Book picks similar to
Unreliable Sources by Martin A. Lee
media
non-fiction
politics
history
Downsize This!
Michael Moore - 1996
Nothing but the truth is sacred in Michael Moore’s hilarious screed on the state of America, Downsize This! With the same in-your-face tenacity that has made him everyman’s hero, Moore gets under the skin of corporate giants, politicians, lobbyists, and the media-anyone who has made life tougher for the millions of Americans who are working longer hours for less pay and have had enough.Source: michaelmoore.com
Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming: The NIPCC Report on Scientific Consensus
Craig D. Idso - 2015
This claim is not only false, but its presence in the debate is an insult to science." With these words, the authors begin a detailed analysis of one of the most controversial topics of the day. The authors make a compelling case against claims of a scientific consensus. The purported proof of such a consensus consists of sloppy research by nonscientists, college students, and a highly partisan Australian blogger. Surveys of climate scientists, even those heavily biased in favor of climate alarmism, find extensive disagreement on the underlying science and doubts about its reliability. The authors point to four reasons why scientists disagree about global warming: a conflict among scientists in different and often competing disciplines; fundamental scientific uncertainties concerning how the global climate responds to the human presence; failure of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to provide objective guidance to the complex science; and bias among researchers. The authors offer a succinct summary of the real science of climate change based on their previously published comprehensive review of climate science in a volume titled Climate Change Reconsidered II: Physical Science. They recommend that policymakers resist pressure from lobby groups to silence scientists who question the authority of the IPCC to claim to speak for climate science. More than 50,000 copies of the first edition were sold or given away in five months to elected officials, civic and business leaders, scientists, and other opinion leaders. The response from the science community and experts on climate change has been overwhelmingly positive. To meet demand for more copies, we have produced this second revised edition. Changes include a foreword by Marita Noon, at the time executive director of Energy Makes America Great, Inc. Some of the discussion in Chapter 1 has been revised and expanded thanks to feedback from readers of the first edition. Graphs in Chapters 4, 5, and 6 are now full color, and new graphs have been added.
How Mumbo-Jumbo Conquered the World
Francis Wheen - 2004
In How Mumbo-Jumbo Conquered the World, Francis Wheen brilliantly laments the extraordinary rise of superstition, relativism and emotional hysteria. From Middle Eastern fundamentalism to the rise of lotteries, astrology to mysticism, poststructuralism to the Third Way, Wheen shows that there has been a pervasive erosion of Enlightenment values, which have been displaced by nonsense. And no country has a more vivid parade of the bogus and bizarre than the one founded to embody Enlightenment values: the USA. In turn comic, indignant, outraged, and just plain baffled by the idiocy of it all, How Mumbo-Jumbo Conquered the World is a masterful depiction of the absurdity of our times and a plea that we might just think a little more and believe a little less.
Real Enemies: Conspiracy Theories and American Democracy, World War I to 9/11
Kathryn S. Olmsted - 2008
Government agents shot the president. They faked the moon landing. They stood by and allowed the murders of 2,400 servicemen in Hawaii. Although paranoia has been a feature of the American scene since the birth of the Republic, in Real Enemies Kathryn Olmsted shows that it was only in the twentieth century that strange and unlikely conspiracy theories became central to American politics. In particular, she posits World War I as a critical turning point and shows that as the federal bureaucracy expanded, Americans grew more fearful of the government itself--the military, the intelligence community, and even the President. Analyzing the wide-spread suspicions surrounding such events as Pearl Harbor, the JFK assassination, Watergate, and 9/11, Olmsted sheds light on why so many Americans believe that their government conspires against them, why more people believe these theories over time, and how real conspiracies--such as the infamous Northwoods plan--have fueled our paranoia about the governments we ourselves elect.
