Events Books

I would like not to see the parallels. Any rational and compassionate person should like not to see the parallels. But the parallels are there, and Miller lays them bare in this devastating and meticulous extended analogy.

This is an astonishing book. Its thesis is provocative, to say the least, and it may not be for everyone -- but if you've ever wondered if just maybe our current federal drug policy wasn't delivering quite what you'd hoped, crack this book open and prepare to lose sleep.

The author has done the work and now the citizens must spread the "gospel". Like a seer Lawrence is able to anticipate the insane trajectory of where this drug war is leading. Though the picture he paints is ugly, if these drug warrior zealots are not vigorously challenged now he clearly shows how much uglier it will become. The evil of Nazi Germany and that of the US drug war are clearly shown to progress via the same chain of events: identification, ostracism, confiscation, concentration, and the final solution ie annihilation. Miller is an American hero doing the best he can to awaken conciousness.

This is one of the most powerful books I've read in a long time. Richard L. Miller deserves an award. In this book, the author details the erosion of civil liberties by the current war on drugs. For those familiar with this area, he trots out the typical points: harsh penalties for minor violations and loss of civil liberties for all.

But what makes this book special is the author's analysis of legal issues and history. Richard Miller is an independent scholar who has written about Nazi justice (in "Nazi Justiz"). I thought his application of Nazi jurisprudence to the drug war was overkill at first. Little did I know just how wrong I was. As one reviewer put it, this book will help you lose weight.

What sets this book above the others on the drug war is that Miller explains how the war effects the innocent, and how innocence is no longer an adequate defense. In fact, Miller has a Justice Department official quoted as saying that innocence was not a defense to forfeiture of assets. He argues that asset forfeiture has corrupted law enforcement at all levels.

In one example, Miller tells of an elderly couple in one California county who owned a mutil-million dollar ranch adjacent to a national park. Apparently, the Park Service wanted the land, the local law enforcement the assets (in the form of the house, possessions, etc.). Thus, police had to get a warrant to raid the property. First, they searched it illegally. This is a typical tactic of DEA agents and local law enforcement, who search a house and either plant or discover evidence that they can use to get a warrent later. Regardless, the courts have determined that even illegal searches and seizures are acceptable in the war on drugs. All of this is documented in the book. Even in the illegal search, no drugs were discovered. An elderly couple, go figure?

If you think that stopped the police, DEA, et al., then you haven't read the book. One local officer testified before a judge that "thousands" of marijuana plants were being cultivated on the property. This testimony was based on a lie told to the officer by another. Although both were aware of the lie (and the couple's complete innocence of ANYTHING), this way neither officer could be chared with perjury. Needless to say, the judge issued the warrant.

During the raid, the husband was sleeping. He was roused awake by his wife's screaming and was shot to death as he put down his rifle, which he had becuase he thought he was being robbed and was defending his wife. The agents participating in the raid evicted the wife. Even agents of the U.S. Park Service were involved, in case you doubted their complicity.

It gets better. The location of the ranch was in a different county than the one in which the local police were from! They went out of their own jurisdiction for the express purpose of seizing property from people THEY KNEW were innocent. All of this was expressed by the county prosecutor (where the ranch was), when he said that they appeared to be motivated by a desire to obtain the property and assests of its owners.

This book is meticulously documented and researched. The analysis of the legal issues with references to the Nuremburg Tribunal and Nazi legal principles is stunning. As well as his telling of the internment of Japenese-Americans to demonstrate how segments of society can be treated if the propaganda warriors desire their elimination.

If you're not enraged by the time you're finished reading this book, your heart is dead.

This is one of the best books I have read. I am against prohibition. Many people are but whenever the subject comes up in conversation the retort to my sugestion that prohibition be repealed is typically something along the line of "all you want to do is smoke pot" ...followed by some chuckling and then some stories about the days when we use to get high as kids.
This book is not about smoking pot. It is about the use of the drug war and prohibition law to circumvent Americans civil liberties. It is very well written. It helped me to form reasonable counter arguments to the for mentioned statement such as... "is it OK to strip search a child?"
This book is made even more relative when used as background material to analyze what I witness while watching the Judge Alito confirmatio hearings.
The scariest part of this book is watching the events described come alive right before our eyes on C-span.
I think you should read this if you, like me, suspect that something is rotten in Denmark and the official version of what is happening just isn't making sense.

