While politics is serious, after a long and divisive presidential political campaign season, many would just like all the politicians and the news media that encourages them to foam at the mouth to just shut up and go away. This interactive book is meant just for fun and could just as well be titled "The Complete Book of Democratic Wisdom and Knowledge.

In The Concept of Justice, Patrick Burke explores and argues for a return to traditional ideas of ordinary justice in opposition to conceptions of 'social justice' that came to dominate political thought in the 20th Century. Arguing that our notions of justice have been made incoherent by the radical incompatibility between instinctive notions of ordinary justice and theoretical conceptions of social justice, the book goes on to explore the historical roots of these ideas of social justice. Finding the roots of these ideas in religious circles in Italy and England in the 19th century, Burke explores the ongoing religious influence in the development of the concept in the works of Marx, Mill and Hobhouse. In opposition to this legacy of liberal thought, the book presents a new theory of ordinary justice drawing on the thought of Immanuel Kant. In this light, Burke finds that all genuine ethical evaluation must presuppose free will and individual responsibility and that all true injustice is fundamentally coercive.

Fourteen young Americans, fourteen stories... The face of Conservatism is changing, and these fourteen young Americans share their personal stories about what it means to be a young conservative. From former Liberals to first-generation Americans, they've each taken different roads, held different beliefs, prioritized different issues, and lived their lives in different ways. Yet each chose conservatism as the best way to protect their freedom. "Young, Conservative, and Why it's Smart to be like Us" offers an exciting glimpse of the future of conservatism with witty, serious, insightful, practical, pointed, and sometimes touching stories about what conservatism means to each author personally and politically. Chapters by Allen Ginzburg, Brady Cremeens, Brandon Morse, Dina Fraioli, Dan Webb, Erin Brown, Gabriella Hoffman, Kate Shaw, Kevin Eder, Liberty Betts, Liz Thatcher, Liz Wheeler, Mary Chastain, R.J. Moeller

The Logic of Classical Liberalism: Ethics, Society & Economics is a short, precise handbook which is an excellent introduction to the ideas of venerable classical liberalism (or simply liberal thought as it known in Europe). It reveals the moral bankruptcy of socialism, and illustrates the fundamental morality of a modern society composed of liberal individuals. As the author Jacques de Guenin writes, "Liberalism is based entirely upon the idea of individual freedom. All the other concepts commonly attached to liberalism, such as responsibility, the respect for life, and property, follow from it by a rigorous logic." This book leads the reader through all the power and consistency of (classical) liberalism on a number of subjects from basic morality and life in society to economics. A must read for all those who are concerned with and cherish the fundamental basics of individual liberty and responsibility, and abhor the pathology of socialism and Marxism.Web Site: TheLogicOfClassicalLiberalism.com.

Republicans have proven adept at getting middle-class voters to vote against their own pocketbooks. George W. Bush and his advisors promised economic growth, jobs and an ownership society but delivered a housing finance bubble, Wall Street profits fueled by fraud, a recession, budget deficits, low economic growth, massive job losses and upward transfers of middle-class wealth.

In Fools and Knaves, author Howard Green explores both the short-term and long-term effects of Republican-controlled government on the nation. When the Republicans left town, they handed the tab for clean-up to taxpayers and then obstructed every effort to repair the economy that they broke. What s more, they now favor cuts to government programs for the poor, government shutdowns, and threats of credit default. The financial crisis of 2007 was no accident; it flowed from GOP policies that were intended to benefit the 1 percent as well as themselves. Republicans succeeded beyond their wildest dreams, and today the wealthiest among us pocket virtually all the gains associated with the rebuilding of our economy. Meanwhile, the middle-class suffers home foreclosures, job losses, and reductions in real income.

Fools and Knaves makes it clear that while appealing largely to social conservatives and older, white, blue-collar voters, Republicans make promises to the middle class but actually deliver results only to the wealthy. Everyone else especially those who are younger, better educated, female, and from minority households is now getting the message: Republicans have nothing to offer them."

Fiorello LaGuardia is known best as the tempestuous mayor of New York City in the days when Franklin Delano Roosevelt sat in the White House. There had been, however, an earlier time, which matched his mayoralty years in sheer drama and perhaps surpassed them in lasting achievement-LaGuardia's years in Congress.