The Unfinished Revolution: How the Modernisers Saved the Labour Party
Philip Gould - 1998
Blair's majority was the culmination of a long struggle to modernize the party, and the politics of his country. Philip Gould is a political strategist and polling adviser who has worked with the Labour leadership since the 1980s. In this book he describes its rise and explains how the transformation was achieved, at the same time exploring the changed political climate in Britain.
The Lincoln Story Book A Judicious Collection of the Best Stories and Anecdotes of the Great President, Many Appearing Here for the First Time in Book Form
Henry Llewellyn Williams - 2005
You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
The Argument: Billionaires, Bloggers, and the Battle to Remake Democratic Politics
Matt Bai - 2007
The New Dealers had one. So did the Goldwater conservatives. So what's the progressive argument? What new path are Democrats urging us to choose in the era of Wal-Mart, Al Qaeda, and YouTube? Matt Bai seeks answers in The Argument, a book that brings you deep inside the turbulent, confusing new world of Democratic politics, where billionaires and bloggers are battling politicians and consultants over the future of a once-great party. Beginning with the devastating election of 2004 and ending with an unexpected triumph in the 2006 congressional elections and the run-up to the 2008 campaign, Bai's book follows such memorable power brokers as Howard Dean, the billionaire George Soros, the union leader Andy Stern, the blogger Markos Moulitsas, and the leaders of moveon.org as they vie for control of the new Democratic landscape. In the pages of The Argument, we are introduced to these activists not just as political figures but as fascinating and flawed characters-ordinary people motivated by ideology or ambition or even personal tragedy. At stake is the future of the Democratic Party and, quite possibly, of American politics itself. At a time when assorted pundits offer their ownprescriptions for Democratic success in the 2008 presidential election, Bai uses rich narrative and vivid portraits to illuminate the party's challenges. In scene after scene from around the country-with union bosses in Chicago, with Dean in Alaska, with movie stars in Hollywood and financiers in New York-Bai reveals a movement that is learning how to win again, even as it struggles to articulate a compelling argument for progressive government in a confusing new century. Readers of The Argument will recognize the unsparing insight and gift for storytelling that have made Matt Bai one of the country's most widely read observers of the American political scene-and its most trusted authority on the Democratic Party.
Tightrope: Americans Reaching for Hope
Nicholas D. Kristof - 2020
About one-quarter of the children on Kristof's old school bus died in adulthood from drugs, alcohol, suicide, or reckless accidents. And while these particular stories unfolded in one corner of the country, they are representative of many places the authors write about, ranging from the Dakotas and Oklahoma to New York and Virginia. But here too are stories about resurgence, among them: Annette Dove, who has devoted her life to helping the teenagers of Pine Bluff, Arkansas, as they navigate the chaotic reality of growing up poor; Daniel McDowell, of Baltimore, whose tale of opioid addiction and recovery suggests that there are viable ways to solve our nation's drug epidemic. Taken together, these accounts provide a picture of working-class families needlessly but profoundly damaged as a result of decades of policy mistakes. With their superb, nuanced reportage, Kristof and WuDunn have given us a book that is both riveting and impossible to ignore.
