The title, How the End Begins: The Road to a Nuclear World War III, could not be more ominous or, depending on your perspective on nuclear weapons, alarmist. Author Ron Rosenbaum has a definitive point of view about the danger of nuclear weapons as he waxes throughout the book about holocausts and the immorality of mass retaliation. Rosenbaum does not, however, ignore the side of the nuclear believers who state that nuclear weapons, through deterrence, have actually made the world safer and saved millions of lives. Rather than a driven point of view, Rosenbaum instead takes the reader on a meandering path pondering the history, danger, role, and, most importantly, morality of nuclear weapons.

Rosenbaum takes on a rather passive role as an observer and questioner throughout the book. The heart of the book is really posed in the question of mass retaliation. That is, if a nation has been destroyed or nearly destroyed, is it moral to retaliate for no other reason than vengeance which may likely end the human race? Rosenbaum asks various powerful or influential people including the US commander of nuclear weapons this question and to Rosenbaum’s apparent dismay, none would or could responsibly give a valid answer. But of course, to answer that “forbidden” question is to undermine what’s been the status quo since the Cold War and what we now rely upon: deterrence.

Deterrence is the theory that mass nuclear retaliation is an inevitability for any nation that launches a first strike nuclear attack. In other words, if you unleash nuclear weapons, you too will be destroyed by a retaliatory attack. Proponents of deterrence say that not only has it prevented nuclear war, but it has also saved millions of lives by preventing non nuclear wars from either occurring or escalating. Yet there is a very real and discouraging paradox that underlies deterrence as it relates to the morality of retaliation. Any mention that a retaliation is not inevitable intensifies the probability that a party attempt a first strike against the nation. So there’s this Faustian deal that is implicit with nuclear weapons, in that there is no middle ground and retaliation must be guaranteed. The safety provided by deterrence is guaranteed by the promise of mutually-assured destruction.

Mutually-assured destruction (MAD) was a very real possibility in the midst of the Cold War with the Soviet Union and the US always at a “hair trigger” notice. In fact, Rosenbaum goes through in the beginning of the book a series of near misses that the world has already witnessed. However, in the Cold War there was some level of stability between the two superpowers and deterrence worked as well as could be expected. Post Cold War is a period of nuclear instability as countries like North Korea gain nuclear weapons. We see a tense Pakistan and India situation with the added concern of terrorists accessing Pakistan’s nuclear stock. Also, the problem of the Middle East as a whole being a tinderbox for igniting a global nuclear holocaust seems all too real. Rosenbaum does an excellent job at highlighting both Cold War and post Cold War areas of concern, some of which like the “hair trigger” alert levels still haven’t changed despite the demise of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War. Rosenbaum also highlights the Israel attack on Syria in 2007 that, again, could have possibly started a World War III with nuclear weapons involved. The end of the Cold War has not given any relief to the notion that nuclear holocaust seems probable, whether by accident or by malice if history stays on course.

Ultimately, that’s where Rosenbaum’s book comes through strongest: nuclear weapons being unleashed are only a matter of time and scale. If changes are not made to the status quo, it’s quite likely (even statistically quantifiable) that we will see the engagement of nuclear weapons. At that point, the “forbidden question” will require an answer and that answer will shape the future of mankind. In his final chapter, “Endgame,” Rosenbaum does lay out some proposals to mitigate the risk. Rosenbaum also delves into the deep, inherent problems of “Zero” or eradicating nuclear weapons all together. The “Zero” policies, while idyllic, are pragmatically impossible as the knowledge will always be available which creates too many problems for any nation to give up nukes 100%. Rosenbaum instead settles on the notion of minimal deterrence, the least amount of deterrence needed to prevent a nuclear war but not risk mass destruction of humanity.

