Have you read a good book on politics? Why not review it for our members? Simply send your short review to SCDC and we will post it. (mike@southcountydems.com)

Of course there are limits of time, space, and the nature of your review. This is a progressive political website -- we reserve the right not to post reviews which we deem are counter to the spirit of our website. Reviews which use language that is offensive in nature, will not be posted.

POSTED 5/28/08 UPDATED 8/25/08

NEW YORK TIMES #10 NONFICTION BOOK

UPDATED 8/25/08: They've done everything they could to keep Vince Bugliosi's book under wraps. Even though Vince Bugliosi is the #1 true-crime selling author of all time, it persists. ABC wouldn't take paid advertisements. There have only been two very short cable news stories. CNN did a hatchet job on a 20 minute interview where they tried to make Bugliosi look sympathetic to Bush. No Oprah, no Colbert, no Jon Stewart (yet), no Crossfire, no Olbermann, NO NOTHING ON MSM for this book.

When Bush runs out the clock on impeachment and you're looking for justice, send a copy of this book to your local prosecutor.

Palpable Anger
Vincent Bugliosi

My anger over the war in Iraq, some will say, is palpable. If I sound too angry for some, what should I be greatly angry about -- that a referee gave what I thought was a bad call to my hometown football, basketball, or baseball team, and it may have cost them the game? I don't think so.

Virtually all of us cling desperately to life, either because of our love of life and/ or our fear of death. I'm told there is a passage in a novel by Dostoyevsky in which a character in the story exclaims, "If I were condemned to live on a rock, chained to a rock in the lashing sea, and all around me were ice and gales and storm, I would still want to live. Oh God, just to live, live, live!"

So nothing is as important in life as life and death. We fear and loathe the thought of our own death, even if it's a peaceful one after we've outlived the normal longevity. We fear not only the loss of our own lives, but the lives of our parents and sisters and brothers, as well as our relatives and close friends. We don't think of our children too much in this regard because our children, in the normal scheme of things, are supposed to outlive us. When they die before us, the already hideous nature of death becomes unbearable. And that's when they die a normal and peaceful death from illness. If the death is from an accident, like a car collision, the death of the child, if possible, is even more unbearable.

So one can hardly imagine the gut-tearing pain and horror when the only child of a couple, a nineteen-year-old son, call him Tim, the center of his parents' lives, whom they showered with their love and lived through vicariously in his triumphs on the athletic field and in the classroom, and who was excited as he looked forward to life, planning to wed his high school sweetheart and go on to become a police officer (or lawyer, doctor, engineer, etc.) dies the most horrible of deaths from a roadside bomb in a far-off country, and comes home in a metal box, * his body so shattered that his parents are cautioned by the military not to open it because what is inside ("our Timmy") is "unviewable." (To make the point hit home more with you, can you imagine if it was your son who was killed in Iraq and came home "unviewable" in a box? Yes, your son Scott, or Paul, or Michael, or Ronnie, Todd, Peter, Marty, Sean, or Bobby.)

No words can capture the feelings, the enormous suffering, of Tim's parents. But I think we can say that among a host of other deep agonies, they will have nightmares for the rest of their lives over the horrifying image of their boy the moment he lost his life on a desolate road in Iraq. As a mother of a soldier who died in Iraq wrote in a May 17, 2004, letter to the New York Times: "The explosion that killed my son in Baghdad will go on in our lives forever." She went on to say that "seared on" her soul are the "screams and despair" of her family over the loss of her son and the "sound of taps above the weeping crowd at the grave site of my son."

Just as Tim's young life ended before he really had a chance to live, so did the lives of thousands of other young men in the Iraq war. Not one of them wanted to die. As one wrote in his diary before he was killed in the battle of Fallouja: "I am not so much scared as I am very afraid of the unknown. If I don't get to write again, I would say I died too early. I haven't done enough in my life. I haven't gotten to experience enough. Though I hope I haven't gone in vain." In letter after letter home by young men who were later killed in combat in Iraq were words to the effect, "I can't wait to get back home and to start my life again."

All of the young men who died horrible and violent deaths in Bush's war had dreams. Bush saw to it that none of them would ever come true. It is impossible to adequately describe all the emotions and the magnitude of the human suffering that this dreadful war has wrought.

• It is not a casket or coffin, which the survivors of course later put the remains in. The military refers to the aluminum receptacle as a "transfer case," and the case is draped with an American flag.

The above is an excerpt from the book The Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder by Vincent Bugliosi Published by Vanguard Press; May 2008; $26.95US/$28.95CAN; 978-159315-481-3 Copyright © 2008 Vincent Bugliosi

Vincent Bugliosi received his law degree in 1964. In his career at the L.A. County District Attorney's office, he successfully prosecuted 105 out of 106 felony jury trials, including 21 murder convictions without a single loss. His most famous trial, the Charles Manson case, became the basis of his classic, Helter Skelter, the biggest selling true-crime book in publishing history. His forthcoming book, The Prosecution of George W. Bush For Murder, is available May 27.

For more information visit www.prosecutionofbush.com

 POSTED 8/7/08

The Wrecking Crew

By Thomas Frank

How Washington's Right-Wing Wrecking Crew Robbed Us Blind

By Thomas Frank, Tomdispatch.com. Posted August 6, 2008.

Conservatives have turned a vast government built for our protection into a device for exploiting us.

(From Alternet) Washington is the city where the scandals happen. Every American knows this, but we also believe, if only vaguely, that the really monumental scandals are a thing of the past, that the golden age of misgovernment-for-profit ended with the cavalry charge and the robber barons, at about the same time presidents stopped wearing beards.

I moved to Washington in 2003, just in time for the comeback, for the hundred-year flood. At first it was only a trickle in the basement, a little stream released accidentally by the president's friends at Enron. Before long, though, the levees were failing all over town, and the city was inundated with a muddy torrent of graft.

How are we to dissect a deluge like this one? We might begin by categorizing the earmarks handed out by Congress, sorting the foolish earmarks from the costly earmarks from the earmarks made strictly on a cash basis. We could try a similar approach to government contracting: the no-bid contracts, the no-oversight contracts, the no-experience contracts, the contracts handed out to friends of the vice president. We might consider the shoplifting career of one of the president's former domestic policy advisers or the habitual plagiarism of the president's liaison to the Christian right. And we would certainly have to find some way to parse the extraordinary incompetence of the executive branch, incompetence so fulsome and steady and reliable that at some point Americans stopped being surprised and began simply to count on it, to think of incompetence as the way government works.

But the onrushing flow swamps all taxonomies. Mass firing of federal prosecutors; bribing of newspaper columnists; pallets of shrink-wrapped cash "misplaced" in Iraq; inexperienced kids running the Baghdad stock exchange; the discovery that many of Alaska's leading politicians are apparently on the take -- our heads swim. We climb to the rooftop, but we cannot find the heights of irony from which we might laugh off the blend of thug and Pharisee that was Tom DeLay -- or dispel the nauseating suspicion, quickly becoming a certainty, that the government of our nation deliberately fibbed us into a pointless, catastrophic war.

