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The Mafia has long held a spot in the American imagination. Despite their earned reputation for brutality, the Mafia has been glorified in countless movies, books, and television shows. Not so in this book. Selwyn Raab makes no attempt to perpetuate myths about the Mafia; instead, he exposes them as a serious threat to honest citizens: "The collective goal of the five families of New York was the pillaging of the nation's richest city and region," he writes. These five families--Bonanno, Colombo, Gambino, Genovese, and Lucchese--were responsible for corrupting labor unions in order to control waterfront commerce, garbage collection, the garment industry, and construction in New York. They also ran illegal gambling operations, engaged in stock schemes, and initiated the widespread introduction of heroin (among other drugs) into cities of the East and Midwest in the 1950s, leading to "accelerated crime rates, law-enforcement corruption, and the erosion of inner-city neighborhoods in New York and throughout the United States." Five Families offers a comprehensive look at the inner workings of the various clans along with vivid profiles of the gangsters who led--and continue to maintain--this criminal empire.
Beginning with a brief history of the Sicilian origins of the Mafia, Raab exhaustively explains how the Mob took over New York before spreading to cities across America, particularly Las Vegas, their most successful outside venture. He also shows how the New York Mafia lost a great deal of power in the 1980s and '90s due to many significant busts and effective plea-bargaining. However, since the attacks of September 11, 2001, the F.B.I. has been focused mainly on external threats, leaving the Mafia room to regain some lost turf by moving into new avenues of crime. An investigative reporter for 40 years, Raab interviewed dozens of prosecutors, law enforcement officers, Mafia members, informants, and "Mob lawyers," providing anecdotes and inside information that tell the true story of the Mafia and their influence over the past 80 years. --Shawn Carkonen
Book Description
The definitive history of the Mafias infamous Five Families, the campaign to eradicate them, and the Mobs refusal to diefrom a noted New York Times journalist Genovese, Gambino, Bonnano, Colombo and Lucchese. These Five Families built the American Mafia (or Cosa Nostra) into an underworld empire that stretched far beyond New York. For decades, they outwitted, outmaneuvered and outgunned the FBI and other police agencies and were seemingly immune from conviction. With insatiable greed and invisible influence, these families wreaked unparalleled damage to Americas vital business enterprises from construction, carting and shipping to Hollywood, Wall Street and Washington. Written by a New York Times reporter who has covered the Mob for decades, Five Families is the vivid story of the rise and fall of New Yorks premier dons and provides insight and answers to key questions, including: How the legendary Lucky Luciano ended internal wars and forged a new, largely impregnable type of criminal superstructure Why J. Edgar Hoover refused to investigate the mob and denied its existence How the Mafia was involved in the assassination of President Kennedy How Crazy Joey Gallo became a caf society pet, and how a penchant for clam chowder and scungelli led to his murder How John Gottis vanity undermined him and the almighty Gambino family How Carmine the Snake Persicos obsession to create a dynasty sparked a major mob war How the secretive Gaspipe Casso triumphed as the tyrannical and blood-soaked leader of the Lucchese family How Chin Gigante created the nations wealthiest crime family while feigning insanity How the 9/11 tragedy has led to a Mafia resurgence. Unprecedented detail on the inner workings of the Commission and how power and tribute flowed from places like New Orleans, Chicago and Miami back to New York.
Customer Reviews:
BEST MAFIA BOOK.......2007-10-10
This book is the best MAFIA book written thatIve read yet. A very thorough, inclusive book where the authir is able to best describe the attributes of both the mafia lowlifes who prey on innocent people and the cops who chase them. In each description of each mafiosa, we see who they cower and betray any honorable code that they swore to.
Five Families.......2007-05-12
Truly the ultimate reference book on the "Mafia".Brings its' history right from the beginning to 2006.
Excellent.......2007-05-07
If your a mob freak like me any mob book is a great buy. This doesn't dissapoint. buy it, you won't be sorry.
Read this to understand your political world, garbage problems, crime and drugs, gambling and heists , .......2007-05-06
What a great writer. I have always enjoyed Mr Raab's pieces in the New York Times. I am going to read more of his books now.
Worth the time to read this huge book.......2007-04-06
I really enjoyed this history of the five New York Mafia families. It is very well written. It is a very lengthy book but if you have any interest in the Mafia you will not care. I would recommend this to anyone who wants to get an overview of the Mafia's history and how their "rackets" work. Saab also does an excellent job of giving the good guys (the cops and prosecutors) the attention they deserve. Usually they are merely mentioned by other authors but Saab makes them as interesting as the mafioso.
Customer Reviews:
Comprehensive and Concise.......2003-03-06
John Ranelagh's book, The Agency: The Rise and Decline of the CIA, is the definitive text on the CIA. It is comprehensive yet concise; moreover, Mr. Ranelagh took on a major project in creating this masterpiece, with so much information, and so much history, it would be nearly impossible to write an accurate history of the CIA. Yet Ranelagh accomplishes this feat marvelously. I, personally, would liked to have seen more on the scientific branch of the CIA in this book; however, it would have made the text to long and cumbersome. A much needed third edition would be relative, seeing as that the book does end with the Iran-Contra scandal, and the CIA's history has grown and transformed over the last decade with the appointment of George Tenet as its Director.
The Definitive History of U.S. Cold War Intelligence.......2001-06-16
Ranelagh, in a massive and engaging tome, brings alive the characters and story of the CIA in a fair and balanced way. My graduate class on National Security Affairs and the Intelligence Community used this book as one of the primary texts. From Julia Childs to James Jesus Angelton to Richard Colby to William Casey, this wonderful story tells the history of the Agency, its people and their interaction with presidents, Congress, the Soviet Union (KGB) and the foreign policy process. It covers the assasination attempts of Castro and various other figures as well as such bizarre episodes such as the attempt to rig up a cat as an assasin. I couldn't put the book down once I got started, however, because of the depth and breadth of its coverage. Make no mistake, this is a serious, meticulously researched and encompassing historical work. The book is as good a history of the Cold War as it is of the CIA, and covers high level decisionmaking at the presidential and Congressional level from WWII through the Reagan Administration. Not a diatribe for or against the CIA or US foreign poilicy, Agency is a first rate account of the actual events and people behind them at all the critical moments in the CIA's history. Ranelagh does a superb job at explaining the context behind the decsions that were made. For example, he gives the reader an awesome sense of the fear of Communism that lead to extreme measures being taken at various junctures without being an apologist. This book is absolutely essential reading for those in the intelligence, foreign policy and defense communities, and highly recommended for anyone interested in Cold War history. Perhaps more importantly, its a terrific read!