The threat of nuclear destruction is one of the most pressing concerns of humanity and one that most of us probably feel utterly powerless about. Even the knowledge of the threat provided in How the End Begins: The Road to a Nuclear World War III begins serves more to scare than to provoke into action. Nuclear policy is not like other political issues, like say tax policy or even Iraq War policy, where in a democratic nation one can have their voice heard and their vote accounted for. Nuclear policy and decision making will be made by likely a few people, maybe not even elected and it will be made in the course of minutes not election cycles, and that is a scary thought. As Rosenbaum pointed out, a possibly unbalanced Richard Nixon made the point very succinctly when he stated, “I could leave this room and in 25 minutes 70 million people would be dead.”

The sad truth is that American students perform worse the longer they stay in our public schools…

That the American educational system has fallen behind globally is not debatable. Children are simply not learning to the level that they need to in order to compete in a global market and to maximize their own self worth and value. The problem is recognizable by all, yet the causes and solutions are entrenched in the status quo and endlessly mired in debate and politics. In his new book, Push Has Come to Shove: Getting Our Kids the Education They Deserve–Even If It Means Picking a Fight, Dr. Steve Perry nobly attempts to bring this dysfunctional educational system out of the shadows of the status quo and illuminate all the flaws that prevent children from learning effectively.

As the title suggests, Dr. Perry takes a very confrontational and in your face tone throughout the book. Perry colors his language with war terms like “front line” and also uses colloquialisms freely which gives the text the tone of a passionate speaker rather than an academic treatise. It’s apparent that Perry is trying to reach out and hook a very broad audience of parents and concerned educators rather than aim for the formal educational crowd. In fact, several times in the book Dr. Perry expresses his frustration with academics like Jonathan Kozol and Dianne Ravitch whom he believes had their time to reform and failed.

The meat of the book, and where it succeeds, is Dr. Perry’s attack on the failure of our society to hold teachers, schools, and everyone else involved with the education of our nation’s children accountable. Dr. Perry deftly describes how even the language and attitudes have been shifted to the point we accept ineptitude in our public school systems when we wouldn’t accept it in any other business or area of our life.  Perry writes:

No other group in the economy, from professionals to blue-collar workers, stays employed with failure rates as high as America’s educators.

Educators get away with failing to teach our kids to state and local standards by falling back on the same old defense: I tried. As long as we can say – not prove – that we tried, we can hand out diplomas to kids who can’t even read them and keep on shouting that it’s not our fault.

The strongest chapter in the book, and the reason why we accept this incompetence, is the titled “Gatekeepers” and describes the power of the teachers’ union. Simply, any attempt at educational reform is countered by the union which carries immense political weight. Reforms from school choice, certification, and the school calendar are thought by many to be beneficial to the education of students but may obviously negatively impact the entrenched position that teachers have dug in for themselves. So the fight for the status quo remains the top priority for the unions, not improving the education of children. Dr. Perry illustrates this point by documenting how difficult it is to remove even clearly incompetent teachers that cannot stay awake during class. If nothing else, the price of the book is justified by that chapter alone.

Though Dr. Perry’s screed on the problems of our educational system is both powerful and effective, his solutions are less so. Dr. Perry is first a Principal and administrator and, it appears, a very effective one. He lays out an effective outline in Part Three about how to find great teachers, enact engaging lesson plans, and he aptly describes the role of the Principal and parents. In Part Seven he lists several proposals to better the overall system, such as lengthening the calendar and modernizing the curriculum. However, the biggest criticism that can be levied against the book is that while Dr. Perry gives a great game plan on how to run an accomplished school, he fails to show how it can be scalable throughout the nation. The fact is that the reason there are so many incompetent teachers is not only because the union protects them, but also because good teachers are in shortage. Dealing with the problems that Dr. Perry illuminates require a lot of data, detail, research, and pragmatism and unfortunately Push Has Come to Shove come up short on the nitty gritty aspects of solving the problems. The solutions are presented but not much effort is put forward to justifying them with any data, everything is anecdotal or assumed to be true.