He served in the House of Representative almost continuously from 1917 to 1933, representing two ethnically diverse congressional districts: the Fourteenth (Greenwich Village), from 1917 to 1919, and the Twentieth (East Harlem), from 1923 to 1933. Although barred from important committee posts because of his political independence and thus denied from playing a direct role in lawmaking, he was a tireless and vocal champion of Progressive causes, from allowing more immigration and removing U.S. troops from Nicaragua to speaking up for the rights and livelihoods of striking miners, impoverished farmers, oppressed minorities, and struggling families. A goad to the era's plutocrats and their enablers in government, LaGuardia fought for progressive income taxes, greater government oversight of Wall Street, and national employment insurance for workers idled by the Great Depression.

In this book, first published by Cornell University Press in 1959, Howard Zinn establishes LaGuardia's tenure in Congress as a vital link between the Progressive and New Deal eras, offering a lively and informative account of his many legislative battles, his political philosophy, and the distinctly urban (specifically, New York City) sensibilities he brought to the Progressive movement.

If you were offered the chance at total freedom from taxes and total freedom from government in your life, would you take it? Our widely-held faith in the free market leads many to believe that government is the problem. If we could only get the government to stop interfering in our economy and in our lives, then market forces would solve so many of the problems plaguing us today. While politicians only continue to offer the fantasy of ending government through government (i.e., vote for me and I'll cut government programs), this book proposes a simple, realistic plan called the Total Freedom Act that will make it possible to live the libertarian, free market ideal. Love It or Leave It cuts right through the endless and tiresome culture war by holding ideology up to the mirror of reality. America is stuck in an endless cycle of debate about whether government is too socialist or not socialist enough and whether it is a force for positive change or our worst enemy. But sometimes a simple idea can change everything. The Total Freedom Act ends this debate with a plan to bring our highest ideals to life and restore true freedom in America. Mark Manney presents the idea that ends government as the problem.

Volume 11 of the "Conservative and Libertarian Thinkers" series focuses on Robert Nozick and his work on libertarianism. In 1974, Robert Nozick's book "Anarchy, State, and Utopia" moved libertarianism from a relatively neglected subset of political philosophy to the center of the discipline, as one of the most cogent critiques of social democracy and egalitarian liberalism. Nozick developed a rights-based account of libertarianism to show that a minimal state can legitimately arise, that nothing more than a minimal state is justified, and that the minimal state is not only morally right, but can also be an inspiring 'meta-utopia'. This volume presents Nozick's contributions to political philosophy in the context of his work in analytical philosophy. It also provides a biography of Nozick and considers the initial reception and long-term influence of his work. "Major Conservative and Libertarian Thinkers" provides comprehensive accounts of the works of seminal conservative thinkers from a variety of periods, disciplines, and traditions - the first series of its kind. Even the selection of thinkers adds another aspect to conservative thinking, including not only theorists but also writers and practitioners. The series comprises twenty volumes, each including an intellectual biography, historical context, critical exposition of the thinker's work, reception and influence, contemporary relevance, bibliography including references to electronic resources, and an index.

When the federal government starts to provide the American citizens with facts about what they are doing instead of making decisions that they believe are best for the common folk. The pathetic part is that the President and Congress for the most part do not listen to what the American citizen is telling them. When we make every member accountable we will be starting the process of ""Taking Back America"." The citizens of the United States need to express our opinions to the representatives of our local districts and make sure that they understand we will not be voting for them in 2012 if they do not start acting in the best interest of the people. Could it be that the reason that the main stream media is always backing the Democrats and the unions is because they are union shops. That is correct. The main stream media are union shops and therefore are usually biased in their reporting in favor of the Democrats and the unions. This sure explains some of their very biased articles.

A "Kirkus Reviews" Best Book of 2012
From the author of "-Isms and -Ologies" and "Cults, Conspiracies, and Secret Societies," here is a deeply researched, fascinating history of the role that organized hatred has played in American politics. "The New Hate "takes readers on a surprising, often shocking, sometimes bizarrely amusing tour through the swamps of nativism, racism, and paranoia that have long thrived on the American fringe. Arthur Goldwag shows us the parallels between the hysteria about the Illuminati that wracked the new American Republic in the 1790s and the McCarthyism that roiled the 1950s, and he discusses the similarities between the anti-New Deal forces of the 1930s and the Tea Party movement today. He traces Henry Ford's anti-Semitism and the John Birch Society's "Insiders" back to the notorious "Protocols of the Elders of Zion," and he relates white supremacist nightmares about racial pollution to nineteenth-century fears of papal plots.
Written with verve and wit, this lively history is indispensible reading for anyone who wants to understand the recent re-ascendance of extremism in American politics.