THERE'S MORE - GO TO ALTERNET

POSTED 7/28/08

This Land Is Their Land:
Reports from a Divided Nation

By Barbara Ehrenreich

 (From the Daily KOS  by SusanG )

THERE'S MORE - GO TO DIARY

POSTED 7/24/08

The Devil in Dover:
A Journalist's Story of Dogma v. Darwin in Small-town America

By Lauri Lebo

In late 2005 national media eagerly flocked to the heretofore peaceful town of Dover, PA in what many journalists labeled a modern day Scopes Monkey Trial, officially known as Kitzmiller Vs Dover Area School District. Reporters came from DC, New York, LA, along with every nook and cranny of the US, not to mention Europe and Asia. But there was one who didn't have to travel to get this story; Laurie Lebo grew up in the area, her family owned the local Christian radio station, her childhood friends were pastors, teachers, and parents embroiled in what would become a bitter controversy turning neighbor against neighbor. When America's simmering culture clash erupted into a full blown firefight, she found herself smack dab between opposing forces fighting tooth and nail in a battle to the idealogical death. Lebo leverages that unique geographical perch with writing skills that can only be described as both gritty and brilliant. Not to mention at times refreshing, for instance:

I've thought of this notion of "fair and balanced" journalism and of how, somewhere along the line, we as journalists have gotten confused by a misguided notion of objectivity. It is our job to inform readers of the truth, not just regurgitate  lies, even if it means the stories are no longer "balanced." page 158  

This is not the usual recap of claims and counter claims, or courtroom details provided by one dimensional cookie cutter characters. The local evangelical community in Dover has been portrayed in some quarters as dishonest hicks gleefully rubbing the hands together and cackling at the thought of bringing down science. The author quickly dispatches that erroneous image; these are the kind of Christians who live by the Sermon on the Mount. They comfort the destitute and terminally ill, they volunteer long hours persuading local businesses to provide recently released felons with gainful employment; in one touching example, the author's own father literally gives a total stranger going through a tough time the brand new shoes off his feet.

Despite her roots and understandable affection for the opinions of friends and family, Lebo courageously exhibits the highest standards in intellectual honesty and journalistic ethos. She doesn't go easy on those who led Dover ISD residents into a bitterly divisive, legal maelstrom based on crack pot pseudoscience. Far from it. Part of the great appeal of this book is that those conflicts are woven into compelling personal narratives and observations from an author who is clearly conflicted on both a professional and emotional level. Rather than trying to hide that internal pain, the author lets it all hang out to the great benefit of her lucky readers. And that's what makes this book such an important read for residents of other close knits communities all over the nation that may be or are being drawn into this debate: the price paid by the local community goes far beyond the cost assessed on the school district (In the case of Dover it ended up costing local taxpayers a cool one-million dollars). Once friendly neighbors become enemies, relationships are tested to the breaking point. And in some cases, based on what's revealed in the book anyway, it sounds like those rifts may never be repaired, even long after the cameras and media celebrities have left for the next big story.

Readers who appreciate the science of evolution, or the lack thereof in Intelligent Design Creationism, will not be disappointed. Lebo wryly remarks at one point she's thankful the topic under scrutiny was not quantum physics, or she would have been hard pressed to adequately convey the scientific testimony. Nevertheless, she does her biology homework magnificently, breaking down even the more esoteric material with such proficiency it should inform those readers new to the evidence for evolution, and still delight the veteran molecular biologist. Same goes for the legal history and constitutional intricacies underpinning the issues at hand, all of which are every bit as interesting as they are far beyond the scope of this review.

In short, this is hands down the best book I've read about the landmark trial. I recommend it highly for anyone. But most especially for any local board members being courted by IDC proponents; whatever you do, before you bring this misery down on your constituents, pick up a copy of Laurie Lebo's The Devil in Dover, and read every last word of it.

POSTED 7/13/08

The Dark Side:
The Inside Story of How The War on Terror Turned into a War on American Ideals

By Jane Mayer

A dramatic and damning narrative account of how America has fought the "War on Terror".

In the days immediately following September 11th, the most powerful people in the country were panic-stricken. The radical decisions about how to combat terrorists and strengthen national security were made in a state of utter chaos and fear, but the key players, Vice President Dick Cheney and his powerful, secretive adviser David Addington, used the crisis to further a long held agenda to enhance Presidential powers to a degree never known in U.S. history, and obliterate Constitutional protections that define the very essence of the American experiment.

THE DARK SIDE is a dramatic, riveting, and definitive narrative account of how the United States made terrible decisions in the pursuit of terrorists around the world-- decisions that not only violated the Constitution to which White House officials took an oath to uphold, but also hampered the pursuit of Al Qaeda. In gripping detail, acclaimed New Yorker writer and bestselling author, Jane Mayer, relates the impact of these decisions--U.S.-held prisoners, some of them completely innocent, were subjected to treatment more reminiscent of the Spanish Inquisition than the twenty-first century.

THE DARK SIDE will chronicle real, specific cases, shown in real time against the larger tableau of what was happening in Washington, looking at the intelligence gained--or not--and the price paid. In some instances, torture worked. In many more, it led to false information, sometimes with devastating results. For instance, there is the stunning admission of one of the detainees, Sheikh Ibn al-Libi, that the confession he gave under duress--which provided a key piece of evidence buttressing congressional support of going to war against Iraq--was in fact fabricated, to make the torture stop.

In all cases, whatever the short term gains, there were incalculable losses in terms of moral standing, and our country's place in the world, and its sense of itself. THE DARK SIDE chronicles one of the most disturbing chapters in American history, one that will serve as the lasting legacy of the George W. Bush presidency.

POSTED 6/29/08

Going Down Jericho Road:
The Memphis Strike, Martin Luther King's Last Campaign

By Michael K. Honey

"The definitive appreciation of the Memphis garbage strike, one of the pivotal human-rights moments in late twentieth-century America."—David Levering Lewis

Memphis in 1968 was ruled by a paternalistic "plantation mentality" embodied in its good-old-boy mayor, Henry Loeb. Wretched conditions, abusive white supervisors, poor education, and low wages locked most black workers into poverty. Then two sanitation workers were chewed up in the back of a faulty truck, igniting a months-long public-employee strike that would shake the nation. With novelistic drama and rich scholarly detail, this "first-rate chronicle" (Seattle Times) relates the riveting story of the 1968 strike that shook Memphis—and claimed Martin Luther King's life. 16 pages of illustrations.

POSTED 6/22/08

Blogwars:
The New Political Battleground

By David D. Perlmutter

Book Review
(From the Daily KOS by SusanG)

Writing books about blogs poses a lot of challenges. Books take time to edit and release, while blogs change so quickly that often a book that was cutting-edge in the writing process is dated by the time it is published. Early studies of blogs have also tended to focus on content analysis -- what blogs say -- rather than on what they accomplish, where their limitations lie, what role they play in the broader political discourse. David Perlmutter's Blogwars suffers from a bit of both these problems, though significantly less so than other booklength academic takes on blogging I have read.

Blogwars looks at the development of the blogosphere (or, as he calls it/them, the bloglands) and dwells as one might expect on Howard Dean's presidential campaign; though it does spend some time on the 2006 elections, this is enough to leave it a bit behind the times. And while it spends a significant amount of time on content, and on what makes blog content different from traditional journalism on the one hand and traditional campaign communications on the other, Perlmutter does try to place blogs structurally a bit more. As such, this book is a significant advance in the study of blogs.

That said, it also suffers from real problems. Many of them stem from Perlmutter being (counterintuitively for a dean at a journalism school who has written several books) not a very good writer. He works hard to introduce a complex view of blogs, neither triumphalist nor alarmist, but his method of doing so is to veer back forth between the two points of view, so that two pages of complaints about pottymouthed diatribes will be followed by two pages of analogy between blogs and the activities of the Great Men of History. The book is filled with such historical analogies, but they tend to be underdeveloped and a bit scattershot, so that you come away from reading Blogwars with a distinct sense that blogging is not a unique development in communication, but without a rigorously developed understanding of where exactly it does fit.