Despite the lack of research and data presented, which Dr. Perry seems to disavow anyway as someone on the front lines, the book is very effective at bringing attention to the failing of the public educational system and the sense of urgency that we must acknowledge it. Dr. Perry’s book should be a must read for any parent, if for no other reason than to change the expectations that a parent should hold. As a taxpaying citizen, one should demand that public schools fulfill their obligations and refute the language that anyone other than the educational institution is at fault for the failure to educate children. The status quo is not working and for reformation or transformation to occur on a nationwide basis people have to be aware of the problems.  Push Has Come to Shove effectively introduces the reader to the quagmire of today’s educational battles and is an excellent first step in striving for change.

Pulitzer Prize winner Ron Suskind’s most recent work, Confidence Men, tears down the walls of the White House to readers to give an inside glimpse of President Obama’s handling of the domestic and economic policies in the first years of his term. The book paints a picture of an inexperienced President encountering an economic crisis unrivaled since the Great Depression. Along with the crisis comes an opportunity to change the system and culture of Wall Street, a very Roosevelt moment in time, and Suskind deftly explains why and how that campaign promise of change was never able to come to fruition.

Suskind’s strength is to take the heavily researched material and compact it into a riveting narrative tale. Throughout the book, the paragraphs can quickly shift from wonkish policy to high Shakespearean drama within the administration. This style lends a lot to the readability of the text but opens up Suskind to the charge of coloring the story with his own brush rather than reporting a drier set of facts. This occurs throughout the book when he inserts into the text lines such as “in a stage whisper”  which work, in this case, to elevate the drama. In addition to coloring the text with the choice of language, Suskind also clearly frames the heroes and villains in a blunt manner. There’s no doubt in Suskind’s text that Larry Summers, Tim Geithner, and Rahm Emmanuel are the confidence men referred to in the title, those who “gain the trust without earning it.” It’s just as clear that the heroes in the book are the few that were shut out of policy making or governing but that were champions for change, like Paul Volcker and Elizabeth Warren.

It’s President Obama, though, that the book is really about. Suskind uses all of Part I to describe the campaign while in the midst of the impending economic crisis, and those are the times when Obama shined brightest. Unfortunately, he was not able implement the rhetoric of the campaign into real change, despite having immense political capital. Confidence Men is primarily an examination of why President Obama failed in his first years as President. The following reasons all contributed greatly:

1)      President Obama lacked experience, especially in management. The knock on President Obama throughout his campaign with McCain was the lack of experience. Obama was only a little more than four years removed from serving as a State Senator in Illinois and had never led any type of large sized organization or business. This lack of experience showed up frequently in the next two years as the administration consistently failed to either take advantage of timely opportunities or failed to execute the desires of the President.

2)      President Obama surrounded himself with the wrong people. This is partly due to his lack of experience that he came to depend on Washington insiders and former Clintonites rather than the people he surrounded himself during the campaign. Suskind frequently refers to a Team A of Volcker, Austan Goolsbee, Bob Reich, Robert Wolf, and Paul O’Neill; and a Team B comprised of Larry Summers, Tim Geithner, and the Bob Rubin acolytes. Obama chose the Team B, most of who were behind the deregulation that had in fact caused the economic crisis and had no interest in altering the status quo. Using their philosophy “first, do no harm,” they were able to avoid any real punitive measures for the finance industry and any real reform.

3)      President Obama attempted to tackle too much. Obama was dealing with the economic crisis, financial reform and health care all at the same time. Suskind writes “no one had the temerity to say, ‘Mr. President, any one of those three would be more than enough to challenge a new president with so little executive experience.’” Remember, also, that this was all on the domestic front and that President Obama was also fighting two Middle Eastern wars. See here.

4)      President Obama’s style was to try to build consensus. Suskind describes the President as extremely intelligent, impressing many that met him. However, he tended to try to bring opposing opinions together in a campaign like effort, rather than using his power to coerce. There were several opportunities in both financial reform and health care that the President needed to use the spear. His inability or lack of desire to do so cost the administration dearly and may have lost them the opportunity to enact real change. Also, his technocratic way of thinking led to an administration that would constantly relitigate issues over and over leading to a paralyzed executive branch.

