5 comments about The Wrong Stuff: The Extraordinary Saga of Randy "Duke" Cunningham, the Most Corrupt Congressman Ever Caught.

1. The Wrong Stuff is a good read on a number of levels.
   
   It challenges our overuse of the word "hero" and forces us to be more discerning and skeptical about those we so readily put on pedestals. Apart from those few minutes over North Vietnam, a bit of luck combined with flying skill, there was nothing heroic about Duke Cunningham. Character flaws were evident in his youth. What he did in Congress should come as no surprise. As Sartre says, the end is in the beginning.
   
   The Wrong Stuff illustrates the need for political reform in campaign finance, the legislative process of earmarks, ethics and oversight. These are dry subjects, but by putting a face -- albeit a sad and corrupt one --on the subject, the authors have penned a readable, well-understood page-turner. They have made a complex issue understandable.
   
   And it is a good how-to book on journalism. Marc Stern broke the story by using good, old-fashioned news instinct born of experience first gained poking around the docks of the gritty Los Angeles port of San Pedro, then later the back hallways and rooms of Washington. He followed those instincts by working the phones, asking probing questions, pounding the pavement and not taking no for an answer. If you want a lesson on how to win a Pulitzer, which Stern did, this is a good place to start. He followed the Yogi Berra axiom: "You can see a lot just by looking."



2. I live in San Diego and bought this book at a street festival. Two of the authors (Marcus Stern and Dean Calbreath) were there and signed the book for me.
   
   The book describes the seemingly sudden fall of Congressman and war hero Randy Cunningham. I say "seemingly" because the authors show that his crimes were the logical extensions of a pattern of behavior based on the belief that he was above rules and laws that the rest of us follow.
   
   The book starts on Duke's best day: May 10, 1972. On that day he and Willie Driscoll shot down three enemy aircraft; this made them the first Navy Aces of the Vietnam War and they were awarded the Navy Cross. What few people knew about Duke was his demand that he be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. When he made this demand to his commanding officer, Ron McKeown, told him: "You ain't going to get the Medal of Honor. Here's what's going to go down: First, both of you are going to go get a haircut. Then you're going to get your blues cleaned and pressed with gold braid and make sure you've got a good shine on your shoes. And tomorrow, at ten o'clock, a grateful nation is going to heap its praise on two of its lofty heros and give you the Navy Cross. And you're going to accept them and be gracious and charming. Anything less than that and I will personally rip your [breasts] off."
   
   From there it's off to the races. Duke's life was nothing more than a series of these events leading to Congress where he had no Ron McKeown to reign him in. As a congressman he played up the war hero image to the max, even falsely claiming to be the inspiration of Tom Cruise in Top Gun. He also found that there were people who would slip money to him in return for awarding defense contracts and this seemed to have no limit.
   
   Duke's world started to fall apart when it was revealed that he sold his home for an inflated price to Mitchell Wade, a defense contractor who earned incredible profits from Duke's earmarks. Pulling this string began an avalanche of stories that even Duke's best efforts couldn't stop. My favorite story was his call to an antique store in Maryland. Mr. Wade bought several antiques for Duke and in a pathetic attempt to cover this Duke called the manager to "remind" her that when Wade paid for it with a credit card, Duke reimbursed Wade with cash. He insisted he paid Wade $35,000 but the manager (Sandra Ellington) wouldn't buy it saying that she would remember if he gave Wade 350 $100 bills.
   
   I liked the book and recommend it, but with two caveats. First, the book has 4 authors and it shows. They all have different writing styles and it makes the book choppy; they would have been well served if they had hired one editor to smooth over this and make the book easier to read. Second one of the authors (I'm not sure which) had a habit of making assumptions with nothing to back it up. In describing Duke's lifestyle between marriages he talked about Duke's evenings at the officer's club on base. "Cunningham...was no stranger to the police during these years. But these were different times, way before Mothers Against Drunk Driving and legislative crackdowns on drinking, long before the term 'designated driver' existed. And not many cops, either on or off the base, were about to arrest a man they knew was the Navy's only ace. Far better to just make sure he got home safely without hurting himself or others." The quotation is fine but gives no indication that Duke drove drunk or was pulled over. This would have had much more credibility if he had a quotation from a local cop who had pulled him over.
   
   That said, it's a good read about a man who believed he was untouchable.



3. Don't forget, Duke was using his influence and reputation as a war hero to steer defense contracts. He was stealing from the Armed Forces in time of war, a traitor to his country and his own men.
   
   Not only is Duke at the center of the Hookergate scandal, this ties into the US attorney scandal, as well as the indictment of Brent Wilkes and former CIA official Kyle "Dusty" Foggo. The Wilkes/Foggo debacle is apparently tied to bribery at the CIA. Google their names and "IranConta" to see how many of the characters in the Cunningham scandal go back to the Reagan adminsitration. Apparently the money laundring, drug running, and bribery network that started in the 80's took on a life of its own. While the Iraq war was still in the planning stages, they swarmed into DC and started bribing congressmen like Cunningham to get their cut of the Iraq pie in the form of sole source contracts.



4. The author's claim that Cunningham was a corrupt Congressman is true, but his claim that he is the "Most Corrupt Congressman Ever Caught" is not true. Congressman William Jefferson has been caught The FBI seized $90,000 in marked bills in Jefferson's home freezer. That cold cash is just the tip of the iceberg of the evidence against "Dollar Bill" Jefferson.
   There is a major difference between Cunningham and Jefferson. Cunningham was a brave and decorated combat pilot. By contrast, Jefferson did not serve in combat and may never have served in the military at all.
   This book is a one-sided hatchet job.