Book Description
The state, which since the middle of the seventeenth century has been the most important of all modern institutions, is in decline. From Western Europe to Africa, many existing states are either combining into larger communities or falling apart. Many of their functions are likely to be taken over by a variety of organizations that, whatever their precise nature, are not states. In this unique volume Martin van Creveld traces the story of the state from its beginnings to its end. Starting with the simplest political organizations that ever existed, he guides the reader through the origins of the state, its development, its apotheosis during the two World Wars, and its spread from its original home in Western Europe to cover the globe. In doing so, he provides a fascinating history of government from its origins to the present day. This original book will of interest to historians, political scientists and sociologists.
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The state, which since the middle of the seventeenth century has been the most important and most characteristic of all modern institutions, is in decline. From Western Europe to Africa, many existing states are either combining into larger communities or falling apart. Many of their functions are being taken over by a variety of organizations which, whatever their precise nature, are not states. In this unique volume Martin van Creveld traces the story of the state from its beginnings to the present. Starting with the simplest political organizations that ever existed, he guides the reader through the origins of the state, its development, its apotheosis during the two World Wars, and its spread from its original home in Western Europe to cover the globe. In doing so, he provides a fascinating history of government from its origins to the present day.
Customer Reviews:
Historical analysis as it should be written (well, almost).......2006-02-13
I will start my review with what I consider two weaknesses of this book.
First, one of the previous reviewers commented on questionable accuracy of the historical facts presented in the book. I found one minor factual error and one mistake with the events I personally witnessed (p. 375). The factual error is the statement that Andropov started campaign to tighten discipline and, as part of it, he launched a campaign against drunkenness. In reality, Andropov indeed started wide-spread disciplinary measures, but the "credit" for the disastrous anti-drunkenness campaign of 1985 goes to Gorbachev.
The mistake is van Creveld's statement that after Afghanistan "adventure ended in defeat, in 1988, the Soviet leadership was left without an armed force which could have imposed unity on the country." This is nonsense. It is equivalent of saying that as a result of defeat in Vietnam, the US Army was destroyed. In fact, Soviet Army was used successfully afterwards exactly for the purpose of maintaining internal stability: in January of 1990 26,000 Soviet troops stormed overnight Baku (the capital of Azerbaijan) effectively "restoring the order" and killing 130 and injuring 700 people in the process. Also, in 1991-1992 the 14th Army under the command of General Lebed had effectively stopped the civil war between Moldova and Transdnistria and restored peace in the region. Only several years later, by murdering General Rokhlin and starting the First Chechen War, KGB started in earnest the destruction of Soviet Army as a fighting machine and political force (General Lebed was killed later).
The second weakness of this book is its writing style. Unfortunately, Professor van Creveld has an intractable predilection for large, convoluted, and unwieldy sentences, especially in the first two thirds of the book. Combined with the book's poor editing, it leads sometimes to outright blunders. Here is an example of a sentence taken from page 350 of the paper-back edition:
"The idea that complete sovereignty, including the unrestricted right to wage war, was too dangerous to entertain in the age of modern technology suffered another blow as a result of World War I and the 10 million casualties (in dead alone) that it wrought."
Not only must you parse this phrase in order to understand it (and you, by necessity, will become good at parsing by page 350 of this book), but this sentence, judging by the context, means exactly opposite: the idea that sovereignty understood as a right to wage war has become too dangerous did not suffer any blows, but was, in fact, confirmed by the horrors of World War I.
My purpose in pointing this out is to allay the anxiety of the future readers of this book. If you cannot understand some passages, this is not because you are stupid, but because of the regrettable way this book was written and edited.
Why would you bother to read a book which is difficult to read and may not be very accurate? There are a few reasons:
First, Professor van Creveld excels in making sense out of the heap of seemingly unrelated historical events. The breadth and depth of the scope of this book is so immense, that it must have inconsistencies by definition (because, for example, historians frequently disagree on the meaning and significance of historical events). This book is not meant to be a source of exact historical information, and you should not use it as such.
The historical analysis offered in this book is essentially Hegelian, i.e. the author presents different forms of political organization at the dawn of human civilization and then shows in minute detail how those organizations changed in time to become the modern state. The author combines an enormous amount of information - facts, dates, historical anecdotes - in order to prove that the modern state is not "the end of history," but only another stage of political development of human society. The author further shows that the modern state had outlived its usefulness and is due to be replaced by a different form of socio-political organization.
The second reason to read this book is the pleasure of following Professor van Creveld's process of historical thinking. Very few historians can match his erudition and intellect, and you can learn a lot simply by reading his thoughts on the subject.
Except for a very vague outline in the last five pages, there is no prediction of the future in this book - Professor van Creveld is too wise for that. Don't look for any practical advice either. If you need to know what kind of shelter to build, what gun to buy, and whether you must invest in ammunition, or gold, or both - look somewhere else. This book is a purely academic exercise, albeit of the highest order.
The Rise and Decline of the State was first published in 1999. Despite all the events of the last 6-7 years (9-11, Afghanistan, Iraq, etc.) this book holds its own remarkably well. I only want to comment that the extent of the UN "oil-for-food" corruption scandal was not known in the late 1990's, otherwise Professor van Creveld would probably expand on his opinion about the role of the UN (p. 385). It may well turn out that a hundred years from now historians will admire the honesty, dedication, and accountability of our state bureaucrats compared to their ruthless and corrupt non-government bureaucracies.
Overall, I think that The Rise and Decline of the State is well worth the time and effort necessary to study it. You will look at the current political and social events from a completely different perspective after reading this book. Anyone interested in history and politics must be aware of and pay attention to the discussion presented in this book.
Intresting, but is it reliable?.......2002-09-13
Lots of good thoughts here, and an interesting historical account of the rise of various types of governance. Unfortunately, when van Creveld talks about things I know about already, he gets a lot of them wrong -- for instance, p222, where he asserts that by 1939, 'every American' was 'issued his or her social security card', and that 'the Dept. of Health and Human Services had been created.' HHS was created in the 1970s, under Carter, and to this day not every citizen has a Soc. Sec. card.
So if so many details are wrong where I know the facts, what about the places where I don't? And if the details are wrong, how good is the big picture?
This book makes you think, and has a lot of good references, but I don't trust its conclusions.
the coming new world disorder.......2002-03-11
This work illustrates that Martin van Creveld is more than one of our premier military historians and theorists. It demonstrates a grasp of political theory that escapes most of the learned professors that infest the upper strata of our current pundits and political science intelligensia.
Historical Pessimism Absent Recommendations for Change.......2001-11-13
Anything Martin van Crevald writes is a five, and this book, although over-priced (...), is as as good as history can get. His notes are world-class, including a highly relevant note in the final chapter, to wit, that according to Soviet General Lebed's 1997 public statement that, "out of 100 suitcase-sized nuclear bombs manufactured for the Soviet Union's special forces, two-thirds could no longer be accounted for."