This book is an anomaly amidst the typical drug policy literature available. Miller's argument stems from his scholarship on Nazism. He applies Raul Hilberg's "chain of destruction" to the current "war," not on drugs, but on drug users. William Bennett was less than secretive about his abhorrence for those who used drugs, especially those "hard-core users who were too far gone to care about" - stated differently, the real issue is not the drugs themselves, but the type of people who use drugs. America is full of social problems, e.g. poverty, crime, &c.; problems that most politicians are timid in addressing because of the complexities involved in solving them. Yet, politicians need a platform to stand on and the American public needs a scapegoat. Drug users, that most alien element in the population, according to Miller, are the perfect group to identify, ostracize, confiscate, concentrate, and then annihilate as scapegoats for all the ills in society: in fact this sequence of stages is Hilberg's "chain of destruction." It is from his "seminal" study on the Holocaust, later published as: The Destruction of the European Jews, that Hilberg constructed his theory of the chain of destruction. Nazi Germany, like America, was in the throes of profound social discord and the public demanded a scapegoat. The Jews became the literal manifestation of a scapegoat for the German people. Hitler, faced with harsh social problems, exercised his own prejudices to isolate, blame and thus use the Jews as a scapegoat for Germany's problems. It was identification of the scapegoat with a real entity and the eventual acceptance of this scapegoat by a German majority that led to the conceptualization and employment of a "final solution" for the riddance of social ills from German society. Miller's argument is provocative, to say the least, in that he sees a direct correlation between the processes of Nazism and the processes of the "drug warriors." Moral indignation when it is directed toward a highly specified group of people can have disastrous consequences. Miller is not the only scholar who has applied the scapegoat theory to drug users in American society, but he is the first to take it to its disturbing, but logical end.

I rate this book as amongst the most influential in my life. The author spends the first half of the book explaining why even though things may look much more advanced and different now than 2000 years ago, the same underlying forces are at play. The powerful are in control and we live under a system of mercantilism and not anything resembling the free trade we are taught at school.

I have read widely and believe that the solutions proposed by Dr Smith in the second half of this book focus too narrowly on the economic aspects of peoples lives and tend to be very prescriptive such as specific taxation reforms. I prefer the writings of Noam Chomsky who is less proscriptive but generally has more the right idea - that as human beings our main goal should be to let everyone live in freedom and peace where everyone is able to be himself. People just want to be free to control their own destiny and economics is only one part of this solution.

Despite not agreeing with all the solutions posed by Dr Smith I still fully rate this book because it is the first half that will blow your socks off. You do not have to agree with the second half and can pick and choose which reforms should be implemented as I did. This book changed my thinking forever and I now realise and understand the real forces at play when I see news items and read books.

Essentially this book is an extremely in-depth deconstruction of neo-liberal economics/politics. I had long thought myself almost unique (outside Academia) in the depth and breadth of my reading, but after having read this book, I realized that I understood very little about what was really going on. It was a humbling experience, to say the least. But it was also liberating, in that for the first time in my life, the opaque inconsistencies between what I had been taught in university and the realities I saw happening in the news became transparent. The author additionally offers many progressive ideas for a more just, efficient and ultimately sustainable economic system, which in my experience is very rare indeed. If you are looking for something more substantial than Michael Moore's often inarticulate rants - albeit less entertaining - than this is the book for you. BE WARNED: once you read this book, nothing will ever seem quite the same.

I've searched my whole life to the reasons for and the solution to world poverty and hunger. This work offers both in a well reasearched and thought out, realistic approach. The reasons for poverty become obvious after reading Dr. Smith's book. The posibility of ending poverty by building buying power in the Third World while improving the standard of living in the developed world is as brilliant as it feasible. I highly recommend this book to anyone looking for answers to solving the world's ills

I was first impressed by JW Smith's book, The World's Wasted Wealth 2, filled as it is with ideas about how to reduce waste. His Economic Democracy book exposes the roots of world poverty and identifies how all people everywhere can become truly wealthy while respecting and conserving the world's ecology. I use several chapters in the undergraduate sociology course I teach called, Cooperation and Conflict. Every chapter is packed with information that we all need to know in order to participate responsibly in redirecting government policies.

A professor of economics once told me that "mainstream economics is 95% ideology and only 5% social science." This wonderful book by J.W. Smith shows why that is true. I found it utterly complelling and could not put it down. By exposing the macro-economic mechanisms of the past five centuries, Smith blows neo-liberal ideology right out of the water. This book should be required reading everywhere in the world. It points the way toward a liberated and decent world-order and shows that a just world-order would not be that difficult to achieve. This book lays the foundation for a new global economics of freedom and prosperity. Thank-you Dr. Smith!

I was very satisfied with the text book. It is in almost perfect condition and was delievered in a timely fashion. Impressive! Plus I saved a lot of needed money.

