Joshua L. Powell is the NRA--a lifelong gun advocate, in 2016, he began his new role as a senior strategist and chief of staff to NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre. What Powell uncovered was horrifying: "the waste and dysfunction at the NRA was staggering." INSIDE THE NRA reveals for the first time the rise and fall of the most powerful political organization in America--how the NRA became feared as the Death Star of Washington lobbies and so militant and extreme as "to create and fuel the toxicity of the gun debate until it became outright explosive." INSIDE THE NRA explains this intentional toxic messaging was wholly the product of LaPierre's leadership and the extremist branding by his longtime PR puppet master Angus McQueen. In damning detail, Powell exposes the NRA's plan to "pour gasoline" on the fire in the fight against gun control, to sow discord to fill its coffers, and to secure the presidency for Donald J. Trump.

Corruption, Party, and Government in Britain, 1702-1713 offers an innovative and original reinterpretation of state formation in eighteenth-century Britain, reconceptualising it as a political and fundamentally partisan process. Focussing on the supply of funds to the army during the War of the Spanish Succession (1702-13), it demonstrates that public officials faced multiple incompatible demands, but that political partisanship helped to prioritise them, and to hammer out settlements that embodied a version of the national interest. These decisions were then transmitted to agents in overseas through a mixture of personal incentives and partisan loyalties which built trust and turned these informal networks into instruments of public policy. However, the process of building trust and supplying funds laid officials and agents open to accusations of embezzlement, fraud and financial misappropriation. In particular, although successive financial officials ran entrepreneurial private financial ventures that enabled the army overseas to avoid dangerous financial shortfalls, they found it necessary to cover the costs and risks by receiving illegal 'gratifications' from the regiments. Reconstructing these transactions in detail, this book demonstrates that these corrupt payments advanced the public service, and thus that 'corruption' was as much a dispute over ends as means. Ultimately, this volume demonstrates that state formation in eighteenth-century Britain was a contested process of interest aggregation, in which common partisan aims helped to negotiate compromises between various irreconcilable public priorities and private interests, within the frameworks provided by formal institutions, and then collaboratively imposed through overlapping and intersecting networks of formal and informal agents.

"RADICAL NATION makes it clear what is at stake. If you want to Save America you must read this-it is MAGA all the way." - PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP The Biden-Harris progressive agenda presents a radical change to the American economy, values, national security, and freedom. From the former Trump White House press secretary and New York Times bestselling author of THE BRIEFING and LEADING AMERICA comes a stark warning: Under Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, America is lurching towards economic collapse, runaway inflation, wide-open borders, an all-out assault on human life and religious liberty, a K-12 school indoctrination plan, "election reforms" to ensure never-ending Democratic Party rule, and more. RADICAL NATION is a bold grassroots agenda for defending America against the Progressives' Socialist agenda. Featuring powerful stories that will move you and keep you riveted, this book will channel conservatives discouragement, anger, and betrayal into meaningful action to keep America free, strong, and secure for our children and grandchildren.

Why leadership is key to ending political and corporate corruption globally Corruption corrodes all facets of the world's political and corporate life, yet until now there was no one book that explained how best to battle it. The Corruption Cure puts some thirty-five countries under an anticorruption microscope to show exactly how to beat back the forces of sleaze and graft. Robert Rotberg defines corruption in its many forms, describes the available remedies, and examines how we identify and measure corruption's presence. He demonstrates how determined past and contemporary leaders changed their wildly corrupt countries-even the Nordics-into paragons of virtue, and how leadership is making a significant difference in stimulating political anticorruption movements in places like India, Croatia, Botswana, and Rwanda. Rotberg looks at corporate corruption and how it can be checked, and also offers an innovative fourteen-step plan for nations that are ready to end corruption. Tougher laws and better prosecutions are not enough. This book enables us to rethink the problem completely-and to solve it once and for all.