5. Lily Tomlin once said no matter how cynical you are, you can't keep up. Mostly, I've viewed Congress as corrupt in those small, corrosive and bipartisan ways: a campaign donation begets wording in a bill, a vote or a visit. But, the size and scale of Duke Cunningham's pocket-bulging corruption boggles the mind. It must be read to be believed. And, the authors carefully inserted an important qualifier in their subtitle: the Most Corrupt Congressman EVER CAUGHT. All of which makes you wonder: What happened to all those promised reforms on ethics and lobbying?

5 comments about Hugo Chavez: Oil, Politics, and the Challenge to the U.S..

1. Provides an alternative view of Chavez from that of our government and the corporate media. Chavez was elected and re-elected democratically by the Venezuelan people with strong majorities. If you believe in democracy--which some on the right claim to do--that should also season your opinion of Chavez. Nobody says that you have to like Chavez, but try being a little more accurate in your use of terms like "dictator."
   
   I found the book to be fairly informative. The author's adulation of Chavez was a little disconcerting at times. There is some degree of hagiography at work here. Also, the author does make some asides in his writing that really could be left out. The defeated conservative candidate for the Bolivian presidency is characterized as wearing a "red polo shirt." This is opposed to the native dress of the successful leftist candidate, who wears a more native costume. Some of these remarks could have been easily left out.
   
   Still, I agree with the author that globalization and US economic dominance of Latin America are not good things. The push for more regional autonomy for Latin America on the part of Chavez and other South American leadership makes a lot of sense in the long run. He who lives by Wall Street, quite literally, can die by Wall Street. "Fair trade" and justice for all. I also agree with the author that Chavez's attempts to alleviate the conditions of the Venezuelan poor are most admirable. His populist, "middle road" approach seems to me to make a great deal of sense.
   
   However, I would criticize the author for his seeming support of Chavez's position on supporting the growing of coca. If the coca were to be only used locally in Bolivia, Ecuador, etc. that is one thing. But this is the essential part of the multi-billion dollar cocaine trade out of Latin America. No US administration could fail to take actions against this trade. White liberal guilt should neither excuse or enable this trade. The production and promotion of cocaine is both criminal and morally bankrupt. I agree there need to be alternatives. But no one can sell me the line that this is the only activity that the poor of the Andes are capable of. If we cannot agree across political boundaries that hard drugs are not acceptable, I don't know what we can agree upon.



2. If mainstream news leaves you with more questions than answers, read this book. It's accurate and informative. Latin America is not full of crazy, misguided people as many of us here believe. If your a fan of right wing radio, you will no doubt hate this book, but anyone with a desire to learn will appreciate it.



3. This book is one of the worst books I have read in recent years.
   
   Nikolas Kozloff, a self-proclaimed anarchist, analyzes the history of Chavez through an inaccurate and self-important lense. Not only does this book contain numerous inaccuracies as to the Venezuela experience, some of the information presented is pure fabrication. The book reaches unsupported and absurd conclusions in an unabashed effort to glorify Chavez and undermine the United States and international organizations. Mr. Kozloff's propensity to use falacious logic is present throughout the entire book.
   
   I highly recommend against purchasing this book unless you want to understand the absolute garbage spewing forth from many quarters in an effort to promote totalitarian and abusive governments. While there are many valid arguments in today's world against the United States foreign policy, the IMF, the WTO, NAFTA, the FTAA, and other bodies and viewpoints, Mr. Kozloff's book does not contain any of them. Instead, this book chooses to set up an absurd straw man and to riddle its body with made up arguments.
   
   If you are looking for discussions of globalization in general, I refer you to such books as The World Is Flat and Runaway World: How Globalisation Is Reshaping Our Lives. If you are looking for books framed around Chavez, I would recommend looking as far from this book as possible.



4. Hugo Chavez, Oil Politics and the Challenge to the U.S. by Nikolas Kozloff lacks focus, is confusing and ultimately is not worth the time or effort to read. Kozloff is a senior research fellow for the Council on Hemispheric Affairs in Washington, D.C. who holds a Ph.D. in Latin American History from Oxford University and writes regularly on Venezuela. With these credentials I was expecting a solid, fact based, informative biography about the man who presides over Venezuela, but this book did not deliver on any account.
   
   The author freely expresses his leftist views throughout the book, which in turn skews him from providing any reader a real analytical view of Chavez and the programs and policies that he is implementing within Venezuela. More often than not Kozloff uses Chavez and his policies to discredit and attack the Bush Administration, while using unsupported claims, "the state owned oil company Petroleos de Venezuela Sociedad Anonima (PdVSA) entered into a joint venture with Science Applications International Corporation, (SAIC) to use SAIC contacts within the CIA to conduct sabotage and espionage in Venezuela," and plenty of leftist bias to make his points. For example, in chapter 4 Kozloff details his personnel involvement in organizing protest against the World Trade Organization, the International Monetary Fund, his association with London based anarchist and how he returned to Oxford and joined in the anti-capitalist May Day protests in London. Kozloff continually interjected his own experiences in Latin Amercia throughout the book which were irrelevant to Chavez, and contributed nothing but reinforcement of his leftist credentials.
   
   Kozloff does try to tackle the subject of how Chavez uses oil to leverage influence and as a weapon throughout Latin and North America. Kozloff would have done well to focus the book on this topic and how Chavez intends to use oil both domestically and internationally to achieve his stated goals.
   
   Kozloff fails to mention or discuss the repressive nature of Chavez or the effects of Chavez's stances against multinational corporations. Kozloff does spend a good deal of time outlining Chavez's policies towards indigenous peoples of the Andes region, but again he fails to make the case that what Chavez is doing is in the best interest of these people. Kozloff points out how Chavez is assisting the indigenous people of the Andes, but it is usually in the context of using them against the right leaning government of Columbia or against the U.S.
   