In Confidence Men Suskind is a much harsher judge of the advisers who often whipsawed Obama around and even, in the Treasury Department’s case, slow walked direct policy orders. Suskind seems willing to give a benefit of the doubt to the President as he replaces most of his initial senior staff and old hand Pete Rouse begins to take charge. Yet, despite Suskind’s somewhat sympathetic tone towards Obama, it’s shocking how the President could allow so much insubordination and lack of accountability in the White House. It points to a weakness in the ability to not only create policy but also make sure it gets executed. In short, Confidence Men is an indictment on the executive ability of President Obama.

The whites…dealt unjustly by me. I came to them, they deceived me; the land I was upon I loved, my body is made of its sands; the Great Spirit gave me legs to walk over it; hands to aid myself; eyes to see its ponds, rivers forests, and game; then a head with which I think. The sun, which is warm and bright as my feelings are now, shines to warm us and bring forth our crops, and the moon brings back the spirits of our warriors, our fathers, wives, and children. The white man comes; he grows pale and sick, why cannot we live here in peace? I have said I am the enemy to the white man. I could live in peace with him, but they steal our cattle and horses, cheat us, and take our lands. The white men are as thick as the leaves in the hammock ; they come upon us thicker every year. They may shoot us, drive our women and children night and day; they may chain our hands and feet, but the red man’s heart will always be free.

History of the Second Seminole War, 1835-1842 by John K. Mahon is the source for the above quote by the brave Seminole warrior, Coacoochee. Mahon’s work is one of the few books to illuminate an oft forgotten about American War, one that had lasting implications and a dramatic story. The Seminole War involved a colorful cast of characters, extremely harsh environs, treachery and bravery, and a war of insurgency that teaches us lessons to this day. The Seminole Wars are but just one chapter in the long story of the Indian Wars and John K. Mahon gives a very clear and concise account of those wars of Florida.

Mahon structures the book chronologically, starting with the background of the First Seminole War and the series of treaties that followed it. Even from the beginning, coexisting with the Seminoles was not in the plans of the settlers of Florida, nor strongly supported by the U.S. government. Horribly debilitating treaties essentially took the land out of the Seminoles hands for nothing. The plan was to move them west of the Mississippi along with the Indians of Georgia. Skirmishes continued throughout the years of 1818-1835, as many Seminoles refused to yield. Finally, under the Presidency of Andrew Jackson, General Winfield Scott was given command in 1836 which marks the beginning of the Second Seminole War. Mahon then takes us through the rest of the war in chapters split up by the six commanding officers, describing events under each officer’s command.

Most attribute the Indian Wars as a natural consequence of Manifest Destiny and in the case of Florida and the Seminoles, it played a part. However, the most important factor may have very well been the slavery issue. Southern states were infuriated by the fact that slaves would escape to Florida and find sanctuary with the Indians. Reclamation of property was a leading reason why the Department of War and the state militias felt compelled to remove the Seminoles from Florida. How to treat the Black Seminoles became one of the most divisive issues to every commanding officer in Florida. Along those lines, the commanding officers also recognized that the “crackers” were also to blame for much of the violence between themselves and the Indians, and that too represented a major problem for the officers. Had it not been for the runaway slave issue, Florida may have been ignored for quite some time.

Anyone that has lived in Florida or spent a fair amount of time in Florida can attest to the brutal environment of Florida in the summer, even now with the advent of AC. War in the unforgiving swamps of Florida tested the hardiest of soldiers and often broke them. Disease, humidity, sawgrass, never ending rain and moisture, snakes, and alligators all posed just as much as threat to the Army as the Seminoles. In fact, disease killed many more soldiers than the Seminoles. A telling anecdote is that Colonel John F. Lane, deranged by fever and fatigue, ran his sword through his right eye. The fact that most soldiers considered Florida the poorest land ever fought over exemplifies the runaway slave factor. The conditions were brutal and the pay miserable, yet many future officers of the US Army gained considerable experience in Florida and would use that knowledge in future Indian Wars and the Civil War.

