In this troubling expose of what went wrong, Christopher Cooper and Robert Block of "The Wall Street Journal" show that the flaws go much deeper than out-of-touch federal bureaucrats or overwhelmed local politicians.Drawing on exclusive interviews with federal, state, and local officials, Cooper and Block take readers inside the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Department of Homeland Security to reveal the inexcusable mismanagement during Hurricane Katrina--the bad decisions that were made, the facts that were ignored, the individuals who saw that the system was broken but were unable to fix it. America's top emergency response officials had long known that a calamitous hurricane was likely to hit New Orleans, but that seems to have had little effect on planning or execution. "Disaster" demonstrates that the incompetent response to Hurricane Katrina is a wake-up call to all Americans, wherever they live, about how distressingly vulnerable we remain. Washington is ill equipped to handle large-scale emergencies, be they floods or fires, natural events or terrorist attacks, and Cooper and Block make a strong case for overhauling of the nation's emergency response system. This is a book that no American can afford to ignore."

    In 'Gore Vidal: History of the National Security State' & 'Vidal on America', TRNN Senior Editor Paul Jay and the acclaimed essayist, screenwriter and novelist Gore Vidal discuss the historical events that led to the establishment of the massive military-industrial-security complex and the political culture that gave us the “Imperial Presidency.”

    So hold your nose, kiss the babies, and just think how good you would look on a stamp.Now, before we go into your media responsibilities, you must understand the true history of political power, so you don't accidentally act on the naive idealism you are required to project to the general public.The reality of political power is very simple: bad farmers own crops and livestock -- good farmers own human beings...

    In the heart of this larger work--today known as The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin--he writes of the bold and arduous Project of arriving at Perfection that he set for himself as a young man. In this task for perfection, young Benjamin prepared a catalog of thirteen necessary or desirable virtues that he might strive to acquire by means of habit and daily practice. This Applewood Books edition includes a chart that Benjamin Franklin used to track his personal progress towards perfection.

    He writes with conversational ease and emotional insight, drawing on contemporary politics, literature, film, and his knowledge of American history.

    Anyone who started a business, marketed a new invention, ran for office, formed an association, or wrote for publication was helping to fashion the world's first liberal society. These are the people we encounter in Inheriting the Revolution, a vibrant tapestry of the lives, callings, decisions, desires, and reflections of those Americans who turned the new abstractions of democracy, the nation, and free enterprise into contested realities. Through data gathered on thousands of people, as well as hundreds of memoirs and autobiographies, Joyce Appleby tells myriad intersecting stories of how Americans born between 1776 and 1830 reinvented themselves and their society in politics, economics, reform, religion, and culture. They also had to grapple with the new distinction of free and slave labor, with all its divisive social entailments; the rout of Enlightenment rationality by the warm passions of religious awakening; the explosion of small business opportunities for young people eager to break out of their parents' colonial cocoon. Few in the nation escaped the transforming intrusiveness of these changes. Working these experiences into a vivid picture of American cultural renovation, Appleby crafts an extraordinary--and deeply affecting--account of how the first generation established its own culture, its own nation, its own identity.The passage of social responsibility from one generation to another is always a fascinating interplay of the inherited and the novel; this book shows how, in the early nineteenth century, the very idea of generations resonated with new meaning in the United States.

    Expressive close-ups of presidents reveal moments of joy, reflection, and turmoil over public issues and private challenges. Unexpected angles cast new light on historic events. Through both iconic and little-known images, this book offers a fresh perspective on life and work behind the famous facade of the White House.The President's Photographer is the official companion book to the National Geographic Channel special that aired in November 2010.