   Hugo Chavez, Oil, Politics and the Challenge to the U.S. offers the reader nothing with regards to Chavez and his domestic or international policies. I was looking for an expert biography about the man and his policies but, clearly this was not the book that would provide me with that insight. Do not read the book it is not worth the time or expense.



5. This book is an incredible piece of investigative work. Nikolas Kozloff delves deeper into critical issues than most other authors do by presenting vast background information on key players in historic events. Sometimes, however, he takes this a step too far and begins including little anecdotes from his personal experiences in Venezuela that resemble a memoir more so than an informative book. Also, he makes no attempt to hide his hatred for U.S. policies and often times his writing becomes rather noneducational and ridden with personal opinion. Some of the information included in the book at times comes from questionable sources that he seems to take at face value and presents as fact, such as information from Chavez's mouth itself. I personally feel that the book adds to the literature written on this subject by foreigners who enjoy the freedoms, civil liberties, and comforts of 1st world nations and who happen to find themselves in line with and interested in President Chavez's socialist experiment as long as they aren't the ones living under and being subjected to his policies. Nonetheless, the book is incredibly informative and with some filtering does give an excellent account the Venezuelan revolution and U.S. policy.

No comments about Ron Paul: A Life of Ideas.

No comments about Richard Nixon: Speeches, Writings, Documents (The James Madison Library in American Politics).

1 comments about Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the Making of Modern America (Library of American Biography Series) (Library of American Biography).

1. In his introduction, Allan Winkler states that this was a book that he had wanted to write for his entire academic career, a desire rooted both in his longtime interest in the era and his respect for other volumes in the Library of American Biography series. He goes on to cite two volumes in particular - Edmund Morgan's The Puritan Dilemma: The Story of John Winthrop (Library of American Biography) and John Morton Blum's Woodrow Wilson and the Politics of Morality (Library of American Biography) - as ones that particularly impressed him.
   
   Sadly, this book suffers by comparison to those earlier works. Part of the problem lies in Winkler's effort to grapple with the particulars of Franklin Roosevelt's life, one that included the longest presidency in American history, during which he lead the nation through the twin crises of the Great Depression and the Second World War. Such a career is filled with detail, and often Winkler seems overwhelmed by it all. All too often, the text degenerates into a litany of developments, with little overarching or explanatory analysis. Winkler's writing contributes to this, as he serves up standard prose containing no hint of the passion for his subject that he describes in his introduction.
   
   As a result, Winkler's book doesn't measure up to the lofty standards of the series set by the volumes he cites as his inspiration. Though not a bad work, it fails to capture its legendary subject, losing him instead in the minutiae of his career. Readers seeking an introduction to Franklin Roosevelt and who desire such details will not be let astray, but anyone seeking a greater sense of the man and his achievements would do well to look elsewhere.

5 comments about I Ain't Got Time to Bleed: Reworking the Body Politic from the Bottom up.

1. Jesse Ventura has had an interesting life, and he wants to tell you about it. He has been a US Navy SEAL, a professional wrestler, and surprisingly, a Governor of Minnesota.
   
   Ventura is a six feet four inches tall and has been an athlete for a long time. He seems to be physically imposing. However his autobiography makes him seem like an intellectual light weight. He became Governor as part of the Reform party. Ross Perot had caused a surge of interest in an alternative to the Democrats and Republicans.
   
   Despite having served as a Governor he offers us few political insights. We learn that there are too many laws, and that people need to be responsible for themselves. I don't think we needed Jesse for that. You would think a political outsider might be able to offer some fresh perspective. The only thing I found surprising about the book is that Ventura seems astonished by gotcha journalism. What did he expect?
   
   I was hoping for more. In the end there is nothing much to the book.



2. Jesse the Body had an unconventional career before being a politician, so he's able to take risks in disclosing his background and ideas in a manner very refreshing in today's political arena. Jesse starts with his background in the Navy, moves on to his life as a wrestler, and lastly the motivation behind his entrance into politics. The pop-autobiography shows a few more warts than most in the genre, perhaps due to Ventura's security with his persona and life. All in all it's a very fun ride!



3. The Jesse Ventura story is an example of the American Dream where an average man can push himself into places that he never would have thought that he would go.
   
   Ventura was a Navy SEAL in Vietnam, then became a professional wrestler, wrestling commentator, radio host, Mayor and then Governor of Minneapolis.
   
   Ventura writes pretty well and tells it the way he thinks it is (which is ok, everyone should have an opinion).
   
   Perhaps the only point that I would like to make is that it appears a very political book - not as in discussing politics (from which he makes some good points) but the rhetoric about not running for President. He mentions it a few times throughout the book, almost as if he wants us to think about him in the role and to start to generate support for the White House bid. It just seemed to me to be a little self-serving. That is a minor point though and could be just my imagination.
   
   All in all, a readable book and worth the time.



4. This work is written in a simple and uncomplicated conversational
   style. The author discusses the desirability of raising money
   modestly and the judicious use of television time in campaigning.
   Governor Ventura is in favor of term limits, legal reform,
   low taxes and the consumption tax. The beauty of the consumption
   tax is that it penalizes excess consumption and frivolous
   purchases. The author would have the government refund budget
   surpluses. In addition, people should not be driven off their
   land due to increasing tax valuations. New York's Harlem is
   becoming unaffordable to people who've lived there for generations.
   
   The author urges us to improve public education and basic
   literacy. He asks that we make math/science relevant and
   involve parents in the schooling process. Reduced class size
   and student work-study programs provide additional enhancements to the learning environment. The internet is a tremendous
   tool for learners according to the author.
   
   Ultimately, Americans are pioneers and visionaries. This is our
   basic strength as a country. To continue prospering, we should
   build upon these strengths.