To begin with, Van Crevald damns the state for its consistent increase of taxes and its decrease in public services. The state has become, in a word, incompetent and archaic--its grossly over-funded militaries are increasingly helpless in the face of covert and guerrilla violence, at the same time that states are spending more and more on police forces and less and less on a rapidly growing politically deprived disenfranchised underclass.
He ends, as a historical purist, without making recommendations for change. Indeed, he quotes Mao Tse Tung, "The sun will keep rising, trees with keep growing, and women will keep having children."
In many ways Van Crevald's book serves as a capstone to the fifty or so books I have reviewed in the past year, most of them about strategy, threat, intelligence, and the so-called revolution in military affairs, for what I take from this work is that the state does have an extremely important role to play in assuring the common security and prosperity of the people, and we abandon the state at our own peril.
Every nation, but especially the most prosperous nations that have allowed virtually out of control immigration and set no real standards for citizenship, must very carefully examine its policies and premises, both with regard to what constitutes citizenship and loyalty, and what services it must offer to preserve and protect the commonwealth.
I am told that the FBI was prevented from searching the homes of several of the suspects in the weeks prior to the 11 September attacks, because we have granted to our visitors--illegal as well as legal--all those rights that might better be reserved for proven citizens. Van Crevald's work is not, as some might take it, the death knell for the state, but rather the bath of cold water for the statesmen--and for those citizens who care to instruct their politicians on our demand for renewed focus on resurrecting the connection between citizenship, taxation, representation, and security.
Insightful!.......2001-11-03
In this comprehensive history of the modern state, author Martin Van Creveld weaves together disparate threads and illuminates hidden connections in forceful, energetic language. Thus, his book is both scholarly and entertaining. Van Creveld takes a generally dim view of governments and the state. The greater the state's power, the more he regards it as a monstrosity, and he's not shy about saying so. The anti-government political right will like this book, but Van Creveld's greatest contempt is reserved for nationalism, militarism and the state at war, which ought to entertain the left. He sees the state as a dubious, archaic institution and, as his narrative shows, his position transcends notions of conservative and liberal. Readers are likely to think of their nations differently after reading this book, which we [...] recommend primarily to students of politics and government and policy makers.
Book Description
The Geography of Nowhere traces America's evolution from a nation of Main Streets and coherent communities to a land where every place is like no place in particular, where the cities are dead zones and the countryside is a wasteland of cartoon architecture and parking lots.
In elegant and often hilarious prose, Kunstler depicts our nation's evolution from the Pilgrim settlements to the modern auto suburb in all its ghastliness. The Geography of Nowhere tallies up the huge economic, social, and spiritual costs that America is paying for its car-crazed lifestyle. It is also a wake-up call for citizens to reinvent the places where we live and work, to build communities that are once again worthy of our affection. Kunstler proposes that by reviving civic art and civic life, we will rediscover public virtue and a new vision of the common good. "The future will require us to build better places," Kunstler says, "or the future will belong to other people in other societies."
Customer Reviews:
luddite indictment of a car .......2007-05-22
The book is well written and provides a lot of facts, though many of these may be known anyhow. However, the author's pet idea - that the car is THE reason for aberrations in suburban development - begins to be more and more irritating as we read on; there is one large chapter devoted to the car and road planning, but if this were not enough the point gets reiterated every few paragraphs. Perhaps indeed the car is the ultimate evil of modern civilization; if only we didn't have to reread this again and again.
As a form of compensation, we get very limited look at the social, economic and demographic causes of all landscape changes during past century. Yes, there is a mention of some historical events, such as WWII, but it disappears under the weight of all those cars blamed for commercial strips, parking lots and suburban housing. Somehow, the population growth, which the strips, suburbs, parking lots and cars try to accomodate, gets overlooked. But then, we get also a healthy dose of nostagia after the goode olde times, when towns were small, kids could play in the streets without a risk of traffic accident, and farms were the base of economy. I could not escape the impression that the author's leading motive was to lament the lifestyles gone.
A Worthy Rant.......2007-02-08
This is book is largely a rant--well-researched and eloquent--but a rant nonetheless. Overwrought with cynicism, it is hard to distinguish Kunstler's reasonable concerns from his own sense of nostalgia. He draws some erroneous parallels (e.g. holding Disney World to the standard of anything but an amusement park) but does make an effective point regarding how U.S. citizens were ill-prepared for the after effects of the heyday of the automobile.
Fundamentally, Kunstler's cynicism aside, he's an advocate for renewed interest in civic planning, decreased dependency on fossil fuels, and models of sustainability. He presents Portland, OR as the best model for a city and the community of Seaside, FL as the model for a smaller town. He sees urban planning as the opportunity to develop while respecting the present landscape and enriching sense of community and public space.
The weakness of the book lies in the author's bitterness, which disguises his very real passion for the topic. The saving grace is that given most of his likely readership, he is preaching to the choir who understands his anger. This choir will understand that Kunstler embeds important lessons in his bleak diatribe--lessons worth embracing.
Kunstler's Gift of Entertaining While Informing.......2006-11-29
I have little more to add to the many thorough reviews already posted, so I'll just note what grabbed me: it was the rare book that was fun to read, even while dealing with serious societal problems in a thoughtful manner. A great introduction to community development issues.
highway to hell.......2006-02-01
Last night in his State of the Union speech, G. W. Bush pointed out the obvious fact that America depends far too heavily on oil to support its lifestyle. Whoever programmed him to say that must have been reacting to the mounting unrest over the crises associated with big oil: war, pollution, corruption, and extreme flabbiness.
Most of the problems associated with oil are problems associated with cars, and cars are the focus of J. H. Kunstler's book. Published in the early 90s, The Geography of Nowhere describes the impact of automobiles on the development of the U.S. Apparently, things started to go south during the Depression, when people were driven out of cities by poverty and the diminishing quality of life in the tenements. Fueling the flight to the suburbs were New Deal programs to build roads and cheap houses. In the ensuing decades the American landscape was built to serve cars rather than people, and that is what Kunstler is angry about. His main criticisms are:
1) A lot of the architecture, both residential and commerical, is very ugly. Buildings are constructed quickly and cheaply, and without regard to their surroundings. After all, what's the point of worrying about your surroundings if people are just going to drive directly to their destination? On this point, Kunstler is angry and sarcastic, though often funny. However, his tone is unfortunate, because ugliness is ultimately a matter of opinion, and I would bet that most people would say they are quite happy living in their suburban boxes. Kunstler argues that people are happy this way because they don't know any better, and he's probably right, but as far as I know there is no good way to force people to appreciate beauty.