Why leadership is key to ending political and corporate corruption globally Corruption corrodes all facets of the world's political and corporate life, yet until now there was no one book that explained how best to battle it. The Corruption Cure provides many of the required solutions and ranges widely across continents and diverse cultures--putting some thirty-five countries under an anticorruption microscope--to show exactly how to beat back the forces of sleaze and graft. Robert Rotberg defines corruption theoretically and practically in its many forms, describes the available legal remedies, and examines how we know and measure corruption's presence. He looks at successful and unsuccessful attempts to employ anticorruption investigative commissions to combat political theft and venal behavior. He explores how the globe's least corrupt nations reached that exceptional goal. Another chapter discusses the role of civil society in limiting corruption. Expressed political will through determined leadership is a key factor in winning all of these battles. Rotberg analyzes the best-performing noncorrupt states to show how consummate leadership made a telling difference. He demonstrates precisely how determined leaders changed their wildly corrupt countries into paragons of virtue, and how leadership is making a significant difference in stimulating political anticorruption movements in places like India, Croatia, Honduras, and Lebanon. Rotberg looks at corporate corruption and how it can be checked, and also offers an innovative fourteen-step plan for nations that are ready to end corruption. Curing rampant corruption globally requires strengthened political leadership and the willingness to remake national political cultures. Tougher laws and better prosecutions are not enough. This book enables us to rethink the problem completely--and solve it once and for all.

The long-awaited diary from Whitehall's most scandalous MP... From Brexit to Covid, parties to pig culling, the Conservative government has lurched from crisis to crisis. With a front-row seat on the, erm, backbenches, the Secret Tory MP has picked up on all the petty rivalries, bad decision-making and scandalous affairs that Whitehall has to offer. And he's got no qualms about sharing it. All. Join the mystery MP as he drunk-texts Liz Truss after a crate of WKD, accompanies Jacob Rees-Mogg (and his kids) to picket a foodbank, takes on the French in the 'Trawler Wars', and euthanises Rishi Sunak's dog - and that's just October. The Diary of a Secret Tory MP is an outrageous spoof of the classic political journal that pulls back the Lulu Lytle curtains to expose extraordinary goings-on at Westminster across a tumultuous twelve months.

"One reason Koncewicz's narrative is so compelling is that it's also a redemption story."-The Washington Post "Excruciatingly timely."-Kirkus Reviews In more than three thousand recorded conversations, the Nixon tapes famously exposed a president's sinister views of governance that would eventually lead to his downfall. Despite Richard Nixon's best efforts, his vision of a government where he could use his power to punish his political enemies never came to fruition because members of his own party defied his directives. While many are familiar with the Republicans who turned against Nixon during the final stages of the Watergate saga, They Said No to Nixon uncovers for the first time those within the administration-including Nixon's own appointees-who opposed the White House early on, quietly blocking the president's attacks on the IRS, the Justice Department, and other sectors of the federal government. Culling from previously unpublished excerpts from the tapes and recently released materials that expose the thirty-seventh president's uncensored views, Michael Koncewicz reveals how Republican party members remained loyal civil servants in the face of Nixon's attempts to expand the imperial presidency. Delving into the abuses of power surrounding the Watergate era and showing how they were curbed, They Said No to Nixon sheds light on the significant cultural and ideological shifts that occurred within the GOP during the pivotal 1970s. Koncewicz deftly demonstrates how Nixon's administration marked a decisive moment that led to the rise of modern conservatism and today's ruthlessly partisan politics.

A no-holds-barred insight into the corridors of Westminster and the secretive club of Lobby journalists - from a woman who was at the heart of the political establishment for two decades.

Counterterrorism experts and policy makers have warned of the peril posed by the links between violent extremism and organized crime, especially the relationship between drug trafficking and terrorism funding. Yet Central Asia, the site of extensive opium trafficking, sees low levels of terrorist violence. Webs of Corruption is an innovative study demonstrating that terrorist and criminal activity intersect more narrowly than is widely believed-and that the state plays the pivotal role in shaping those interconnections. Mariya Y. Omelicheva and Lawrence P. Markowitz analyze the linkages between the drug trade and terrorism financing in Central Asia, finding that state security services shape the nexus of trafficking and terrorism. While organized crime and terrorism do intersect in parts of the region, profit-driven criminal organizations and politically motivated violent groups come together based on the nature of state involvement. Governments in high-trafficking regions are drawn into illicit economies and forge relationships with a range of nonstate violent actors, such as insurgents, erstwhile regime opponents, and transnational groups. Omelicheva and Markowitz contend that these relationships can mitigate terrorism-by redirecting these actors toward other forms of violence. Offering a groundbreaking combination of quantitative, qualitative, and geographic information systems methods to map trafficking/terrorism connections on the ground, Webs of Corruption provides a meticulously researched, counterintuitive perspective on a potent regional security problem.

