Current Events Books

Dr. Francis J. Beckwith's Defending Life is simply the best, most comprehensive, most logically sound examination of abortion & the meaning of personhood available in print today. Excellent summaries of the book are available elsewhere, so let me focus on some unique features.

First, Dr. Beckwith argues for a definition & moral value to humanity that provides a defense for innocent humans in a wide variety of circumstances, not just those who are tiny & preborn. The general philosophical arguments used here are helpful for evaluating human value among those in undeveloped, famine plagued regions of the world; among populations of hardened, committed career criminals; among those yet to be conceived several generations after our pollution-promoting public policies; & those who are physically and/or mentally disabled, etc.

Second, Dr. Beckwith treats abortion rights advocates with respect & honesty, not merely fairly representing their views & arguments, but even improving their arguments when he can & yet showing that even the best abortion rights arguments fatally undermine basic human rights based on the nature of humanity. A number of years ago, I role-played an abortion rights advocate in a public debate with Dr. Beckwith. He was concerned that his opponent be formidable & insightful, but he couldn't find an available true advocate he thought would do a credible enough job. I gave it my best shot (& Dr. Beckwith kindly said I was his toughest opponent to date), but Dr. Beckwith's arguments remained compelling & invincible. That generous respect & yet actual superiority is reflected in this book.

Third, Dr. Beckwith's sharp wit makes this book a serendipitous pleasure to read as well. Without demeaning his opponents or trivializing the issues, he is able to broach illustrations packed with humor & allude to cultural comedy to make telling points. As Dr. Beckwith's students will attest, he is nothing like the typical boring philosophy professor.

Fourth, this book provides such a wide spectrum of issues, arguments, & approaches that if you only have one book on the subject in your library, you should have this one -- even (or especially) if you are an abortion rights advocate.

Regardless of your familiarity with the subject or other volumes you might possess, you can't afford to miss getting & studying your own copy of Defending Life.

We live in an age of paradox. On the one hand, scientific concepts are confidently and systematically understood, and our control of the physical world continues to expand through our employ of thorough, rigorous scientific method. On the other hand, the poverty of moral discourse is such that, in the words of J. Budziszewski, "it is...like a great smoke which fills our houses and dulls our minds and makes it difficult to complete any thoughts." Trying to discuss moral issues such as abortion in my experience does not lead to reasoned discussion; instead it is waved off as uninteresting or intractable, or the "right to choose" mantra is immediately invoked.

Francis Beckwith, however, notes that the climate has changed a bit in recent years. People are not so sure of moral relativism in the post-9/11 West. As stem cell research and the spectre of cloning bring to light alarming technological possibilities, we are forced to confront issues of what it means to be human. The thrust of Beckwith's argument, then, is to at the same time clarify the abortion debate and also advance the prolife position, by blowing away the smoke of confusion and appealing to our basic moral intuitions.

On January 22, 1973, Roe v. Wade was issued, and with its companion decision, Doe v. Bolton, it effectively legalized abortion on demand for all nine months of pregnancy. However, the reasoning used by Justice Harry Blackmun, who authored Roe, was flawed. To build his case, he had to overcome two legal impediments. The first was regarding the purpose of the anti-abortion laws that many states had enacted beginning in the nineteenth century. The reason, he said, these laws existed was not to protect prenatal life but rather to protect women from dangerous medical procedures. Since abortion was now a relatively safe procedure, there was no longer a need to prohibit it. Going back into common law prior to the nineteenth century Blackmun claimed that abortion was "a fundamental liberty, found in our nation's traditions and history." Therefore, given the right to privacy which the Supreme Court manufactured in the 1965 Griswold v. Connecticut decision (but which Blackmun said was older than the Bill of Rights), abortion was declared a constitutional right. Beckwith points out that "since 1973 the overwhelming consensus of scholarship has shown that the court's history...is almost entirely mistaken." It is clear that the primary purpose of the state laws was in fact to protect the unborn from harm.

The second flaw in the court's reasoning in Roe involves the Fourteenth Amendment which protects U.S. citizens from having their rights violated by the government, and whether the unborn are persons protected by it. Blackmun argued that since the court cannot resolve the difficult question about when life begins, the state ought to remain neutral and not prefer one theory of life over another, and therefore not rule against abortion. But in practice he really is taking a position: by legalizing abortion the state is saying that the unborn is the kind of thing that should not be protected by the state and is thus outside of membership in the human community. His argument actually provides a compelling reason to prohibit abortion, since it admits that abortion may result in the death of a human entity who has a full right to life (but we just don't know for sure).

Under scrutiny, these pillars no longer seem to be able to support Roe, so one would think that when the opportunity arose it would be reversed. Such an opportunity was the 1992 case, Planned Parenthood v. Casey which unfortunately upheld Roe in a narrow 5-4 decision. What is interesting is that since the original discredited reasoning could not be sustained, all the court could do was to base its decision on stare decisis, the principle that the court respect precedent. Chief Justice Rehnquist, in his dissent in Casey said that "Roe continues to exist, but only in the way a storefront on a western movie set exists: a mere facade to give the illusion of reality." The language of Casey indicated that the court had shifted the basis of abortion from the right to privacy to a new right that they found in the Fourteenth Amendment: the right to personal autonomy. It would seem that the right to abortion was derived not so much from sound legal reasoning as from the sheer force of judicial will.

It is claimed that the prochoice position should enjoy a privileged standing in our legal framework because the prolife position is religious. Beckwith argues that this is false: both positions presuppose some metaphysical point of view. If one is a materialist (believing that the physical world is all there is) one will reject the idea of a unifying human nature. A human being, then, is not a substance ontologically, but is something that comes into being only when sufficient parts or attributes are in place, whether these are brain waves or self-awareness or whatever criteria one chooses. In this view the whole is equal to the sum of its parts, much like an automobile or a table. Many prolifers, on the other hand, argue, as does Beckwith, that the human being is ontologically prior to its parts. From conception it has a human nature that defines and maintains its identity as long as it exists. Personhood is not achieved after a minimum number of attributes are evident, but exists immediately as an integral part of our human nature. The point is that both the prolife and the prochoice positions are in a sense religious; there is no metaphysical neutral ground.

Beckwith deals extensively with popular arguments for abortion choice, and the common denominator seems to be that they all beg the question as to the humanity of the fetus. That is to say, the arguments only work if one assumes from the outset that the unborn is not a human person, but this is the very point in dispute. For example, the argument that abortion on demand would reduce the number of unwanted children and child abuse begs the question, and this can be shown by extending the principle of the argument to post natal persons: would the killing of three-year-olds be acceptable if it would eliminate the abuse of five-year-olds? Obviously not. So the primary issue is whether or not the unborn are human persons or not. Furthermore, making wantedness a criteria for the relationship between a parent and a child is destructive for family life; it gives the parents far too much power if the value of the child is defined by the parent's feelings. Surely wantedness has bearing on value only with things, not people.

There are academic abortion choice advocates, such as Eileen McDonagh, who will grant that the unborn is a human person, but that we should be able to kill it anyway because of what it does to a woman's body. The fetus is regarded as an intruder who actually is causing the pregnancy, doing violence to the woman's body without her consent, comparable to the actions of a rapist. The woman may have consented to sex, but she did not at the same time consent to pregnancy, so she should have the right to expell this unwelcome intruder from her person. But this seems to be grossly counter-intuitive on a number of levels. The nature of the sexual organs, of sperm and ova, as being intrinsically directed toward procreation, suggests that the purpose of sex is pregnancy and for many people a radical separation of the two goes against the grain of their moral intuitions. Second, to assume moral volunteerism is to distort what we know instinctively about parental obligations. And if we applied this standard to the father there would be no moral reason to demand child support from him, for he could just say that he had consented to sex but not to fatherhood.