This thesis examines the reception of Thucydides' History of the Peloponnesian War in US foreign policy debates since the end of the Cold War. It begins with a background survey of Thucydides' use in foreign policy debates up to and during the Cold War, primarily by the realist school of international relations, and the comparisons which were drawn between the Cold War and the Peloponnesian War. After the Cold War, these comparisons became less relevant to current debates, and critics of realism began to use Thucydides to support their own theories. The emphasis is on how the three key movements since the Cold War, realism, liberal internationalism and neoconservatism, have each seen aspects in Thucydides' writing to admire and utilise for their theories, at the same time building competing interpretations of key sections from Thucydides' History. At the same time, as well as drawing abstract theories from Thucydides, analysts have also drawn historical parallels between the present and the Peloponnesian War in a creative process which results in modern states playing different ancient roles depending upon the context. I show that Thucydides' text lends itself particularly well to such recycling due to the author's tendency to highlight complex tensions without providing explicit authorial 'answers'.

This book offers an original interpretation of the achievement of Leo Strauss, stressing how his ideas and followers reshaped the American conservative movement. The conservative movement that reached out to Strauss and his legacy was extremely fluid and lacked a self-confident leadership. Conservative activists and journalists felt a desperate need for academic acceptability, which they thought Strauss and his disciples would furnish. They also became deeply concerned with the problem of 'value relativism', which self-described conservatives thought Strauss had effectively addressed. But until recently, neither Strauss nor his disciples have considered themselves to be 'conservatives'. Contrary to another misconception, Straussians have never wished to convert Americans to ancient political ideals and practices, except in a very selective rhetorical fashion. Strauss and his disciples have been avid champions of American modernity, and 'timeless' values as interpreted by Strauss and his followers often look starkly contemporary.

Since the dawn of the Enlightenment, modernity and the Papacy have experienced a difficult though never severed relationship. The Modern Papacy goes beyond the caricatures to demonstrate how the popes - specifically John Paul II and Benedict XVI - have articulated a sophisticated critique of the post-Enlightenment world, one that acknowledges the real progress made in modernity while simultaneously highlighting its political and philosophical shortcomings. Far from falling on deaf ears, the nature of their engagement with the modern world has sparked criticism and praise from Catholics and non-Catholics alike - sometimes in surprising ways. Whether the subject is faith and reason, religion and the modern sciences, the roots and future of Europe, or the origin and ends of human freedom, John Paul II and Benedict XVI pose questions that simply cannot be ignored, regardless of whether one likes their answers.