A frontline account of how to fight corruption, from Nigeria's former finance minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala.In Fighting Corruption Is Dangerous, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has written a primer for those working to root out corruption and disrupt vested interests. Drawing on her experience as Nigeria's finance minister and that of her team, she describes dangers, pitfalls, and successes in fighting corruption. She provides practical lessons learned and tells how anti-corruption advocates need to equip themselves. Okonjo-Iweala details the numerous ways in which corruption can divert resources away from development, rewarding the unscrupulous and depriving poor people of services. Okonjo-Iweala discovered just how dangerous fighting corruption could be when her 83-year-old mother was kidnapped in 2012 by forces who objected to some of the government's efforts at reforms led by Okonjo-Iweala--in particular a crackdown on fraudulent claims for oil subsidy payments, a huge drain on the country's finances. The kidnappers' first demand was that Okonjo-Iweala resign from her position on live television and leave the country. Okonjo-Iweala did not resign, her mother escaped, and the program of economic reforms continued. "Telling my story is risky," Okonjo-Iweala writes. "But not telling it is also dangerous." Her book ultimately leaves us with hope, showing that victories are possible in the fight against corruption.

Known in health care circles for his ability to fix ailing hospitals, David Shulkin was originally brought into government by President Obama, in an attempt to save the broken Department of Veterans Affairs. When President Trump made him the first VA secretary without military experience-a fact Dr. Shulkin first learned from his television-he was as shocked as anyone. Yet this surprise was trivial compared to what Shulkin encountered as the VA secretary: a team of political appointees devoted to stopping anyone -- including the secretary himself -- who stood in the way of privatising the organisation. In this uninhibited memoir, Shulkin opens up about why the government has long struggled to get good medical care to military veterans and how the current government has stopped even trying. This is a book about the commitment we make to the people who risk their lives for our country, how and why we've failed to honour it and why the new administration is making things worse than they've ever been.

As a presidential candidate, Donald Trump claimed he would only hire "the best people." It hasn't quite turned out that way. From high-flying former EPA administrator Scott Pruitt, whose penchant for first-class travel and a highly suspect housing arrangement raised Washington's collective eyebrow, to Education Secretary Betsy Devos, who vowed to protect children from "potential grizzlies," members of the Trump Cabinet have shown a startling penchant for headline-grabbing behavior. Despite Trump's pledge to "drain the swamp," petty corruption abounds. But what's really going on in the executive branch? In The Best People, journalist Alexander Nazaryan takes readers deep inside the Trump government. Nazaryan shows how laughable "scandals" like Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson's attempted purchased of a $31,000 dining set have masked far more important and potentially devastating developments: a coordinated, systematic effort by extreme right-wing Republicans to shred established institutions. Dogged in their conviction that the scope of government (apart from the military) should be reduced, Trump's Cabinet secretaries--many of them smarter than their gaffe-prone personalities might indicate--are dismantling the federal bureaucracy, showing long-term employees the door and gutting regulations. The result is a leaner, dumber government--one that will be far less equipped to protect the interests of regular Americans. The consequences will be felt for decades to come. In the tradition of Fire and Fury and It's Even Worse Than You Think, The Best People will be a riveting, harrowing, and essential read of Trump-era Washington.

Two award-winning journalists offer the most comprehensive inside story behind our most significant modern political drama: the House impeachment of Donald Trump. Having spent a year essentially embedded inside several House committees, Michael D'Antonio and Peter Eisner draw on many sources, including key House leaders, to expose the politicking, playcalling, and strategies debated backstage and to explain the Democrats' successes and apparent public failures during the show itself. High Crimes opens with Nancy Pelosi deciding the House should take up impeachment, then, in part one, leaps back to explain what Ukraine was really all about: not just Joe Biden and election interference, but a money grab and oil. In the second part, the authors recount key meetings throughout the run up to the impeachment hearings, including many of the heated confrontations between the Trump administration and House Democrats. And the third part takes readers behind the scenes of those hearings, showing why certain things happened the way they did for reasons that never came up in public. In the end, having illuminated every step of impeachment, from the schemes that led Giuliani to the Ukraine in 2016 to Fiona Hill's rebuking the Republicans' conspiracy theories, High Crimes promises to be Trump's Final Days.