The arguments for abortion choice may make great slogans, but upon analysis they all fail, whether they are the crude coat-hanger arguments or ones from academic philosophers. Beckwith helps us to see more clearly just what the unborn are, where they belong, and what our duties are toward them. If we are truly an honest and compassionate society, we will not suppress this knowledge because it is inconvenient. We will practice generosity and virtue toward the weakest and most vulnerable in the human community, and we ourselves will be enriched in the process.

Beckwith's primary purpose is to provide a thorough defense of the pro-life position and its grounding in the "substance view" of human persons--a view he claims best explains human equality. He writes: "This book is, in a sense, then, not really a book about abortion, but rather, a book about human equality." Frank contends that the larger metaphysical question--who are we?--should be answered by enlarging our definition of the human family to include the unborn. His secondary purpose is to examine the relationship between abortion and law, politics, and public discourse.

The pro-life argument Frank defends can be outlined as follows:

1. The unborn entity, from the moment of conception, is a full-fledged member of the human community.
2. It is prima facie morally wrong to kill any member of that community.
3. Every successful abortion kills an unborn entity, a full-fledged member of the human community.
4. Therefore, every successful abortion is prima facie morally wrong.

The book is divided into three parts. Part 1 deals with moral reasoning, the law, and politics. Part 2 is the core of Frank's case for the pro-life view, which includes both the scientific and philosophic considerations. Part 3 takes on cloning and embryonic stem-cell research.

The thrust of the text is philosophical and jurisprudential rather than religious. In each case, the arguments presented pass the test of public reason. That's not because he thinks theology doesn't count as real knowledge (indeed, he argues elsewhere it does). Rather, he's cutting-off secular critics who unjustly dismiss pro-life arguments with the wand of "faith"--which they define as non-rational and subjective.

Frank sums up the current controversy this way: "At the end of the day, the abortion debate is about who and what we are and whether we can know it."

This is certainly the newest pro-life work to appear, and arguably among the best. It not only lays out the legal, rational, moral and philosophical case against abortion choice, but it more broadly makes the case for human equality and the sanctity of life.

Beckwith is an American professor of law and philosophy who has written extensively on these issues previously. This volume brings together years of thinking and debating on this contentious issue. It is an invaluable resource for all those wishing to stand up for human life at all stages of development, and to counter the arguments of the pro-choice brigade.

The first third of the book paints with broad brush strokes, examining moral reasoning, legal considerations, and political dimensions of the abortion debate.

The second third of the book looks more closely at the abortion debate per se, looking at the science, the morality and the arguments involved in the debate about abortion.

The final third of the book extends these considerations to recent developments in bioethics, including cloning and stem cell research.

The second and longest section of this book does many things, including carefully dismantling the various arguments put forward by the pro-abortion camp. All the leading pro-abortion thinkers, such as Thompson, Boonin, Stretton, and Dworkin are taken on, with their positions carefully assessed and interacted with.

On the broader issue of human equality, Beckwith argues for the substance view which states that a human being "is intrinsically valuable because of the sort of thing it is and the human being remains that sort of thing as long as it exists". That is, an individual "maintains absolute identity through time while it grows, develops, and undergoes numerous changes".

Various functions and capacities, whether fully realised or utilised do not constitute a person. Thus a human being is never a potential person, but is always a person at different stages of development, whether potential properties and capacities are actualised or not.

This view stand in stark contrast to the utilitarian and functionalist views held by most pro-abortionists. They argue that personhood is not inherent or intrinsic, but based on certain capacities and functions, be it consciousness, sentience, self-awareness, the ability to reason, and so on.

As to the specifics of the abortion debate, Beckwith responds to the numerous objections raised by pro-abortionists over the years. For example, consider the argument often heard, involving the hard cases of rape and incest. These are certainly tragic events, but in no way can they be used to justify an abortion.

First, such cases are extremely rare, making up just a tiny fraction of all abortions. Second, to argue for the legalisation of abortion because of these extreme cases would be similar to arguing that we eliminate traffic laws because in some rare cases they need to be violated, as in rushing a loved one to hospital.

Third, it simply begs the question by assuming the unborn child is not fully human. Fifth, to justify abortion in these circumstances is to argue that it is acceptable to forfeit a life for the alleged benefit of another. But a basic ethical intuition argues that we may not kill one person to possibly save another. John may desperately need a vital organ of Mary to stay alive, but he has no right to demand it, especially if it entails killing her in the process.

The more recent, and difficult, cases of embryo research, human cloning and stem cell therapies are also examined, looking at the various justifications given for them, and their pro-life responses. Similar issues arise here concerning the nature of personhood and the inviolability of life.

Beckwith closes by laying out his case as it has been argued throughout: the unborn are full members of the human community; it is wrong to kill members of that community; abortion kills the unborn entity; therefore abortion is morally wrong.

The three hundred pages of tightly-knit argumentation and logical-constructed reasoning take on nearly all the major justifications for abortion. All are found wanting - morally, legally, and philosophically. Beckwith is to be praised for assembling in one volume some of the best pro-life argumentation around.

This book is simply incredible. Beckwith answers all the typical abortion-choice arguments, and builds an undeniable case for the personhood of the unborn. In particular, Beckwith spends a chapter answering the human being vs. human person objection, and a chapter answering the common bodily autonomy argument, the only two abortion-choice arguments that actually don't beg the question. This is, of course, after Beckwith builds the case for the humanity of the unborn. The book is extremely well researched, and each chapter contains extensive footnotes. Along with Life Giving Love by Kimberly Hahn, this is now my favorite book. A MUST for all pro-lifers, as well as those that support abortion who wish to know how the other side argues.

for any gov., hist., econ., soc., anth. student a must read

"Democracy in America", published in two parts (the first in 1835, the second in 1840), is the great work of Alexis de Tocqueville, a young, aristocratic Frenchman, who traveled through most of the Eastern, Southern, and Midwestern United States during a 9 month period in 1832. Tocqueville had originally set out to study the U.S. prison system but what he saw inspired him to write about much, much more.

The foresight he had for such a young man is really impressive to read 160 years later. What he saw in the morals, work ethic and government structure of the United States led him to accurately predict many of the ways in which the U.S. would lead and has led the world. At the same time Tocqueville was not oblivious to many of the ills in the America he saw. He very wisely writes of the cancer that the institution of slavery was to not only all black Americans, but to the white, Southern farmers and workers as well.

I hate having to give these books "stars" for ratings because in many cases it takes away from the ultimate importance and classic status of a book like this one. Tocqueville does tend to jump around and venture off into different topics that don't fit with the rest of their chapter, which could be attributed to his youth. Also, a few of his predictions, naturally, were way off. A native Texan, I had a good laugh at his view that "the province of Texas is still part of the Mexican dominions, but it will soon contain no Mexicans." But overall Tocqueville's view of America was honest, accurate, and the perfect explanation of why, on a daily basis, people continue to risk their lives to gain the freedom that only the United States of America offers.

This is one of the greatest books ever written on politics! Toqueville analyzes American democracy and its inherent strengths and weaknesses from the view of a foreigner, thus giving the reader a balanced view of the situation. A definite must-read for anyone concerned with politics and American politics in particular.

to read democracy in america is to confront greatness itself, to follow the reflections of one the greatest political thinkers of all time, a man of balanced rationality, with a passionate concern for the fate of democracy--true democracy, that is, not the kind we see politicians preach on tv everyday. personally i prefer volume 2 of this great work, where the author summons up his astonishingly penetrating power of analysis and prophesy

De Tocqueville was simply of one of the great social scientists writing about America and Democracy. From reading the book I deduced that De Tocqueville was a social scientist before Marx! He compares European culture and government with the fledgling culture and democracy he observes in America. He is very much impressed with what he sees taking place in America in the 1830's and hopes it will spread to Europe. He at first believed that America's prosperity was simply due to geography and their distance from powerful neighbors, he abandons this idea after his visit to America. He comes to realize that the West is not being peopled "by new European immigrants to America, but by Americans who he believes have no adversity to taking risks". De Tocqueville comes to see that Americans are the most broadly educated and politically advanced people in the world and one of the reasons for the success of our form of government. He also foretells America's industrial preeminence and strength through the unfettered spread of ideas and human industry.

