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Title: Reason: Why Liberals Will Win the Battle for America
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Manufacturer: Vintage
List Price: $14.95
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| Reason: Why Liberals Will Win the Battle for America by Vintage A must read! Fantastic Book! | This is a "persuasive" book, as opposed to narrative or expository writing. He uses descriptions to facilitate communications instead of trying to be complete. For example, he uses the term "radcons" - radical conservatives. You can get a flavor for this term at http://www.robertreich.org/reich/20040501.asp. One can go on about the different types of conservatives (libertarian, paleo...) but that would not be useful. The real power in recent years has been the radcon; an unholy alliance between religious/social and fiscal conservatives
Mr. Reich takes radcons to task, and rightly so. They complain about moral-bankruptcy, focusing almost completely on sex. Yet, they rarely if ever speak out against the greed and concentrated wealth that is destroying our country. How often do right-wing preachers castigate those that would layoff hard working Americans just to give the CEOs a raise, even when the stock is down! How often do they speak out against a system where CEOs are coddled because they hand pick the people on their board!
How many times did Jesus speak out against wealth and greed? How often did Jesus say we should help the poor and weak? How many times did Jesus speak out against homosexuality? Jesus never said we needed to get rid of the estate tax. Jesus never said capital gains tax cuts were immoral. Radcons focus on the wrong things.
Radcons have hurt this country. Their Greed Over People philosophy has led to many disasters, from Enron-like rip-offs to billions lost in Iraq. This corruption hurts families and small-investors alike.
The FDR quote about radicals, liberals, and conservatives is worth the price alone of this book. A real gem, it explains the reality that is only again coming to light: liberals are the practical politicians. Radicals on the left and right (communists, facists, radcons, libertarians) will bury the world trying to push their ideology. Liberals look at problems and use practical solutions, which may involve government, to solve them. Rural power, Social Security, food safety, civil rights, public transportation, public roads, libraries... all liberal traditions that are solving problems that the free market cannot.
It appears that Mr. Reich's thought parallels mine: history has shown that communism does not work; extreme capitalism does not work; the only way is the middle way, regulated capitalism.
Slightly dated, as it does not (or should say cannot as it was written before 2006) discuss the recent blow-back (i.e., lost elections) conservatives have received from the fiasco in Iraq and their disastrous economic policies, it is still a very worthy read.
| | Reason: Why Liberals Will Win the Battle for America by Vintage One of the best political books of the past decade | I love this book. Reich explains in great detail how progressive ideas and ideals are the true hope for America and how the conservative, regressive programs of the right-wing are bad for America. He uses examples, gives details, explains things. It's really a wonderful read.
That said, you probably have to be a real political junkie to really enjoy it. At times, it's kind of dry reading. Then again, if you picked up the book in the first place, you probably already ARE a political junkie.
This book offers essential ammunition for combatting the right-wing smear mearchants who prefer to talk in sound bites and remember the good old days of "separate, but equal."
| | Reason: Why Liberals Will Win the Battle for America by Vintage Buy it. You'll like it. | In short, I highly recommend this book to anyone who espouses reason over vitriolic spew. If you love America, but are troubled by the current state of affairs, this book may provide you with some level of inspiration.
I purposefully chose the audio version of this book because I have heard Reich speak and his quirky delivery is affecting. | | Reason: Why Liberals Will Win the Battle for America by Vintage Un-Reason | MUST READ REVIEW: The Free Speech Haters (lefties) have deleted this review Twice.
Robert Reich, was Bill Clintons scariest appointment. His ideology, ergo his politics has been the of the most extreme left of any Bill Clinton's appointments. And some may argue that he some of the most extreme viewpoints of ANY high level appointment.
Robert Reich and his ilk were very happy when from the 1940's - 1980, radical lefties was setting the public agenda. All items were in play, courts were stacked and extremist's legislatures abdicated their law making ability to the courts. The executive branch simply turned a blind eye when radical lefties created a false impression that they were supporting the constitution when in fact they were and still are systematically undermining it. Left-Wing views that were on the fringe of the Democratic Party in the Sixties and Seventies are now center stage. These views, being forwarded by people like Reich, Dean, Kerry and Feingold, seem accepted as normal.
Left Wingers - control the media, academia, the sciences, think-tanks, and for most of the last century the executive, judicial and legislative branch. Republicans were demoralized, but the pendulum has finally begun to swing the other way. People are finally getting fed up with the extremist left who is arrogantly opposed to honest intellectual debate for they are fervently certain that they are correct in all matters. Their disdain for discourse and for anybody who challenges them is extant.
But the worst part is that radical lefties are uncivil to the extreme. They fill the public airwaves and bookstores with nastiness. Listen to Air America or watch a Michael Moore DVD. Read their editorials and you will find vicious vituperative attacks. Open a leftist political best-seller and you find more mean spirited screeds. Extremist lefties, RAD-COMS (Radical Communists) typically reduce political debate to nonsensical statements that seem to be making point but are nothing but vague and angry assertions, unsupported by facts.
But what we're now witnessing is something far more corrosive of civic life than normal political vitriol: It's viciousness directed toward anyone holding a view other than the prevailing elitist left-wing propaganda. Insults also calculated to belittle and ridicule entire groups or judged to be different are part of the divisive wedge that lefties like to play in hurting the cohesiveness of the nation.
The Conservative tradition values free speech and debate. No one should be deterred from speaking his or her mind for fear of offending some group. Lefties are opposed to this idea, the shouting down of Ann Coulter the attacks on Christians, etc, etc. Are all handiworks of the left. It is their mean-spirited trash talk that fills their protégée's with this HATE and ANGER of anybody not like them.