One of the major things that striked me about this book is Lauren's acknowledgement that the concept of human rights is not a completely Western creation. Traditions around the world, political, cultural, and religious, have stressed justice and equality.
Lauren's treatment of Human Rights is quite thorough. I have to commend him for the fact that he does not value judgements on any of the events he described. He acknowledges the mistakes made but does not dwell on them.
I also learned a lot of things about history that wasn't touched about in my history classes. I can say that I actually felt smarter reading this book. :)

"For scholars of international human rights, it is difficult to imagine a finer gift on the fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights than this study of the Declaration's complex and far-reaching impact. Paul Gordon Lauren has skillfully combined a detailed history of the legal documents with the political, philosophical, and social contexts in which they developed. He has further enriched his study with the personal visions of leading individuals so that the story comes alive, unfolding with a human drama supported by meticulous scholarly research." -- American Historical Review

Awarded an Outstanding Academic Book for 1999 Award from Choice Magazine

The author Paul Gordon Lauren deserves kudos!! A very well written book on Human Rights Theory. A must for all those who seriously want to go into depth on this subject. The concept of Human Rights is not limited to the western world nor it is proper to say that it has arisen mainly from Europe, an idea which has been very well captured in this book.

I wanted so badly to give this book 4 stars but couldn't bring myself to do it.
The concept of the book is interesting and Mr. Olson tackled it very well. The early part of the book details Mr. Olson's experiences growing up in Iowa, attending the University of Iowa Law School (Go Hawks!), how he came to join the CIA, and gave a brief summary of his career, although I say it was TOO brief and if Mr. Olson ever wrote a biography about his experiences in the Agency it would make a tremendously interesting read. He also mentioned that when he was recruited into the CIA, all he knew about it was what he had learned in Allen Dulles' book The Craft of Intelligence, which is ironic because I ordered that book on the same day as Fair Play. Both turned out to be greatly enjoyable.
The largest portion of Fair Play focuses on different (hypothetical) moral dilemmas potentially faced by Intelligence Officers, with each dilemma being asked in question form, "Would it be moral if..." Following each posed dilemma several people give their opinions and answer the posed question, answering either `yea' or `nay,' and telling why they answered in that way. At the conclusion of each `dilemma,' Mr. Olson himself chimes in and gives some basic background on the issue raised (these are the most informative parts of each section).
In the back of the book is an index explaining certain words and concepts, used throughout the text, that those outside the intelligence community may not fully grasp, which was nice to have as a reference. He also lists some of his most highly recommended books regarding the Intelligence community. Again, nice bonus.
All in all, it's a great book. So, why did I want to give it only 4 stars? ...Because the book wasn't entirely informative, as I prefer. That is to say, the questions were posed and people were allowed to give their opinions. Granted, the purpose of the book is to highlight the various dilemmas and take into consideration various perspectives, but that can grow tired after a bit. At times it made me feel like I was sitting in a moral dilemma debate conference.
However, in taking the following into consideration I feel obligated to give it 5 stars and absolutely recommend it: the informative reference section, the real-world input of the author, and the recommended reading list add a lot of value to the books content. Heck, even the small font causes the pages to be jam-packed with content. And lastly, Mr. Olson does indeed what he set out to do. It's worth the price!

Great book, great intro. to the intelligence field, and gives you a birdeye's view on the little spoken subfield, which is the morality of the intelligence field. Great demystifier of this field.

Fair Play offers the reader a peek into the murky world of espionage. CIA veteran Jim Olson has a unique perspective that few other authors can offer to anyone interested in intelligence. Fair Play is not your standard historical narrative. It is an interactive experience, which invites the reader to participate in fifty realistic and morally challenging scenarios that our spies must contend with. Olson adds further credibility to Fair Play by sharing with the reader a cross section of responses to his very realistic scenarios. These elicited responses are from accomplished professionals, whose vocations vary from the former Deputy Director of the CIA to practicing physicians.
Fair Play includes chapters on Olson's under cover career in the CIA, changing U.S. attitudes toward espionage from the Revolutionary War to the present, and historical, biblical, and philosophical justifications for committing espionage. Armed with this requisite knowledge, the reader is thrust into true-to-life situations that U.S. spies actually face in the shadows today. This approach redirects the reader from the role of arm chair quarterback to active participant by asking what he/she would do in that same situation. Among the many topics covered are assassinations, kidnappings, interrogation, torture, drugs, seduction, sexual entrapment, and blackmail.
Morality and espionage are not mutually exclusive. As Olson says, it is about time someone started thinking about how morality and spying fit together in today's world. The community he continues to serve faces monumental challenges. Its operators need to have a clearly defined moral code with which to take the fight to our enemies. This book represents a great first step towards providing such a moral code to our clandestine warriors.

FAIR PLAY could've been featured in our Military Shelf section - after all, it's by the former chief of CIA counterintelligence - but deserves a much broader reading audience than those who frequent military libraries. FAIR PLAY presents both a survey of the real world of spying and espionage and a concurrent survey of moral and ethical issues involved in spying, and dilemmas which come from field experience every day. The blend of intelligence history, political insights, and social issues makes for a survey which advocates a clearer moral sense in U.S. intelligence officers - and that holds many lessons for civilians as well. Even the general-interest lending library will find it a unique, compelling read.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

In the vast genre of intelligence writing, this book is simply unique. In presenting the moral dilemmas faced by intelligence officers, this work is indispensible--both for practical training for the professionals and for educating the public about the realities of the profession.