De Tocqueville also saw the insidious damage that the institution of slavery was causing the country and predicted some 30 years before the Civil War that slavery would probable cause the states to fragment from the union. He also the emergence of stronger states rights over the power of the federal government. He held fast to his belief that the greatest danger to democracy was the trend toward the concentration of power by the federal government. He predicted wrongly that the union would probably break up into 2 or 3 countries because of regional interests and differences. This idea is the only one about America that he gets wrong. Despite some of his misgivings, De Tocqueville, saw that democracy is an "inescapable development" of the modern world. The arguments in the "Federalist Papers" were greater than most people realized. He saw a social revolution coming that continues throughout the world today.

De Tocqueville realizes at the very beginning of the "industrial revolution" how industry, centralization and democracy strengthened each other and moved forward together. I am convinced that De Tocqueville is still the preeminent observer of America but is also the father of social science. A must read for anyone interested in American history, political philosophy or the social sciences.

Veterans For Peace is in the forefront of the vast majority waging peace in our times. If you have a sense of humor you'll be putting this book down often due to uncontrollabe laughter. If you don't (have a sense of humor) you'll laugh anyway. If you are a peace monger, send this to your congresspersons. If you are from Minnesota, they probably have it already.

Fun and educational, especially for those free thinkers that can't get up to speed in the post 911 world. Shine up your value systems with the Department of Homeland Decency guide book. Go forth, secure that you know what IT is. You will be able to impress your conservative friends with your understanding of the new rules. There is a chuckle in it for everyone.

Department of Homeland Decency is funny. Not just ha-ha funny but laugh out loud hysterical. Hysterical because what else is there to do when there is W in the White House? This decency manual reads like something W actually did scheme up. I mean, it is good. G-O-O-D. Very good. Brilliant.

The structure is concise and covers decency guidelines for home, work, TV, medical issues, and, of course, for doing "it." Each section consists of snappy articles with goofy subtitles-- "How to Prevent Insertion, " "Frozen Embryos," and "Abstinence Bake Sale." At the end of each section there is an "Ask Yourself This!" which brings up tasty issues such as "ask yourself this: What could my children learn at the library that I don't know and that would make me feel stupid if I didn't know it before they did? Why wouldn't I rather have my children do research at home where parental locks have been placed on the internet and on the television?"

There are many ways to tell a story, to get at the heart of an issue. Michael Moore goes for the jugular and leaves me feeling worked up, manipulated and annoyed. Susan and Frank Fuller's approach is also direct but not like I just got punched in the gut with political dogma. The writing is accurate, consistent, and direct.

Although the writing is funny it's not like the Fuller's tip toe around charged issues. "Decency in the Lunchroom" snowballs into "Suddenly the workplace is filled with languages other than English, including Black, Spanish, Indian and the like. The workplace lunchroom is no longer a restful spot to consume a hamburger or doughnut; instead, foods like hummus and salsa take up space in the company refrigerator." This is so brilliantly written I feel as if I could give this book to any right winger and they would sanction it as Truth. The Truth. This book rings true. And the truth hurts. If I couldn't laugh about the Truth, I'd cry. I'll take a good laugh any day.

Buy this book NOW. It's the perfect size to tuck into a picnic basket, beach bag or carry on. Enjoy!

Ask yourself this: are you tired of liberals, weak-willed Democrats and manly looking females who are eroding the decency of our homeland? Do you desire to "go backward into the future" into a new "Age of Decency", leaving behind all those who are not decent (free thinkers, PBS viewers, people who buy free range eggs, people who wear religious head coverings , people who do not like to watch NASCAR on TV)? If you have recently fallen off the decency wagon or just want to take your decency to the next level of separation from the indecency around you, this rule book is for you. All of the instructions are supported by years of research by the DOHD scientists who are gifted at making their data easy to understand even if their findings are not true. With this book, the DOHD helps us comply with decency standards and live decently, thus avoiding both painful punishment and rich fulfilling lives. Expect to see authors Frank and Susan Fuller with their own FOX News show soon!

Contained within the covers of this clever, cynical little volume are instructions for living an exemplary Homeland life ruled by decency. Issued by the Department of Homeland Decency (DOHD), it covers key life areas, including home, sex ("it"), work, entertainment, health, and worship. The book is filled with inspiring mottos, for "Mottos help decent Homelanders remember the rules of decency." One favorite is "It's not how much it hurts but for how long afterwards", from the appendix on Punishments. My favorite feature of the USA Decency Act (UDA) is the LookSee. DOHD agents patrol everywhere in big black SUVs, ferreting out and reporting acts of indecency. Your actions could trigger, at any time, a Home LookSee, "It" LookSee, Workplace LookSee, Medical LookSee, or any other number of LookSees. The authors, Frank Fuller and Susan Fuller, treat their subject with the silliness and disrespect it deserves. Inspired surely by the current US government's topsy-turvy priorities and self-righteous judgments, they shred the myopic and naive pronouncements of the powerful right with their simplistic, yet stern, language of a government manual. The book's design is beautiful, and it's small enough to take with you, in case you need a reminder of what is decent. Humor is often an outlet for anger, and this book wittily lampoons the cause of so much frustration in a time when many of us feel faceless and powerless.

A wonderful introduction to and overview of the works of one of the only coherent intellectual "schools" of the 20th century. Jay describes the penetrating insights (and weaknesses) of the thought of Adorno, Horkheimer, Marcuse et al., with mercifully little of the psychologizing that one often finds in intellectual history. Ideas and their relation to historical context are the focus, rather than personalities and psyches. The book is readable enough to be attractive for non-academics and academics alike. It would have been nice to have more on the post-1950 period, but the as the subtitle makes clear, this is beyond Jay's purview for this book.

Even though a few years old by now, this is still the finest volume on the (at one time) subversive and all-encompassing attempt at rewriting the understanding of man, with special emphasis on reconciling Marx with Freud. The movement was known as The Frankfurt School, and its leading lights are examined here, both in life and thought, with a special emphasis on the former. Other books have come out since then, some had greater access to previously unavailable documents. Even so, no other book beats Martin Jay's scholarly and eminently readable account. If you must read just one book on the movement, read this one.

This was one of the best books I read in graduate school. After 20 years this is still a great reference for anyone interested in the development of American universities. This work is an essential part of the intellectual landscape to anyone navigating the currents of the reactionary neocon thought, which developed in large degree in opposition to the legacy of the Frankfurt School. While the Frankfurt School's students seemed to dominate academe for a generation or more, the new invisible college is dominated by the reaction to this major stream of thought.

28 years after its initial publication, Martin Jay's "The Dialectical Imagination" is still the best introduction and most indispensable guide to the Frankfurt School's history and thinkers. Jay can easily be forgiven his occasional historiographer's dryness and insistent reminders of the boundaries of his project (I would be a rich man if I had a nickel for every time he writes that "such considerations fall outside of the area of the current inquiry" or something to that effect). Moreover, even if subsequent publications of the translated correspondence and unpublished papers of figures like Benjamin and Adorno have robbed Jay's book of some of its potential for novelty and scoop, Jay still provides the best and most pithy assessments of the major points, and he does so without sacrificing the scholarly rigor that organizes "The Dialectical Imagination."