2) When you step back from the individual buildings, and look at the organization of towns and cities, things start to look really grim. Here Kunstler's got a good point. Throughout most of America, the landscape is zoned into residential and commercial districts, which are separated by long stretches of four-lane roads. The residential zones are further divided by income (and to a lesser extent, by race and ethnicity), impeding the development of anything like a genuine community. The result is a weird mix of intolerance and paranoia that pervades the culture of what has historically been a relatively progressive nation.
3) At an even larger scale, the impact of cars on the nation and on the world seems absolutely dire. The Geography of Nowhere was written before car companies had figured out how to trick yuppies into buying pick-up trucks, and by now there is a broad scientific consensus that the Earth's climate is getting warmer as a result of human activities. Yet people continue to buy bigger and bigger SUVs, and to drive them longer distances to get to work or to buy their microwaveable burritos. It's like a hideous inversion of the idea of public transportation, in which every individual drives his or her own bus to work. Here it's not merely a matter of personal preference -- it's only possible for an individual to drive an SUV if other people subsidize the cost of cheap oil and environmental degradation. In all likelihood these other people haven't been born yet.
Ultimately, someone has to make decisions about the development of towns and cities, and there's no reason in a democratic society why these decisions have to be based on short-term economic interests. Although most suburbanites are probably not miserable in their surroundings, I doubt if anyone would consider their dependence on cars to be ideal. The Geography of Nowhere is a good way to start thinking about kicking the habit.
The Rise and Decline of Humanity.......2006-01-01
I believe that many of the ways we view our lives and live it is directly related to the relation of space, especially where our homes are and what we do daily.
Kunstler points out very cunningly and sometimes with anger how horrible America has set up its cities - cities of which I usually refer to as 'Suburbia World' and America, for a large part, really has turned into a world of suburbia, of endless homes stacked next to each other in a large sea, of which all its inhabitants commute to a Office park some 30 miles away.
Anyway, although Kunstler does not cover as in-depth as I believe he should, he points out many architectural and planning elements that even I, as an architecture student in Los Angeles, have never truly observed. He so well argues against suburban development that I am, even more than before, inspired to work on architectural projects that have nothing to do with suburban qualities (although this shall be very difficult).
If you are looking for a book to explain how horrible our cities really are (especially in the suburban world) and have never had the vocabulary to express that please read this book, it is something I wish everyone could understand and react to.
Average customer rating:
- thorough, insightful look at the oft-maligned mobile home
|
Wheel Estate: The Rise and Decline of Mobile Homes
Allan D. Wallis
Manufacturer: The Johns Hopkins University Press
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Book Description
In Wheel Estate, Allan Wallis offers a lively and informative history of the mobile home in the United States over six decades. His colorful account, extensively illustrated with period photographs and vivid portraits of the people who live in mobile homes and the industry pioneers who designed and built them, will inform and amuse anyone curious about this American phenomenon.
Beginning with the travel trailers of the late 1920s and 1930s -- with models that were built like yachts or unfolded like Polaroid cameras -- Wallis moves through the World War II era, when the industry mushroomed as trailers became homes for thousands of defense workers, to the post war era, when trailers became year-round housing. The industry responded with new models -- now called mobile homes -- that tried to strike a balance between house and vehicle, even as owners built their own often fanciful additions (including one mobile home complete with Egyptian pylons).
Carrying the story up to the present, Wallis links the need for mobile homes to continuing housing crises. He traces regulations and reforms aimed at "linear living," arguing in the end that manufactured housing remains distinctively American and embodies fundamental national ideas of home and community.
Customer Reviews:
thorough, insightful look at the oft-maligned mobile home.......2005-07-12
Wallis here presents an incredibly thorough, and amazingly respectful look at the history of the "mobile home". Well researched and masterfully integrated with the sociopolitical influences that have played such a large part in shaping the industry, this book is an incredible resource for those interested in the mobile home as a housing form, or for those researching some of its sister forms--modular and prefabricted housing.
From the introduction:
"The mobile home is the dream of the factory-built house come true, yet few advocates of that dream are proud to acknowledge its manifestation in the present form."
"...the mobile home as both an object and agent of change: as an addition to our inventory of housing options that must be brought into conformance with our expectations, but also as an option that forces us to reconsider what we understand about the character of American housing. Rather than prescribing ways in which mobile homes could become more acceptable, I consider how standards of acceptability are devised in a social and cultural context, then manifested in public policy."
"The basic thesis of this book is that two processes have shaped the use, form, and meaning of the mobile home. The first process is one of invention, or innovation, carried out by mobile home manufacturers, park developers, and the people who live in mobile homes....The second process affecting the mobile home has been one of regulation or categorization carried out primarily by institutions: zoning and building agencies, mortgage bankers, and insurance companies."
Book Description
This remarkable volume is the first full-scale revision of the official history of the U.S. executive state. It traces the progression of power exercised by American presidents from the early American Republican up to the eventual reality of the power-hungry Caesars which later appear as president in American history. Contributors examine the usual judgments of the historical profession to show the ugly side of supposed presidential greatness.
The mission inherent in this undertaking is to determine how the presidency degenerated into the office of American Caesar. Did the character of the man who held the office corrupt it, or did the power of the office, as it evolved, corrupt the man? Or was it a combination of the two? Was there too much latent power in the original creation of the office as the Anti-Federalists claimed? Or was the power externally created and added to the position by corrupt or misguided men?
Contributors include George Bittlingmayer, John V. Denson, Marshall L. DeRosa, Thomas J. DiLorenzo, Lowell Gallaway, Richard M. Gamble, David Gordon, Paul Gottfried, Randall G. Holcombe, Hans-Hermann Hoppe, Jeffrey Rogers Hummel, Michael Levin, Yuri N. Maltsev, William Marina, Joseph Salerno, Barry Simpson, Joseph Stromberg, H. Arthur Scott Trask, Richard Vedder, and Clyde Wilson.
Customer Reviews:
Reassessing the Presidency, Cincinnatus to Caesar.......2004-01-04
~Reassessing the Presidency : The Rise of the Executive State and the Decline of Freedom~ is an intriguing historical assessment of the American Presidency, which has become one of the most powerful institutions in the world. Likewise, the American Presidency has dramatically changed since its inception. Most modern history books on the Presidency are characterized by adulation of executive power, administrative largess, and aggressive federal intervention in domestic, economic and foreign policy. Nonetheless, this powerful reassessment of the Presidency by the Mises Institute challenges such hagiographic tomes that idolize the President and venerate the dictatorial Presidents for their constitutional usurpations and assumptions of un-delegated power solidified as precedent.
This powerful tome is essentially an anthology of essays offering a critical analysis of the Presidency as an institution, and the various Presidents through the year, as well as an assessment of their policy prerogatives, etc. Most of the authors do not mince words and they hold to a priori presupposition that constitutionally limited government is desirable and offer no apologies in their condemnation of those who usurp it. Some contributors are cynical enough to bluntly declare the utter impossibility of limited government like Hans-Hermann Hoppe.