5. The title of Jesse Ventura's memoir is taken from his famous line he delivered in the movie Predator. It is a great mantra for a former Navy SEAL, pro-wrestler, and man-of-the-people elected official. Once you get through the first chapter that explains Ventura's views on the issues of the day, the rest is an absorbing, humorous, truthful, and motivating memoir of a true tough guy who can put his money where his mouth is.
   
   Jesse tells all in this memoir. When he was a young man, he worked hard, and played hard. Drinking and sex are included here. My eyebrows went up a few times. It is clear he is not covering anything up in order to look squeaky clean.
   
   Anyone who reads this book will wish there were a million more Jesses holding political office, instead of the Democrat/Republican factory of career politicians who are addicted to power. I never seriously considered the validity or need for a third political party until I read this book.

5 comments about Fantastic: The Life of Arnold Schwarzenegger.

1. Arnold is without doubt one of the most influential human beings of the 21st century. Fantastic gives us a glimpse into the life of the man who on the face of things looks invincible. The book (and I pray it doesnt make things up) also gives readers a glimpse into arnolds kinder side. The oak has a heart.



2. my boyfriend is a huge arnold fan so he loves this book that i bought for him



3. this book is an objective and complete biography of Arnold Schwarzenegger.
   it tells the rise to fame and power from his childhood to his first year of governorship. After reading it, one must observe that succes in life depends not on luck, as many believe so, but on discipline, wilful ambition,drive and
   positive thinking followed by action.
   i recommend this book not only for arnold fans (it should be mandatory for them :) ) but to anyone who wants to get an insight into one of the most extraordinary success stories of our times
   Please excuse any language mistakes, i`m not a native english speaker



4. Larry Leamer's 'Fantastic' is fantastic. I couldn't put it down. It is amazing to learn that one human being, Arnold Schwarzenegger, built such an amazing life. Leamer catalogues this life in a readable, entertaining, objective way. If anyone wants to know what makes Arnold tick, this book will tell him.
   
   Marc H. Rudov
   Author
   The Man's No-Nonsense Guide to Women
   (ISBN: 978-0974501710)



5. As a big fan of Arnold I couldnt wait to buy this book.
   However as he is now a politician I feared it may be nothing but pro Arnold propangada as there is a future possibility of this man running for president. Instead I found a well written, interesting and honest account of the man who was born with nothing material but had bucketfulls of determination, ambition and confidence. The early accounts of Arnolds life are facinating and the book gives an honest account of how Arnold was far from the perfect man providing details of his gamesmanship and arrogance in bodybuilding contests and his days of womanising.
   Some people only knock this book because they despise the fact that Arnold won California. The facts are he is the greatest bodybuilder of all time, his movies while not oscar winners sold millions of cinema tickets and he did win California which was incredible. Love him or loathe him the mans a winner. My only knock against this book is that it contains too much political stuff and as I am from Spain im not very interested in American politics.

5 comments about Radical Son: A Generational Odyssey.

1. I had always been disappointed by the memoirs of political figures on the left because of their inability to reflect on themselves---to even attempt to understand why they had seen the world the way they had, and how their visions had affected who they were. I did not think this omission accidental. If radicalism was a displacement of personal grievance, it wasn't surprising that radicals could not confront their interior lives. "The Left, the author eventually realized, "lived by its radical myths, which were crucial to its sense of moral superiority, of being chosen as humanity's moral vanguard." "When I looked into myself, I saw how integral my radical views were to my sense of myself and the world around me." The above words, bereft of quotes, are not mine, incidentally, but the author's too, explaining why he wrote "Radical Son": "The collapse of this faith had been inseparable from the collapse of the life I had lived. I could not conceive of an autobiographical work that would not attempt to plumb this connection." Mr. Horowitz was the child of Communists, was inculcated into this faith, as it were. The real bounties his parents had achieved in America, the author states, hardly impressed them. "Success like theirs was so common that they took it for granted. What my family longed for," rather, he writes herein, "was an impossible fantasy: that mankind would be released from history, which included individual success and failure; their ambition was that poverty and inequality would disappear from the earth. To realize this fantasy they dedicated themselves to the Communist cause."
   
   Mr. Horowitz's parents were Jewish, and like Marx and Spinoza were "of Judaism but not in it" and whose outsider status had led to their revolutionary views."
   
   It's interesting moreover how many Marxist sympathizers were Jewish as well. It was believed by such folk that "Socialism would `solve' the Jewish question by eliminating Judaism, along with other ethnic and national identities." "What we had to ask ourselves,' Horowitz once explained at a public forum, "was whether Marx wasn't a self-hating Jew, and whether socialism was anything more than a wish to be included."
   
   "Fusion and unity---this was the cry of my father's Communist heart, writes the author herein, "His unquenchable longing to belong."
   
   For many years Mr. Horowitz was also a Communist, becoming eventually a prominent writer and figure of the 1960s Left, himself focusing as he did "on the issues of equality and freedom that once inspired [him] as a radical." Khrushchev's secret speech in 1956 shook many Communists, but Horowitz states that, at the time, "I was not sure what to make of it all. Monstrous crimes had been committed, and much else had gone terribly wrong. But did this mean it was necessary to abandon socialism? I was not ready for that," he writes herein. "The socialist vision provided the only way I knew of looking at the world that would distinguish right from wrong that gave hope for a better future. Socialism was the desire for justice. I did not see how I could give that up."
   
   So it wasn't surprising when he took another leap of faith when a "New Left" began forming out of the ashes of the old; participants like Horowitz, doing so, "out of the conviction that the original passion could be born again, and that we could create a new socialist vision free from the taint that Stalin had placed on the movement our parents had served."
   
   Interestingly, a lot of this generation, its leaders I'm speaking about specifically, were born in red diapers, that is, were born to members of the socialist vanguard that existed in the 1920s 1930s. Hence the commonplace phrase: "Like many radicals, he was a self-exiled son of the middle class."
   