    Instead of revising the Articles of Confederation, the framers had created a fundamentally new national plan that placed over the states a supreme government with broad powers. They proposed to submit it to conventions in each state, elected “by the People thereof,” for ratification.Immediately, a fierce storm of argument broke. Federalist supporters, Antifederalist opponents, and seekers of a middle ground strove to balance public order and personal liberty as they praised, condemned, challenged, and analyzed the new Constitution.Assembled here in chronological order are hundreds of newspaper articles, pamphlets, speeches, and private letters written or delivered in the aftermath of the Constitutional Convention. Along with familiar figures like Franklin, Madison, Patrick Henry, Jefferson, and Washington, scores of less famous citizens are represented, all speaking clearly and passionately about government. The most famous writings of the ratification struggle—the Federalist essays of Hamilton and Madison—are placed in their original context, alongside the arguments of able antagonists, such as “Brutus” and the “Federal Farmer.”Part One includes press polemics and private commentaries from September 1787 to January 1788. That autumn, powerful arguments were made against the new charter by Virginian George Mason and the still-unidentified “Federal Farmer,” while in New York newspapers, the Federalist essays initiated a brilliant defense. Dozens of speeches from the state ratifying conventions show how the “draft of a plan, nothing but a dead letter,” in Madison’s words, had “life and validity…breathed into it by the voice of the people.” Included are the conventions in Pennsylvania, where James Wilson confronted the democratic skepticism of those representing the western frontier, and in Massachusetts, where John Hancock and Samuel Adams forged a crucial compromise that saved the country from years of political convulsion.Informative notes, biographical profiles of all writers, speakers, and recipients, and a detailed chronology of relevant events from 1774 to 1804 provide fascinating background. A general index allows readers to follow specific topics, and an appendix includes the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, and the Constitution (with all amendments).

    It's a carefully plotted path that eventually led them to the White House. But along the way, a series of compromises had to be made, including a prearranged marriage, clandestine assignments for the CIA, and Hillary's ultimate role as a "fixer" for her husband's many dalliances. Pulling no punches, investigative journalist Victor Thorn paints a compelling portrait of secrecy, deceit, violence, and betrayal that shatters the myth Mrs. Clinton has spent so many years trying to create. This three-book series is the most comprehensive examination of the Clinton marriage ever compiled, with HILLARY (AND BILL): THE SEX VOLUME laying a riveting foundation for the next two books which follow: part two - HILLARY (AND BILL): THE DRUGS VOLUME, and then part three - HILLARY (AND BILL): THE MURDER VOLUME. Get all the lurid details of how Hillary Clinton harassed and intimidated Juanita Broaddrick after her husband violently raped her, as well as the lengths to which she went to terrorize other women who were victimized by Bill Clinton. - Extensive quotes from a plethora of public figures chronicling the Clinton Lie Machine. - Who was Bill Clinton's real father? Discover the startling facts concerning the death of William Blythe and why an overwhelming amount of evidence indicates that he could not have been the President s biological father. - Learn about Hillary's collegiate career and how it shaped her later views on feminism, globalism, and how to infiltrate the System from within. - What one culminating event not only brought Hillary Rodham to the attention of Washington, DC s power-brokers, but also made her a darling of the mainstream media. - Touching upon the work of Michael Collins Piper and other investigators, find out how during their academic careers Bill and Hillary were recruited into the CIA under Operation CHAOS to subvert the anti-war movement. - Although largely ignored by the corporate press, read how Hillary's family was associated with organized crime figures in the Chicago area, while Bill Clinton's relatives were integral members of the notorious Dixie Mafia. - For the first time anywhere: was Bill and Hillary's much ballyhooed first meeting at Yale actually part of a much larger prearranged marriage engineered by shadowy New World Order figures whose ultimate plans led them to the White House? - Despite being labeled radicals, volume one of this trilogy documents how Bill and Hillary were trained at three of the most prestigious globalist universities in the world: Georgetown, Oxford, and Yale; while simultaneously being groomed by such figures as Professor Carroll Quigley. - Did Hillary Rodham further her intelligence career by infiltrating underground groups such as the Black Panthers, and was she also used in this same context to leak highly sensitive information during Richard Nixon's infamous Watergate hearings? - Why did Bill Clinton travel to Russia and across Europe during the early 1970s (at the height of the Cold War), and what powerful forces from Arkansas and Washington, DC used their leverage to keep him from being drafted into the Vietnam War? - How has Hillary's marriage-made-in-hell become akin to a prison sentence one from which she has no escape due to the severe consequences she would face in doing so? - Also, Bill and Hillary's sordid sex lives, including: - Rape - Gennifer Flowers darkest secrets - A black love child - The real reason why Bill Clinton lost his case to Paula Jones &l

    Kennedy was the great-grandson of Irish immigrants and the only Irish-Catholic American elected as President of the US. He relished his Irish heritage and in June 1963 made a 4-day trip to his homeland. This book documents his trip and reveals the huge effect his visit had on Ireland.