History of the Second Seminole War, 1835-1842 is a dense history and definitely does not fit under the breezy category. At times it can as trudging of a read as the Seminole War was a long, brutal trudge for both sides. However, Mahon provides an endlessly fascinating account of the Seminole War and the politics of the Seminole War. History of the Second Seminole War, 1835-1842 is a must read for anyone interested in Florida history and/or in general US history during the mid 19^th century.

PoliticalBooks.org prides itself on providing original and provocative reviews, however, there are times when it’s important to acknowledge that another reviewer nailed it so perfectly that there’s little to add. A high profile release such as Known and Unknown: A Memoir by Donald Rumsfeld will have no shortage of analysis and review, yet none have been as comprehensive, damning, and precise as the following review by Max Boot for tnr.com which can be found here.

The aspect of both Rumsfeld’s memoir and Boot’s review that is worth a deeper look is, to what degree of failure is attributable to the limits of human knowledge? Specifically, was bad intel the primary reason for poor decision making in the Bush administration? Boot harshly writes:

In other words, all this mock-philosophical reflection is really a not-so-subtle plea on behalf of Donald Rumsfeld. I did the best I could based on the information I had; don’t judge me too harshly. Rumsfeld would be more sympathetic if he were to come out and just throw himself on the public’s mercy. But contrition and humility are utterly alien to the cocksure former Navy fighter pilot who is forever poking his finger in someone’s chest, literally or metaphorically. By invoking the limitations of human knowledge, he is merely providing an alibi for his own failures, without quite coming out and saying so.

Obviously Rumsfeld’s arrogance and lack of grace doesn’t win him many sympathizers, yet, it is the folly of hindsight to condemn decisions made without the same perspective. That Rumsfeld uses the limits of knowledge as an alibi, as Boot suggests, to excuse past decisions does not mean that the alibi has no merit. It does not seem disingenuous, even in hindsight, for Rumsfeld to assert that a major concern of the administration and of President Bush was to prevent Saddam Hussein from disseminating WMDs to terrorists, especially when their intelligence backed up that concern. Nearly eight years after the invasion of Iraq it might be a productive exercise to imagine a counterfactual in which the U.S. did not invade Iraq. Regardless of what one concludes from that exercise, it would be unfair to not imagine a possibility of a much more dangerous world without the Iraq War decision. Obviously that doesn’t absolve the administration from the poor execution, diplomacy, public relations, and further poor decisions made with better intelligence.

Ultimately, Rumsfeld won’t be able to escape the fact that even with the best intentions with regards to decision making, the implementation was often severely flawed. Rather than take responsibility and explain what went wrong on his part or his department’s, Rumsfeld often casts blame at the foot of others – most notably the State Department and Condi Rice. This is where the memoir particularly stands out as a clean up job.

Donald Rumsfeld has had a remarkable career, even with his failures in his second reign as Secretary of Defense. The memoir is filled with interesting anecdotes and notable names. It serves as a first hand perspective from one of the most influential figures in U.S. policy in the last 50 years. Despite Rumsfeld’s mendacity, Known and Unknown: A Memoir is still an important volume in the canon of the Bush Presidency and an entertaining flight through U.S. contemporary history.

America’s relations with former nemesis Russia are as important as they have ever been, yet to many in the West the view of Russia is often clouded with misperceptions and a quick to demonize attitude. China’s rise, global terrorism, two wars in Central Asia, nuclear containment – these are all issues that the U.S. is dealing with and will need the cooperation of Russia to succeed going forward. However, it will be difficult to engage Russia without having a clearer idea of their history and interests. Daniel Treisman authors an extensive work on Russia from Gorbachev to Medvedev which tears down some prevailing beliefs of the West and illustrates the factors and personalities which led Russia to its present day status as a returning power.