The book could certainly better fulfill its role as research tool if the publishers would sponsor an updating of the notes and citations; now that everything has been published and republished by presses like Fischer and Suhrkamp in Germany and by the likes of Continuum, Columbia, Harvard, etc., in the English-speaking world, Jay's opus might be more helpful were it not to insist on citing the original issues of the institute's journals, to which most of us simply don't have easy access.

That's a small bone to pick, though, with such a thorough book. Jay's chapter on the philosophical roots of critical theory moves quickly but surely (despite the occasional dependence on disciplinary argot that may slow down readers not steeped in the vocabulary of "isms"), providing a crucial backdrop to his reading of the Frankfurt School's entire intellectual contribution. This chapter grounds Jay's book safely, and the subsequent chapters make good on this very promising start.

"The Dialectical Imagination" is sure to remain the best available introduction to the thought of the Frankfurt School on the whole. I cannot recommend it highly enough for those interested in the history of philosophy in the 20th century, in radical politics, or in developments in literary theory.

Frankfurt school is now a part of history. Not much of its arguments are reproduced now a day. For example, their critical cultural theory opened up the vast terrain of cultural study in capitalism. But their characterizing cultural consumer as dumb passive receiver is too much extreme to be real. Now nobody hold up such a position. Its perspective seems locked in the interwar period. Indeed, the power of the school comes from the distinctive problematic derived from such a peculiar era. But the strength is the source of weakness. But even we don¡¯t follow their lines, we should know what they said at least in cursory manner, for their theories are now classic in each field.
This book must be still the most authoritative history of Frankfurt school from its inception to 1950. but it deals with not only chronological events but also what the first generation of the school, such as Horkheimer, Adorno, Marcuse, Walter Benjamin, and Fromm, worked. This book is the intellectual history of the school. The author illustrates the school against the time of school. As Hegel said, thought is the child of its time. So the thought should be located in the right context to understand. The society of Western intellectuals faced a crisis in the interwar period. The impact was severe especially to German intellectuals. The thought of Frankfurt school is one of the reactions to the crisis. Marin Jay succeeds in reconstruct their time in front of us. This book is the ¡®must¡¯, if you want to be oriented to Frankfurt school.

The reason why you see such a high price tag on this book [...], is because it is a "How-to" guide that explains how a president in a Republic acquires dictatorial powers and changes the Republic into Empire.

The model for this insightful, "spill-the-beans" work is Louis Napoleon III of France. Louis was elected president of France in 1848 in an election that was probably more legitimate than ours in 2000. The Constitution of the French Republic limited a president's term to four years. Louis was able to convince his parliament to extend this so Louis would have time to implement his policies. Louis then staged a coup d'etat and seized dictatorial powers, passing new constitutional statutes masking his power and Louis reigned France as a dictator for 20 more years.

Due to the new century and the militant foreign policy of the neo-cons, today's America is in this same position. (chillingly, super neo-con Harvey Mansfield is listed as an editor of this Political Theory Series). Following are passages in the "Dialogues" that run parallel to the political tactics of today:

Machiavelli: "I will start by having my coup against the state ratified by popular vote. In a carefully crafted message to the people, I will show that we were in a crisis situation". "On the very next day after my constitution takes effect, I will issue a series of decrees with force of law that will do away with these liberties and rights...". (PATRIOT ACT-2001).

Montesquieu: "Indeed, you've chosen your moment well. the country is still terrorized by your coup d'etat" (9/11). "As for your constitution, nothing will be denied you, since you could take everything".

Machiavelli: "But I hasten to assure you that the liberties I suppress I shall formally promise to restore after factional strife has been quieted". (THE PATRIOT ACT WAS LIMITED IN YEARS AND HAD TO BE RESTORED WITH THE PATRIOT ACT II).

Machiavelli: [Regarding the Press] "I could suppress all of you. I haven't yet done so but I can I'll let you live, on one condition, that you don't try to block my progress or descredit my power...I reserve to myself or my agents the right to judge when I am being attacked...the third time you will be suppressed". (WHY THE PRESS IS MUZZLED ON 9/11, IRAQ, AND SOON IRAN).

Machiavelli: "I shall count the number of newspapers that represent what you call the "opposition". If there are ten in this category, I shall have twenty pro-government". (MASS SUGGETION as explained in my review of the book, Propaganda. "I will put a certain number of newspapers that will adopt the official line of things in a straightforward way. They will defend my acts unreservedly. (TELEVISION TODAY-FOX NEWS).

Machiavelli: "Some malfeasance by a public official, I shall forbid the newspapers to speak of it. Silence about such things, rather than noising them about, is more respectful of public decency". (TODAY, OMMISSION OF KEY STORIES AND EVENTS).

Machiavelli: "...see how I will use statements in the press to prepare the ground for official political acts...For several months, each of my newspapers will play upon the public mind in their own fashion and then recommend a course of action. One fine morning, this course of action is officially adopted". (AGAIN, SEE "PROPAGANDA" AND THE INFLUENCE OF MASS SUGGESTION).

Machiavelli: "I would give a certain number of my newpapers the task of constantly exalting the glory of my reign while holding other governments responsible for the shortcomings of European politics". (CLINTON ALLOWED OSAMA BIN LADEN TO GET AWAY).

Machiavelli: "Do you know what SOVEREIGN IMMUNITY is? When individuals are wronged by government agents performing their duties and bring them before the courts, judges must answer them thus: "You have no legal recourse here". (BUSH INVOKES SOVEREIGN IMMUNITY ON THE 600+ LAWSUITS AGAINS HIM, ROVE STILL INVOKING THIS TO GET OUT OF TESTIFYING, ETC.)

Machiavelli: "...the source of lawsuits will dry up. Public opinion would become so tame that total reliance would be placed on the official opinions of the government for the meaning of the law. At certain moments, when there is a good reason to fear that some controversy may arise over some point of law, the government will declare as an advisory opinion that the law applies to this or that situation or that the law extends to this or that case". (NSA WIRETAPPING, TORTURE, ETC).

Machiavelli: "If this district has only a small population, I simply redraw it and put in into a neighboring district where opposition voices will be drowned out and...". (REPUBLICAN TOM DELAY'S REDISTRICTING SCHEME)

Machiavelli: "I will control 19 of 20 men, all of whom will follow my instructions. In the meantime, I would pull the strings of a sham opposition, clandestinely enlisted to my cause". (CONGRESS DEMOCRATS-ALL PAID FOR).

Machiavelli: "...there is a particular way of presenting the budget to disguise rising costs". (COST OF IRAQ WAR)

Montesquieu: "...whom you will ask of such capital and for what purpose?"

Machiavelli: "Foreign wars are a great help in providing a rationale". (SELF EXPLANATORY PARALLEL).

"These financial giants would be able to manipulate the markets at will".

Machiavelli: "The wars that will occur in my reign will be undertaken in the name of the liberty of men and the independence of nations". (IRAQ)

Machiavelli: "I have brought into being around me a formidable school of political men...in all branches of government there will be veritable miniature Machiavellis, who will trick, dissimulate, and lie with an imperturbable sangfroid. Truth will not be able to come to light anywhere".

I must end this, the despair is immense...

Joly's work is important. Reading this obscure 140+ year old text tells much about the past, present and future. It is almost prophetic.

Waggoner does an excellent job and I thank him mightily for allowing us access to this text. The commentary is a bit extensive, as I did not look forward to reading it upon completion of the consuming Dialogue. However, it is helpful, necessary and worth getting through.

I had not read "The Prince" nor "Spirit of the Laws" prior, but had general understanding of them. Needless to say, next are they on my list. My motivation for picking this one up was the "Protocols" scandal. All in all, I consider this a remarkable work providing insight on the tyrants of the 19th/20th centuries and the ones presently budding. Those especially for which the Dialogue proved a heavy and indirect influence vis a vis the forged "Protocols". Perhaps it makes sense such a telling tome remains obscure, as the masses seem to prefer their dose of soma (McDonalds, iPods, TV...) rather than actual thought, in this "brave new world".