The various contributors include a motley crew of intellectuals from Old Right thinkers, classical liberals, libertarians and southern conservatives. Generally, their harmony of perspective includes advocacy of a non-interventionist foreign policy based on armed neutrality, strategic independence and open commerce, as well as support of a laissez-faire market economy. Amongst the more notable contributors are: John V. Denson (author of The Costs of War: America's Pyrrhic Victories); Marshall L. DeRosa; Thomas J. DiLorenzo (author of the Real Lincoln); Paul Gottfried (author of After Liberalism); Hanns-Herman Hoppe (author of Democracy: The God that Failed); Jeffrey Rogers Hummel (author of Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men); Joseph R. Stromberg, and Clyde Wilson (editor of John C. Calhoun's papers).
One of the more interesting essays penned by Marshall DeRosa is entitled "Supreme Court As Accomplice." It essentially documents judicial backing for what he characterizes as a despotic presidency. He starts by going over history from Old Republic constitutional foundations to a FDR's stacking the court to move the New Deal along. Another interesting piece is featured on the Electoral College. One essay by J.R. Hummel offers a history of an unsung hero, Martin Van Buren, and he wins acclaim chiefly for his advocacy of an independent treasury system where all federal government monies are kept in a federal depository, which is attendant to his opposition to a national bank. Marshall DeRosa and Thomas DiLorenzo offer a slew of indictments against Abraham Lincoln whose administration was characterized by executive usurpation of constitutionally delegated powers. They see the bittersweet precedent for usurpation set by the Lincoln regime. President Andrew Johnson receives extol as the tribune of states' rights and with putting an end to radical reconstruction. Also, several essays wrestle with the assent of the Imperial dreams of grandeur by William McKinley who architected the American empire and the belligerent Teddy Roosevelt are met with a piercing critique of their policies. They acted to repudiate the founding father's advocacy of armed neutrality and condemnation of reckless interventionism and expansionism. Teddy Roosevelt who is the darling of neoconservatives and progressives alike receives no praise here. His personality is demonstrated as megalomaniac as was his bloodlust for war. Roosevelt publicly scathed the idea of limited government as a relic of the horse-and-buggy era. Roosevelt is famous for his trust-busting campaign, which was really a smoke and mirrors charade to espouse populist rhetoric while devising economic corporatism beneficial to favored constituencies. He was a pawn of the J.P. Morgan group and Chicago meatpackers that lobbied for a federal regulatory state to put its small-scale competitors out of business. Roosevelt labored tirelessly to engorge the Presidency by his series of usurpations in the domestic and foreign policy arena. Woodrow Wilson is not spared criticism as Wilson's naive idealism and internationalism are documented as well. Finally, America's most cherished sacred cow, the legacy of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, is trampled as the contributors make light of the ominous similarities between the New Deal and fascism. (Initially, prior to WWII, American progressives found Mussolini to be saint and his corporatist regime as a model of reform for all nations.) FDR's love affair with Joseph Stalin and his naive overtures to the Soviet Union receive an energetic documentation as well. FDR practically handed Eastern Europe to Stalin on a silver platter and did so rather enthusiastically praising the Soviet Union as a democracy. As the reassessment reaches its climax, Paul Edward Gottfried and Michael Levin offer compelling condemnations explaining how the managerial President has become a social engineer of sorts.
All things considered, this colossal read is a veritable goldmine of information and history and its honest and frank critique of the Presidency is certainly informative to say the least. These days, it seems Presidents with a fetish for usurpation of their constitutionally limited powers always seem to be the darlings of the academic and political establishment who spout out hagiographic books idolizing the worst offenders against the Constitution. Presidential dictators are trendsetters and loved by the establishment. Thus, this book is profoundly heterodox in rejecting the usual bandwagon praise for Lincoln, the two Roosevelts, Truman and Wilson. Overall, the book is amazingly astute in its observations and sharply critical of the executive state. Its conclusions, whether you agree with them or not, are extremely thought provoking and they cannot be easily dismissed. This book isn't written in a spirit of withholding judgment as conservative historian, Forrest McDonald, so often does, but rather it frankly just 'tells it like it is. One doesn't have to agree with everything in total to find it incredibly useful. Nonetheless, the book is profoundly thought provoking and a devastating indictment of an institution that has so egregiously strayed from the original intent of those that framed it and the Constitution.
Reassessing the Presidency.......2003-09-10
(excerpted from The Independent Review, Spring 2003)
Herbert Spencer, the great nineteenth-century libertarian, said of the relation between history and theory: ýUntil you have got a true theory of humanity, you cannot interpret history; and when you have got a true theory of humanity you do not want history.ý The authors of Reassessing the Presidency generally subscribe to the philosophies of Mises and Murray Rothbard and are well equipped with a theory. Things have changed since Spencer wrote, however, for these authors are historical-minded libertarians, confidently deploying theory to interpret the U.S. Constitution and the executive power. For them, libertarian theory serves as an analytical calculus capable of explaining with breathtaking simplicity ideas and events that more pedestrian scholars, uninstructed in what Joseph R. Stromberg has referred to elsewhere as ýlibertarian dogma,ý perceive as conflicting motives, purposes, and goods embedded in contexts of historical and political complexity.
As a contribution to constitutional history, Reassessing the Presidency has a fundamental flaw, however. It purports to tell the story of the loss of liberty at the hands of ýpower-hungry Caesarsý who have filled the presidential office. In any but the most superficial sense, however, the book fails to examine the constitutional basis on which presidential power rests. Denson says the framers, influenced by classical liberal ideas, were concerned to protect liberty against both popular majorities and tyrannical central government. They intended for Congress to be the dominant branch of the federal government. Denson poses the question whether in the executive branch they created there was ýtoo much latent power in the original creation of the officeý or whether corrupt and misguided men aggrandized power external to the office. Inexplicably, however, nowhere in this book do framer intent and the design of the Constitution with respect to the executive power receive systematic analysis.
It is as though these libertarian scholars have decided they need not study debates about the actual constitution of government and the exercise of power. To do so may problematize received dogmas. It may compromise and offend, leading to the consideration of moral and political dilemmas that require reflection, choice, and prudential judgement, rather than asseveration of libertarian absolutes. Misesians know what they need to know: that the state is compulsion and coercion; that the story of human history is summed up in the eternal conflict of ýliberty versus power.ý All the rest is mere detail. Better to stand on the right, draw inspiration from correct theory, soldier on in the cause of the ýunvanquised,ý although ýdiscarded,ý ideal of anarchocapitalist liberty.