A collection of articles and interviews on the history, psychology, and current state of torture in democratic societies, "Hurt" is a short but hard-hitting look in the mirror for first-world countries. This expose on the act of torture explores this dark world with essays from authors, anarchists, and many more. While striving to provide the general public with a greater understanding of torture, this resource forces readers to think critically about its current uses and the far-reaching implications of letting it continue unchecked.

A compelling look at the misuse of power, lies, corruptions and cover-upsFake news, alternative facts, outright lies, fears of nuclear war, widespread surveillance of the population, mass shootings, the rise of a totalitarian state and more have led millions of us to distrust the word of government. And with good reason, too. There are countless conspiracy theories in circulation that suggest the world as we see it is not as it really is. Disinformation campaigns try to tell us that up is down and right is wrong. More and more people are beginning to realize that we are being manipulated and lied to. We are denied access to secrets that shouldn't be secrets. Our politicians obfuscate, deny, and outright lie. No one knows whom to trust. The nightly news is being replaced by carefully orchestrated propaganda. Our iPhones are monitored as are our laptops and our landlines. As for social media, that too is ripe for spying by men in black suits. No wonder, then, that the last few years have seen an incredible rise in conspiracy theories about deceptions and cover-ups. They range from the controversial to the shocking and from the nightmarish to the downright terrifying. And you can find all of them in the pages of Cover-Ups & Secrets: The Complete Guide to Government Conspiracies, Manipulations & Deceptions. From the dark agendas to restrict our access to the Internet and even ban books to suppressing cancer cures to ensure the pharmaceutical industry continues to reap gigantic profits and the murder of politicians, scientists, world leaders, and even Princess Diana in the name of national security. Cover-Ups & Secrets reveals dozens of nefarious conspiracies, plots, hidden agendas, and betrayals, including ... Amazon's Alexa, the secret spy in the home NASA misdirections The classified Pentagon program on alien life Clandestine plans for nuclear and bacteriological warfare NSA's penetration of cell-phones, email, Facebook, Twitter, and Skype messages Suspicious deaths The Bilderbergers, the Illuminati, and the Bohemian Club Secrets of the Philadelphia Experiment Reptilian Aliens and the British Royal Family The Patriot Act and the government's monitoring of reading habits And much, much more!!!

The second edition of Corruption and Government updates Susan Rose-Ackerman's 1999 book to address emerging issues and to rethink old questions in light of new data. The book analyzes the research explosion that accompanied the fall of the Berlin Wall, the founding of Transparency International, and the World Bank's decision to give anti-corruption policy a key place on its agenda. Time has vindicated Rose-Ackerman's emphasis on institutional reform as the necessary condition for serious progress. The book deals with routine payoffs and with corruption in contracting and privatization. It gives special attention to political corruption and to instruments of accountability. The authors have expanded the treatment of culture as a source of entrenched corruption and added chapters on criminal law, organized crime, and post-conflict societies. The book outlines domestic conditions for reform and discusses international initiatives - including both explicit anti-corruption policies and efforts to constrain money laundering.

The Politics of Corruption in Dictatorships studies how institutional and social factors influence corruption in dictatorships. Dictatorships are often synonymous with high levels of corruption, yet Vineeta Yadav and Bumba Mukherjee argue otherwise. The authors ask why corruption has declined in some but not other authoritarian regimes. What are the main political factors that drive some autocrats to curb corruption? The book explores the role that business mobilization can play in reducing corruption under some conditions in dictatorships. It investigates how political competition for an elected legislature affects the incentives of dictators to engage in corruption. The study relies on case studies from Jordan, Malaysia, and Uganda. The book is accessible to a wide audience without requiring sophisticated statistical training.