    It is also a psychohistory about Eleanor and Franklin Roosevelt. Goodwin becomes a psychoanalyst, who delves into their childhood traumas, emotional lives, family relationships, and even their extra-marital affairs, to create an understanding of them as human beings.This study guide includes the following sections: Plot Summary, Chapter Summaries & Analysis, Characters, Objects/Places, Themes, Style, Quotes, and Topics for Discussion.

    This commemorative edition contains for the first time Seton's drawigns of American Indian motifs, a selection of photographs illustrating his life, information about his role as founder of the Boys Scouts of America.

    Now it is viewed as a major threat to the future of the Euro, indeed to the European Union as a whole. Italy's political system is shorn of credibility as it struggles to deal with huge public debts and anemic levels of economic growth. Young people are emigrating in droves, frustrated at the lack of opportunity, while older people stubbornly cling to their rights and privileges, fearful of an uncertain future.In this lively, up-to-the-minute book, Bill Emmott explains how Italy sank to this low point, how Italians feel about it, and what can be done to return the country to more prosperous and more democratic times. With the aid of numerous personal interviews, Emmott analyzes "Bad Italy"—the land of disgraced Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, an inadequate justice system, an economy dominated by special interests and continuing corruption—against its contrasting foil "Good Italy," the home of enthusiastic entrepreneurs, truth-seeking journalists, and countless citizens determined to end mafia domination for good.

    It is filled with quips and quotes that represent the Code of the West, like: "Always drink upstream from the herd" and "The easiest way to eat crow is while it's still warm. The colder it gets, the harder it is to swallow."

    There is no middle ground. It is the Church and kingdom of God or it is nothing."--LDS President Gordon B. Hinckley, April Conference, 2003. Many Mormons assume that this and other similar proclamations by Mormon Leaders are rhetorical statements. But what if the LDS leaders meant something else? It is estimated that more than 1-1.5 million Mormons have resigned from the LDS Church since 1995. This book exposes why there is such a recent, formal abandonment of Mormonism by, in many cases, previously devout members of the Church. Admittedly, the LDS Church "stands or falls," on the divinity of "The Book of Mormon." However, it has been proven that "The Book of Mormon" is not a translation of ancient American history engraved in "reformed Egyptian," on golden plates buried by an early American prophet. Instead, it has been shown to be a 19th-century work of fiction authored by Joseph Smith and perhaps others. Until the advent of widespread internet access, most members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Mormons, rarely read outside the strictly proscribed canonized scriptures, books and magazines approved by Church leaders. But over the past 10-15 years, Mormons have begun to discover facts about LDS history that had only previously been known to very few, mainly scholarly historians of Mormonism. Through the discovery of these primary historical sources, now available on numerous internet sites, most intelligent and curious Mormons have reached a critical point and are furious. If they read, they have become disaffected and disoriented. Many are experiencing existential crises. Those who refuse to look outside Mormon Society for Truth have become increasingly self-righteous and insular. The first third of "An American Fraud: One Lawyer's Case against Mormonism," chronicles the Author's journey out of the Religion. The second two-thirds of the Book, the last six chapters, are an exposé including an analysis under the law. The Author, an experienced civil trial attorney, places the activities of Mormon Leaders over almost two centuries in their proper legal framework, analyzing not only the misrepresentations, but the resulting damages: political, environmental and especially psycho-social. Ms. Burningham writes that a determination of whether Mormon Leaders have historically misrepresented the origins of LDS theology does not involve a judicial evaluation of the truth of religious beliefs and is therefore not beyond the reach of the American legal system--it is not constitutionally barred. The issue is not whether Jesus Christ is the Son of God, or the efficacy of prayer. These things could never be determined by a secular court of law. Instead, the fraud committed by generations of Mormon Leaders is that they have misrepresented the facts surrounding the source of their scriptures, presenting that source as divine, when they have known otherwise. Neither the golden plates, nor the writings by the Old Testament prophet, Abraham, claimed to have been inscribed on Egyptian papyri, ever existed. Furthermore, the claimed visitations by biblical apostles to restore lost priesthoods to Smith and his colleagues never occurred.  Yet for decades LDS leaders have at least ignored, if not suppressed and grossly misrepresented, the true facts surrounding Mormonism's origins, reworking and re-packaging the founding facts and the theology as necessary. Those who joined the Church or continued on in the Religion reasonably relied on LDS leaders' misrepresentations to their significant detriment. Given what has been proven about its sources, the Author claims that the Mormon Religion cannot continue to be defended under any guise as a religious organization for the good of its members.