The principle conclusions of this idiosyncratic and uneven book can be summarized briefly. Although in theoretical and substantive terms ignoring the Foundersý Constitution, the collection offers elliptical commentary that conveys the idea that the constitutional order was flawed from the outset. That order gave ideologically correct and personally ambitious men opportunity to destroy liberty.
Excuse my gushing, but this book is REALLY good.......2002-06-22
As a student of the presidency, I'm nearly at a loss to describe how interesting and important the essays in this collection are. This high quality is just what I've come to expect from the scholars and writers at the Ludwig von Mises Institute, and if I could give this title six or seven stars, I would.
As in any collection of essays, some of the ones here assembled are better than others. Taken as a whole, though, they are a powerful indictment of how the increasing centralization of power in the office of the presidency has resulted in the destruction of America's heritage of individual liberty and decentralized government. Some of the articles that struck me as particularly valuable (or just as fascinating reads) include:
* H. Arthur Scott Trask's study of Thomas Jefferson. This is one of the best attempts I've yet seen to grapple with the question, not only of whether Jefferson himself can justly be called a 'libertarian,' but also the specific issue of whether his two terms as president advanced or hindered the cause of liberty.
* Marshall L. DeRosa's 'Supreme Court as Accomplice: Judicial Backing for a Despotic Presidency.' While all three branches of government are to blame for the centralization of power in Washington, the Supreme Court has, at key points in history, been particularly destructive. DeRosa gives us chapter and verse.
* Randall G. Holcombe's 'The Electoral College as a Restraint on American Democracy.' This article goes beyond other analyses of the Electoral College in explaining how the Founders really intended the body to function, why it never did, and how it was early corrupted and twisted by the influence of party and faction.
* William Marina's excellent 'From Opponent of Empire to Career Opportunist: William Howard Taft as Conservative Bureaucrat in the Evolution of the American Imperial System.' In tracing Taft's career, Marina shows how foreign and domestic empire-building inevitably go hand-in-hand. This is an insightful and unexpectedly timely essay.
The two concluding essays, by Hans-Hermann Hoppe and Clyde N. Wilson, are also excellent summaries of the changing nature of the presidency and the likelihood, or lack thereof, for meaningful change. Other essays -- including those by Thomas J. DiLorenzo (of 'The Real Lincoln' fame), Ralph Raico, Joseph R. Stromberg, Jeffrey Rogers Hummel, and editor John V. Denson -- are of similar high quality. Space prevents me giving each of them the raves they deserve.
Each of these essays challenges the accepted hagiography of the presidency as an office, and of individual presidents as well. The men generally voted by historians as among our 'greatest' chief executives -- notably FDR, Lincoln, and Truman -- are proven in these pages to have been among the worst, most dangerous, and least worthy of canonization. The Mises Institute is never afraid to challenge the old orthodoxies (founder Lew Rockwell has called for the abolition of the office of the presidency altogether), and here they have done so, not only with skill and insight, but almost compulsive readability as well.
I have no hesitation, even now, in declaring this my Book of the Year for 2002 (it was published in 2001, but I'm a little behind in my reading). It's a bit of an effort to carry around, but it's definitely worth the exertion.
A highly needed review of the presidency........2002-01-21
Reassessing the Presidency shatters long held myths about some of the occupants of the White House and instead exposes their real actions. Denson's work documents how the decline of liberty and the rise in power of the executive of the United States has gone hand in hand.
The opening part of the book focusses on how presidents are "ranked" by historians, drawing the conclusion that most often, presidents that created more outlays by spending more and enlarging the federal budget where ranked as better then those who were more fiscally conservative with the taxpayers dollars. While the closing section is devoted to the impossibly of a limited government and offers the solutions in overcoming our current situation.
Denson then takes a critical look at the Lincoln and Roosevelt administration as both men used war and crisis to further enhance their power and control. Well, outside the presidency's constitutional limits. And how future presidents such as Truman would further build on earlier power grabs, turning the executive branch into what it has become today.
Denson's work even takes a look at some less know and documented president's and their role such as Van Buren work in the creation of modern political parties. And how the Supreme Court has acted helped to create the modern presidency.
It's an excellent work that strips away warm fuzzy feelings about past presidents and takes a much needed critical look at their actions.
Superb!.......2002-01-15
An outstanding work, thought provoking, albeit sometimes disturbing work that should be required reading for any student of American hostory. How many of us really understand the differance between freedom and democracy, or between private enterprse and free enterprise? I expect that most people who affiliate themselves with either of the traditional two American political parties will have little good to say about this work and poo-poo its conclusions (it's called denial, folks). Nevertheless, if you love freedom, if you are proud of America and its Constitution, and if you have an open mind - read this book.
Book Description
A manifesto by America's most controversial and celebrated town planners, proposing an alternative model for community design.
There is a growing movement in North America to put an end to suburban sprawl and to replace the automobile-based settlement patterns of the past fifty years with a return to more traditional planning principles. This movement stems not only from the realization that sprawl is ecologically and economically unsustainable but also from a growing awareness of sprawl's many victims: children, utterly dependent on parental transportation if they wish to escape the cul-de-sac; the elderly, warehoused in institutions once they lose their driver's licenses; the middle class, stuck in traffic for two or more hours each day.
Founders of the Congress for the New Urbanism, Andres Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk are at the forefront of this movement, and in Suburban Nation they assess sprawl's costs to society, be they ecological, economic, aesthetic, or social. It is a lively, thorough, critical lament, and an entertaining lesson on the distinctions between postwar suburbia-characterized by housing clusters, strip shopping centers, office parks, and parking lots-and the traditional neighborhoods that were built as a matter of course until mid-century. It is an indictment of the entire development community, including governments, for the fact that America no longer builds towns. Most important, though, it is that rare book that also offers solutions.
Customer Reviews:
The "A-ha" moment.......2007-09-10
I really must thank the authors for putting this together. I just finished Suburban Nation and I now know why I'm so stressed out all the time living in this "ticky-tacky" world (to borrow a line from the Weeds theme song).
I wish I could do more to help combat sprawl at the moment. However, I'm keeping my eyes open all the time for what works, what doesn't work and I will continue to study this subject so that if and when I'm in a position to either make a move or be part of a decision making body, I will be able to intelligently make my opinion known.
The Suburbia Style In Its Worst - And Real - Perspective + Solutions For The Future Ahead.......2007-07-30
It's no wonder that the suburbia style brought so much finance and - why not - mental damage to our everyday lives. We gave up living smartly for living in beautifulness.
I believe that the sense of ownership prevails in suburbia much more than the sense of community. If you live in one for a long time, you probably know what I am talking about. Even if you don't, you might imagine how it feels to be in one.