Perlmutter also omits some significant questions. He makes every effort to analyze both liberal and conservative blogging, but does not for instance take on the question of why liberal blogs are so much more successful than conservative ones. This omission, among others, impoverishes his laudable attempt to consider what role blogs play in politics more generally.

Nonetheless, this book represents a major step forward in blogs being taken seriously and analyzed not simply as words on a computer screen but as a dynamic part of the political landscape. And certainly it's a subject many readers of Daily Kos will find interesting.
--MissLaura

POSTED 6/16/08

Bad Money:
Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism

By Kevin Phillips

Money is "bad," in the historical sense, when a leading world economic power passing its zenith—before the United States, think Hapsburg Spain, the maritime Dutch Republic (when New York was New Amsterdam), and imperial Britain just before World War I—lets itself luxuriate in finance at the expense of harvesting, manufacturing, or transporting things. Doing so has marked each nation's global decline. To institutionalize the dominance of minimally regulated finance at this stage of U.S. history is a bad idea.

...

... prior eminence of the United States in petroleum matters has left not only an outdated infrastructure but a spectrum of disabilities, unwarranted smugness, vested interests, and booby traps. These range from currency vulnerabilities and lack of a serious national energy strategy to apparent policy inertia in Washington, where many officeholders seem unable to understand how much has changed for the United States over the last decade.

...

Let me underscore: except tangentially, this book is not about elections. It is about the insecurity of America's future as the leading world economic power, given a debt-gorged and negligent financial sector, and the vulnerability caused by the nation's expensive dependence on imported oil.

Kevin Phillips, author of bestsellers  American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21stCentury and American Dynasty: Aristocracy, Fortune, and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush, turns his full attention to the economy in his latest book, and the news he brings is—not to surprise you or anything—bad.

POSTED 6/22/08

Credit and Blame

By Charles Tilly

Book Review
(From the Daily KOS by SusanG)

Studies of television news’ impact clearly show the difference between reporting single episodes in a story form and offering in-depth thematic treatments of the same subjects. When new reports focus on episodes that dramatize a poor person’s plight, viewers look for someone (the poor person or someone else) who caused the hardship. When news reports take up poverty more generally, using individuals to illustrate the general theme, viewers more often attribute responsibility to government and society at large. When doing total justice, we have a choice between singling out one or two culprits or tracing the whole complicated process that brought someone grief.

People think in stories. People persuade with stories. People live their lives in a narrative form, telling stories about themselves to themselves.

And most of the these stories feature action and action's consequences,  according to author Charles Tilly in his new work, Credit and Blame, who points out that not only our personal lives, but our public life too, is nearly always focused on designating responsibility. Indeed, Tilly points out, this has been the case from this country's separation from Britain; he writes, "A great deal of public politics in the United States and elsewhere consists of taking or denying credit, assigning or resisting blame. The country’s very founding document, the 1776 Declaration of Independence, adroitly combined credit and blame."

Tilly's book is a wide-ranging, engaging academic work that looks across cultures and throughout history as societies grapple with questions about effectiveness, moral accountability, fairness and the blurry line between individual initiative and collective responsibility.

Credit and Blame is a thought-provoking read for anyone interested in the dynamics of structuring political narratives, or of mining data in such a way that accountability and predictions can be packaged and explained in an engaging way.
SusanG

POSTED 6/5/08

What Happened:
Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception

By Scott McClellan

With unprecedented candor, one of George W. Bush's closest aides takes readers behind the scenes of the Bush presidency, and what exactly happened to take it off course.

Scott McClellan was one of a few Bush loyalists from Texas who became part of his inner circle of trusted advisers, and remained so during one of the most challenging and contentious periods of recent history. Drawn to Bush by his commitment to compassionate conservatism and strong bipartisan leadership, McClellan served the president for more than seven years, and witnessed day-to-day exactly how the presidency veered off course.

In this refreshingly clear-eyed book, written with no agenda other than to record his experiences and insights for the benefit of history, McClellan provides unique perspective on what happened and why it happened the way it did, including the Iraq war, Hurricane Katrina, Washington's bitter partisanship, and two hotly contested presidential campaigns. He gives readers a candid look into who George W. Bush is and what he believes, and into the personalities, strengths, and liabilities of his top aides. Finally, McClellan looks to the future, exploring the lessons this presidency offers the American people as we prepare to elect a new leader.

POSTED 6/2/08

Great Lakes for Sale
From Whitecaps to Bottlecaps

Dave Dempsey

From the Foreword:

"Dave Dempsey's book is an important part of the effort to remind people why commercialization of Great Lakes water is a dangerous threat. It's not simply a matter of how much water in the short term is bottled and shipped away; the long-term threat is control of water and the possibility that private interests will assert ownership of the very substance of the Great Lakes. This is an issue that could determine the fate of the Great Lakes. I encourage the millions who care about the Great Lakes to read and act on this valuable book. Our Great Lakes water must always remain a public resource in public hands. It's a matter of prosperity, fairness, and survival."
---Congressman Bart Stupak, First District, Michigan

Great Lakes for Sale is a book for anyone interested in saving the Great Lakes, a huge fresh-water system that contains an estimated 6 quadrillion gallons of water and about twenty percent of the world's fresh surface water. The book poses---and answers---important questions about the export and diversion of Great Lakes water. Not only does Great Lakes for Sale examine past and present water-diversion practices; it also shows readers what they can do to save this natural resource.

It's difficult to understate the importance of the Great Lakes water system---economically, environmentally, or from a public-health perspective. The Great Lakes support year-round sport fishery, they provide a route for commercial and recreational navigation, and they supply many communities with drinking water. Water means jobs and life in the Great Lakes region. And, while residents of this huge region revel in a seemingly limitless quantity of fresh water today, it's likely that the future will see that same fresh water grow ever more scarce as well as become a source of contention between thirsty communities---and corporations---further afield and those who live in this giant watershed.

Great Lakes for Sale is an important part of the effort to remind people why commercialization of Great Lakes water is a dangerous threat. It's not simply a matter of how much water in the short term is removed; the long-term threat is control of water and the possibility that non-Great Lakes interests will assert ownership of the very substance of the Great Lakes.

Dave Dempsey is senior policy advisor for the Michigan Environmental Council and well known for his writings on environmental issues in the Great Lakes region. He is author of Ruin and Recovery: Michigan's Rise as a Conservation Leader and William G. Milliken: Michigan's Passionate Moderate. He lives in St. Paul, Minnesota. Visit Dempsey's website at: http://www.davedempsey.org/ and his blog at: http://daviddempsey.typepad.com/.

POSTED 6/5/08

The Real McCain:
Why Conservatives Don't Trust Him and Why Independents Shouldn't

By Cliff Schecter

Synopsis: A hard-hitting profile of a political celebrity, this book analyzes John McCains out-of-the-mainstream stances and expedient flip-flops on the economy, campaign finance reform, the Iraq war, and other key issues.

Synopsis: Thinking about voting for McCain? Read this book. Cliff Schecter's hard-hitting profile explores the gap between the public record of Senator John McCain and his media image. Drawing on a range of sources and adding his unique perspective and humor, Schecter guides the reader though McCain's long history of expedient flip-flops, especially on his signature issues of national security and campaign finance reform. Far from a straight-talking maverick, McCain emerges as a temperamental political chameleon who will do or say virtually anything to become president of the United States. On issue after issue - including the invasion and occupation of Iraq, torture, abortion, and gay rights - The Real McCain reveals a politician who started as a Goldwater Republican, experienced a brief period after sanity after his loss to George W. Bush in 2000, and began pandering to the very groups he challenged after deciding to run again in 2008.