Deep State: Inside the Government Secrecy Industry
Marc Ambinder - 2013
It was formed from the astonishing number of secrets held by the government and the growing ranks of secret-keepers given charge over them. The government secrecy industry speaks in a private language of codes and acronyms, and follows an arcane set of rules and customs designed to perpetuate itself, repel penetration, and deflect oversight. It justifies itself with the assertion that the American values worth preserving are often best sustained by subterfuge and deception.There are indications that this deep state is crumbling. Necessary secrets are often impossible to keep, while frivolous secrets are kept forever. The entire system has fallen prey to political manipulation, with leaks carefully timed to advance agendas, and over-classification given to indefensible government activities.DEEP STATE: INSIDE THE GOVERNMENT SECRECY INDUSTRY, written by two of the country’s most respected national security journalists, disassembles the secrecy apparatus of the United States and examines real-world trends that ought to trouble everyone from the most aggressive hawk to the fiercest civil libertarian. The book:- Provides the fullest account to date of the National Security Agency’s controversial surveillance program first spun up in the dark days after 9/11.- Examines President Obama’s attempt to reconcile his instincts as a liberal with the realities of executive power, and his use of the state secrets doctrine.- Exposes how the public’s ubiquitous access to information has been the secrecy industry’s toughest opponent to date, and provides a full account of how WikiLeaks and other “sunlight” organizations are changing the government’s approach to handling sensitive information, for better and worse.- Explains how the increased exposure of secrets affects everything from Congressional budgets to Area 51, from SEAL Team Six and Delta Force to the FBI, CIA, and NSA.- Assesses whether the formal and informal mechanisms put in place to protect citizens from abuses by the American deep state work, and how they might be reformed.DEEP STATE: INSIDE THE GOVERNMENT SECRECY INDUSTRY IS based on the authors’ insatiable curiosity for the ground truth and layered on a foundation of original and historical research as well as unprecedented access to lawmakers, intelligence agency heads, White House officials, and secret program managers. It draws on thousands of recently declassified documents and candid interviews with more than 100 military, industry, and government officials.By the bestselling authors of THE COMMAND: DEEP INSIDE THE PRESIDENT’S SECRET ARMY: Marc Ambinder, editor at large at The Week, contributing editor at GQ and The Atlantic, who has covered Washington for CBS News and ABC News; and D.B. Grady, a correspondent for The Atlantic, national security columnist for The Week, and former U.S. Army paratrooper and Afghanistan veteran.
The First Family Detail: Secret Service Agents Reveal the Hidden Lives of the Presidents
Ronald Kessler - 2014
What the nation’s leaders are really like and what goes on behind the scenes remains hidden. Secret Service agents have a front row seat on their private lives and those of their wives and children. Crammed with new, headline-making revelations, THE FIRST FAMILY DETAIL: Secret Service Agents Reveal the Hidden Lives of the Presidents by Ronald Kessler tells that eye-opening, uncensored story. Since publication of his New York Times bestselling book In the President’s Secret Service, award-winning investigative reporter Ronald Kessler has continued to penetrate the wall of secrecy that surrounds the U.S. Secret Service, breaking the story that Secret Service agents who were to protect President Obama hired prostitutes in Cartagena, Colombia and revealing that the Secret Service allowed a third uninvited guest to crash a White House state dinner. Now Kessler presents far bigger and more consequential stories about our nation’s leaders and the agency sworn to protect them. Kessler widens his scope to include presidential candidates, former presidents after they leave the White House, and the presidents’ relationships to their first ladies and children. From observing Vice President Joe Biden’s reckless behavior that jeopardizes the country’s safety, to escorting Bill Clinton’s mistress at Chappaqua, to overhearing First Lady Michelle Obama’s admonitions to the president, to witnessing President Nixon’s friends bring him a nude stripper, to seeing their own agency take risks that could result in an assassination, Secret Service agents know a secret world that Ronald Kessler exposes in breathtaking detail. THE FIRST FAMILY DETAIL reveals: · Vice President Joe Biden regularly orders the Secret Service to keep his military aide with the nuclear football a mile behind his motorcade, potentially leaving the country unable to retaliate in the event of a nuclear attack. · Secret Service agents discovered that former president Bill Clinton has a blond mistress. Within minutes of Hillary Clinton’s leaving, the woman—codenamed Energizer by agents—shows up to be with Bill every day while the likely future presidential candidate is away. · The Secret Service covered up the fact that President Ronald Reagan’s White House staff overruled the Secret Service to let unscreened spectators get close to Reagan as he left the Washington Hilton, allowing him to be shot by John W. Hinckley Jr. · Secret Service agents have been dismayed to overhear Michelle Obama push her husband to be more aggressive in attacking Republicans and to side with blacks in racial controversies. · Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan diverted agents from protecting President Obama and his family at the White House and ordered them instead to protect his assistant at her home and illegally retrieve confidential records as a favor to her. · Because Hillary Clinton is so nasty to agents, being assigned to her protective detail is considered a form of punishment and the worst assignment in the Secret Service. · Secret Service agents were ordered to ignore security rules and allow the SUV carrying actor Bradley Cooper to drive unscreened into a secure restricted area when President Obama was about to deliver his speech at the White House Correspondents Dinner. · Vice President Joe Biden spends millions of taxpayer dollars flying to and from his home in Delaware on Air Force Two. His office tried to cover up the costs of the personal trips. · Because the Secret Service refused to provide enough magnetometers at his campaign events, Mitt Romney regularly left himself open to assassination by giving speeches to unscreened crowds. · Vice President Joe Biden swims nude at the vice president’s residence in Washington and at his home in Delaware, offending female agents.