Where the book falls down, I'm afraid, is in its judgments about other works of intelligence writing. Olson's list of the best books for a professional library include two that have been discredited as historical works. He also repeats the mythical canard that Winston Churchill allowed Coventry to be bombed during World War II so as not to let the Germans know their communications were being read; he needs to read David Stafford, Martin Gilbert, and R.V. Jones on this score. Being taken in by [...] or by myths are disturbing failings for a former chief of counterintelligence.

Strother, a Texas bred Democrat consultant who served as a mentor to better known figures such as James Carville, recounts his experiences in the rough and tumble world of politics. In many hands, this could have been a very factual, dry and boring book. Luckily for the reader, Strother is an uproarious storyteller.

The son of a fervent union man in Port Arthur, Texas, Strother more or less falls into the political consulting business by default. He begins his career in Louisana, a hotbed of corruption and questionable ethics. Thru his journey, we relive his often painful and hilarious campaign experiences with country singer Jimmie Davis, Gary Hart and Bill Clinton.

Current politics are dirty business and not for the weak of heart. Idealists are often rudely discarded before they even realize what's happened. Strother considers himself a man of integrity in a profession that increasingly looks at such a trait as a weakness. He not only has to deal with Republican adversaries but underhanded tactics by members of his own party. Strother is honest in his analysis of his work and colleagues and spares no one including other Democrats who employed dirty tricks against his firm.

No matter what side your political beliefs fall, this is a good read if you want to understand how politics work behind the scenes.

I had the pleasure of visiting with Raymond last week in Montana,and hearing him tell some of the stories that were not in the book was an interesting evening.

Even though I have lived in La. all of my life so many of the stories in the book I had never heard!Raymond brought them all to life.

Books about politics by insiders get most of the business right, but only Ray Strother tells you what it is really like to work in national politics in plain, unhyped prose.

Ray Strother's chronicle of the industry that brings us our leaders is fascinating. His story is also an "American Success Story". From the giants of the U.S. Senate includingRussell Long (recently passed) and Lloyd Bentsen to today's leaders in the Senate - Mary Landrieu, Blanche Lincoln and Zell Miller - Strother has woven a tapestry of stories that enthral and make us consider our democracy.

This is a first-rate, fast-read of an industry that is seldom discussed but that brings us world leaders. Ad agency execs marvel at their brilliance but at the end of the day they sell sugar water to children. Strother has given an insight to a world seldom seen, but of importance to all of us.

Get the book - read it and pass it around. This is one of those books that flys below the radar but could become a movie.

happy reading

Raymond Strother's warts-and-all memoir of his life as a political consultant is a fun, must-read for all students of American politics. Strother's career began when there was still some innocence in campaigning, and winds up during the frustrating years of ego-driven hacks whose self-importance overshadows their candidates, to the detriment of government. Ray Strother's genuinity was formed the old-fashioned way: he grew up poor and learned to appreciate other people.

Strother's tales of Southern political skirmishes will entertain. He's a smooth storyteller who should write more, now that he's out of the maelstrom of the Washington kill-or-be-killed consultant circuit.

Caveat: I am a Republican, and although Strother's life has been spent around Democrats, his tales are compelling across the board.

A must read for anyone serious about their freedom. The history of copyright of the world is covered. Larry makes this accessible to anyone and puts copyright and fair use in the context of the original creation of copyrights.

This book is not only a history lesson on copyright, but it shows how big corporate enterprises obtain and used material, through the same methods they now want to deny the general public, in order to get to the powerful presence they are today.

Example: Disney using lots of old fairy-tales which were in public domain. And today they fight for everything never to go into public domain in order to keep profit to themselves, while at the same time going after creative use that would expand our culture and art.

This book is worth the price just to hear the constant process of American culture - be a pirate, fend off "the man" to build your industry, become "the man," then go after the pirates who are presumably cutting into your business. Money makes hypocrites of us all. Please, RIAA, don't sue me for reading this book (although I'm sure you'll find a way, if there aren't any grandmothers or poor college students you can harass).

This book is excellent. Lessig's argument is thorough and well-developed, showing why the copyright laws affect all of us, from producers of copyright material to consumers and creative innovators building off of previous work. A great, and important, read for anyone, especially those interested in learning how Big Media in bed with Congress has successfully limited the freedom of typically law-abiding citizens to empower the old corporations and enfeeble the upstarts.

Whether conservative or liberal or anything in between, the book should really "strike home" and make you understand just how important it is to have a free culture.

I heard Lawrence Lessig speak at a conference earlier in 2006 and it was one of the best presentations I'd ever heard. So it will come as no surprise that his book is written in the same to the point, easy to follow and conscise style.