There's no question John McCain is getting a free ride from the mainstream press. But with the power of YouTube and the blogosphere, we can provide an accurate portrayal of the so-called Maverick. We can put the brakes on his free ride!

Since we first released The Real McCain a year ago, Brave New Films' REAL McCain series has garnered close to two million views, with over 13,000 comments and tens of thousands more in petition signatures! Clearly, John McCain's record is something the public wants to discuss, and yet the corporate media is doing nothing to present the truth. We feel obliged to continue countering the mainstream media's love of McCain. And so we thought it was high time for a sequel: The Real McCain 2 (the video to the right).

We're doing everything to get the facts out there about McCain. Join us in making a concerted effort to tell the story that corporate media refuses to tell. E-mail this video to all of your friends and family members, news blogs and other local media outlets.

According to Cliff Schecter, author of The Real McCain: Why Conservatives Don't Trust Him And Why Independents Shouldn't:

"It is dangerous for a democracy when a presidential candidate can lie with impunity, change positions on a whim, and physically and verbally threaten others and virtually none of it is reported by a besotted media eagerly awaiting the next moment when he might slap their backs in friendship."

The mainstream press may not do their job, but we can surely do ours. It is crucial that we alert the public to the REAL McCain, and it is crucial we act now, before it's too late.

POSTED 5/19/08

Moyers on Democracy

By Bill Moyers

Bill Moyers: "We are in trouble"

(From the Daily KOS  by Inky99 )

Today, Alternet published an excerpt from Bill Moyers' new book, "Moyers on Democracy", which states the plain damn simple truth about this mess America is in right now.   I'm amazed nobody here has diaried it yet (I did a search but found nothing.)

At any rate, here's a little sampler:

. . . the philosophy popularized in the last quarter century that "freedom" simply means freedom to choose among competing brands of consumer goods, that taxes are an unfair theft from the pockets of the successful to reward the incompetent, and that the market will meet all human needs while government itself becomes the enabler of privilege -- the philosophy of an earlier social Darwinism and laissez-faire capitalism dressed in new togs -- is as subversive as Benedict Arnold's betrayal of the Revolution he had once served.

This is one of those "you just gotta read this" diaries.  Although I find Moyers to be a bit of a snooze when he's speaking, he's a brilliant man and a fantastic writer.  And this time he just hits it out of the park.  There is almost nothing a guy like me can add to this.  

He just nails it.

The earth we share as our common gift, to be passed on in good condition to our children's children, is being despoiled. Private wealth is growing as public needs increase apace. Our Constitution is perilously close to being consigned to the valley of the shadow of death, betrayed by a powerful cabal of secrecy-obsessed authoritarians. Terms like "liberty" and "individual freedom" invoked by generations of Americans who battled to widen the 1787 promise to "promote the general welfare" have been perverted to create a government primarily dedicated to the welfare of the state and the political class that runs it. Yes, Virginia, there is a class war and ordinary people are losing it. It isn't necessary to be a Jeremiah crying aloud to a sinful Jerusalem that the Lord is about to afflict them for their sins of idolatry, or Cassandra, making a nuisance of herself as she wanders around King Priam's palace grounds wailing "The Greeks are coming." Or Socrates, the gadfly, stinging the rump of power with jabs of truth. Or even Paul Revere, if horses were still in fashion. You need only be a reporter with your eyes open to see what's happening to our democracy. I have been lucky enough to spend my adult life as a journalist, acquiring a priceless education in the ways of the world, actually getting paid to practice one of my craft's essential imperatives: connect the dots.

The conclusion that we are in trouble is unavoidable. I report the assault on nature evidenced in coal mining that tears the tops off mountains and dumps them into rivers, sacrificing the health and lives of those in the river valleys to short-term profit, and I see a link between that process and the stock-market frenzy which scorns long-term investments -- genuine savings -- in favor of quick turnovers and speculative bubbles whose inevitable bursting leaves insiders with stuffed pockets and millions of small stockholders, pensioners, and employees out of work, out of luck, and out of hope.

And then I see a connection between those disasters and the repeal of sixty-year-old banking and securities regulations designed during the Great Depression to prevent exactly that kind of human and economic damage. Who pushed for the removal of that firewall? An administration and Congress who are the political marionettes of the speculators, and who are well rewarded for their efforts with indispensable campaign contributions. Even honorable opponents of the practice get trapped in the web of an electoral system that effectively limits competition to those who can afford to spend millions in their run for office. Like it or not, candidates know that the largesse on which their political futures depend will last only as long as their votes are satisfactory to the sleek "bundlers" who turn the spigots of cash on and off.

The gist of the piece is that America is in deep trouble, our Democracy on the very brink of disappearing.  

It's one of those pieces you read and realize that Orwell was never more right when he said:

"In a time of universal deceit — telling the truth is a revolutionary act."

It's appalling that there is only one Bill Moyers.

POSTED 5/1/08

Five Years of My Life:
An Innocent Man in Guantanamo

By Murat Kurnaz, Jefferson Chase (Translator) , Helmut Kuhn

From the Publisher

In October 2001, nineteen-year-old Murat Kurnaz traveled to Pakistan to visit a madrassa. During a security check a few weeks after his arrival, he was arrested without explanation and for a bounty of $3,000, the Pakistani police sold him to U.S. forces. He was first taken to Kandahar, Afghanistan, where he was severely mistreated, and then two months later he was flown to Guantanamo as Prisoner #61. For more than 1,600 days, he was tortured and lived through hell. He was kept in a cage and endured daily interrogations, solitary confinement, and sleep deprivation. Finally, in August 2006, Kurnaz was released, with acknowledgment of his innocence. Told with lucidity, accuracy, and wisdom, Kurnaz's story is both sobering and poignant--an important testimony about our turbulent times when innocent people get caught in the crossfire of the war on terrorism.

POSTED 5/1/08

Naked Emperors:
The Failure of the Republican Revolution

By Scot M. Faulkner

Naked Emperors explains in sharp detail how the historic congressional election of 1994 utterly failed to live up to the promise of the Republican Revolution and its Contract for America. The book provides vivid insights into how a culture of corruption festers in Washington, and lays out a blueprint for how normal citizens can make government accountable even in the face of entrenched special interests.

POSTED 5/1/08

For Love of Politics:
Bill and Hillary Clinton - The White House Years

By Sally Bedell Smith

During their eight years in the White House, Bill and Hillary Clinton worked together more closely than the public ever knew. Their intertwined personal and professional lives had far-reaching consequences–for politics, domestic policy, and international affairs–and their marital troubles became a national soap opera. Based on unparalleled access to scores of Clinton insiders–cabinet officers, top administration officials, close personal friends–and skilled analysis of a vast written record, including previously unavailable private papers, For Love of Politics is the first book to explain the dynamics of Bill and Hillary’s relationship, showing that they are two halves of a unique whole and that it is impossible to understand one Clinton without factoring in the other.

Sally Bedell Smith, acclaimed author of Grace and Power: The Private World of the Kennedy White House, offers intimate scenes from the Clinton marriage, with new details and insights into how a passion for politics sustained Bill and Hillary through one crisis after another. With clarity and depth, Smith examines the origins of an unconventional copresidency, explains the impact of the Clintons’ tensions as well as their talents, and reveals how Hillary shifted from openly exercising power in the first two years to acting as a “hidden hand,” advising her husband on a range of foreign and domestic issues as well as decisions on hiring and firing.