Before I can even begin about the book, the story BEHIND the book is amazing. It would not surprise me if Cheney had a copy of the German version somewhere in his desk as Bush probably wouldn't understand a third of the amazing ideas put forth in this formerly banned book.

Watching the news is like watching Machiavelli's Dialogue come to life. Listening to Democrats is like hearing Montesquieu's feeble attempts to say that in the end, the good guys will win because of Justice and Liberty. If the Dialogue were a swordfight, Machiavelli would have not only killed poor Montesquieu, but eviscerated and beheaded him as well. Waggoner's commentaries and insights are a little dry when compared with the excellent text but are a good read and do well to put some of the outdated points in the text into context. I strongly reccomend this for anybody who is questioning the course of events that our world is being swept up in.

I read this book while researching the "Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion." Clearly "Protocols" was heavily plagiarized from this work and was a forgery to boot. In any event, this is a captivating tale of a conversation between Machiavelli (counselor to despots) and Montesquieu (philosophical and political father of the U.S. Constitution.) Machiavelli claims to be misunderstood but as the dialogue progresses it seems painfully evident that he is generally not.

While Machiavelli and Montesquieu both claim to be followers of Christ, it becomes clear to everyone but Machiavelli that he operates out of self-interest rather than the good of society. His self-delusion is phenomenal and is readily seen in politics today. The book is obscure, true, but I found it to be a page-turner. Do not pass judgment on this book because someone later used it for anti-Semitic purposes. There is nothing anti-Semitic in this original tale.

As noted in every book I've ever read about the infamous forgery, _The Protocols of the Elders of Zion_, this book was the source, edited beyond recogintion by the Czar's secret police.

_The Dialogue in Hell_ must not have done very well, or more people would have recognized the _Protocols_ as a forgery sooner.

Sadly, political forgeries continue today. Dan Rather and Mary Mapes lost their jobs at CBS over forged memos; how odd that today's American liberals haven't learned from the Czar's secret police's mistakes.

This book was pretext for Karl MARX idea of communism. Rousseau blamed inequality among people due to ownership of property.

I find Rousseau especially creative in the way he describes how inequality progressed from the time the first humans made contact. He makes a good case for the solitary life. I think Rousseau believes it is destructive whenever humans come together in groups. Governments were formed to protect the weaker from the stronger or as Rousseau thinks to actually protect the rich from the poor. This is an outstanding book. It will haunt you.

This is a wonderful example of the 18th century enlightenment. In this work, Rousseau states that inequalities of rank, wealth, and power are the inevitable result of the civilizing process, something most of us have found to be very true if unfair. This new translation also includes all of Rousseau's own notes.

I enjoyed this tremendously, and am always amazed that the thought pattern and process is oneof the few things that hasn't changed over the centuries.

Excellent discourse. This book discusses some of the rudiments of the history of inequality and how its self supporting and ever existing in human nature. I recommend this book for those readers who either want to increase their knowledge on Jean-Jacques Rousseau or historical development of inequality

(...)

This essay was Rousseaus's submission to the Academy of Dijon contest, entitled, "Has the progress of the arts and sciences contributed more to the corruption or purification of morals?".

This text is his story about Nature, and Society, and the scandal that happens when people come together, build, divide, dance, sing, and compare themselves with one another. In many ways, it is his answer to the problem of evil.

Natural man is, in many ways, good, because his needs are immediately felt and immediately fulfilled. Social man begins to compete, to hoard, and to use cunning to enslave his fellows, to gain their esteem, take their property, and sometimes their lives.

His picture of the natural man is half what we think of an "animal" and half the "human" that we recognize in ourselves. He shifts his description as the flow of arguement dictates. The habitual provocateur, Rousseau - watch him!

In a way, he is rewriting the Christian "Creation Myth". In his version, evil does not originate at that moment when man eats the fruit of the "Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil" --to "be like God"; it happens when Adam wants a better apple than Eve's got for herself. Before society develops as we know it, Adam would have been fine with just a pear.

This is a great book to read if you are planning to visit China, It is easy to read with beatiful pictures, a review about modern Chinese society, the good side and the dark side when the Dragon is rising.

Dragon Rising: An Inside Look at China Today comes from a Beijing-based journalist who examines the major issues around China's transition to a global power. His experiences with a wide range of Chinese residents, from urban to rural - and his observations of the different paths the Chinese are choosing on the road to modernity - lends to a blend of powerful images and social observation key to any understanding of Chinese culture. Both general-interest libraries and high school to college-level holdings strong in intercultural understanding will want to consider this introductory review.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

My father will be traveling to China in May for a 3-week trip, to learn more about this fascinating country. I can think of no better book, to prepare him for his travel to Beijing, Shanghai, and the Yangtze River. So, I will be sending him this book immediately.

Following up his well-researched and detailed 600-page "The Chinese" with "Dragon Rising," Becker has given the "China" shelf in the bookstore a book, which it dearly needed. Instead of reading about the Ming Dynasty or Chairman Mao, business travelers and adventure travelers needed a book, which could be easily read in a day, covering the different regions of China (Beijing, Shanghai, Guangdong, Yunnan Province, etc.), an explanation of Deng's reforms which were responsible for the China economic miracle, and some hard-hitting truth-telling about the human and environmental impact of China's rush to modernism.

On this point, anyone who has read Becker's "The Chinese" will not be surprised by his honest assessment of this human impact on the Chinese. In the chapter on Beijing, he recounts the developments that led to the Tiananmen Square protests; in the Shanghai chapter, he documents the misery of construction workers building this city of the future and the prostitutes who inhabit it; and in the Pearl River Delta, he puts a face to the cheap labor and goods being sent from China to the rest of the world: the young and petite factory girls recruited from the countryside who live their regulated lives in factory dormitories.

Becker's reportage combines a sense of wonderment and awe about China's rise with a Dickensian sensibility. Becker is terrific at distilling confusing political developments into a language the average reader can understand. But, he is at best when his journalistic instinct kicks in: traveling the country to interview farmers, entrepreneurs, beggars, prostitutes, local party leaders, labor activists, and prostitutes. In a way, the book is a series of fascinating anecdotes strung from one chapter to another.

Finally, I should mention that this is a National Geographic book, so the pictures are tremendously beautiful, even when they focus on the poverty or environmental disasters of the countryside. More of the China books would be much better, if they contained more contemporary pictures!

All in all, this is a well-rounded, very readable book.

China's future impact on world affairs, economies, and raw-material/energy demand is frequently pondered, but with little detail. Becker's "Dragon Rising" brings clear detail and reality to recent accomplishments by China. In addition, the reader also learns interesting tidbits such as China lost Taiwan to Japan in 1895, Tiananmen Square was modeled after Moscow's Red Square, and Deng Xiaoping was the de facto Chinese leader who led China out of Mao's mess and into the modern world (despite being deposed twice, and sentenced to death once for non-conformist actions).

Example of Chinese Urban Renovation: China spent $30 billion from '92 to '99 to rebuild Shanghai's infrastructure. This supported construction of 8,000 high-rises in 15 years (each taller than any building in the area prior to 1980), new steel and car plants, an automated stock exchange, a new airport, and a Maglev train to/from the airport (top speed 269 mph). The bad news is that Shanghai has sunk 8 feet since '21, its population density now exceeds 5,800/square mile (much greater than New York, London, or Paris), many of the new buildings are of poor quality and will require significant repairs in ten years, prices have skyrocketed to as high as $1,250/square foot, many of the buildings are vacant, and the disparity between rich and poor has never been greater.