I lived in one for quite a long time and must recognize its benefits: peacefulness, plenty of space to stroll around and not much of noisy neighbors. Surely it has its advantages. I really admire how beautiful some neighborhoods really are and can remain when apart from the hassles of the inner city.
But the need of taking my car to do absolutely everything from my basic needs just started to bother me as time went by and as my bills started to rise from such crazy oil consumption. One of the reasons why we are the biggest spenders in the entire planet is certainly the suburb predominance all over the country. Any doubt about it?
This book is absolutely wonderful. It traces back to the WWII era when everything started out. Government has promoted all of the land development we see today and which is still in high demand, unfortunately. What once was a success formula to promote economic development is today a "cancer" that we have to live and deal with. We were imposed to a lifestyle that we didn't necessarily want to live, and we now pay high taxes just to keep this "monster" alive. As the book brightly states on its pages: suburbs were made for cars, not human beings.
At some point in the book, authors state something that for me it is absolutely true: the archictecture is a science which is very undervalued in America. Obsolete and outdated zoning ordinances, traffic engineers more worried about the flow and the trucks that could pass on the streets and, most of all, community planning based on numbers and not aesthetics are the major rules when a new development takes place, leaving no room for smart development.
Smart growth requires a lot of thinking, and for the long run, but thinking isn't really one of the best characteristics of land developers and home builders who have no expertise on archictecture issues, but only on how to make money fast and effortlessly. However, I have to recognize that it's not all their fault. Smart growth will also require a major cultural shift from a society which became used with such sprawl standards, whether living this way is beneficial or not.
The book not only shows what went wrong with such aged growth policies, but also proposes solutions for building smarter towns and stimulates the creation of a community sense that today is just missing. Carefully written, is a reading that won't put you at sleep.
A must read for anyone involved in real estate development.......2007-01-16
The authors point out some obvious and not-so-obvious trends and benefits of recent architecture and urban planning. As a small builder and developer of urban "in-fill" housing, I thought this brought an excellent perspective to our industry on the changing climate of urban development in America. Immediatly bought ten copies for our employees to read (and reread).
Good Intro to Urban/Regional Planning.......2007-01-09
This is the first book I've read in the field of Planning. Very easy to read, informative, and really gets you excited about the material. I would recommend it highly
One of the Most Important Books of the 21st Century.......2006-12-13
This book, written for people, sets the stage for one of the most important movements in American: New Urbanism. I've bought a dozen copies thus far, for distribution to friends. The book explains proper community building and lifestyles in terms that can be understood by all. Be prepared to change your way of thinking and living.
Book Description
In contrast to other scholars who emphasize the affinity of the "New York Intellectuals" for literary modernism and its largely Jewish composition as its defining characteristics, Wald finds these traits to be secondary to the group's agonizing efforts in the 1930s and after to build a Marxist alternative to the official Communist movement. Wald presents an absorbing account of this misunderstood chapter in the history of literary radicalism and the Marxist intellectual tradition in the United States.
Customer Reviews:
Scoundrel Time.......2002-07-07
This book is a good chronicle of the milieu of Cold War Liberals who provided a sophisticated democratic rationale for the Cold War and the political repression of the McCarthy era and who are the most responsible for the demonization of Communists in intellectual circles. In recent times their mentor and hero was President Reagan who gave James Burnham the Medal of Freedom along with Whittaker Chambers-thus their pretensions to being "left-wing" are about as credible as their less generic genuflections before the altar of Leon Trotsky.
This intellectual banditry and collusion with the forces of repression has nothing in common with traditions of authentic libertarian socialism. James P. Cannon, in particular, the founder and long time leader of the Trotskyist movement in the U.S., who unlike Lillian Hellman never had any illusions about the charachter of the Stalin regime and who before founding this movement had played in the 1920s a leading role in the struggle in defense of Sacco & Vanzetti as a Communist leader of the International Labor Defense, took a dim view of these kind of turncoats and fair-weather friends as reflected in his essay from the early 1950s, "Treason of the Intellectuals" contained in his anthology "Notebook of an Agitator", where he denounced those who were leaving both the CP and his own organization, and the progressive movement generally, to jump on the bandwagon of the anti-communist witch-hunt, some like Edward Dymytrk going so far as to inform on their former comrades, in addition to making false and demagogic accusations against others, as nothing but cowardly and corrupt opportunists, scabs, finks and traitors. Cannon always distinguished between opposition to Stalinism and anti-communist redbaiting, the latter of which he always emphasized was part of corporate management's strategy to confuse and divide the working class and suppress basic democratic rights.
Thus this milieu is rightly viewed today by progressives as discredited and philistine, representing the views and interests of Wall Street and official Washington.
Customer Reviews:
Damn funny, and a bit scary.......2001-10-15
Many a year after boy-Quayle has been out of the public eye this book is still a treat. Queenan does a nice little touch of history of the VP while adding nice little bits of humour. In this day and age of stupid people (um, Bush, um, Ashcroft, um, Powell...scary) this book helps you laugh a bit at these fools that lead the nation. Plus maybe question it a bit. Enjoy!
Not Dan!.......2001-02-12
As surprising as it may be, this book quickly moves off Dan Quayle and all his idiosyncracies, and concentrates on a satirical/humourous account of the office of the Vice President. And it is intersting from an academic point of view, but also in the various curiosities that Queenan points out, for eg, that Indiana holds the record for the number of VPs of any US state. I thoroughtly recommend this book, as an introduction to a US political office that has received scant political attention - when it should be just as important - especailly during the election cyncial - as to who is the rtunning mate and what qualifications etc they have should the president no longer able to fulfill their position.
Not really about Dan Quayle.......2000-06-18
This book about Dan Quayle is not really about Dan Quayle. It is about the politcal life of the United States. The author just uses Dan Quayle as the pirism which he looks thru at the world of politcs and life in. It takes a bunch of pop shots at Quayle, but then, you knew that when you picked the book up.
Basically, the conclusion of the book is the the United States and the world can survive bad leadership. It has survived it in the past, and it can darn well surive it in the future.
It is also a very funny book. Which makes you want to read it.
Declining quality.......2000-04-03
Joe Queenan is a magazine journalist and this becomes apparent in his book. Whilst he can be exceptionally funny, he loses steam with each additional chapter. As a three to five chapter monograph this would have been ideal if unmarketable. Queenan is still humourous and readable - I frequently found myself laughing aloud in the most innapropriate locations as I read this. However his other books are better.
As dumb as they come.......1998-10-16
Here Joe takes on a pretty good target..Quayle certainly has his shortcomings, but along the way manages to insult every person in Indiana, and then the midwest....Save your money and your time...