POSTED 5/1/08

Marching Toward Hell:
America and Islam After Iraq

By Michael Scheuer

When Michael Scheuer first questioned the goals of the Iraq War in his 2004 bestseller Imperial Hubris, policymakers and ordinary citizens alike stood up and took notice. Now, Scheuer offers a scathing and frightening look at how the Iraq War has been a huge setback to America's War on Terror, making our enemy stronger and altering the geopolitical landscape in ways that are profoundly harmful to U.S. interests and security concerns.

Marching Toward Hell is not just another attack on the Bush administration. Rather, it sounds a critical alarm that must be heard in order to preserve the nation's security. Scheuer outlines the ways that America's foreign policy since the end of the Cold War has undermined the very goals for which we are fighting and played right into bin Laden's hands. The ongoing instability in Iraq, for example, has provided al Qaeda and its allies with the one thing they want most: a safe haven from which to launch operations across borders into countries that were previously difficult for them to reach. With U.S. forces and resources spread thinner every day, the war has depleted our strength and brought al Qaeda a kind of success that it could not have achieved on its own.

POSTED 4/28/08

Standing up to the Madness:
Ordinary Heroes in Extraordinary Times

By Amy Goodman, David Goodman

(From Mother Jones) Malik Rahim, a barrel-chested 59-year-old man with long gray dreadlocks that arc down his back and chest, stands on a street corner in what remains of the once vibrant African-American New Orleans neighborhood known as the Lower Ninth Ward. A veteran community organizer and the former defense minister of the New Orleans chapter of the Black Panther Party in the early 1970s, Rahim has thrown his share of punches and survived many battles, as well as time in jail. All of which has been good training for the epic struggle he is now engaged in: fighting for the right of poor and working-class residents of New Orleans to return home after being uprooted by Hurricane Katrina in August 2005.

We arrived in New Orleans on the second anniversary of the hurricane. President Bush had also come on this day to applaud the revival of New Orleans. But that revival skirted the places where poor people live. "The city didn't do nuthin' to save this," says Malik in disgust, waving a burly arm over the devastated landscape of the Lower Ninth Ward. Hurricane Katrina, the costliest and one of the deadliest hurricanes in American history, was not just a natural disaster. The catastrophe began with water, wind, and flooding on August 29, 2005. Today, the disaster continues for the poor and working-class people of New Orleans as they contend with "another hurricane called racism, greed, and corruption," says Malik.

When the long-forecasted hurricane drowned a great American city, the richest country in the world simply abandoned its poorest residents. President George W. Bush took in the show from his ranchette in Texas, then flew to California for a chuckling photo op with a country singer. "Heckuva job, Brownie" was the back-slapping praise he dished for his inept director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, who didn't even realize that thousands of flood survivors were huddled, terrified and starving, downtown in the Morial Convention Center.

As the hurricane roared through the Gulf states, Vice President Dick Cheney swung into action to ensure that oil pipelines came before people: Cheney's office ordered a Mississippi town to immediately restore electricity to the Colonial Pipeline Co., a company that pumps gasoline and diesel from Texas and the Gulf Coast to the Northeast. The repair delayed efforts to restore power to two rural hospitals and a number of water systems in Mississippi. It was a telling indicator of the White House's priorities in the Gulf.Two shameful weeks later, the president touched down in the darkened flooded city that was temporarily illuminated to serve as a backdrop for his speech. "Throughout the area hit by the hurricane, we will do what it takes, we will stay as long as it takes, to help citizens rebuild their communities and their lives," pledged the president. "We want evacuees to come home, for the best reasons—because they have a real chance at a better life in a place they love." Then New Orleans was plunged back into darkness—one that endures in countless ways for tens of thousands of its residents.

THERE'S MORE - GO TO MOTHER JONES

POSTED 4/23/08

McCain:
The Myth of a Maverick

By Matt Welch

Book Review: Matt Welch's "McCain: The Myth of a Maverick"

(From the Daily KOS  by SusanG)

McCain: The Myth of a Maverick
By Matt Welch
Palgrave/Macmillan
New York: 2007

This book examines the under-examined philosophy and track record of presidential candidate John McCain, teasing out his views on the proper role of government. It’s not a biography or a campaign memoir so much as it is a user’s guide or decoder ring for deciphering a supposedly inscrutable candidate.
...
As a former soldier, an independent by temperament and a man who places high value on forming partnerships with his ideological foes, McCain was a natural at couching all of his initiatives in the high rhetoric of above-it-all patriotism. Because journalists are so accustomed to plotting politicians along a single axis from left to right, McCain’s record looked like a mess of zigzagging contradictions, desperate for coherence and interpretation. Searching for "the real McCain" became a favored pastime of wish-casting reporters and analysts from coast to coast.

There's no better book out right now on John McCain than Matt Welch's tour de force that suffered the unfortunate fate of being released this past October when the candidate's likelihood of securing the Republican nomination seemed nil. As a character sketch and rumination on this particular "maverick''s" place in the political imagination, Welch's work is unparalleled. And for those who are unfamiliar with the author's writing--he's a former assistant editor of the Los Angeles Times editorial page and a current editor at Reason--The Myth of a Maverick should serve as a perfect introduction to a must-read writer.

Like Free Ride: John McCain and the Media (reviewed here), Welch looks deeply at the cozy relationship McCain has built up over the years with the reporters who cover him; he goes beyond the documentation--in which Brock and Waldman excel in Free Ride--and tries to tease out the personality and belief system of McCain in order to explain the foundation of the media love affair. The result is an extremely satisfying and thought-provoking read, full of Welch's wry humor and basic political smarts.

Two major propositions emerge from Welch's work. The first irevolves around how the Arizona senator has managed to use the device of the preemptive confession to disarm his would-be interlocutors--the press--and turn them into his infamous "base." The author pores over McCain's interviews and, most importantly, his voluminous autobiographies and tracts co-authored with long-time aide Mark Salter, and finds a pattern very similar to the 12-step program used in Alcoholics Anonymous and its spin-off groups. And this willingness, even eagerness, to openly admit and condemn himself about his flaws--his temper, his impetuousness, even his own personal ambition--is part of the strange dynamic that makes reporters feel so protective of his reputation when they're on that Straight Talk Express. Welch quotes more than one journalist who not only did not report on some of McCain's "confessions," but felt the urge to tell their subject to clam up.

Whether McCain's self-incriminations are conscious manipulations or not (after reading Welch, it's tempting to say sometimes yes, sometimes no), there's no arguing with the result: a press that sees him as interesting, unique and--for what it's worth--"human" and therefore likable. This underlying sympathy and admiration comes across in a majority of reporting on the candidate, and it's helped propel his career to heights that are not easy to predict based on his fairly meager record on the issues for which he's gained fame--bucking the status quo, clean politics and bipartisanship.

THERE'S MORE - GO TO ARTICLE

POSTED 4/13/08

Free Ride:
John McCain and the Media
(Paperback)

By David Brock (Author), Paul Waldman (Author)

(From the Daily KOS by SusanG)

A love affair took place aboard John McCain’s Straight Talk Express during the 2000 presidential primaries, one truly unique in the history of American political journalism. And it has hardly waned in the years since. The media, usually known for their ravenous appetite for scandalous behavior, have conveniently left out the legendary tales of the senatori’s hair-trigger temper, his mean and vulgar sense of humor, and his questionable ties to shady characters. While reporters spill gallons of ink on McCain’s admirable qualities, they have shoved to the side his unattractive traits, features of the McCain personality and record that he is no doubt all too happy to have the public overlook.