China has also build underground cities and factories in preparation for nuclear war.

Transitioning the Economy: China had about 300,000 state-owned enterprises (SOEs) with jobs and food originally guaranteed for life; however, with their overheads (about one administrator for every three workers) they were slow-moving, and productivity was poor. Deng began transitioning by changing their focus from military products to civilian, and by the late 1990s, two-thirds were operating in the red.

Glove Company Example: The firm began as a part-time husband/wife activity aimed at adding to their farm income. Success led to adding onto their house, buying a few Japanese machines, and hiring some workers. More success and reinvestment brought new machines made in China (some with computers), and a capacity of a million/year. Large orders were shared with others in the area.

Sales activities took place not only via mobile phones, but at a local market (in this case about a mile long with five floors and 40,000 vendors) - buyers liked it because of the ease in filling a shipping container, even with small purchases from individual vendors. Dongyang focuses on socks (about 9 billion pair/year), and attracts 100,000 buyers at its sock fair.

MBAs are not needed - the average number of employees is 18, and 70% of owners have at best a middle-school education. Profits are reinvested, or put into real-estate or even purchasing jet planes; China has private savings of over $1.4 trillion. Employees work 10-12 hours/day, often for less than minimum wage (many workers are illegal migrants from rural areas - China severely restricts movement to avoid peasants overwhelming cities). The government is trying to crack down on pay violations; other problems include a damaged environment, high-cost healthcare that often is of poor quality, and lack of worker safety standards.

How does this all add up? A Mattel Barbie doll retails for $10 in the U.S., with $1 going for management and shippers in Hong Kong, 65 cents for raw materials, and 35 cents for other factory costs (including labor and equipment). Sophisticated parts are often made outside China and simply assembled; look for this to change soon.

Why do peasants want to move to the cities? Their income has stagnated at low levels (average land farmed is 1.5 acres; title to the land still resides with the government). Regardless, this creates considerable pressure for the government to further increase trade so that they can move off the farm and the land can be consolidated for production efficiencies.

Bottom Line: Becker does not hide the fact that China has a long way to go as far as human rights are concerned. However, it is also clear that the Chinese government is maneuvering carefully, trying to avoid unmeetable expectations and the problems caused by instant transition (eg. Russia, East Germany). Regardless, China's future military, political, economic, and resource impact on the world will be very significant and occur much faster than we probably would have imagined.

Dragon Rising is a very well written book giving the reader an excellent overview of modern China. Its clear from the very beginning (via the introduction) that the author is not a "China cheerleader" and can ask the difficult questions. I think this book balances all the China hype we see and read about it in the economic media with the reality of the the many pressing economic and social problems that are becoming more acute.

This book is very interesting and easy to read and intersperses anecdotes, with history, and facts, as well as colorful photos -all without getting bogged down in minutiae. Probably the best book available for anyone interested in an overview of modern China. I would recommend it for anyone doing business with China or traveling to China, and interested in an overview of modern Chinese society. Not for academic types or someone interested in Chinese history.

I'll admit that any book with the work heresies in the title has an automatic advantage in peaking my interest, but this volume does so much more than merely entice. MacCoun and Reuter have done an amazing job of looking that drug prohibition from a new point of view. Frankly, despite the passage of a few years, I believe that this book is absolute essential if one hopes to really understand the controversy over the War on Drugs.

Rather than attempt a summary of the contents, let me simply point to three specifics as representative of the wealth of insight the reader will encounter. First, MacCoun and Reuter have expanded the typical dichotomous legalization v criminalization perspectives to include depenalization and commercialization. Counter the arguments of drug prohibitionists, depenalization does not seem to be inextricably intertwined with massive increases in the prevalence of drug use as is anticipated with legalization. Also, legalization may have less negative increases in prevalence without the accompaniment of commercialization. By adding these two considerations, MacCoun and Reuter enable expansion of the debate into potentially fertile areas for improving the consequences of prohibition.

Secondly, the careful analysis of the 48 negative consequences of prohibition and the related causal linkage to enforcement, illegal status, and use should be the focus of careful reflection by every reader. In many respects, the damage caused by the War on Drugs is a kind of collateral damage - unintentionally caused by the implementation of US prohibition efforts.

Thirdly, MacCoun & Reuter reconceptualize the total harmfulness of illicit drugs as the interaction of three factors: prevalence, intensity, and micro harm (i.e., user self-damage). Much of the criticism of drug prohibition deals with the extensive micro harm without equal weight being given to the total harmfulness to our society. The negative correlation between prevalence and micro harm is among the more interesting possibilities to consider.

In summary, it is quite difficult to imagine a more sensitive evaluation of drug prohibition that so carefully considers the US case in light of the European context and the historical experience with legal addictive substances (alcohol and tobacco). I cannot recommend this book more highly.

Drug War Heresies may be the best book ever written about modern U.S. drug policy. Written by a psychologist and an economist, the authors draw on attempts to control other substances (such as alcohol prohibition in the U.S.) and exhaustively examine the alternative and experimental European drug policies that most American readers will find particularly useful. The authors are careful to not impose their values and beliefs into their work, instead focusing on the consequences of alternative drug policies. The result is a persuasive case for policy reform in America that is not doctrinaire. Required reading for all who are interested in illicit drug policy in America.

The 'War on Drugs' in the United States grew from a million dollar acorn absentmindedly planted by President Nixon to a thriving 18 billion dollar oak three decades on.

The outcome of the 'war' is not satisfactory. The prevalence of illicit drug use is down but the substances are still readily available for people who really want to use them. The collateral damage is alarming, including one of the highest per capita rates for imprisonment in the world and regular reports of ghastly mistakes by law enforcement officers.

This book presents a massively researched and dispassionate cost/benefit analysis of the likely effects of various forms of legalisation for the major categories of illicit drugs. The subtitle of the book signals that the conceptual framework is enriched by a survey the international experience in the control of prostitution, gambling, alcohol and tobacco as well as the illicit drugs.

Drug War Heresies is a really excellent source for a wide range of literature and for the standard arguments that are likely to be bandied backwards and forwards for some time to come. It is clearly written and it provides a model of policy analysis in a deeply controversial field where the authors articulate a position of their own without apparently biasing the analysis.


The centrepiece of their analysis is the estimation of the Total Harm from a drug as the product of Prevalence (number of users) x Intensity (average number of doses) x Harmfulness (harm caused by each dose). This is a complex equation because the intensity is not uniform in the drug-using population and the harms arising from particular levels of drug use depend on the public health provisions and other policies (such as policing) that are in place.

The highly nuance stance that they adopt calls for modest law reforms that would result in increased prevalence (more users) in conjunction with other policies which would moderate both the intensity of use and the harms that result from drug use. The harms include the cost of crimes to support expensive habits, and other costs that result from policing zero-tolerance prohibition policies.

The analysis is far from complete, partly because the financial costs and benefits cannot be calculated accurately, also because the attractiveness and the political feasibility of the options depends on highly subjective (and widely divergent) appraisals that different people apply to drug use and its consequences.

The authors concluded that there is very little likelihood in the near future for reform, even for cannabis. All the problems in the analysis favour the status quo. So far only one major political figure, the Republican Governor of New Mexico, was prepared to put the ball of reform into play in the political arena and he was rebuffed by the Democratic majority in his legislature. This was a most unfortunate outcome from a scientific point of view because some of the imponderables that dog the cost/benefit analysis might have been illuminated in the light of experience in one state.

After the authors put down their pens both terrorism and Iraq became major issues, hence the prospects for change in drug policy are even more dismal, partly due to the diversion of attention to other areas and partly on account of the deterioration in the civility of public debate in general. This does not detract from the value of this excellent book, merely from the impact that it is likely to have in the short term.