Treisman uses an odd format for presenting his book, ignoring a conventional linear layout and instead uses the first four chapters to highlight each of the four Russian leaders since the collapse of the Soviet Union. The first four chapters briefly touch on the issues of 1990-2010 with the emphasis being more on the leader. He then returns to specific periods with more depth in the following chapters. At times this layout can be confusing and redundant, yet the first four chapters highlight what may be one of the most determinant factors in modern Russian history, the personalities and characters of the leaders.

The ninth chapter, “Falling Apart”, is where the book shines and is most compelling because it strictly relates the foreign policy between the U.S. and Russia. Treisman separates the chapter into the “View from Moscow” and the “View from Washington” giving each side a balanced perspective and reasoning for making the foreign policy choices it has.  Russia’s perspective, according to Treisman, is that:

• The U.S. failed to provide economic aid to Russia after the breakup of the Union equivalent of other nations. More damaging was the refusal to forgive the loans that Russia alone was burdened with from the Soviet Union. The West did little to aid Russia’s transformation into a democracy.
• NATO quickly expanded right up to Russian borders which was a clear betrayal of former promises. In addition to the betrayal it was seen as a threat and not as an action of a country that wanted to support the transition to democracy. Also, by expanding NATO so quickly into the Russian sphere it enhanced the chance of a war between the two powers. The issue with Georgia is along the same lines, with Russia upset at perceived American hypocrisy.
• The leaders of the U.S. were strangely condescending towards Russia, a nation that still remained a global power.

The US perspective, according to Treisman, is that:

• Economic Aid was not politically possible. Congress would not grant the aid, especially towards former Soviet soldier’s housing, when their own citizens and soldiers were living in subpar accommodations.
• Including Russia in NATO was an impossibility because Russia would never agree to play 2^nd fiddle to the Americans. Therefore, enlarging NATO to serve the U.S. interests was the rational and necessary choice.
• Russia appears to often act in defiance of the U.S. for no other reason than to be difficult. This difficulty works against Russia’s interests in the West by redefining their identity to many as a state unwilling to cooperate, or worse an enemy.

Going forward it’s in both nations interests to have a working relationship and according to Treisman, Obama is beginning to open doors that were shut during the Bush administration.

The Return: Russia’s Journey from Gorbachev to Medvedev is an excellent narrative of modern day Russian history; in fact the chapter dedicated to the Chechen Wars is alone worth the price of the book. However, more than constructing a narrative, Treisman tries to shed some of the Western notions about Russia as an autocratic nation on par with the Arab states. He illustrates that when it comes to liberties, democracy, and economics, Russia is more similar to other emerging nations such as Brazil rather than Yemen as many would have you believe. Treisman’s writing style may be wanting for a little more color at times, but the depth and extensive material on Russia for the last twenty years is not at all lacking. Anybody interested in how Russia came to its present day status and its role in modern day global affairs would be well advised to check out The Return: Russia’s Journey from Gorbachev to Medvedev.

Even with the most gruesome and graphic depictions of war violence on film there is still a mental barrier between reality and fantasy. In his book The Good Soldiers, David Finkel brings the reader realistic depictions of the savageness of the modern day warfare and to some level the reader is given a glimpse of the dark state of mind that results from war. The Good Soldiers tells the story of the 2-16 Battalion from pre-deployment in early 2007 until they go home almost a year later. The 2-16 was part of the “surge” ordered by President Bush in 2007 to quell the mounting insurgency in Iraq. Finkel does not ignore the meta-political questions of the surge or the war in Iraq, however, the focus of the book is truly on the soldiers and their life.

Lieutenant Colonel Ralph Kauzlarich is the leader of the Battalion and a large focus of the book as he tries to maintain a rah-rah attitude, while many of his underlings are coming to the realization that their efforts are not working and that their life is in constant danger. A poignant display of the overly optimistic attitudes that have plagued the Iraq War from the lowest authority to the highest authority of President Bush, is when LTC Kauzlarich is given an opportunity to brief General Petraeus. There was a heavy emphasis on strictly the positive news and not any negative news or views that may be considered negative or dissenting. Not to suggest that it was the time and place or even role for a dissenting view, however, somewhere along the chain of command reports have to reflect what’s happening on the ground. Finkel portrays an area of Baghdad that’s beyond help, while the command is solely focused on reporting successful operations.