   "He was a vociferous opponent of America's war in Vietnam and any American intervention anywhere. JFK was "an arch Cold warrior, a liberal agent of the imperial ruling class," in his view. He "harangued students about the dangers of radioactive fallout, and the dark forces in Washington that were leading us to `a universal grave.'" Horowitz was also an editor of "Ramparts," the magazine of the "New Left."
   
   But the Left didn't rise up because of the Vietnam issue. Rather, the author has a different take on this topic: "My speech illustrated the real importance of Vietnam to the radical cause, which was not ultimately about Vietnam but about our own antagonism to America, our desire for revolution. Vietnam served to justify the desire; we needed the war and its violent images to vindicate our destructive intentions."
   
   The arrival on the scene of an organization such as the Black Panthers reinforced this view. Mr. Horowitz knew these people and when asked by a Panther's member to suggest someone that could help a community center run by the Panthers manage their finances he recommended fellow leftist Betty Van Patter. Betty, some speculated later, asked too many questions about the Panthers' money and as a result disappeared. "When her body finally turned up and the future was no longer unknown, I,' admitted the author, "was forced to confront myself in a way I never had to before." "I had to understand my relation to this deed, this murder of innocence, committed by my political comrades." Because the Panthers "had been made the symbol of the revolution, they could not be condemned without negative consequences for everything we stood for and had said." "I had schooled myself in Hegel and Marx, and where had they led me? I had worshipped the gods of reason, and they had delivered me into the company of killers." "Until now, my political comrades had felt like a family I could trust. We had all been recruited from the same tribe of sentiment, raging with common indignation over the injustices we perceived, and sharing visions of a retribution that would make things right." "But a mother of three, who was also one of us, had been murdered by people we knew." "There were dozens, if not hundreds, of activists with direct links to the Party...who were aware of what happened to Betty. Yet no one came forward." "This silence was more than unusual for people who normally felt compelled to protest injustices---even those that took place at the far ends of the earth." But for Betty "there was only silence." "The incident had no usable political meaning, and was therefore best forgotten."
   
   "We thought of ourselves as self-effacing, but in fact we were arrogant. We regarded ourselves as better than others from our privileged caste who were unwilling to perform the deeds we did. That was why we didn't listen and couldn't see. Like all radicals, we were intoxicated by our own virtue."
   
   And what about the media, why didn't they investigate this murder, or other murders by the Black Panthers? Or expose the issue of who filled the jails of Cuba, or Russia? Well, because, as the author eventually realized there exists an odd operating principle within the Left: "The responsibility of progressive journalists was to suppress facts that hurt the progressive cause, and to print only those truths that served it."
   
   Thus Jimmy Carter's "decision, in 1979, to let the Sandinistas take power in Nicaragua without American intervention" was cheered by journalists and those on the Left in general, but not by Mr. Horowitz. When it came time to choose between Walter Mondale and Ronald Reagan in 1984 (another Orwellian moment, this time in Nicaragua) the author had had enough, and voted for the first time in his life for a Republican, this while a new generation was organizing "solidarity committees" to support the Sandinistas. It was one thing to support Castro when he promised everything under the sun for Cuba but, unlike other Leftists, Mr. Horowitz couldn't continue to support Castro after it was apparent to all but the blind that "Cuba had been transformed into a totalitarian state, its economy ruined by socialist plans, its jails filled with political dissenters." "Nor was the tragedy of Cuba unique. Every socialist state created by Marxists had been transformed into an economic sinkhole and a national prison. There were no exceptions."
   
   And the Sandinistas were Marxist protégés of Castro, after all "This time, "he posited, "I could not plead ignorance of what was going to happen if radicals had their way."
   
   Having watched history unfold he came to the view "that socialists had contrived to demonstrate by bloody example what everyone else already knew: Equality and freedom are inherently in conflict. This was really all that socialist efforts had shown, over the dead bodies of millions of people. In talent, intelligence, and physical attributes, individuals were by nature different and unequal; consequently, the attempt to make them equal could only be achieved by restricting---ultimately eliminating---their individual freedom." He reflected on his own children: "The four children we had spawned were all so different in character and disposition that they posed a challenge to my radical worldview. The belief that environment shaped human destinies, and that therefore human character could be molded in some fundamental way, was essential to all utopian schemes. You could not change the world if you could not change the people in it."
   "Socialism could not even achieve the general welfare that its adherents promised. Socialist efforts to create economic equality invariably led, in practice, to the imposition of poverty on society as a whole, because socialism destroyed the incentives to produce. There were entire socialist libraries devoted to the confiscation and division of existing wealth, but not a single article on how people were motivated to create wealth. Socialists did not know how to make a society work. That was the lesson of the Communist debacle, which the Left had refused to learn. "The revolutionary failures of the Twentieth Century had demonstrated the wisdom of the American founding, and validated its tenets: private property, individual rights, and a limited state."
   
   "The idea of original sin---that we are born flawed, that the capacity for evil is lodged within us (no matter how our consciousness may be raised)---would have instilled in me a necessary caution about individuals like Huey Newton, [of the Blank Panthers] and movements like ours."
   
   "If evil was a choice that any individual could make, then human beings would always pose a danger to each other, and there could be no `withering away of the state'. There would always be a need for law above individuals, for police to enforce the law, and for prisons to contain those who broke it." After all, "how could we dispense with `bourgeois' law, the best system of rules and institutions yet devised to protect individuals from the predations of their government and each other?"
   
   Horowitz, because of this book and his outspokenness, has been demonized for having had second thoughts and has been subjected to savage personal attacks by his former comrades. The "problem" is that the world "is (and must remain) forever imperfect. The refusal to come to terms with this reality is the heart of the radical impulse and accounts for its destructiveness, and thus for much of the bloody history of our age."
   