This is one of the most comprehensive, objective or "bi-partisan," and current studies available to the general public. Although it is indeed an academic study and is written to influence policymakers, the educated public can easily follow most of the arguments posited by MacCoun and Reuter. Both thinkers have extensive experience in the area of drug policy, both are senior consultants with RAND (Drug Policy Research Center) and have published a considerable amount of literature on the nature of drugs and drug laws. This dynamic text attempts a comparative analysis of vices, such as gambling and prostitution, with that of recreational drug use, including alcohol and tobacco. The purpose of this study is to research whether or not there are any correlations between vices and, if so - can they assist in our understanding of how to regulate drugs and the desires of individuals for drugs. For example, of the kind of comparisons made, is that of prostitution and gambling. Both are legal in Las Vegas, NV - both are thought to be harmful vices, nevertheless, the law has provided a place for them in a legal context - can the same be done for drugs? The text also evaluates extensively, the European models of drug law enforcement and treatment and compares them to America's own models of law and treatment. The authors do not offer any solutions to the drug problem, but what they have done is contribute a comprehensive study with an extensive and diverse amount of data on the subject, something of which has not been achieved as thoroughly as it has been done in this study. The authors also analyze many of the drug reformer's arguments and parse them for consistencies and/or inconsistencies; in the conclusion, they offer a sympathetic gesture to the reformer's contentions because the authors admit to realizing the inanity and harm current drug laws are causing society, but they do so cautiously. They realize that something "must change," but what? and the future can only hold speculations. This book is highly recommended.

Another interesting companion study is the Consumer Reports study that was released in 1972. It is comprehensive and treats the many aspects of the "drug problem" in America. See:

Breacher, Edward M. et al., Licit and Illicit Drugs: the Consumers Union report on narcotics, stimulants, depressants, inhalants, hallucinogens, and marijuana - including caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol. (Boston: Little Brown, 1972).

"In Drug War Heresies, Robert J. MacCoun and Peter Reuter ask whether drug prohibition makes sense and whether legalization might achieve a better balancing of the costs and benefits associated with drugs and drug policy. They draw on a broad range of social science literature, and they emphasize the lessons provided both by drug prohibition in other places and by prohibitions of other goods, such as alcohol and prostitution. In discussing this evidence, they raise most of the key issues that should be considered in evaluating drug policy. Their book is an excellent starting point for anyone who wishes to understand the debates about prohibition versus legalization.

MacCoun and Reuter make a compelling case that many evils typically attributed to drugs result instead from drug prohibition and its enforcement. According to their analysis, prohibition causes increases in property crime because users face elevated prices; increases in violent crime because traffickers cannot resolve disputes using the courts; diminishments of civil liberties owing to the difficulty of detecting crimes without natural complainants; increases in corruption of police and politicians; disruption of countries that produce coca and opium; diminishments of users' health because of poor quality control; increases in the spread of HIV because of prohibition-induced restrictions on clean needles; excessive restrictions on medical uses of drugs; and reductions in respect for the law bred by widespread violation of prohibition-among other consequences.

And yet the authors do not endorse legalization. They find great fault with the heavy emphasis on criminal sanctions in current U.S. prohibition, and they believe substantial deescalation to, say, the level of enforcement in western Europe, Canada, or Australia would diminish many of the harms of prohibition while causing only small increases in drug use. Still, they do not endorse legalization. Why not?

Their position rests on four arguments: that moving from weak, European-style prohibition to legalization would produce a substantial increase in drug use; that this increase would be a bad thing; that most of the benefits from legalization are achieved simply by deescalating prohibition; and that the effects of legalization are uncertain."

"The authors' basic points move in the right direction. They have done a great service in carefully, honestly, and scientifically considering both theory and evidence on the effects of alternative drug policies. Room remains for reasonable persons to disagree about certain pieces of evidence, but if more persons were to analyze drug policy as dispassionately as MacCoun and Reuter, both drug policy and the country would be in far better shape."

What a country! Only once in our history, did one president, (the 2nd one), decide to co-opt the US Constitution; and forcing the Sedition Act, down journalists' throats. Thank goodness John Adams didn't get a second term; and his "act" vanished in 1801. Thomas Jefferson then entered the White House.

And, pretty much the RULE that journalists can investigate things on their own; they don't have to swallow PR at all; shows ya that Franklin Foer kept fighting for this principle, above others. Sure, the army tried to get Foer to "surrender" ... the building? In New York City! That's what our army does these days?

Pretty much explains the silence; where the army can't get anything happening in Iraq covered. Or else, you'd know for sure that Maliki hates Bush's guts. And, "diplomatically speaking" all we have for our trillions; and years of toil, is a re-emergence of Putin.

Reagan's victory against the soviets didn't last long. The Bush's went ahead, promising the moon to the Saud's. Which is a whole other story.

If we're lucky? Someday, it will get told. (But not from PR machinery!)

The outstanding journalistic integrity of Mr. Foer and TNR will make this book a hot commodity. I can't wait to not get it.

I expect that at least a couple dozen will fly off the shelves just in time for Christmas.

I smell Pulitzer! Oh wait, that's something else................

In this revealing, behind the scenes look at the 2008 presidential campaign, the peerless journalists of TNR uncover - via unsubstantiated, anonymous sources of course - Republican presidential candidates committing multiple atrocities and war crimes while in the field. In Iowa, Fred Thomson and his good ol' boy colleagues mock disfigured WAC WWII vetrans while visiting a VA hospital; Rudolph Giuliani - with the aid of 9/11 rescue workers - excavates a cemetery of undocumented alien victims of the Minutemen and cavorts through New Hampshire will wearing a skull fragment over his bald spot. Finally, Mitt Romney in his fervent search for the golden plates, careens through South Carolina in a Bradley fighting vehicle clad only in his sacred underwear, recklessly luring Log Cabin Republicans within range of the Brad's tracks, and with a deftness not to be found in tracked fighting vehicles, severs them in half and leaves their writhing parts twitching in the waist-deep sewage.

The sections on Giuliani, Thompson and Romney are sure to generate the most press, but the genuinely interesting material is on the second tier candidates. For example, I didn't know that McCain's "Straight Talk Express" bus has small silhouettes below the driver's window, keeping tally of the conservatives he's thrown under the wheels. Or that Mike Huckabee once killed 930 people by baptizing them in poisoned grape Kool Aid. Or that Ron Paul was a German concentration camp guard in WW2.

This amazing, deeply researched book will tell you everything you need to know about voting in the 2008 Presidential election - but really, all you have to do is read the title of the chapter on Our Next President -

"We Love Hillary Clinton."

I am reviewing those two books together because they cover the same topic. And, I find a review comparing them more relevant and timely than reviewing them on a stand alone basis. I read them simultaneously on the coverage of the same candidates to observe if I would get different information. I actually got very similar info as I could not detect any political bias. But, the way these books impart the information is different. Thus, there is no difference in substance but there is a huge difference in style.

Within `A Voter's guide,' the coverage of each candidate is written by a different writer. After a short curriculum on the candidate, these writers write out a long narrative essay that could qualify as an article in the New Yorker. Those essays also come across as a book summary on the candidates. For a checklist of the candidate's specific position you have to refer to the Appendix.

The Undecided Voter's Guide to the Next President: Who the Candidates Are, Where They Come from, and How You Can Choose is structurally very different. The entire book is written by a single author. The coverage of each candidate is thoroughly structured as a user friendly manual or almost a college (Presidential) application package. It starts as the Voter's Guide with a curriculum on the candidate. Next, it moves on to a very detailed description of the candidate's position on all major issues. Then it goes on to a narrative section that is less sophisticated than the one in `A Voter's Guide.' Then it systematically covers the following headings: a) Areas of Potential Controversy; b) Why this specific candidate can win the General Election; c) Why this specific candidate can't win the General Election; d) The best case for candidate X presidency; e) The worst case for candidate X presidency; f) What to expect if candidate X is President; g) What supporters say; h) What detractors say; i) Facts and stories; j) Quirks, habits, and hobbies; k) The Undecided Voter's Guide Questionnaire.