The book’s acclaim comes from the insight it provides to the soldier’s life in Iraq. The depictions of the sewer stench, the overbearing dust and heat, and the randomness of deadly EFPs bring to life a living hell. The damage that these EFPs are capable of doing to young vibrant soldiers is gut wrenching. Finkel graphically describes how bodies are shredded, limbs are torn off, and how soldiers bleed out, all in a blink of a second. The toll this takes on the living soldiers is unimaginable, and Finkel does a wonderful job of addressing the unspoken injury of war, PTSD. Finally, PTSD is starting to be understood and accepted more, even in the macho driven armed forces, but not without some hesitation. The fine line between a visible physical injury and a mental injury is still a gap in a lot of people’s eyes. It’s obvious that there’s a lot of mixed feelings when Sergeant Schuman leaves for home with PTSD, and it’s apparent that he doesn’t necessarily feel comfortable with it either.

PoliticalBooks.org has spent a lot of time on the meta-political issues regarding the Iraq and Afghanistan War, however, it’s also important to recognize the day to day implementation of the war and the soldier’s perspectives.  Like another great book, In a Time of War by Bill Murphy Jr., The Good Soldiers shows the reality of modern day warfare and gives a glimpse into the lives of the modern day soldiers. Those stories and experiences are crucial to understanding the war in a broader context and crucial to empathizing with the soldier experience, which still too many citizens do not understand.

The fourth book of the Bush at War series by Bob Woodward, The War Within: A Secret White House History 2006-2008, covers the years the final two years of the Bush Presidency and recounts the decisions and internal strife of that period. The War Within picks up where State of Denial left off, with Iraq declining into a violent cesspool of sectarian war and the U.S. with no decisive strategy. While State of Denial was condemning in accounts and tone, The War Within is a slightly drier account as the situation in Iraq goes from horrible to improving.

The focus of the book is the struggle of how to address the rising insurgency in Iraq that was causing such violence.  On one side you had the Defense Department led by Donald Rumsfeld and commanding General William Casey advocating a troop drawdown to make the Iraqis responsible for their own well being. The other push was for a “surge,” bringing more troops into Iraq to help quell the violence.  As we all know, the surge ended up happening and General Petraeus replaced Casey as the commanding General and Bob Gates became the new Secretary of Defense. What may be the most interesting tidbit in the book and that is not explored is that the real change of fortune in Iraq was most likely due not to the surge but instead a secret Manhattan Project like innovation (page 380). Unfortunately, due to its highly classified status, the reader doesn’t get anymore explanation than that.

Like State of Denial, Woodward once again describes an administration that is out of touch and ineffective, which stems from the President.  Bush’s unwavering optimism and certainty prevent any dissent which is necessary for rational debate or discussion.  The other criticism that can be levied against Bush is his public spin that everything was going fine in Iraq and his refusal to address, to the public, a necessary strategy change.  It’s a fine line between being an optimistic leader and being a deceiver. In fact, it was only until he failed miserably as the leader of the Republican Party in the mid –term elections of 2006 that Bush implemented any change. Woodward paints a picture of a President that has “displayed impatience, bravado and unsettling personal certainty about his decisions.”  President Bush surrounded himself with people that would show deference to him, not challenge him, in fact, it’s very noticeable how often Bush must remind people that he’s President or that he has the power.  It’s indicative of a sense of insecurity, as is his refusal to ask his father for any kind of input.

The Woodward quartet of books about the Bush Presidency is highly informative but will ultimately be just one source of information on the calamitous Presidency of George W. Bush.  As Bush himself often states, history will eventually judge his actions. I have no doubt the George W. Bush has no doubt that history will come down on his side. However, even if the Middle East does become a stabilized situation due to a Free Iraqi state, that will not excuse the incompetency of the execution of the War. Bush never seems to be able to grasp that there is more than just the decision, there’s also the implementation and history will judge him and his administration very harshly.