   Mr. Horowitz includes several pages of personal photographs in "Radical Son." The last page of these, interestingly, shows Mr. Horowitz with his mom, a picture of his dad alone (indicative of his lack of personal closeness with his father perhaps), and a photo of the author receiving an award from Ronald Reagan in 1991. In a way, the pictures seem to suggest the author's life; an estrangement and lack of closeness with his Marxist father, a father who never gave him his approval; a Marxist mother who eventually put family before politics; and finally, the individual, happy to accept a teaching award from a retired American president, that the author himself ultimately became.
   
   Thereafter he "become involved...with the idea of doing something of immediate benefit for people in the community." "I was tired," said he, "of pouring energy into grand abstractions like `the revolution,' and longed to see my efforts lead to practical results."



2. I wish I had read this years ago! As cultural history, Radical Son is as monumental as the Diary of Anne Frank - but Horowitz' autobiography is a literary masterpiece in its own right. Most importantly, Radical Son is one of the few honestly historical accounts of the campus movement that changed America from the inside out - and left Marxism as the official religion of our universities.
   
   If you wonder what our current presidential candidates mean when they call themselves "progressive" - then you really, REALLY need to read this book.



3. It falls short of classic, but frankly this is one of the most mind-altering things I've ever read. It's the closest I've ever gotten into the mind of a conservative (I'm a proud center-liberal), and it makes utterly believable a thesis I would have formerly thought ridiculous: that the bases for modern liberal thought, that universal human unity is necessary in order to avoid environmental or nuclear extinction, are lies manufactured by homegrown agents of Soviet Communism who populate modern journalism and academia.
   
   Horowitz never explicitly makes this claim, and that is the supreme flaw of the book. He leads you convincingly enough through his disillusionment with 60's student radicalism, and presents a detailed case that its roots lie with children of communists, like Horowitz himself. His account of the Black Panthers and the experience that would become his turning point make riveting reading. But, as others have pointed out, the narrative breaks down toward the end of the book. I was with him up to the point where he is coming to an acceptance of the inevitable persistence and humanity of markets, hierarchies, inequalities, etc. But the path out of the center left to the far right pronouncements of the latter third of the book is frustratingly spotty. The incendiary David Horowitz of Front Page Mag. fame pops up infrequently delivering party line zingers almost out of nowhere.
   
   This is especially frustrating for me, as Horowitz' growing fascination with the right during the 80's and 90's parallels a time when my parents were moving away from Reagan toward the left as they felt the growing influence of the similarly radical (as Horowitz admits) Goldwater republican movement. The appeal that this movement would have for Horowitz is strangely missing from the book. Horowitz briefly but memorably recounts the rebirth and justification of his firebrand rhetorical style, but doesn't expound on the conviction behind his latest ravings. He mentions authoritarian puritanical goons within the conservative movement, and never really retracts those statements, but, if they are really goons, why does he not distance himself from them? It's almost like a Straussian secret writing. So either he's paid or threatened to write his current outrageous stuff, OR
   
   ... and here I assume the thesis above. Horowitz ignores most of the arguments of the contemporary left, because they inevitably originate in an international community of academics and journalists who want America to be a socialist state simply because they grew up sons and daughters and friends of communists. The thing is, he might just be correct... and from now on, my life is going to be dedicated to finding out. If he isn't correct, I hope he lives long enough to be jarred once more out of a beautiful political dream.



4. A fascinating biography by a former radical Marxist who saw the light and became one of the most superb conservative commentators of our time. Horowitz started having second thoughts about Marxism when a female colleague was murdered by other Marxists in the San Francisco bay area. The book covers Horowitz transition in gripping detail. Few write about the left like Horowitz does because few know the left like he does. A 'do not miss' read...



5. This biography of a 1960's new left radical traces his journey from idealism's promise to its ugly reality. Born in 1939 and raised by communist parents his early years were surrounded by an ideology that permeated every aspect of his life. His transformation from his leftist past to Conservatism came at great struggle over many years. Rarely is an individual given to such total introspection, that he is able to see the self delusion and denial of reality that had motivated his political life since the beginning.
   
   Horowitz' life grabs the reader with its intensity of feeling, drawing the reader into the emotions of disillusionment and guilt, fear, and failure. Through years of working with the Black Panthers, questioning the dichotomy between what was claimed and what was really happening, brought him to an awakening. He began to see that Socialism, what the new left was calling Progressive or Liberal, was not compatible with freedom. He realized that it can only be sustained by totalitarianism because it is contrary to human nature. This new understanding had been growing in him but it was a monstrous event that provided the final jarring reality that broke his attachment to an ideology that was nothing but a lies and empty idealism.
   
   Horowitz torturous journey will stir the reader to empathy, understanding, and appreciation for a man with great courage. He goes through the fire of self-recrimination, to a place where he had to let go of all his previous beliefs and admit that he and his entire social, political, and career community had been wrong. The reader will also admire his courage to stand up against the hate, the criticism, the threats, and the attempts to destroy him from his former colleagues. He is an extraordinary human being. I highly recommend this book.

5 comments about Disturbing the Peace: The Story of Father Roy Bourgeois and the Movement to Close the School of Americas.

1. I began James Hodge's and Linda Cooper's "Disturbing the Peace" (2005, 244-page paperback) with high expectations. This chronicle of Father Roy Boureois' movement to close the US Military's "School of the Americas" promised to be a riveting narrative, in the genre of Oscar Romero, for advocacy and activism. As a Liberation Theology enthusiast (and advocate for the poor) myself, I relished the opportunity to learn from a colleague's experience. With the book's conclusion, however, only one word describes my encounter with this text- disappointing.
   