The world of politics, with its dueling delusions and realities (and narratives and memes and frames and arcs), can be a bewildering and frustrating one for activists. Nowhere is this more the case than when confronted with the fundamental stories America tells itself about itself--and its leaders, its goals and its destiny. Some bedrock beliefs in this country appear to be almost hard-wired into our nationalistic DNA--"socialized" medicine is horrible, the "heartland" of America is the real America, taxes are bad bad bad bad, always.

And, of course: John McCain is a straight-talking maverick war hero.

This last "truism" is seemingly unshakeable to the general American public. It drives political observers mad, particularly liberal ones, and is clearly the impetus behind David Brock’s and Paul Waldman’s heroic attempt to debunk the myth that surrounds the presumptive Republican nominee. It will come as no surprise to Daily Kos readers that the traditional media is named in the book as the culprit in spreading unfounded glory and a reputation for honesty on behalf of the Arizona senator. After all, both authors are from Media Matters, press fact-checker extraordinaire, and the process of press corps co-optation has never been examined so closely nor documented so well as it is in Free Ride. Diagnosing the problem, of course, is only half the battle, but without taking a long look at how the seduction of a cynical media class proceeded, there is little hope of fighting the McCain image in the months leading up to November.

There is an air of scholarly frustration throughout Free Ride that proves impossible not to share. Underlying all the closely cited flip-flops, the look at what was left out of numerous press accounts, and numerous data charts concerning McCain performance ratings or number of Sunday morning press appearances, there is an inescapable constant of wonderment: Just how the hell, in the face of so much contrarian evidence, can McCain’s reputation as a straight-talker not only survive but continue to thrive? What’s wrong with these reporters?

The authors seem most incensed by the "maverick" appellation. They return to it repeatedly, how often McCain is named "maverick" with absolutely no evidence, as in the following passages:

The very word "maverick" implies not only independence but a willingness to take risks. But it is to understand the common thread running through McCain’s high-profile breaks with the GOP: in nearly every case, McCain took a position that was overwhelmingly popular with the public. [Emphasis in original.]

Campaign finance? Unpopular with the GOP, overwhelmingly popular with the public. Tobacco tax? Ditto.

There is nothing "maverick" at all about siding with the majority in public opinion polls and then blustering loudly that one is taking a risky political stand. Yet journalists never point this out. In fact, one of the more frustrating trends Brock and Waldman note is how extremely often the term, "maverick," is applied to McCain with absolutely no explanation as to why. News story after news story hooks the term to him and hauls him up the glorified reputation hill. After poring over coverage leading up to McCain’s 2000 run for the presidency, the authors comment:

What’s noteworthy about these stories is that they referred to McCain as a maverick without providing a single example or citation to explain exactly what made him so--not even bothering to mention campaign finance reform or tobacco. McCain’s maverick standing was simply noted, with the assumption that readers would know what the commentator was talking about.

This shared political conventional wisdom is created and sustained by co-opted reporters who now have years and years of investment in maintaining the assumptions of McCain’s moderation and his willingness to buck the system. Brock and Waldman aren’t trying to make the case that there is something evil about journalists, but there is indeed something insidious at work, it seems, when reporters are allowed to get up close and personal with the candidates they are assigned to cover.

Part of McCain’s success certainly lies in an astute instinctual understanding of PR, human relations and what makes a journalist’s job easier. His availability is legendary and part of a strategy he hit upon in the wake of the Keating Five scandal in the 1980’s. Answer question after question after question, give so much access the issue becomes stale and unmysterious, and eventually the controversy will disappear. This has worked best with the national press corps, which McCain has taken great care to court over the past couple of decades as his sights have been raised to higher office. The Arizona media, which has been on the receiving end of his ugly temper tantrums and freeze-outs, has quite different tales to tell about their "maverick" senator--and a great many are told in this this book.

THERE'S MORE - GO TO DAILY KOS AND DIARY

POSTED 3/31/08

Millennial Makeover:
MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics

By Morley Winograd, Michael D. Hais

"It happens in America every four decades and it is about to happen again. America's demand for change in the 2008 election will cause another of our country's periodic political makeovers. This realignment, like all others before it, will result from the coming of age of a new generation of young Americans-the Millennial Generation-and the full emergence of the Internet-based communications technology that this generation uses so well. Beginning in 2008, almost everything about American politics and government will transform-voting patterns, the fortunes of the two political parties, the issues that engage the nation, and our government and its public policy.

Building on the seminal work of previous generational theorists, Morley Winograd and Michael D. Hais demonstrate and describe, for the first time, the two types of realignments-"idealist" and "civic"-that have alternated with one another throughout the nation's history. Based on these patterns, Winograd and Hais predict that the next realignment will be very different from the last one that occurred in 1968. "Idealist" realignments, like the one put into motion forty years ago by the Baby Boomer Generation, produce, among other things, a political emphasis on divisive social issues and governmental gridlock. "Civic" realignments, like the one that is coming, and the one produced by the famous GI or "Greatest" Generation in the 1930s, by contrast, tend to produce societal unity, increased attention to and successful resolution of basic economic and foreign policy issues, and institution-building.

The authors detail the contours and causes of the country's five previouspolitical makeovers, before delving deeply into the generational and technological trends that will shape the next. The book's final section forecasts the impact of the Millennial Makeover on the elections, issues, and public policies that will characterize America's politics in the decades ahead.
 

REVIEW FROM MY DIRECT DEMOCRACY BLOG:
Millennial Makeover: MySpace, YouTube, and the Future of American Politics

(From MyDD  by Jerome Armstrong)

This is a remarkable book, and one that I'll be referring to often this election. If you want to understand the historical context of the 2008 election, read this book.

A 'realignment' book that goes into the history of US elections to describe two types of realignment, idealistic and civic, and how they have influenced history. More importantly, how it's happening again. What makes the book all the better is that its a terrific read. Very easy to read and I found myself gaining a new insight every chapter.

They argue that there's been five previous political makeovers, the last being toward the conservatives in 1968. The one we are in right now, they argue, is for either '08 or '12, we are sorta on the cusp right now.

My own view has been that Democrats should take the presidency this year, but we might fall just short in '08 (like Al Smith did in the 1928 election due to religious prejudice). If we are able to take it in '08, all the better.

I was trying to think about a similar book, and I guess it would be The Emerging Democratic Majority, from the beginning of this decade. If you enjoyed TEDM, you'll likewise enjoy Millennial Makeover. They've got a website with more info, including videos and where you can buy the book.

POSTED 3/31/08

Bad Moon Rising:
How Reverend Moon Created the Washington Times, Seduced the Religious Right, and Built an American Kingdom

By John Gorenfeld

Interview with Author John Gorenfeld

 (From the Daily KOS by DarkSyde)

Bad Moon Rising: How Reverend Moon Created the Washington Times, Seduced the Religious Right, and Built an American Kingdom. By John Gorenfeld (Order here)

I had a chance to ask John a few questions and post his newest video report (King of America -- Broken in parts 1 and 2 below) on Daily Kos. John is available in comments, West Coast time permitting, to chat with you about the cult of Moon and its seemingly unending influence on the conservative movement and the Republican Party.

DarkSyde (DS): Given recent media interest in religious/political  connections, or even before, how does the right-wing expect to get away with being so closely tied into someone as controversial as Moon without greater coverage or exposure to the public?

