an easy read, but a book that provides the basic underpinnings for understanding policy analysis--and how to do policy analysis.

I read this book for a class and it gives a fantastic overview of the basics of policy analysis. It discusses the reasons for government intervention in markets, the analysis of policies and ways of going about doing a thorough policy analysis. Easy to read and very informative!

I think Perry's book entitled Western Civilization is very lear, articulate and comprehensive. I have been using it in My Humanities courses and it is the best book I have come across so far.

As an adult student, I feared having to take History 101. It was an online class, and the professor I had was not very good, but this book taught me a lot. The authors emphasize the relationship of ethics and morality with the development of western religions and governments from early Mesopotamia until 1789. For example, it helped me to understand the different viewpoints of the contemporary issues happening in the Middle East (why and how religion serves as a basis for many governments.)

If you are considering taking a History course that uses this textbook, or just want to learn more about how our world's societies have developed, I highly recommend this book. I didn't continue with History 102, but I did buy Volume II of this book series from Perry, et al., to continue my understanding world issues. Please join me!

This book was required reading for my Political Science class on the American Presidency. It was very informative and supported the professor's lectures.

Edwards creates a book which may be a decent introduction to some more complicated ideas presented by more famous or prolific Political Scientists like Neustadt or Kernell, but there isn't a clear thesis to his book and much of it is uncited, which leads to incorrect assumptions, or things which are flat out wrong.

In specific, he writes on page 332 that "the houses of Congress are highly decentralized," and then runs with that assumption for quite some time. Edwards could not be further from the truth on this matter. It is a nearly unanimous conclusion among Congressional scholars (Smith, Gamm, Schikler, Dodd, Aldrich, Cooper) that the Congress has become almost as centralized as the days of Czar Cannon.

He also writes that Congressional voting records have been moving away from party line voting but this is flat wrong. The levels of party homogeneity are at an all time high and intra party cooperation is at an all time low. This negatively affects his conclusions in reference to the interactions between the President and the Congress.

While this book may be a good overview of certain things, Edwards has incorrect conclusion when it comes to the examination of Congressional / Presidential negotiations... and that relationship ought to be one of the clearest in the mind of any aspiring Political Scientist.

This is an excellent text for anyone interested in political leadership. Both the beginner and anyone who wants a top notch reference text. I have owned dozens of books on the American presidency, I only buy one from the list to give as a gift to others: Edwards & Wayne's "Presidential Leadership." Buy it you will enjoy it. I am buying a new copy to replace my old copy, which is falling apart!

How did Michael Beschloss get to be "America's Leading Presidential Historian?" I can only assume it is because he has a talent for getting himself on TV again & again...because it certainly isn't because of dreadful efforts such as this.

Setting content aside for a moment --- how can any literate person regard this as well written? It reads like a Power Point presentation, or more specifically, like research notes which were never revised into a coherent narrative. It's hard to have narrative at all when your chapters are only 5 pages long! Suffice it to say, I found the writing to be such an irritant that I ultimately never finished the book. Life is too short to read crappy writing.

As for the content itself, this is all ground which has been well-covered many times before and Beschloss' conclusions are generally quite unremarkable. When he isn't stating the obvious, Beschloss is dumbing down the subject matter to make it appear more simple than it really was.

Just as an example, I would point to Andrew Jackson & the Bank War. Exactly how is this courageous? Jackson was enjoying tremendous popular support when he went in for the kill against the 2nd BUS, and he was as convinced of his own rectitude as any man ever has. Also, it is grossly inaccurate to characterize the 2nd BUS as corrupt. Nicholas may have been a ruthless autocrat, but nobody could accuse him of corruption. That label would be more accurately applied to Jackson's "pet banks" into which Jackson put government deposits, and which were largely responsible for the catastrophic Panic of 1837. Does Beschloss provide anything more than the most shallow of analysis? Of course not.

I never would have purchased this in the first place, but it was part of a book club shipment which I opened by mistake, thinking that it was another (better-written) book. It was only the first of many regrets.

Like the rest of us, our Presidents have been flawed people -- each with his own limitations, prejudices, and conflicts. And yet, through our history, at times these men have risen above their limitations to exert extraordinary leadership: grasping a moral imperative with uncommon clarity, and finding the strength and passion to use the powers of the office to follow that imperative despite great risk to their own political fortunes -- and, in some cases, to their very lives.

"Presidential Courage" tells the stories behind nine such moments of courageous leadership. In none of them is the protagonist portrayed as an all-knowing superhero. In each, we see the President wrestle with a challenge in a profoundly human way -- beset by the uncertainties, self-doubts, pride and fear that are familiar to all who struggle with a moral dilemma. In each case, the President ultimately comes to the painful decision that the right course of action is contrary to what his advisors recommend or public opinion demands. And yet he chooses to throw himself into the breach.