   The padre's odyssey to re-form government policy and actions is sometimes astonishing, often pedantic, and always interesting. For him, there is redemption and recognition in rebellion against his demons.
   
   Father Boureois is a product of his era's two extremes influences: his US Navy participation in the Viet Nam War and his Roman Catholic Liberation Theology religious training. These opposing, and sometimes polarizing, positions brought him to activism for the poor and oppressed. His story is brilliantly captivating, convincing, and converting! Perhaps, there is redemption in rebellion.
   
   The book is written with seventeen short chapters, fifteen pages of relevant black and white photos, but with only a brief six-page bibliography. It is disappointing that the text contains no footnotes or endnotes (causing it to earn fewer stars). Hodge and Cooper should remember that undocumented history is nothing more than novel fiction. Without retraceable source referencing one does not confidently believe presented material. Father Boureois' story deserves better.
   
   "Disturbing the Peace", as a quick read novel, is cautiously recommended to everyone interested in late 20th century American activism, anti-war advocacy, modern central and south American life, and Liberation Theology.



2. Maryknoll Father Roy Bourgeois is a further example of the US repression of our religious expression.
   
   When Bob Dole went to Nicaragua for a Nixon-style Kitchen debate with freely and fairly elected Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega prior to the 1984 US elections, Dole accused the Nicaraguan government of religious repression. President Ortega, accompanied by hisministers of foreign relations and of education and of culture, Fathers Ernesto Cardenal, his Jesuit brother, and Maryknoll Father Miguel D'Escoto, pulled out a photograph of Father Roy Bourgeois being arrested and dragged away by US military forces at Fort Benning Georgia. This spelled the end of Bob Dole's presidential aspirations and political carreer, to be replaced with an interesting advertising endorsement.
   
   On the other hand the Reverend Father Roy has never wavered from his carreer and his commitment to preaching and to living the Gospel of Peace and Justice in Jesus Christ, with orthodoxy through orthopraxis, to the final consequences, running ever bravely in the footsteps of Our Lord. He remains strong in opposing those assassins of his own Maryknoll brothers and sisters like Bill Woods, and as on the cover here, Maryknoll Sister Ita Ford, killers and generals trained and directed from the SOA in terrorism, torture and homicide, who did not flinch from killing even the greatest prophet, martyr and saint of the Americas, Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero.
   
   Father Roy finds his duty and obligation as Catholic, as priest, as true follower of Jesus Christ, to call to stop the killing and oppression, the torture and genocide. Father Roy never fails to stnad tall as a true prophet of Peace and of Jesus Christ. Let us learn by his holy example to do as well, for as long, in life-long commitment to peace, justice and the Gospel of Jesus Christ in its fullest daily, courageous expression.
   
   Read this book. Every Christian must read this book. All Americans must read this book. Each Catholic must embrace this book as lectio divina, as our own hagiography, as manual and rulebook of how to live as Catholics under this present military regime, courageously, integrally, standing up for peace and for Jesus Christ in our darkened and bloody day.
   
   Read this book before you judge him or stand with those who condemned Jesus Christ before the Sanhedrin. Father Roy is a great man, a great Catholic, an excellent priest, and a fine American, the kind we truly most need for our national moral and ethical recovery.
   
   Please read as well School of Assassins: The Case for Closing the School of the Americas and for Fundamentally Changing U.S. Foreign Policy, Ita Ford: Missionary Martyr, Witnesses to the Kingdom: The Martyrs of El Salvador and the Crucified Peoples, Rigoberta Menchu, Salvador Allende, General Noriega, ARENA in El Salvador, the contra, etc., etc., etc.



3. Disturbing the Peace is a compelling story of a cleric who has dedicated his life to waging what some might call a quixotic battle against the highest military and political forces of the United States. These same forces look away from the evil they have wrought in other lands, specifically Latin America, and in American-run jails in Iraq.
   These evils, thanks to the machinations of the School of the Americas, include torture, murder, rape, and pillage. The school, costing Americans millions of dollars to maintain at Ft. Benning, Ga., is at the center of Bourgeois' relentless crusade. Bourgeois, who as a young man of the Louisiana bayoulands had beauteous Cajun mademoiselles at his beck and call and almost married one, chose the priesthood after heroic service and a Purple Heart in Vietnam. Following discharge, Bourgeois was appalled at America's foreign policy, which fawned upon megalomaniacal foreign dictators and which gave rise to the founding of the School of the Americas.
   This is no Bush-bashing book. Presidents of recent years have all contributed to the shameful institution that teaches young foreign soldiers how to commit the most nefarious crimes, then sends them back home to put into practice what they have been taught on American soil by American teachers.
   Item: Dismembering a 55-year-old woman with a chainsaw.
   Item: Torturing a priest before throwing him out of a high-flying helicopter.
   Item: Killing an archbishop, priests, and nuns in cold blood.
   Bourgeois and his followers have served time in jail and have had their lives threatened over their never-ending crusade to close down this inhumane cancer of the American military. Irony aside, the subject of this insightful, provocative biography is a modern Thomas Paine in clerical garb, indefatigably fighting for justice everywhere and against tranny in his own country.



4. The one thing that stands out the most about this book for me is that this priest was only standing for truth, freedom and justice. Yet the one country that he fought for during the Vietnam War prosecuted him for these beliefs. So much suffering in the world today is simply based on greed. One country trying to profit by controlling the government and natural resources of a smaller, weaker country.That is really what it is all about and the truth is there as long as we do not turn a blind eye as we did on Father Roy Bourgeois. Too many people today simply do as they are told and believe what they hear. You should read this book because the greatest threat facing the world is not knowing or ignoring the truth and sadly the world will continue to suffer at the hands of a few powerful people if we do not open our eyes.