John Gorenfeld: You know, I would bet you that fewer than five percent of Americans know that the Washington Times, this newspaper that is constantly quoted in the conservative media sphere, is published by Sun Myung Moon. When I tell regular people—the ones old enough to remember Moon—they're horrified.

Washington journalists, though, are another story. They have a tin ear for hypocrisy, and working in D.C., they get so out of touch with reality they don't blink when Moon shows up at Washington Times dinner parties and raves about replacing Jesus Christ with himself. And they don't bother to inform the heartland.

There used to be plenty of Washington Post reports about the conservative/Moon alliance. But through sheer shamelessness, the Right just kept on keeping on until the media lost interest. Now everyone I talk to at big media outlets thinks Moon is a stale story, even though he's as significant a figure as Rupert Murdoch or George Soros in current American politics. "Oh, it's that '70s cult thing, we've covered it already."

THERE'S MORE - GO TO DIARY

POSTED 3/24/08

The GOP-Haters Handbook:
 378 Reasons Never to Vote for the Party of Reagan, Nixon and Bush Again

By Jack Huberman

The GOP-Hater’s Handbook is a godsend to those looking for a concise, scary and darkly entertaining overview of the Grand Old Party record from a liberal perspective; or those who want to arm themselves with talking points, facts, and figures for debates with conservatives; and for those seeking the perfect holiday gift book for that certain, special GOP-hater in their lives, or for a Republican they hope to rescue from the outer darkness. Summarizing, detailing, and bewailing all of the more important Republican outrages, and some of the more trivial ones, The GOP-Hater’s Handbook is the brainchild of Jack Huberman, author of the bestselling The Bush-Hater’s Handbook, a former Canadian who took up U.S. citizenship just so he could vote against Dubya in 2000.

POSTED 3/24/08

Confessions of a Political Hitman:
 My Secret Life of Scandal, Corruption, Hypocrisy and Dirty Attacks that Decide Who Gets Elected (and Who Doesn't)

By Stephen Marks

When a politician's dark secret is exposed in the middle of a campaign, a political hitman is behind it. When a political ad airs that's so repulsive everyone talks about it, behind the scenes a political hitman has made his mark.

For the past 12 years, Stephen Marks has built a career as one of the country's top opposition researchers: a political hitman and an assassin of reputations.

This engrossing story follows Marks from his early days through his rapid movement into the secret world of opposition research. The exciting work of digging up dirt on political candidates soon turns to dirty tricks and manipulation. From creating ads linking John Kerry to Willie Horton to fleeing Florida with the Mob on his trail, Marks finds himself living in a world he cannot escape.

POSTED 3/18/08

The Squandering of America:
How the Failure of Our Politics Endangers Our Prosperity

By Robert Kuttner

The incomes of most Americans today are static or declining. Tens of millions of workers are newly vulnerable to layoffs and outsourcing. Health care and retirement burdens are increasingly being shifted from employers to individuals. Two-income families find they are working longer hours for lower wages, with decreased social support. As wealth has become more concentrated, the economy has become more recklessly speculative, jeopardizing not only the prospects of ordinary Americans, but the solvency of the entire system. What links these trends, writes Robert Kuttner in this provocative, engaging, and necessary book, is the consolidation of political and economic power by a narrow elite, who blocks the ability of government to restore broad prosperity to the majority of citizens.

Kuttner—one of our most lucid economic critics—explores the roots of these problems and outlines a persuasive, bold alternative. In BusinessWeek, The Boston Globe, and The American Prospect, he has established himself as a prophetic voice connecting economics and politics. Here he demonstrates how our economy has fallen hostage to a casino of financial speculation, creating instability as well as inequality. He debunks alarmist claims about supposed economic hazards, such as Social Security and Medicare, and exposes the genuine dangers: hedge funds and private equity run amok, sub-prime lenders, Wall Street middlemen, and America’s dependence on foreign central banks. He describes how globalization of commerce has been used by business less to promote free trade than to escape the balanced regulation that delivered widespread abundance in the decades after World War II.

POSTED 3/18/08

United States of Toyota:
 How Detroit Squandered Its Legacy and Enabled Toyota to Become America's Car Company

By Peter M. De Lorenzo

The United States of Toyota is many stories in one. First and foremost, it is a business story, detailing the decline of the American automobile industry - and the simultaneous rise of an Asian manufacturer to take its place. It is also a history book, providing an intimate portrait of the larger-than-life personalities and cars that led the American auto industry through its glory days and down the path toward extinction. It is a political/current affairs piece, presenting the rise of a Japanese company - Toyota - not just in terms of its sales success but also in terms of its cultural success, as it works to assimilate into American society. And finally, it is a never-before-seen primer on Detroit - The Motor City - a town and a region dominated by the auto companies, their suppliers and their ad agencies - and by a mindset and culture all its own. In commentary that is as accurate as it is blunt, Peter De Lorenzo presents the players and the action in the auto business in a way not seen before in print. His voice is unique and refreshingly candid. His provocative analyses and assessments - grounded in personal experience and a lifelong immersion in all things automotive - present a compelling picture of the state of the auto business - how it used to be, what it has become and where it is headed. From the arrogance and short-sightedness of the Detroit manufacturers to the acumen and relentlessness of Toyota, The United States of Toyota paints an insightful portrait of an iconic American industry as it struggles for survival in the early years of the 21st century.

POSTED 3/10/08

The Commission:
The Uncensored History of the 9/11 Investigation

By Philip Shenon

(From The Sydney Morning Herald) In this exclusive extract from his new book, Philip Shenon uncovers how the White House tried to hide the truth of its ineptitude leading up to the September 11 terrorist attacks. .

In the American summer of 2001, the nation's news organisations, especially the television networks, were riveted by the story of one man. It wasn't George Bush. And it certainly wasn't Osama bin Laden.

It was the sordid tale of an otherwise obscure Democratic congressman from California, Gary Condit, who was implicated - falsely, it later appeared - in the disappearance of a 24-year-old government intern later found murdered. That summer, the names of the blow-dried congressman and the doe-eyed intern, Chandra Levy, were much better known to the American public than bin Laden's.

Even reporters in Washington who covered intelligence issues acknowledged they were largely ignorant that summer that the CIA and other parts of the Government were warning of an almost certain terrorist attack. Probably, but not necessarily, overseas.

The warnings were going straight to President Bush each morning in his briefings by the CIA director, George Tenet, and in the presidential daily briefings. It would later be revealed by the 9/11 commission into the September 11 attacks that more than 40 presidential briefings presented to Bush from January 2001 through to September 10, 2001, included references to bin Laden.

And nearly identical intelligence landed each morning on the desks of about 300 other senior national security officials and members of Congress in the form of the senior executive intelligence brief, a newsletter on intelligence issues also prepared by the CIA.

The senior executive briefings contained much of the same information that was in the presidential briefings but were edited to remove material considered too sensitive for all but the President and his top aides to see. Often the differences between the two documents were minor, with only a sentence or two changed between them. Apart from the commission's chief director, Philip Zelikow, the commission's staff was never granted access to Bush's briefings, except for the notorious August 2001 briefing that warned of the possibility of domestic al-Qaeda strikes involving hijackings. But they could read through the next best thing: the senior executive briefings.

During his 2003 investigations it was startling to Mike Hurley, the commission member in charge of investigating intelligence, and the other investigators on his team, just what had gone on in the spring and summer of 2001 - just how often and how aggressively the White House had been warned that something terrible was about to happen. Since nobody outside the Oval Office could know exactly what Tenet had told Bush during his morning intelligence briefings, the presidential and senior briefings were Tenet's best defence to any claim that the CIA had not kept Bush and the rest of the Government well-informed about the threats. They offered a strong defence.