Another area where the books differ is on setting up the political context. `A Voter's Guide' has an excellent historical analysis of the evolutionary changes within the parties and how they shaped Presidential elections since the late 1800s. This is one of the last chapters in the book, and I recommend you read it first. `The Undecided Voter's Guide' has no counterpart to this thorough historical analysis. Instead, it briefly touches on similar themes within the introduction. But, the latter is not even as thorough as A Voter's Guide's own short introduction.

These two books cater to different audiences. `The Undecided Voter's Guide' is excellent to extract a maximum amount of information really quickly. It is an excellent tool for the political novice. `A Voter's Guide,' although better written, does not deliver the information quite so readily and is catered to the more sophisticated reader. I am not talking about intelligence here; I am talking about political engagement. An MIT engineer who is fairly apolitical in between elections will prefer `The Undecided Voter's Guide' to acquire efficiently the knowledge he needs to vote. A lawyer who follows politics closely would probably prefer `A Voter's Guide.'

In the end, I think both books are excellent. Within both, the profiles of the candidates are very interesting and informative. If you read at least one of the two, you are bound to be a more informed voter than otherwise. But, you don't need to read both as their coverage overlaps. And, they both cover the topic objectively.

Our current administration is fond of dismissing its critics by labeling THEM as extremists. The Whitewater investigators are part of a "right-wing conspiracy." Those who criticize the under-the-desk-activities at the Oval Office are simply venting their wrath against people from Arkansas, and those who oppose the failed War on Drugs are "fringe groups."

With each passing day, this tactic becomes harder to get away with, as "fringe" types such as George Schultz, Walter Cronkite and Perez de Cuellar weigh in against the Drug War. The latest of these "fringe" elements to come out against our idiotic drug policy is Dirk Chase Eldredge, a founding bank director, "successful entrepreneur," and former co-chairman of Ronald Reagan's campaign for governor of California.

This conservative Republican has examined our drug policies in considerable detail. He details the failures of the Justice Department, FBI, US Customs Service, and others in their futile quest for a "drug-free America."

He clearly points out the horrendous effects of these policies on our country: the overcrowded prisons, police corruption, violence, spread of AIDS, unjust sentencing, judicial overload, and the tyranny of asset forfeiture.

Some months ago, I was having a drink with Judge Jim Gray, an Orange County, California, Republican running for Congress, and I asked him how he broaches the subject of the Drug War to his conservative constituents. "Easy," he replied. "I just say, `let me tell you about an $18 billion federal program that doesn't work,' and they're all ears." That is just what Eldredge does in "Ending the War on Drugs." He gives us just the facts, Ma'am. Those facts are the key to effective policy, and Eldredge has plenty of them.

There is, however, a human note to his opus, too. Eldredge points out that his father's life was ruined by his addiction to alcohol, and that what he needed was help from medical people, not law enforcement. Eldredge is also quick to point out that the vast majority of drinkers, unlike his dad, do not have a problem with alcohol. Likewise, he says, "Ninety-six percent of people use drugs today, use them recreationally, without harming anyone."

Eldredge also gives lie to the "Try and Die" is another myth promoted by Prohibitionists. In the preface, Eldredge says, "America's War on Drugs is reminiscent of the Russian princess who sat weeping profusely at the death of the hero in a performance at the opera, while, at the curb, her waiting carriage driver froze to death in a Moscow ice storm." He understands the inherently dishonest nature of the Drug War and makes an excellent case for ending it.

If I have a quarrel with anything in this book, it is with his solution, or at least part of it. There are three possible administrators of the multi-billion-dollar drug market in the US - the free-market, the government, and the underworld. Currently, our policy-makers obviously favor giving control to the underworld. Ending the Drug War would leave us two choices; the free-market or the government. Eldredge favors the latter, in the form of state-run stores akin to the alcohol sales system in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and other states. While this is an obvious improvement over turning the market over to the Mob, as we do today, I'm surprised that a self-proclaimed conservative Republican would opt for this Socialistic solution. A more effective system of state-regulated but privately owned "drug stores" would seem to be a better way to go. We are still a long way from either of these solutions, and have ample time to debate which one will prevail. Hopefully this book will hasten the time when that decision will have to be made.

Mr. Eldridge presents us with a very well writen critiqe of our nations stance against drugs. The book is full of insight into ways that the war on drugs can be put to better use. anyone interested in drug public policy should read this book.

The most knowledge packed 200 pages on Drug War circumstance I have ever read. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in politics and especially on the War on Drugs. The author is incitive and extraordinarly objective in his discussion. I read the book in one sitting and immediately searched to find more books by Eldredge. Though an ex Reagan man (campaign for CA governor) his views show a fairly liberal view on the topic, far away from any Reagan stereotypes. Too much good to discuss here, just read it!

Dirk Chase Eldredge's "Ending the War on Drugs" is a powerful and persuasive book that argues that America's war on drugs has been an abysmal failure and should be ended as soon as possible. The author's message has a certain edginess in that he is one of a small but albeit growing number of Republicans who are weighing in against the drug war. Of particular note, Eldredge was co-chairman for the California Gubernatorial campaign of Ronald Reagan, who was perhaps the nation's most vocal drug warrior. Yet there wasn't a single word in this book that I could disagree with.

Eldredge is encouraging us to act like grown-ups and provide the caring and compassion that drug abusers need. Through the use of numerous statistics that are supplemented by some interesting anecdotes, the author overwhelmingly shows that interdiction has failed. The bottom line is that illegal drugs remain readilly available to those who seek them. But their illegal status has proven to be a boon to the drug lords, street gangs and other undesirable elements -- including Afghan terrorists, as we have recently learned -- who are attracted to the promise of quick and (usually) easy profits.

Edlredge contends that de-criminalization will swiftly take away the profit motive and bust up the drug gangs, both here at home and in places like Columbia and Mexico. Safer streets will enhance the quality of life for our citizens and no doubt help stablize the governments of countries where drug lords are nearly as powerful as the state. And for the user, government distribution will ensure a safer supply of drugs and, importantly, provide the drug user with a point of contact who could arrange treatment, should it ever be requested.

Eldredge's discussion of the nuances of how the anti-drug laws should be changed and the types of programs that need to be implemented show that he has spent a fair amount of time carefully considering the issue. But Eldredge takes care to critique the drug war in terms familiar to most Conservatives: as an example of wasteful government spending. If criminalizing drugs is not working as a deterrent to behavior patterns, and if it does not suppress the supply, then the government should logically search for alternative solutions where it may be able to get a better return on its investments.

One hopes that the mature message found in this book will be heeded by a growing number of policy makers. I encourage you to read it and to join the growing number of Americans who think that sanity and clarity of purpose should rightly replace the current state of insanity and corruption that unfortunately characterizes our country's current drug war strategy.

In Ending the War on Drugs, Dirk Eldredge provides an insightful and convincing look at the full gambit of issues surrounding our perceptions of drugs in this society. He succeeds masterfully in proving that we must reexamine our "War on Drugs." I believe anyone wishing to make an informed and educated opinion about our public policy toward illicit drugs should read this book. It is my hope that this book will help spark a fresh debate on what we might do to stem the tide of horrors our drug prohibition has brought not only to our society, but also to the global economic and political landscape. While many may disagree about his proposed solution, namely the federally controlled distribution of what would be newly legalized drugs, few could argue his conclusion that our attempted "War on Drugs", has been a absolute failure.