LIBERTARIANISM by John Hospers The Original Book that Inspired the Worldwide Political Movement John Hospers on What Libertarianism Is: 1) No one is anyone else's master, and no one is anyone else's slave. 2) Other people's lives are not yours to dispose of. 3) No human being should be a non-voluntary mortgage on the life of another. Dr. Hospers sees these as three versions of the same absolute right of personal liberty. In other words, assuming we are talking about mentally-able individuals, no person can make their life better by reducing the liberty of another person. For the same reason that slavery is wrong, it is equally wrong to involuntarily deprive others of their time or money. The basic human rights of life and liberty cannot exist without a right to property. The benefits I create for myself are MINE, and to take them away (or to make me work for another's benefit without my consent) is wrong. RIGHTS are ONLY to be understood as involving duties of forbearance or restraint. In other words, so-and-so's right to property is nothing more than the duty that others have to refrain from taking that property for themselves. Rights belong naturally to us. Rights are not something given to us by governments. Rights are claims that we make AGAINST governments If I have a right to benefit from my own labor, then the government is wrong to take any of those benefits from me without my consent. "The only proper role of government ... is that of the protector of the citizen against aggression by other individuals." Because governments has the role of "protector," government must possess enough force/power to protect its citizens (e.g., by having a police force and/or military and a related system for punishing or neutralizing those who practice aggression against others). Aggression against others includes unintended harms to others. Government also has a role in deciding and settling claims of harm by others. Other than providing for these legitimate functions, government has no right to tax its citizens for any purpose whatsoever. Government should intervene only in a RETALIATORY situation. The government must never INITIATE an action to create a better world -- it is not the business of government to make an advance decision about what counts as benefit. Through laws, government can prohibit various aggressive actions, but it cannot require the bringing about of supposedly beneficial ones. Government charity, social programs, public works, etc., require one person to pay for the benefits that another person will receive. However, doing this through involuntary taxation is theft of property. LIBERTARIANISM by John Hospers The POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY WHOSE TIME HAS COME "For many decades, news reports on the intellectual activities of the younger generation have been confined almost exclusively to advocates of statism and collectivism. Only recently have there appeared the first acknowledgements, in the newspapers, of a rising interest among the younger generation in political philosophy that stands in radical contrast to this authoritarian trend: Libertarianism. "Now, Professor John Hospers, Director of the School of Philosophy of the University of Southern California, has given us, in his latest book, a clear statement of the central political-economic positions of this young intellectual movement. The book is offered, not as an original work of philosophy, but rather as an attempt to delineate the major positions on which most Libertarians would agree -- and to answer many of the objections and questions with which Libertarians have to contend. "Libertarianism is very simply and clearly written and requires no technical knowledge on the part of the reader. Enjoyable, informative reading." - Nathaniel Branden, Author of THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SELF-ESTEEM

The movie companion book to Ayn Rand and the Prophecy of Atlas Shrugged, a feature length documentary film that examines the resurgent interest in Ayn Rand's epic and controversial 1957 novel and the validity of its dire prediction for America. This book picks up where the documentary leaves off, featuring in-depth interviews and insights from 16 personalities, CEO's, educators, journalists, authors, biographers, philosophers, Rand associates, et al. All of them bring deep insight and unique perspective to the subject. Set in what Novelist and philosopher Rand called 'the day after tomorrow, ' Atlas Shrugged depicts an America in crisis, brought to her knees by a corrupt establishment of government regulators and businessmen with political pull - the 'looters' and the 'moochers' - who prey on individual achievement. Less a conventional work of fiction than a philosophical manifesto in the form of a romantic novel, over the course of a thousand-plus pages, Atlas tackles no less an essential argument than the one debated by philosophers and theologians since time immemorial: altruism vs. self-interest. Am I my brother's keeper - or not? For Ayn Rand, the answer is an emphatic no. To Rand and the disciples of her Objectivist philosophy, self-sacrifice is as heinous an act as murder....murder of the soul. Upon publication, Atlas Shrugged was widely scorned by critics for its 'preposterous' plot and one-dimensional characters. Intellectuals and academics from across the ideological spectrum roundly dismissed the new and original philosophy called 'Objectivism' that Rand so compellingly illustrated in the novel. Despite this pummeling, Atlas became a best seller and has remained in print ever selling a healthy 75,000 or so copies each year. Then with the new century, sales began to increase dramatically. In 2007, its fiftieth anniversary year, Atlas sold a record 180,000 copies. Since then Atlas Shrugged - published over a half century ago - has sold over a million copies. Why? Because - as evidenced by pointed and frequent references to Rand and Atlas Shrugged in the media - an increasing number of Americans - right or wrong - see their society devolving into a nightmare scenario like the one Rand projected over a half century ago. Ayn Rand and the Prophecy of Atlas Shrugged looks into Rand's background for the ideas and philosophy that inspired and shaped her novel and seeks to determine whether America is indeed headed for the disastrous outcome she predicted. Writer/Director Chris Mortensen is a television producer and documentary filmmaker whose many programs have appeared worldwide. In the U.S. his documentary subjects have ranged from Field Marshall Bernard Montgomery, Hermann Goering and John Paul Jones to American Gangsters, the HIV crisis and the Iraq War. From Professional Wrestling to Halle Berry to the Suez Canal, his programs have appeared on Discovery, A&E, History Channel, ESPN, Fox Sports, BET, TV One, et al.