It's historical research sets the foundation for a look at things to come on the Internet as new technology threatens established media, much the same way as Lessig points out it did in previous centuries. The pirates of yesteryear are the corporations of today who threaten the pirates of today. He is humble as he describes his defeat in the US Supreme Court and proactive as he puts some suggestions forward to resolve the current crisis affecting copyright on the Net.

Couldn't put it down and have already purchased Code 2 by the same author.

Thank you Mr. Lewis for taking the time to write this book. I cannot stop talking to friends, colleagues, and strangers about how it has brought to my attention just how recent our "freedom of speech" really is. Although our founding fathers might have written the text over 200 years ago, men and women were still being jailed under the libel laws and Sedition Acts. Current and future reporters please read this book and use it as a reminder of the importance of your role in our democracy, by keeping our leaders honest with your thorough research and candid accounts. Every American should read this book!

Unless a person goes to law school, it is unlikely that he or she will learn the 200 year old history of the First Amendment...yet is is a fascinating and necessary history to learn. The thesis of the book is that our common notion of what "freedom of speech and press" means in America is not self evident law. In fact, the author explains, our right to criticise the government and its leaders was developed and protected by "activist judges."

Think about the role of activist judges - many of whom are criticised today in certain political circles. Anthony Lewis reminds us that American activist judges used the language that all persons are born free and equal to issue rulings that slavery was against the law as early as 1783. 150 years later it was again activist judges and lawyers who struck down the Espionage Act of World War I which punished speech against the war. So it was only in the twentieth century that the First Amendment was used to protect free speech and condemn a statute that infringed this liberty.

Author Anthony Lewis takes us on a historical journey through First Amendment cases from its beginnings in the constitutional convention to its interpretation by the Jeffersonians and the Federalists to Woodrow Wilson's oppressive statutes, and finally to the more recent cases of flag desecration and the Patriot Act. Mr. Lewis is clear headed and forceful in his history and arguments. As I see it, this volume is one of the top 10 books on the law that I have ever read. I suggest it as a gift to your sons and daughters, to your high school or college students who care about what America means. Highly recommended.

This book is a clearly written, easy to read and very informative history of freedom of speech in America. It reveals how freedom of speech has matured to what it is today from shockingly shaky beginnings. It's quite timely, given the current need for open debate about the course of the nation when some political leaders and many others think criticism of the President is unpatriotic. It would be great if everyone would read it, including teenagers.

As CS Lewis made "righteousness readable", Anthony Lewis makes legal history readable. It may well be that law originates in the mind of God, but the law we live by is made on earth by courts explaining what legislatures mean. Tony Lewis finds a golden thread running through American history: The First Amendment.As he tells us about the cases in which its meaning has been evolving,and about the lives of the legal giants who have expounded it, we get a firmer grip on what makes America distinct. For those who genuinely enjoy history, this is a page turner.

One of my favorite things about reading history is getting a perspective on how new some ideas are even when they feel like they've been around forever. This book absolutely has that effect... and it's a really healthy thing.

Lewis does a nice job of laying out the history of free speech. He starts before the founding of the United States, but spends most of his time exploring the development of the right since the United States founding. What you see is how, even in two short centuries, the understanding of freedom of speech has evolved into what we take for granted today.

Starting with the Alien and Sedition Acts during John Adams presidency and working his way forward, you really come to understand that the freedom of speech we enjoy today is far in excess of what citizens of the very same country enjoyed 200, 100, or even 50 years back. It's truly fascinating to get that perspective and it helps you to understand that rights can go as easily as they can come if they aren't defended vigilantly and vigorously.

Highly recommended for fans of history or for anyone who wants to understand a little more about where one of America's fundamental rights came from. Lewis has written a clear, concise history of an idea and a right.

Bart Jones, in my opinion, wrote one of the best biographies about a man who might lead South America in a revolution that will upset or at least seriously impress all of us. As he makes very clear, Hugo Chavez is brillent, sleeps little, moves around a lot with restless energy, has a definate goal, an admirable goal, and is on his way to reaching it.

But there is another side to Mr. Chavez.

I recommend that Mr. Jones read the life of Huey Long, who came from an immodest background in Lousiana, surrounded by the poor an oppressed, worked his way through enough college to meet his needs and was on his way to making a serious run for the U.S. presidency, all for the successful work he did for the poor. And he did a lot. But his passion was for power, not just helping the poor.

The depression produced a lot of these guys, the ones in Itly and Germany come to mind.

Being dedicated to the poor can be dangerous.

We have been receiving a one-dimensional, Bush Administration-driven perspective on Hugo Chavez. Bart Jones paints a complete picture of this Venezuelan Abe Lincoln. It helps us ordinary readers to remember that we certainly have no reason to dislike a man just because he is unpopular with the rich and influential. Jones's experience as a Maryknoll missioner and an AP reporter in Venezuela give him the depth of knowledge and discernment necessary to dissect a complex figure such as Hugo Chavez.