Joseph Gibson, author of A Better Congress: Change the Rules, Change the Results: A Modest Proposal – Citizen’s Guide to Legislative Reform, begins his book with the assertion that Congress does not work well and that the incentives that drive the members of Congress are the problem. Very few people would likely disagree with that broad assertion, however, the causes of the problems and solutions to the problems are steeped in rhetoric. In A Better Congress Gibson lays out his views on the failings of Congress in Part I and his proposed solutions in Part II.

In order to better communicate the problems of Congress Gibson constructs a fictional Congressman named Rick Johnson and uses him as a model while illustrating the following reasons why Congress does not work well:

• The enormous advantages of incumbency discourage competition among candidates
• The tremendous ordeals of a campaign narrow the pool of candidates
• The skills to win a campaign do not correlate with governing
• The Congressional bubble divides the representative from his constituency
• The minority party has little to no incentive to govern
• The drive for reelection is all encompassing
• The bias towards passing laws regardless of their need or effectiveness
• The counterproductive overreaction to crisis and the inability to address entitlement reform

It becomes clear that the real underlying issue to all of the above is the drive for reelection. The incentives in the current system are to first retain power and then, perhaps, govern wisely. Yet it is clear that getting reelected and governing wisely are almost always in direct conflict. Gibson illustrates this clearly in the chapter about the minority party and their ineffectiveness. This is not an issue solely confined to Congress either; Scott McClellan referred to the permanent campaign and its effect on the Bush Administration in his book What Happened. Gibson addresses solutions to this problem in Part II but really the highlight of the book is in Part I where Gibson adeptly illustrates the problems of Congress through the use of his fictional Congressman.

Part II addresses solutions to the above problems and breaks it down as solutions for both houses and house specific. Gibson emphasizes in Part I that the system is complex and there is a lot of incentive driven behavior, but not in the way that was probably imagined by the creators of our Constitution. A lot of our past modifications, additions, and fixes to the structure of government have created this enormous growing blob of unintended consequences. Solutions, even with the best of intentions, rarely work out in ideal fashion and unfortunately it’s hard to predict how they’ll affect the system without them being implemented. So, for example, Gibson advocates changing campaign finance laws which were originally instituted as a fix to political corruption but have morphed, in Gibson’s view, into a system that gives incumbents enormous advantages. However, any drastic change to the campaign finance laws, like Gibson’s proposal of the lifting of any cap and mandating transparency, will almost without a doubt not work out as idealized and could possibly be more disastrous than the current system. Without a careful examination of these proposals, it’s difficult to really see the validity of them other than as conversation starters into the solutions.

It is not that Gibson’s proposals don’t have merit or that attempts to fix Congress should not be attempted because of unintended consequences, instead Part II just does not give a serious enough look at each solution and explore how it might play out. Also, some of the solutions are matter of ideological beliefs and not pragmatism. The solution to minimize the number of House members is based on how you view the function of democracy and government and how responsive they should be to their constituency; it is not a simple technical fix like say changing committee rules.

Gibson clearly states that this work is intended to provoke debate about why Congress doesn’t work well and to stoke the discussion on how to fix it. On that measure Gibson succeeds, even the most passive of readers will find the contents and proposals stimulating. Yet, it’s questionable whether the solutions set forth have any real practical merit. This book probably won’t appeal to the hardcore political junkie as its focus is quite broad and solutions very sweeping. The book’s real strength is in bringing to light how the Congress functions, or doesn’t, and what the problems are that prevent it from working in a more ideal way. This book is perfect for the average citizen who is frustrated by the inefficacy of Congress but may not quite understand why. Gibson’s plain English style and brief chapters make the Herculean task of fixing a dysfunctional Congress seem like an approachable subject and his book should appeal to a large swath of readers.

** Review Copy provided by the publisher.