The author's research is impressive, drawing upon unpublished papers and (for President Reagan) interviews with people who witnessed personal dimensions behind publicly reported events. As a result, the stories contain many human details that do not make it into our school curriculum or popular awareness. These details are not always flattering. Kennedy, for example, is portrayed as being dragged only reluctantly to the "right" side of the fight for racial equality. And for Truman, his own anti-semitic bias was a key obstacle that he had to overcome. But to a large degree it is precisely the humanity of the way these men struggled with -- and triumphed over -- their personal limitations that gives these stories such inspirational impact.

One aspect of the book that I particularly enjoyed was the transitions between chapters. The author searches out connections between these men, suggesting almost spiritual ways in which the legacies of past Presidents have in effect enabled them to reach forward through time to inspire their successors. It gives hope that the best moments in our presidential history will yet empower future leaders, at least from time to time, to rise above their limitations to achieve great things as well.

I had high expectations for this book. It let me down a little. It just wasn't that engaging. Some of it is very well known like JFK's battle with civil rights. I was looking for a good analysis on the different presidents and their actions. I didn't find that. I found that Mr. Beschloss just told about the different incident but didn't offer any new insight to it. I was hoping that he would even use them to give perspective on what is happening now but he didn't. I rated this book 3 stars because he does include several presidents and topics that I was unaware of. For that it was worth my time reading it. This is a very basic book so I would recommend it to people that are wanting to learn about the presidents and their thought processes concerning major events in their presidencies.

This is an interesting review of some history. Some of it was in high school textbooks but long forgotten. The author includes details that probably weren't in the textbooks. One aspect that I really like is the author makes links between past and present, e.g. the grandson of a person in one administration turns up in the another president's administration.

It is not dense history so a history-buff probably would find it too simple. But for most of us, it is a quick read (short paragraphs) that is interesting. We can see how difficult governing really is.

I recommend this book be read by everybody in America-in order to learn more about some of our finest Presidents. I was educated on things that I had not learned before-FASCINATING!

Simply the best book on comparative West European politics. Organised by theme rather than country; but does not just cover the 'big' countries as most texts do. Excellent.

The timeline at the end of the book ties up the case: for some unknown reason (perhaps just to get re-elected) the party in power deliberately takes the country to war. Every documented lie is exposed. Sometimes the anguish I felt reading this book caused me to put it aside and I felt despair about our miss-directed lives as citizens.

In this day and age of sanitized/filtered news and monopolized corporate media, it is refreshing to read a 'timeline' book that delineates all the mistakes, bad schemes, and outright lies of 'Bush 2' and company, written by an astute and honest researcher and chronicler. The book presents disturbing fact after fact that should trouble every American, and is not partisan in any way. Republicans, as well as Democrats, should be at least concerned, and at most outraged at all the inept mismanagement and lies that led to the Iraqi invasion, as well as the many other incompetencies of the Bush administration. From his ignoring the message that the second tower was attacked while reading to children to 'Yellowcake' to wrongly outing Valerie Plame to the Iraq war buildup based on lies/false information to the Iraqi war mismanagement to Bush staging 'Mission Accomplished' to Abu Ghraib to not providing proper armor/combat vehicles to our soldiers to the intransigence of Katrina to the 'swiftboating' of a war hero, John Kerry (while Bush saw no combat duty) to the fast rising oil/gas prices to the brainwashing of the largely gullible and malleable American public, etc. etc. etc. This excellent book essentially 'covers all the bases' when it comes to why George Bush will be considered one of the worst, if not THE worst Presidents we've ever had. Frankly, if 'Shrub' was a corporate CEO, his rear-end would have been fired a LONG TIME AGO! How this way below average buffoon ever made it to be POTUS in the first place is the shock of the century.

what a truth-teller!!! if you want a refreshingly honest and accurate critique of the horrors of w's presidency, be sure to have this in your library...frankie's essays are delightfully biting...

the spin, and Fox news propaganda always made up a quick response to any BUSH lies, and Incompetence. In this excellent book on CD's you can hear the actual truth, sans lying propaganda, and see how we were systematically deceived, manipulated, and just constantly lied to. As to IRAQ, and the whole run up to war, 'the whole damn thing was a LIE !'

Several years ago, I may have had some disagreements with Frank Rich's worldview and some of his columns. But I'm compelled to take a few moments to convey what an astounding accomplishment "The Greatest Story . . ." is.

Mr. Rich has strung together all the important milestones that were incomprehensible to those of us shrouded in the "fog of war" until the convergence of Cindy Sheehan, Katrina and Scooter Libby. This book is nothing short of the first draft of history that a century from now will be the pre-eminent resource of our nation's tragic misadventure in Iraq.

Mr. Rich's narrative is compulsively readable, making sense of the seemingly senseless, and demystifying the propaganda machinery perfected by the Bush administration.

"Greatest Story" is a must-read for anyone who cares to understand how a faux existential threat to America was exploited by the neocons to fashion a new world order in the Middle East with disastrous consequences, a squandering of blood and treasure and -- most importantly -- the destruction of a generation of patriots: American soldiers who will be brought home with appalling disabilities, psychological damage and torn families.

Kudos to Mr. Rich for this monumental achievement. It stands alone in the pantheon of books on the subject of making sense of the senseless.