Since retirement a couple of years ago, I have read over a hundred books on Latin America, and political science...subjects I never studied in college. This is one book I place near the top of the list. It is accurate, unbias, and reads like a great novel. If only people could/would take time to become better informed, we could have a better world. By the way, another good book on Hugo Chavez is by Nikolas Kozloff.

I thought this was a great book and really gives the inside scoop on Chavez's life and ideas--since he is a leading political figure of the times and and especially of change in Latin and South America it behooves us in the US to know what motivates him and what he has done-even if one is not personally fond of him-I happen to be a great admirer of his and loved this book!

Journalist Bart Jones's detail-laden HUGO! tells the story of Venezuela president Hugo Chavez, the complete story that America's corporate "news" media ignores. And reading the HUGO! passage regarding the Venezuelan people's demand for Chavez's release after moneyed interests overthrow his administration in 2002, you realize this book also tells the story of that South American country's citizens. World history is nothing more than the wealthy few attempting to steal from and dominate the poor masses. In Venezuela, the rise of Hugo Chavez personifies the people establishing democracy, the most radical notion in humanity's chronicles.

Read HUGO!

This is an interesting book with serviceable writing that will leave you uneasy about the state of our intelligence gathering and security. The 3 stars are more for writing style but there is a lot of merit in the content.

The author relays, at first, many good stories from what sounds like an honorable career with the FBI. Even as he wades more deeply into the swamp of corruption in the state of Arkansas these episodes have an almost folksy travelogue-esque style with a report-writing quality that is still readable enough to do the job. I had to remind myself that his manuscript was scrubbed through a sanitizing process by at least FBI and CIA agency reviews before publication.

Still we see interagency rivalries, incompetent bureaucrats, inappropriate political interventions, the ever-dysfunctional state department along with internal agency problems. He closes with some sobering observations on crisis of leadership and the FBI's drift away from its mission and missteps that made it a less than stellar player in the road to 9/11 and after. I found the last chapters most worth the read for this.

Taken in conjunction with the excellent (and highly recommended works) Terrorist Hunter, and the Third Terrorist, this book completes a picture of an agency in trouble.

I recommend these latter 2 books first for more info on the war with terrorists, but if you have time, Mr. Smith's memoirs are a nice read. And his book does, indeed, have a treasure trove of insights into the headlines of the 90's and bureaucratic bungling that will drive you crazy.

Not often does a career FBI manager write his uninhibited expose of the FBI. Street agents will stand up and applaud loudly. FBI deskjockeys will cringe behind their desks preferring to believe FBIHQ press releases. I so enjoyed the book I attempted to get my copy autographed but the author's email address is no longer in use. Nota bene: SAC Smith's comments on the Squiggly Box (aka polygraph) is alone worth the price of the book-----and is a chilling caveat to those who might even consider having their lies detected by wires, waves and wiggly lines. Suggest a followup: the 9/11 books by Peter Lance.

Smith's autobiography of his career with the FBI provides an outstanding view of many faces of the FBI. Smith captures the good, the bad and the ugly. Reading the book helps the reader to understand some of the Bureau's great achievements and failures.

The book provides a useful look into the culture of the FBI, a culture that has both great achievements and failures. Like so many other governmental and private organizations as more information is passed to headquarters through the information highways, micromanagement increases and leadership decreases. Clearly this was the case at the FBI.

Published after 9-11 the author offers some very insightful comments on what could have been done and what should be done in the future. Smith also traces the debacles at Waco and Ruby Ridge to leadership failures at the FBI headquarters and the appointment of a HRT leader with no experience in the area of hostage rescues or swat operations.

Sadly these same institutional deficiencies would later prove to be part of the fabric of failure which allowed 9-11 to happen. The Marines stress a culture where the opinions and experience of the senior NCO's are respected and nourished. Sadly the FBI evolved to an organization that failed to maintain high ethical standards and leadership in its headquarters and in doing so betrayed the Nation and the great people in the field.

Smith wanders in and out of international intrigue and then returns to handling high profile domestic cases.

It is not a true history of the bureau, but, rather one agent's journey through a distinguished career at the FBI at a time when its leadership was not up to the quality of the men and women in the field and the challenges it faced.

Perhaps the most disturbing aspects of the book are the allegations that top management of the FBI lied to Congress and others on the issue of critical matters relating the 9-11. Perhaps this is part of the culture that grew after the Bureau promoted senior leadership that had lied under oath about Ruby Ridge and had destroyed documents relating the the issue. Smith points out that the FBI was warned years well in advance about the number of Muslim fundamentalist students taking flight training in the US and after the fact claimed not to have had the resources to have conducted an investigation. With warning from multiple offices, Smith believes that an average analyst would have concluded that there was a real threat. Hence the claim by Freh that there were no signals was simply false. Smith also asserts that the FBI never concluded a complete review of the many documents captured in Manila years earlier. Not only did these documents related to Al Qaeda plots to bomb American aircraft but they also had the potential to relate to the Murad office building bombing.