I'm sorry Mr. Reich, I used to be one of these lefties, and I know the condescension with which I was taught to look at people on the right. The attacking of American Citizens rather than ideas, the smearing of whole segments of society for some perceived ills against our ideology. This is leftism at its base. Fear and Hate driven. No. Mr. Reich it will be a sad day when you and your type WIN America. People are waking up, they are realizing that the great Democratic Party of yesteryear has been hijacked by Radicals.
Your book speaks about morals but you never discuss where the morals come from. Conservative position comes from a bedrock of factual and historical facts. They are a clear-eyed view of where America is and where we need to go. Your left wing morals come from a modernist philosophy, blown by the wind and proven to be a disaster. You biggest moral imperative is to BLAME others but that is what happens when you are ideologically based rather than historically and fact based.
I could go on and on, but MR. Reich, I used to be on the left. But the divisiveness, hate, anger, name-calling, utter compliance with leadership, no dissention, no debate, and supreme arrogance drove me away. Once one is away and in the middle you look at the two competing political thoughts and it is scary, very scary to see what you once were.
Mr. Reich, I am not an automaton, and that is what you need to usher in your America. What the conservatives need, is open honest debate, free speech, and equal time. You have a fight on your hands, one that I am hoping for my children's sake that you lose.
| | Reason: Why Liberals Will Win the Battle for America by Vintage Forcefully written, methodically argued | Robert B. Reich, Secretary of Labor under Bill Clinton, crafts a unified but diverse work in Reason. He forcefully attacks right-wing policies, methodically arguing against the irrationality of policies.
Reich avoids writing like an academic (which he is) and intersperses his agreements with personal anecdotes - interesting events from his childhood (listening to a conservative neighbor talk about FDR) stories from his time at Dartmouth (as a member of an honor committee that expelled a student for having sex), and a memorable tour of a public school with the late Daniel Patrick Moynihan (who demanded that vandalism on the wall be removed immediately).
Reich was especially impressive on second points:
*First, in the prelude ("The Revenge of the Radcons"), Reich rejects "neoconservative" and "paleoconservative" labels and instead refers throughout to "radical conservatives," or "radcons." He describes how radical conservatives aren't really conservative, contrasting true conservatives in the tradition of Burke (cautious, skeptical of grand plans, big ideas, meticulous, concerned with civilly) with radical conservatives in the mold of Kristol and Shachtman (revolutionary, intent of dramatic change, uncivil in the extreme).
*Second, in the discussion on economic policy ("Real Prosperity"), Reich demonstrates his economic brilliance through his discussion on globalization, outsourcing, and "the Two Jobs of the Future." Here he discusses how the declining consumer-goods sector of the American economy (replaced by technology and foreign workers) will be counterbalanced by the two growing sectors of the economy--personal service workers and what Reich calls symbolic analysts. It's a unique and intriguing argument that trumps the "protectionism-free trade" dichotomy artificially imposed on economic debate.
In generally, an excellent discussion that presents a solid and reasonable view of the modern United States and how it can be a better country if liberals win the "battle for America." Five stars. | | Reason: Why Liberals Will Win the Battle for America by Vintage Product Description | For anyone who believes that liberal isn’t a dirty word but a term of honor, this book will be as revitalizing as oxygen. For in the pages of Reason, one of our most incisive public thinkers, and a former secretary of labor mounts a defense of classical liberalism that’s also a guide for rolling back twenty years of radical conservative domination of our politics and political culture.
To do so, Robert B. Reich shows how liberals can:
.Shift the focus of the values debate from behavior in the bedroom to malfeasance in the boardroom
.Remind Americans that real prosperity depends on fairness
.Reclaim patriotism from those who equate it with pre-emptive war-making and the suppression of dissent
If a single book has the potential to restore our country’s good name and common sense, it’s this one. | | Reason: Why Liberals Will Win the Battle for America by Vintage Amazon.com | | Onto 2004's already crowded political non-fiction bookshelf, comes Reason by former Clinton administration Labor Secretary Robert Reich. It's a call to arms for liberals and progressives against what Reich terms the "Radcons", radical conservatives who combine the aggressive "neoconservative" foreign policy of Richard Perle and Robert Kagan with an insistence on interfering with private morality, all the while eliminating social safety nets. At times, it seems like Reich is trying to have it both ways: he condemns the Radcons for being judgmental and demonizing those with whom they disagree but, in the process, he often does some demonizing of his own in his summarization of their philosophies. Reich's arguments are most persuasive when he takes the approach of the Radcons but turns them around. Yes, he says, morality is crucial to the survival and prosperity of the United States, but instead of worrying about what people do in their own bedrooms, we should focus on public morality, especially as it pertains to overpaid CEOs, corrupt corporations, and the government's tacit approval of them. Despite his long history with the Democrats, or perhaps because of it, Reich saves some of his most pointed criticisms for his own party. He assails the Democrats for ceding the ongoing electoral struggle to the Republicans (and the Radcons, naturally). It's stupid, says Reich, to pursue a centrist approach to capturing the voting blocs necessary to achieve victory in the White House or congress because there is actually no such thing as centrism. Instead, there is a shift in the political dialogue as the right tacks further rightward and drags victory-hungry Democrats with it, thus alienating and ultimately disenfranchising the substantial liberal electorate. Reich ultimately sees good news for liberals on the horizon, however. While he thinks millions of Americans are fed up with the overly cautious Democratic Party that won't stand up for it's progressive principals, they are even wearier of the Radcons and "their intolerance, their mean-spiritedness, their moral righteousness, and their arrogance toward the rest of the world." --John Moe |
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