THERE'S MORE -- AN EXTRACT FROM THE BOOK AT The Sydney Morning Herald

POSTED 2/16/08

Memo to the President Elect:
How We Can Restore America's Reputation and Leadership

By Madeleine Albright, Bill Woodward

After eight years of mismanagement and miscalculation under George W. Bush, the office of the American president will be at an all–time low. The new commander–in–chief will have to recover quickly and rebuild completely. In Memo to the President Elect, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright offers a persuasive, wide–ranging set of recommendations to the prospective winner of the 2008 Presidential election. Secretary Albright explains how to select a first–rate foreign policy team, how to avoid the pitfalls that plagued earlier presidents, how to ensure that decisions, once carefully made, are successfully implemented, and how to employ the full range of tools available to a president to persuade other countries to support U.S. objectives.

Making full use of her experience as an adviser to two presidents and as a key figure in four presidential transitions, Secretary Albright addresses all the major world conflicts that are sure to be paramount over the next four years at the White House. Top on her list are our confrontation with terror, Iraq, the Middle East, the control of nuclear weapons, the rise of Asia, emerging threats to democracy, and the management of U.S. relations with troublesome leaders, including Iran's President Mahomoud Ahmadinejad, Venezuela's Hugo Chavez and North Korea's Kim Jong–Il. With the 2008 election campaign entering its decisive phase, Memo to the President Elect will be an indispensable companion to what is sure to be a highly volatile race.

POSTED 2/16/08

Woman in Charge:
The Life of Hillary Rodham Clinton

By Carl Bernstein

Carl Bernstein’s stunning portrait of Hillary Rodham Clinton shows us, as nothing else has, the true trajectory of her life and career with its zigzag bursts of risks taken and safety sought. Marshaling all the skills and energy that propelled his history-making Pulitzer Prize reporting on Watergate, Bernstein gives us the most detailed, sophisticated, comprehensive, and revealing account we have had of the complex human being and political meteor who has already helped define one presidency and may well become, herself, the woman in charge of another. In his preparation for A Woman in Charge, Bernstein reexamined everything pertinent written about and by Hillary Clinton. He interviewed some two hundred of her colleagues, friends, and enemies and was allowed unique access to the candid record of the 1992 presidential campaign kept by Hillary’s best friend, Diane Blair. He has given us an audiobook that enables us, at last, to address the questions Americans are insistently–even obsessively–asking about Hillary Clinton: What is her character? What is her political philosophy? Who is she? What can we expect of her? As she decides to run for president, her husband now her valued aide, she has one more chance to fulfill her ambition for herself–to change the world.

POSTED 2/6/08

State of the Unions:
How Labor Can Strengthen the Middle Class, Improve Our Economy, and Regain Political Influence

By Philip M. Dine

From steel workers, Teamsters, and coal miners to teachers, actors, and civil servants, union members once accounted for more than one third of the American workforce. At a mere 12 percent, union membership today is a shadow of what it once was. What happened to organized labor in America and what can be done to restore it to its role of the defender of middle-class values and economic well-being?

Award-winning investigative reporter Philip M. Dine takes us on a riveting journey through America's cities and back roads, its factories and union halls, to answer those questions. From the health care crisis to massive job flight overseas, from rampant home foreclosures to illegal immigration, he clearly shows how virtually every major economic, political, and social trend impacting our way of life is tied to the state of America's unions.

Combining a compelling narrative with expert analysis, Dine offers firsthand accounts of the union members striving to make their voices heard in a political landscape increasingly shaped by corporate interests.

POSTED 2/6/08

This book will be available on May 13.

Nixonland:
The Rise of a President Standing up to the Madness: Ordinary Heroes in Extraordinary Times by Amy Goodman, David Goodmanand the Fracturing of America

By Rick Perlstein

David Sirota: This book by Rick Perlstein is scheduled for release in mid-May, and available for pre-order. I have an advanced proof and I can say that from the first bits I have read, this is every bit as good as Perlstein's first book on Barry Goldwater. If you want to know how the Right came to prominence and built itself into a political machine, these books are must-reads. And the best part is that your guide is Perlstein - a talented story-teller who makes reading history truly enjoyable.

POSTED 1/17/08

Sellout:
The Politics of Racial Betrayal

By Randall Kennedy

In the wake of his controversial national best-seller, Nigger: The Strange Career of a Troublesome Word, Randall Kennedy grapples brilliantly and judiciously with another stigma of our racial discourse: "selling out," or racial betrayal, which is a subject of much anxiety and acrimony in Black America. He atomizes the vicissitudes of the term and shows how its usage bedevils blacks and whites, while elucidating the effects it has on individuals and on our society as a whole. Kennedy begins his exploration of selling out with a cogent, historical definition of the "black" community, accounting precisely for who is considered black and who is not. He looks at the ways in which prominent members of that community--Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, and Barack Obama, among others--have been stigmatized as sellouts. He outlines the history of the suspicion of racial betrayal among blacks, and he shows how current fears of selling out are expressed in thought and practice. He offers a rigorous and bracing case study of the quintessential "sellout"--Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, perhaps the most vilified black public official in American history. And he gives is a first-person reckoning of how he himself has dealt with accusations of having sold out at Harvard, especially after the publication of Nigger. Lucidly and powerfully articulated, Sellout is essential to any discussion of the troubled history of race in America.

POSTED 1/29/08

Strong at the Broken Places:
Five Voices of Illness, One Chorus of Hope

By Richard M. Cohen

Strong at the Broken Places is the remarkable story of five ordinary people trapped in the complex world of serious chronic illness. In this intimate portrait, acclaimed journalist Richard M. Cohen probes lives of sickness as these individuals struggle to cope.

In 2003 Cohen published Blindsided, a bestselling memoir of illness. The outpouring of support revealed to him that not only does the public want to hear from people who overcome the challenges of illness, but that in the isolated world of illness, there are people who want their voices to be heard. Strong at the Broken Places was born of the desire of many to share their stories in the hope that the sick and those who love them will see that they are not alone.

Cohen spent three years chronicling the lives of five diverse "citizens of sickness": Denise, who suffers from ALS; Buzz, whose Christian faith helps him deal with his non-Hodgkin's lymphoma; Sarah, a determined young woman with Crohn's disease; Ben, a college student with muscular dystrophy; Larry, whose bipolar disorder is hidden within. The five are different in age and gender, race and economic status, but they are determined to live life on their own terms. Intimately involved with these patients' lives, Cohen formed intense relationships with each, talked to their families and friends, and shared joy, even in heart-breaking setbacks.

POSTED 12/10/07

A Time to Lead:
For Duty, Honor and Country

By Wesley K. Clark, Tom Carhart

Publisher Comments: Four-star General Wesley K. Clark became a major figure on the political scene when he was drafted by popular demand to run for the Democratic nomination for President of the United States in 2003. But this was just one of many exceptional accomplishments of a long and extraordinary career. Here, for the first time, General Clark uses his unique life experience — from his difficult youth in segregated Arkansas where he was raised by his poor, widowed mother; through the horror of Vietnam where he was wounded; the post-war rebuilding of national security and the struggles surrounding the new world order after the Cold War — as a springboard to reveal his vision for America, at home and in the world. General Clark will address issues such as foreign policy, the economy, the environment, education and health care, family, faith, and the American dream. Rich with breathtaking battle scenes, poignant personal anecdote and eye-opening recommendations on the best way forward, General Clark's new book is a tour de force of gripping storytelling and inspiring vision.