Highly recommended.

UPDATE
The recent release of a book by the agent in charge of the Oklahoma bombing incident in which he seeks to put to rest any claim of a broader conspiracy has the look and feel of that which IC Smith fought against. Arriving just as Hillary would be vulnerable to any disclosure that the investigation was flawed, the book has the look and feel of another favor to the Clinton administration of which there were far too many.

Great Book. Anyone who's followed history and current events for any length of time must be aware of the FBI's arrogance, public failings, and history of horrible decision making (overall, in general terms..certainly not everyone in the oranization). Much (or most) of it through horrible management. It's documented nearly every day. I.C. Smith details just a few of these instances in his book (along with, of course, the ubiquitus political, white house, and DOJ interferrences). It's no wonder he left the FBI soured.

Interestingly, he even mentions the FBI's trend towards a paramilitary dress code and mentality. Apparently many individuals in the FBI feel cool wearing paramilitary clothing and brandishing automatic weapons. He says the FBI has changed a lot since he began...much of it not being for the better. As an aside, I'd like to hear his opinion on these "national security letters" and their publicized
abuses.

Great book for those who want a better understanding of the FBI and why they do the things they do.

If there's one thing that can be said about the FBI it is that they try to keep a spotless image with the public. What exactly goes on inside the FBI? I. C. Smith comes forward with this account of his personal experiences as a Special Agent in Charge. Mr. Smith takes the reader on an autobiographical tour around the world including diplomatic experiences, terrorism, and the many times the FBI ignored mounting internal evidence that could have prevented tragedies. This is the inside story told from his point of view. It not only exposes bungling within the FBI but also examines some of the corrupt systems in which the FBI must work. As Special Agent in Charge of the Arkansas office he had unique insight into and a lot of problems dealing with the corrupt political system through which Bill Clinton rose to become governor and then president. Mr. Smith pulls no punches and includes lots of names in the book including Janet Reno, Rafael del Pino, the Clintons, and Kenneth Starr. Inside: A Top G-Man Exposes Spies, Lies, and Bureaucratic Bungling Inside the FBI is highly recommended, entertaining, and enlightening.

The book is only 105 pages long, but it explains the US/British foreign policies that wanted the war, how the evidence necessary to invade was manufactured, and also the misreporting of the war by the media. It's extremely concise and valueable. The author even manages to squeeze in some semi-tangents that are important. My favorite one is the discussion of the Democratic Party and their belligerence - I just get tired of hearing that the Democratic Party is an anti-war party.

A third of the book is devoted to explaining why the invasion was sought after (as well as the occupation of Afghanistan). Then the book moves to focus on the realities of the war's fighting, and how it is covered. After the end of all "major combat operations" in May 2003 the continued attacks on US troops was blamed on Hussein, who was captured in December 2003. After the fighting continued, it was blamed on foreign interference. The administration said a provisional Iraqi government was needed. After the "free" elections on January 2005 the fighting continued. Since then, the administration has been blaming it on al-Qaeda and other foreigners, which Arnove shows not to be the case. These steps of blaming a domestic resistance to other causes is strikingly similar to that of Vietnam. After facing continued resistance, our policies changed to describe and fight those false causes (strategic-hamlet program-->search-and-destroy operations-->pacification program-->Operation Phoenix-->Vietnamization (which was only initiated after the Tet Offensive of 1968 awakened people to the grim truth of the war). Also discussed in this portion of the book (what's really going on over there) is the liberalization of Iraq's economy - It's straight from the IMF/World Bank playbook. The last section of the book argues, after looking at why the invasion occured and what's happening there now, that we should leave Iraq and provide aid until they're back on their feet.

I'd also recommend that an interested reader look into Bush in Babylon: The Recolinisation of Iraq and America's confrontation with revolutionary change in the Middle East, 1948-83.

Q: How many pages does it take to make a compelling case for immediate withdrawal from Iraq? A: Apparently not many when you have logic on your side!

It is a myth that Bush & Co.--though misguided--had the best of intentions at heart when they ordered the military invasion of Iraq in March of 2003. And this unfortunate myth prostrates the antiwar movement when it deludes itself into believing that a bloody occupation stemming from an illegal war can somehow be salvaged into something beneficial for anybody besides Halliburton.

Anthony Arnove's book explains the real roots of the Iraq war in the context of power and profit (not misguided humanitarianism), summarizes for the reader three years of blood-spattered occupation history, provides eight excellent reasons for immediate withdrawal and then discusses the ABC's of anti-imperialist struggle drawn from the history of the Vietnam War.

This isn't a catchall antiwar book to give to your chicken hawk uncle at the next family reunion. This is a book for the 50 million Americans who already consider themselves part of the antiwar movement and want some real answers about stopping the blood-letting. Or as the author puts it, "...the U.S. left in particular needs far greater clarity about the reasons for the war, the political context of the war, and an effective strategy for ending it." (page 98)

This is the most articulate, politically sophisticated yet easy-to-read appeal to bring our loved ones home now that I've read since the war began.