Murray Rothbard (1926-1995) was an economist, historian, philosopher, and legal theoretician. His work was unified by a passionate and resolute commitment to a libertarianism that may be characterized as 'anarcho-capitalism' and which implied a belief that even the legal system may be provided privately without the need for a coercive collective authority. Hence, anarcho-capitalists envisage a society where the traditional role of government is wholly subsumed by private, profit-making enterprises and all social relationships are ultimately founded upon consent. Rothbard's unique intellectual contribution was to build this system of thought from many pre-existing but previously disparate strands and to develop it to its logical conclusion. Rothbard's starting points were the notions of methodological individualism, natural rights theory, and individual self-ownership. He showed that if we wish these seriously then the justification for government falls away. According to Rothbard government can only be 'justified' if we abandon the notion that individuals have the right to determine what to do with their own bodies, a step he believed to be unconscionable.

Polls indicate that the newsrooms and editorial boards of America's largest news organizations are overwhelmingly populated with self-described progressives, or Leftists. This high concentration of Leftists in newsrooms has created an echo chamber that insulates journalists, editors, and producers from opposing viewpoints and alternative political opinion. Timely and hard-hitting, Distorted Landscape examines the deceptively false narratives crafted by Leftists in the media and by politicians about the issues of guns and race, war and peace, and wealth and charity. Philip J. Eveland shows how journalists, along with their political comrades, who possess this echo-chamber mentality, slant the narrative toward the political Left. Eveland presents several examples of how the media's Leftist bias distorts the landscape of current affairs and politics, distracting the public's attention away from the core issues by instead focusing on the symptoms rather than the causes of the chronic problems plaguing the nation. His blunt critique of this disturbing trend makes a strong case for greater transparency among politicians and the media. Gain a new appreciation for the depth and extent of Leftist media bias and learn how to glean the truth on the issues of today with Distorted Landscape.

Imagine if you could study the operations manual of a master American Marxist trainer, someone who teaches American Communist operatives the strategies and tactics used to subvert the citizens of the United States of America. Well, now you can. A Look Inside the Playbook: How Marxists Plan to Destroy America is THE Bible of American Communist subversion strategies and tactics. In this training manual you will learn Marxist's methods, their thinking, strategies and inside secrets that have been used so successfully against the people of the United States of America. The authors provide readers with a tell-all expose on the dangerously sophisticated subversive techniques being used by collectivist revolutionaries intent upon subverting American principles and values and replacing them with Communist inspired tyranny.

I'm "Common Sense" & I'm Running for Office is the most explosive political book ever written This book sets the standard by which all politicians seeking Office shall be judged As Thomas Paine's book, "Common Sense," sparked the American Revolution, this book shall be the spark that ignites the New American "Common Sense" Revolution, propelling America's Tea Party Movement to the next level - For this book is the Tea Party Revolution on "STEROIDS " This is the book that every Democrat fears - For this book shall be the death of the Democratic Party After reading this book, no decent human being will ever again vote for any Democrat This book REVEALS: 1) How America Has Gone Mad When It Elected Barack Obama 2) The God-given "Common Sense" Role of Government 3) How Winning America's War Against Islamic Terrorism is as Easy As A, B, C "Simply": Acknowledge that Every Muslim is a Potential Terrorist ...4) Ban the Vile, Violent False-Religion of Islam From America's Shores ...and 5) Counter Islam's Stronghold On Foreign Soil By Mandating the Freedom of Christianity in the Middle East Other Topics Covered Are: 6) "Common Sense" Solutions for Getting America's Economy Back on the Road to Prosperity 7) "Common Sense" Solutions for America's Illegal Immigration Problem 8) Why it's Not OK To Be Gay 9) Why Blacks Should "NEVER" Vote Democrat And 10) The 666 Factor Surrounding Obama America, this book is the "ANSWER" you've been waiting for

From Change We Can Believe in to Change We Simply Cannot Believe. The United States of America, a Republic founded on principles of freedom, liberty and opportunity has experienced a crippling series of governmental assaults over the past year-plus that has left its People shaken, uncertain, and struggling. But the American Spirit is strong, and from the ashes of this Constitutional onslaught, the will of the People is rising. A Perfect Liberal Storm: When Executive, Legislative, and Media Enjoin, presents our experience of the first year of the Obama Administration as chronicled by web columnist Barry Secrest. Offering witty commentary, keen cultural insights, and sharp political analysis, A Perfect Liberal Storm is a shrewdly-critical, often emotionally impactful journey through the maelstrom of changes the United States experienced throughout 2009-2010: Healthcare reform, global warming scandals, economic disasters, government expansion and take-over of private sector businesses, Mainstream Media complacency, the rise of the Tea Party, and the fall of one liberty after another into the hands of an Administration with a chillingly clear agenda. Along with Conservative Media heavy-hitters such as Beck, Hannity, Levin and Limbaugh, Barry Secrest has emerged as a strong champion of Conservative values. Always grounded in the basic principles of the Charters of Freedom, this engaging and highly relevant recount of events provides a crucial reminder of all that is at stake as the 2012 elections draw near.