47 Percent: Uncovering the Romney Video That Rocked the 2012 Election
David Corn - 2012
In 47 Percent, Corn recounts how the 47 percent video fit into the ongoing narrative of the 2012 election and greatly changed the course of the campaign. This instant, on-the-news book also features an astute review of the first debate between President Barack Obama and Governor Mitt Romney and assesses the strengths and weaknesses of each candidate as they head into the final stretch of this historical election.
A Dirty, Wicked Town: Tales of 19th Century Omaha
David L. Bristow - 2000
In the nineteenth century, however, it had a very different reputation. Omaha grew from a speculative scheme in 1854 to a booming city. Along the way there were scores of great stories. “It requires but little if any, stretch of the imagination to regard Omaha as a cesspool of iniquity, for it is given up to lawlessness and is overrun with a horde of fugitives from justice and dangerous men of all kinds who carry things with a high hand and a loose rein. . . . If you want to find a rogue’s rookery, go to Omaha.”—Kansas City newspaper.
Ever the Diplomat
Sherard Cowper-Coles - 2012
For over thirty years Sherard Cowper-Coles was on the diplomatic front line in a distinguished career that took him from the corridors of power in Whitehall to a string of high-profile around the world. Entering the Foreign Office in 1977, he took up postings in Beirut, Alexandria and Cairo, Washington, Paris, and Hong Kong, his globe-trotting punctuated with spells in London, where the young diplomat had a baptism of fire writing foreign affairs speeches for Geoffrey Howe and Margaret Thatcher. In 1999, under the New Labour government and Prime Minister Tony Blair, he was made Principal Private Secretary to the irascible Foreign Secretary Robin Cook, providing the book with some of its most hilarious sequences. His career culminated in a succession of ambassadorial posts as Our Man in Israel, Saudi Arabia and finally Afghanistan. 'Ever the Diplomat' is his revealing and witty account of half a lifetime in diplomacy.
Yes We (Still) Can: Politics in the Age of Obama, Twitter, and Trump
Dan Pfeiffer - 2018
How had Donald Trump won the White House? How was it that a decent and thoughtful president had been succeeded by a buffoonish reality star, and what do we do now?Instead of throwing away his phone and moving to another country (which were his first and second thoughts), Pfeiffer decided to tell this surreal story, recounting how Barack Obama navigated the insane political forces that created Trump, explaining why everyone got 2016 wrong, and offering a path for where Democrats go from here.Pfeiffer was one of Obama's first hires when he decided to run for president, and was at his side through two presidential campaigns and six years in the White House. Using never-before-heard stories and behind-the-scenes anecdotes, Yes We (Still) Can examines how Obama succeeded despite Twitter trolls, Fox News (and their fake news), and a Republican Party that lost its collective mind.An irreverent, no-B.S. take on the crazy politics of our time, Yes We (Still) Can is a must-read for everyone who is disturbed by Trump, misses Obama, and is marching, calling, and hoping for a better future for the country.