But don't trust this synopsis--read the book.

This outstanding book makes the case for the immediate withdrawal of all foreign troops from Iraq. This would meet the democratic demands of the Iraqi people, and also of the American and British peoples. In a September 2005 New York Times-CBS News poll, 52% supported the immediate withdrawal of US troops.

Arnove sums up, "Every single argument the Bush administration made to justify the invasion of Iraq has turned out to be false. Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction, posed no imminent threat to the United States, and had no connection to al-Qaeda or to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Iraq was attacked not because it had weapons of mass destruction, but because it did not (a fact that has not been lost on other potential targets of U. S. intervention). U. S. soldiers were not greeted as liberators, and the occupation has not paid for itself, or required few troops, or been quickly concluded. Nor has the occupation made the world safer or reduced the threat of weapons of mass destruction. Indeed, it has made Iraq, the Middle East, and the world far more dangerous."

From the start, the war on Iraq was a huge lie. As Arnove writes, "The attacks of September 11, 2001, provided the pretext the Bush administration needed to portray an offensive war to reshape the Middle East as a defensive measure to protect the people of the United States."

Everything we are told about the war is untrue. For example, we are told that the occupation troops conduct a humanitarian war on the ground. In reality, the USA is waging war largely by massive, unreported, bombing: the 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing alone dropped more than 500,000 tons of bombs on Iraq between May 2003 and December 2005. We are told that there is no national resistance attacking the foreign occupier, just terrorists attacking civilians. In reality, for every attack against civilians, there are a hundred against the occupying forces.

British governments have always lied to us about matters of war and peace, of security and the national interest. This Labour government is different only because its lies have been more stupid, so that we have rumbled it more quickly.

Arnove's book lays out, in a pretty straight-forward manner (105 pages, not counting the foreword, afterword, appendix, acknowledgement, and notes) the case for pulling all U.S. troops out of Iraq immediately. I read a few other books about Iraq before reading this one, and I would suggest that to any reader, just so they have a frame of reference while reading it. Arnove tries to use well-known quotes and facts to support his argument, and this helps, but there is still so much information on such a complex issue, that I think it would be difficult to read this and fully comprehend it with no prior knowledge of Iraq.

Arnove makes a very compelling case. What's sad is that he's using readily available information to make it, and yet we're now sending more troops to Iraq.

I think the only fault of the book is expecting that it will drive people to action. Arnove isn't really presenting anything new, just laying all the facts out for us in a very clean, logical way, almost like he's writing his thesis. While this style might work if Arnove were a lawyer convicting Bush of war crimes, it just serves to further highlight how this administration works above the law and gets away with it. Even with this much clear evidence against the war it continues on.

This should be mandatory reading for anyone who has bought into the lie filled Bush regime change rhetoric regarding Iraq. A Neocon filled US administration which has been proven wrong in virtually every single one its Iraq pre-war and current engagement contentions.

From "Mission Accomplished", to "Bring It On", to "...the insurgency is in its last throes..." to lies about active WMD programs, lies about Yellow Cake material from Niger, lies about Saddams mythical connections to Al Qaida and 911, this book helps unearth many of the utterly false, and utterly illogical claims told by the current Bush Administration in D.C. regarding their oil based, "Project for the New American Century" military actions in Iraq.

Another reviewer above stated the following, "Suppose the US pulls out and Mr. Arnove is proven wrong. A civil war breaks out."

Hello, a civil war had already broken out in Iraq in case you missed the last 3 years of activity over there!!! That's what the insurgency is, it is a Civil War action! A civil war initiated solely, 100% by the Bush Neocon doctrine in Iraq beginning in April 2003. As far as the war spreading further in the Middle East, there was no war in Iraq prior to the US military illegally attacking that country in 2003. Again, there was no war there! And there is nothing to indicate that our continued military presence in Iraq is reducing the insurgency after 3+ years of occupation. In fact, all logical signs are that it is merely fueling futher insurgency recruits and fueling further deaths in that civil war.

And what happens if the Iraq Shiite cleric Al Sadr, an extremely anti-US fundamentalist, is eventually elected the majority leader of Iraq, which could easily happen given that he's in the majority Shiite sect. Do we then remove him from power because Iraq elected him in a "democratic" fashion, but we now disagree with whom they elected?

The attempt at analogy between US highway deaths versus military deaths is comparable to believing that "Fox News" is "fair and balanced" reporting. If you believe that you probably also believe that there is no civil war yet being waged in Iraq too, LOL.

Very good read, and if you want further information on the real motives behind the Bush Administrations Iraq regime change, do a google search on "The Project For a New American Century" and read up on the true motives behind this illegal war of Don Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz and other Neocons whom Bush has surrounded himself with.