World Famous Comics: The Unraveling of the Bush Presidency
The Unraveling of the Bush Presidency
By: Howard Zinn Publisher: Seven Stories Press Average Rating: Binding: Paperback Label: Seven Stories Press Number of Items: 1 Number of Pages: 64 Publication Date: April 01, 2007
Excellent update on the USA since 2001 The most recent edition of American historian Howard Zinn's classic A People's History of the United States ended with Bush's declaration of a `war on terror'. This brief volume brings the story up to date.
Zinn explains how Bush misled people into the wars. "It was part of a historic pattern in U.S. foreign policy to tell the American people that war was necessary to defend the United States against a threat, or to bring liberty and democracy to other countries, while the real motives for war - the profits of corporations, the control of vital raw materials, the expansion of the U.S. empire - were concealed."
He sums up that Bush's two wars have not brought democracy, freedom or security to the peoples of Iraq and Afghanistan and have not weakened terrorism. Far from bringing democracy abroad, the wars were violating democracy in the USA. The PATRIOT Act extended the state's power to intercept communications and gave it the power to search people's homes without their knowledge.
Zinn particularly condemns the US state's authorisation of torture. He notes that when the US Senate was considering a bill to ban torture, Vice President Cheney visited senators to argue against the bill. Late in 2006, Congress passed, and President Bush signed, a bill allowing the CIA to continue harsh interrogation - torture - of suspected terrorists in secret CIA prisons abroad. This bill also ended the right of habeas corpus for anyone, including US citizens, whom the President or the secretary of defense designated as an `unlawful enemy combatant'.
In 2006 Congress passed a military budget of $500 billion and arms and oil firms got huge profits, while education and medical care were cut. Chief Executive Officers got 400 times the wage of the average worker, while the minimum wage stayed where it was ten years ago, at $5.15 an hour.
Most Americans now oppose the war and want to withdraw the troops, and President Bush has the lowest ratings of any president in history.
Why is this "book" $8? Well written, but only 30 or so pages. Not worth the cost. You can easily read the whole book at the store in 10 minutes.
The Unraveling of the Bush Presidency Well thought out and balanced regarding how inapropriatley Bush and his administration is marshalling the unique resources of the US and not in the best interests of the world. Among the most precious of these resources is the Values it stands for and the Goodwill it had earned over centuries.
The message is not an argument but a reasoned voice for what is just.
A short book yet not a "quick" read and well worth the time.
Read this review, it'll change your mind. This is a work which propagates the ills or rather the chills of the Bush administration, meant to inform the readers what is going on, not a biblical study by any means, not sure what the past reviewer is thinking but perhaps I could refer him to A POWER GOVERNMENTS CANNOT SUPPRESS.
This is a pamphlet book, cheap and easy to access.
One has to remember that the sensationalistic media does not allow for much in the way of a large, overburdening text which will never be read.
This is a book of 48 pages! It could have been 1500! This book recaps much of what we have already heard about "Dubya's" corrupt and incompetent administration. No theme was developed beyond a cursory brushover. But why should have Zinn regurgitated all that we already know in a long running tome? It would have been redundant. However, if you are inclined, buy this book and thirty years down the line, in 2037, give it to your grand kids so they might read a good summary of just how dangerous and disgraceful Bush's 8 years in office really were. Hopefully Zinn will have to write a postscript some day about the endless crimes for which many of Bush's lieutenants were jailed -and- hopefully Bush himself. For such a work I might stick around for another 30 years!
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