5. This book inspires and educates while still being a page-turner. Roy Bourgeois is a purple heart Vietnam veteran who became a Maryknoll missionary priest. He has been in and out of Latin American countries and in and out of prison as he fights for social justice. In his struggle he discovers the now infamous School of the Americas - Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation at Fort Benning, GA. This school has trained the hemisphere's worst human rights violators. This book skillfully weaves Fr. Roy's story with that of the School of the Americas leaving the reader uplifted by the courage of a man and a movement and appalled by the secret teaching of torture and anti-democracratic use of force. Great read!

5 comments about My Past and Thoughts.

1. There is no question that it is good to have this edition of Alexander Herzen's autobiography, "My Past and Thoughts," though it is considerably abridged. The work is deservedly praised as one of the great autobiographies of the West. Well written and colorful, it acquaints us with the mind and spirit of one of the most important political figures of the nineteenth century. Herzen, darling of radicals and nemesis of conservatives (wrongly, I believe), is a seminal thinker and activist of his time.
   Herzen, a Russian by birth but an internationalist in spirit, knew most of the radicals of the era, Bakunin, Mazzini, Garibaldi, Louis Blanc. Yet he was in a way not one of them. He was too hardheaded and too reasonable--he knew what worked and what didn't. Raised in autocratic Russia, he had experienced prison, exile--and fame as a writer.
   This edition has been abridged by Dwight MacDonald, unfortunately leaving out some crucial parts, for example his relations with his wife, Natalie, and other more domestic issues. However, the original appeared in five volumes, and something had to be excised to make this edition manageable. Those who wish to read the complete autobiography should look up the Knopf four-volume edition of 1968. Nonetheless, this edition will do for most of us. It's a gem.
   
   Philip Brantingham
   Chicago, IL



2. One finds oneself drawn to Herzen. He comes off as urbane, generous, strong, empathetic to those suffering under the Tsar (and all tyrannies), dedicated to the cause of bringing freedom to his homeland and a wonderful writer. He seems to have known, or at least bumped into, all the luminaries of the Russia and the Europe of his time.
   
   This abridgement by Dwight McDonald, dating I believe from 1968, is of its time. The editor tells us that he excised those portions of the narrative dealing with Herzen's marriage, his wife's affair with a close friend of Herzen's, the loss of his mother and son in the sinking of a passenger boat and the death of his wife shortly thereafter. I wish that material had been included. I suppose an abridgement done in 2007 might include only those portions and nothing else, as we have less high seriousness and more interest in scandal and tragedy. In any case, I would have loved to read Herzen on these more personal topics.
   
   I should add that it may be my spotty background in 19th Century European history but I was lost any number of times as I read. Herzen is telling us about contemporary men, events, controversies and schools of thought. There are numerous footnotes identifying the people he refers to but I needed more--no doubt the references would have been understood by any educated reader at the time but that was then.
   
   That said, I'm glad I made the effort and I wish I could have met him.



3. In the years before Lenin and the harsh, bleak application of socialist thought to autocracy there existed a group of philosophers who believed in the beauty of the commune and its cooperation with a Republican government. Britain had Robert Owen and his factory town, the French had Fourier (the phalanstery) and Proudhon among others, and the Russians had Herzen. Here existed a time where the leading academics saw folly in violent revolution, and Herzen was by no means a demogogue willing to mobilize the Russian peasants in a siege of Moscow like a simple Pugachev or a Decembrist.

   This perhaps explains Herzen's stern dislike of Marx and Engels, for he saw too much of the Robespierre in them and their ideas.

   Herzen believed in democracy almost in a modern American sense. Indeed, much of the work is laced with arguments in disfavor to the flowering of socialism in Europe, citing particularly the cruelty of the police in France during 1848: "The Latin world does not like freedom, it only likes to sue for it." Certainly the tendencies of the Germans were no more progressive either. Instead at one point in the text the author suggests that those who "can put off from himself the old Adam of Europe and be born again a new Jonathan had better take the first steamer to some place in Wisconsin or Kansas."

   The selections and abridgement of the text emphasize Herzen's basic belief about reform: revolution is gradual. One has to breed engrained stupidity out of the ruling class and make laws that better everyone, like the English and Americans. Laws make a better society, not people: "The Englishman's liberty is more in his institutions than in himself or his conscience. His freedom is the 'common law.'"

   The text covers the demise of Herzen, culminating in his rejection on his deathbed by the new revolutionary ("terrorist") camps in Russia, headed ideologically by Chernyshevsky and best seen in the widespread incendiary and murderous practices of Sergei Nechaev. These are all topics of the years after Herzen's death, the tragic history of the latter half of the nineteenth century and the prelude to the pall of 1917.




4. Herzen is one of the many authors whom Americans never are exposed to and rightfully should be. He was a great thinker; he writes lucidly (although tending toward personal speculation.... you've got to remember-- he was living at a similar time to Tolstoy who does the same thing....) and CAN BE surprisingly contemporary for someone so long dead....

   It's understandable why Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, and Solzenitzen (sp?) are much more widely read than he is: they are better novellists and never got cursed by the fact that they were socialists (such a dirty word in the US!) BUT, Herzen is definately someone whom anyone trying to pawn themselves off as a psuedo-intellectual should read.

   One problem with this book: some of his best stuff is obviously just not in here (as it is his memoirs....) His philosophy is brilliant; some of his letters to his son are as moving as any I can think of (excepting perhaps Rilke's to the young poet...)

   His memoirs are a definate must-read.... for whomever is reading this review.... Just buy the book!




5. A worthwile read for anyone with an interest in 19th century history - or Russian thought. Herzen's narrative begins with Napoleon's retreat from Moscow and winds on through Nichlos II's reign to the larger events of Napoleon the III's Europe. At times a witty and fascinating account of both Russia and Europe during a crucial era, Herzen occasionally drifts off into somewhat tedious personal speculation.