Amazon.com
This examination of the era after the civil rights movement can best be described by the old saying "one step forward, two steps back." Klinkner and Smith attack the widely held view that greater racial equality in the United States is preordained by the characteristics and principles of the founding fathers or the tides of history. The authors look at the circumstances that fostered black civil rights, including wars and political instability; when those factors are reduced, they argue, antiblack backlash sets in, from the Reconstruction era up to post-Reagan Republicanism. The Unsteady March is an alarmist book, but not without hope. The authors offer solutions that include increased commitment to enforcing civil rights legislation, economic parity, and reform of the criminal justice system--as well as bringing back the draft and introducing a universal national service program. --Eugene Holley Jr.
Book Description
American life is filled with talk of progress and equality, especially when the issue is that of race. But has the history of race in America really been the continuous march toward equality we'd like to imagine it has? This sweeping history of race in America argues quite the opposite: that progress toward equality has been sporadic, isolated, and surrounded by long periods of stagnation and retrenchment.
"[An] unflinching portrait of the leviathan of American race relations. . . . This important book should be read by all who aspire to create a more perfect union."—Publishers Weekly, starred review
"Could it be that our unswerving belief in the power of our core values to produce racial equality is nothing but a comforting myth? That is the main argument put forth by Philip Klinkner and Rogers Smith . . . The Unsteady March is disturbing because it calls into question our cherished national belief and does so convincingly. . . . [It] is beautifully written, and the social history it provides is illuminating and penetrating."—Aldon Morris, American Journal of Sociology
Winner of the Horace Mann Bond Award of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for Afro-American Research at Harvard University.
Customer Reviews:
Learn From the Past.......2006-12-02
An incredibly insightful and powerful book that examines the history of race in America - charting the knotty path toward racial equality, and exposing the many contradictions and setbacks upon it. Most importantly, the book can help us all look at present-day race relations in a more progressive way.
Up the down escalator.......2003-05-08
Highly interesting and useful book with a simple but effective history: put the whole history of civil rights struggle in one line, since the Revolutionary war. The result shows immediately the tiding of the struggle for racial equality, and the correlation of eras of advance with the periods of major war, the Revolutionary, Civil, and Second World Wars to be exact. Too often we see the efforts of abolitionists in the generation before the Civil War without seeing the similar history during the Revolutionary period, and then the falling away of advance into retrogression in the early nineteenth century. And then again after Reconstruction. The rise of the Civil Rights movement after the Second World War, next also to the need to repair the image of the American system in the Cold War, falls into place therefore as the next incremental advance in an undertow of resistance, backsliding and the Jim Crow curse. We seem to be, or have entered, another of the doldrum eras, and the prospect seems alarming, although each period of advance maintains some portion of its gains. At a period of neo-liberal machinations made in Texas we need hardly bother to wonder why affirmative action is under attack, etc...
One has to wonder, finally, at the botched legacy of the Constitutional era. It seems less than fully convincing all at once that the founders were unable to resist compromise. The results have been a horrendous series of obstructions.
As the dot.gov goes into action in Iraq, it is worth wondering if they are qualified. American history shows one way to blow it. Vigilance.
A Very accurate depiction of Race relations.......2002-12-03
When I read this book, I was surprised to find a almost completely accurate depiction of the African-American experience and race relations. Klikner and Smith validate the claim of Black separatist groups such as the Nation of Islam that the Black man is considered a citizen during wartime and tax time. Their analyzing of race relations during The American Revolution, The Civil War, World War II, and The Cold War show that the status of African-Americans was changed by each war. However the nation took 2 steps back when the attitudes of the White majority changed during hard economic times and developed a reluctance to expand the social revolution that was spurred by the war. The book offers a challenge to all who desire racial and economic equality to continue a unfinished social revolution.
One step forward, two steps back.......2002-04-30
Civil Rights leaders supposedly described their achievements in these terms and thus give the authors the title for their book. Such footwork can only be described as THE UNSTEADY MARCH. Klinker and Smith highlight the periods of progress and retreat through a broad sweep of US history. Beginning with the era of slavery (1619-1860), chapter 1 titled "Bolted with the Lock of a Hundred Keys" obviously describes a period of zero progress. According to the authors there have only been three periods of progress and each can be identified by the presence of specific factors. The thrust of their argument throughout this book is that the special circumstances and the effort, energy, and enthusiasm associated with these factors has both a beneficial and deleterious impact on black progress. Beneficially these are not short-run periods of gain. Indeed the third era of progress beginning with WWII and covering the Cold War (inclusive of Vietnam) from 1941 to 1968 "framed an extraordinarily prolonged period" of gains.
It's not coincidental that this period included WWII, the Cold War, and Vietnam because progress has come only "in the wake of a large-scale war requiring extensive economic and military mobilization of African-Americans for success." This statement by the authors made me think about the message of AMERICAN PATRIOTS: "The Story of Blacks in the Military from the Revolution to Desert Storm". If gains by blacks is conditional on wars the treatment of blacks in those wars is a high cost to pay for progress as Gail Lumet Buckley shows in her book. Gaining support for these wars usually means invoking our inclusiveness, egalitarianism, and democratic ideals; elements which the authors identify as another precondition for progress. The third critical factor is that a political protest movement must emerge and be "willing and able to bring pressure upon national leaders to live up to that justificatory rhetoric by instituting domestic reforms."
Progress has been a continual dance of advances and retreats but in their penultimate chapter "Benign Neglect?" the authors express concern over the current climate of complacency. Rather than a threat from any direct action or program of retrenchment, acceptance of present trends is a far greater impediment to continued progress. Through a series of parallels with periods of increased segregation they make a compelling case for overturning the historical pattern and replacing it with a movement towards sustained economic justice and racial equality.
One African American Man's view.......2001-04-10
About six months ago, Klinkner's book fell into my lap having been dropped off by my brother who knew me to be an avid reader. My initial thought was that this book was another attempt to recycle the old liberal ideas of the 60's. Liberalism, for all intents and purposes, has been discredited, relegated to the scrap heap of forgotten history-along with the Edsel, leisure suits, 8 tracks and E.S.T. Later that evening, I sat down to read the introduction. After completing the introduction, I wanted to call my brother to thank him for delivering such a find. It is imperative to read the introduction before tackling the main body of the book. Also, try not to read the book too quickly, it is better digested in small pieces. As a historical document, there is no more scholarly or analytical a treatise out there. It stablizes the argument in favor of reconsidering the issues surrounding the way we--as a country--have in the past and present continue to treat the progeny of former slaves. The issue is not reparations for the effects of slavery, but rather the institutional structures in place that perpetuate the superior/inferior relationship between Americans separated by the color of their skin. In short, if we could eliminate the current effects that became ingrained during the 300 or so years of slavery, we would gladly forego any compensation we may be arguably entitled to. This book is a must read for anyone grappling with the issues of equality-or inequality--in it's present transmuted form.
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