The Liberty Leaders A Family Dinner Table Textbook, is an expanded testimonial detailing the men and women who influenced freedom. By taking their stories well beyond the average U.S. textbook, it captures the thoughts, words and deeds of those individuals with the courage to confront the struggles that brought their visions of liberty to fruition. The Liberty Leaders focuses on the men who impacted the spirit of our founding fathers and those who followed in their footsteps. It introduces the reader to historic figures that may have been unknown until now; each chapter ends with notable quotes, capturing the thoughts of each visionary. A coffee table reference book for those who cherish our constitutional freedoms as originally intended.

This special issue of "TOPIA Canadian Journal of Cultural Studies" addresses the ubiquity of militarization, a presence that is woven into the very fabric of civic culture.Militarization is not just something that happens in war zones; when our government invests billions of dollars in war planes, prisons and the "digital economy," while starving resources in social justice, education, the environment and culture, we are living the consequences of global militarization. To talk about cultures of militarization is to talk about the terms in which collective identity is militarized and resistive forms of agency allowed and disallowed. By recognizing the human relations within capitalism and how these have come to be defined increasingly by military interests, we reveal that militarism is a global master narrative; military diction becomes inseparable from the language of power, sweeping aside human suffering as mere "collateral damage." We are led to believe that it is temporary, and we are compliant in our acceptance of these narratives.

A 2022 Best Comedy Book, Vulture A rousing call for liberals and progressives to pay attention to the emergence of right-wing comedy and the political power of humor. "Why do conservatives hate comedy? Why is there no right-wing Jon Stewart?" These sorts of questions launch a million tweets, a thousand op-eds, and more than a few scholarly analyses. That's Not Funny argues that it is both an intellectual and politically strategic mistake to assume that comedy has a liberal bias. Matt Sienkiewicz and Nick Marx take readers--particularly self-described liberals--on a tour of contemporary conservative comedy and the "right-wing comedy complex." In That's Not Funny, "complex" takes on an important double meaning. On the one hand, liberals have developed a social-psychological complex-it feels difficult, even dangerous, to acknowledge that their political opposition can produce comedy. At the same time, the right has been slowly building up a comedy-industrial complex, utilizing the humorous, irony-laden media strategies of liberals such as Jon Stewart, Samantha Bee, and John Oliver to garner audiences and supporters. Right-wing comedy has been hiding in plain sight, finding its way into mainstream conservative media through figures ranging from Fox News's Greg Gutfeld to libertarian podcasters like Joe Rogan. That's Not Funny taps interviews with conservative comedians and observations of them in action to guide readers through media history, text, and technique. You will find many of these comedians utterly appalling, some surprisingly funny, and others just plain weird. They are all, however, culturally and politically relevant-the American right is attempting to seize spaces of comedy and irony previously held firmly by the left. You might not like this brand of humor, but you can't ignore it.

Paradigm shift? A better title for a summary of "The Cat in the Bag" might be something like "Synopsis" or "Prologue." Why use the term "paradigm shift"? Isn't it just another overworked buzz word from the late twentieth century? Maybe so, but in this case, the terminology fits. "The Cat in the Bag" describes a fundamental change in the way we view American politics. There is something different going on, and it is seen in its purest form through the actions and methods of the Democratic Party in the early twenty-first century. A political party, you might think, is nothing more than a way of organizing people to facilitate governmental action. Political parties help bring order to chaotic affairs. That's the conventional belief. The Democratic Party brings much more to the table. This book examines the themes of the Democratic Party and the way they are employed to generate anti-Republican sentiment in America. It shows how the themes influence our culture and create emotions that tend to blur the distinction between religion and politics. It's time to fasten your seatbelt