Should the criminal law be used to deter and punish corruption in politics: from employing family members at public expense to improper spending on elections, lobbying, and cronyism? How did so many MPs avoid facing charges after the 2009 government expenses scandal? In this book, Jeremy Horder tackles these questions and more. As well as offering the first treatment of the history, philosophy, and politics of the application of the offence of misconduct in office to Members of Parliament in England and Wales, Horder explains how political corruption might be dealt with in future, and how politicians could be held accountable for their actions so that they are deterred from betraying the public's trust. Use of the criminal law should not be the sole or even the main way to remedy all corruption in politics. Nevertheless, for too long the offence of misconduct in a public office has had an ambiguous status in the political realm. If we are to preserve the good health of government it must be seen as a constitutional fundamental. A charge of misconduct provides a way in which corrupt conduct on the part of legislators can be punished with an appropriate label, holding them to account for the misuse of power by reference to the standards of ordinary people. When other - civil law or regulatory - means prove insufficient, it should be possible for ordinary members of a jury, and not for Parliamentarians or other officials, to decide whether, for example, the expenditure of public money on legislators' private income and benefits amounts to a criminal abuse of the public's trust. This book offers an authoritative and accessible account of a 'bottom-up' (jury standards-led), as opposed to a 'top-down' (officials applying their own standards), approach to the role of the criminal law in constitutional contexts.

On September 26, 2014, 43 male students from the Ayotzinapa Rural Teachers' College went missing in Iguala, Guerrero, Mexico. On route to a protest, local police intercepted the students and a confrontation ensued. By the morning, they had disappeared without a trace. Hernandez reconstructs almost minute-by-minute the events of those nights in late September 2014, giving us what is surely the most complete picture available: her sources are unparalleled, since she has secured access to internal government documents that have not been made public, and to video surveillance footage the government has tried to hide and destroy. Hernandez demolishes the Mexican state's official version, which the Pena Nieto government cynically dubbed the "historic truth". As her research shows, state officials at all levels, from police and prosecutors to the upper echelons of the PRI administration, conspired to put together a fake case, concealing or manipulating evidence, and arresting and torturing dozens of "suspects" who then obliged with full "confessions" that matched the official lie. By following the role of the various Mexican state agencies through the events in such remarkable detail, Massacre in Mexico shows with exacting precision who is responsible for which component of this monumental crime.

Winning the anticorruption battle: a guide for citizens and politicians.The phenomenon of corruption has existed since antiquity; from ancient Mesopotamia to our modern-day high-level ethical morass, people have sought a leg up, a shortcut, or an end run to power and influence. In this volume in the MIT Press Essential Knowledge series, Robert Rotberg, a recognized authority on governance and international relations, offers a definitive guide to corruption and anticorruption, charting the evolution of corruption and offering recommendations on how to reduce its power and spread. The most important component of anticorruption efforts, he argues, is leadership that is committed to changing dominant political cultures. Rotberg explains that corruption is the conversion of a public good into personal gain--either by the exchange of cash for influence or by the granting of special favors even without explicit payments. He describes successful anticorruption efforts in countries ranging from Denmark and Sweden to Canada and Costa Rica, and discusses the roles of judicial systems, investigative journalism, multinational corporations, and technological advances. He shows how the United States has become more corrupt than before, and contrasts recent US and Canadian experiences. Without sufficient political will to eliminate corruption, it persists. Rotberg outlines thirteen practical steps for battling corruption, including removing holdover officials tainted by corruption and the public declaration of financial assets by elected officials and appointees.

____________________ THE EXPLOSIVE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER 'A bombshell.' Daily Mail 'Damning, terrifying and enraging.' The Spectator ____________________ House of Trump, House of Putin offers the first comprehensive investigation into the decades-long relationship among Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and the Russian Mafia that ultimately helped win Trump the White House. It is a chilling story that begins in the 1970s, when Trump made his first splash in the booming, money-drenched world of New York real estate, and ends with Trump's inauguration as president of the United States. That moment was the culmination of Vladimir Putin's long mission to undermine Western democracy, a mission that he and his hand-selected group of oligarchs and associates had ensnared Trump in over more than two decades of shady business associations. As Unger traces Donald Trump's sordid ascent from foundering real estate tycoon to leader of the free world, House of Trump, House of Putin, reveals the deep-rooted alliance between the highest echelons of American political operatives and the biggest players in the frightening underworld of the Russian Mafia. Examining Russia's phoenixlike rise from the ashes of the post-Cold War Soviet Union, Unger reveals its ceaseless covert efforts to retaliate against the West and reclaim its status as a global superpower, and how such ambitions came to compromise the president. Without Trump, Russia would have lacked a key component in its attempts to return to imperial greatness. Without Russia, Trump would not be in the White House. This essential book is crucial to understanding the real powers at play in the shadows of today's world.