Review: No He Can't: How Barack Obama is dismantling hope and change

Disclaimer:  I rec'd a review copy of this book through the publisher's Book Sneeze review program.  The review below is my honest reaction to No He Can't: How Barack Obama is dismantling hope and change.

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I've been to many places in my almost-50 years of life and I have to say I love our country -- there are few places on this earth that can boast of major political upheavals occurring peacefully, of the freedoms we Americans have and use daily, of the wealth and power of our nation.  But these great benefits come with a price -- the price of responsibility for knowing what is happening in our country, of knowing what our employees (remember, when you vote someone into office, they are for all intents and purposes your employees -- if you don't like what they are doing, you must "fire" them!). in Washington are doing for us, and in ensuring that we never allow these rights, these freedoms to be taken from ANY American.

Kevin McCullough's book, No He Can't, is a book that every voting-age (or even, soon-to-be voting age) American should read.  McCullough defines four major policies areas and what the current administration, that is, Mr. Obama, is saying he'll do, is actually doing and what the end results will be if these policies remain unchecked.  The policies areas covered include:

1. the economy -- on the campaign trail, Mr. Obama stated that there would be no tax increase for families making less than $250,000 per year; but in the same speeches, he swore he would remove the tax breaks of the Bush administration -- the net result?  By cancelling the tax breaks, the tax bill for everyone went up.  The $1.3 TRILLION stimulus package, the brain-child of such experts as Mr. Obama, Mr. Reid and Ms. Pelosi -- a package that could have been distributed to each family in the United States (where a family of four could be given a check for $17,000) -- instead went for corporate bail-outs, "cash for clunkers" (that no one wanted anyway and which ran out of funding within a week of the program's start), and millions to STD awareness. In other words, the huge national debt incurred by this stimulus package was a major flop ... and one that we'll be paying for the next few centuries.  Remember, these politicians are our employees -- "we the people" elected them and asked them to do a job; is this the job we asked them to do?
2. national security and international policies -- in May 2010, Mr. Obama gave the commencement speech at WestPoint.  His topic was that he was intent on shaping a new international order, to minimize the US role of securing democratic values around the world, and "implied that America should not claim the mantle or the right of self-protection or self-responsibility" (pg 79).  He was talking to newly graduated Army officers, men and women who would shortly be asked to go out and defend our country -- and the President of the United States tells them he's basically moving toward getting rid of these jobs?  That's like telling a group of new-hires in a company that in the next few years, we won't need you anymore!  Mr. Obama, who seems to promote a non-American agenda (buddying-up to anti-American international leaders like Chavez of Venezuela and Castro of Cuba, embracing blatantly non-democratic policies),on one of his first international trips as President he spoke to a group of Egyptian students in Cairo; the speech "equated the roots of freedom in the United States with the origins of Islam, a religious system that enslaves women and dehumanizes and kills opponents" (pg 84).  Really?  Is this what we want our hired President to say?  Is this what we think?  
3. domestic policies -- all of the domestic policies pushed by the Obama administration (health care bill, education policies, recreating the definition of "family", allowing millions of federal dollars to go to Planned Parenthood, etc) seek to shift our democracy to a socialist state through more and more, bigger and bigger government, to cause our free market economy to implode, and to punish those who disagree with his policies.  When the blogosphere was rampant with critical essays about the proposed health bill, the White House website asked readers to send links to anti-administration posts to the White House so they could track the dissidents!  Really?  In a democratic country, we're encouraged to rat on each other?  Hmmm ... so much for the First Amendment!  Is this what we want our elected officials to say and do?

The final section of the book, "render unto Caesar", lays-out what "we the people" need to do.  McCullough asks the reader:  how do we treat our political officials, and most especially, how do we treat our President?  We elect these folks ... and the elected officials are our employees.  If they are not doing their job, they need to be fired.  We are stockholders in the country, we all benefit when all is well and we all suffer when things are not good.  We elect officials who we think will fix things.  We have hope that our officials will fix what's broken, leave the overall good things in place, and make, FIRST, the country a better place, and SECOND, make the world a better place.  Is our current administration doing this?  Why not?

Politically, I'm a conservative -- want smaller government, less federal spending, protection of rights for all humans (from the pre-born to natural death).  I am a Roman Catholic and believe in a merciful God and my right to practice my religion.  I don't want any of these things taken away ... I don't want a debt that my great-great-great-grandchildren will have to cover.  I don't want bigger and bigger government.  I don't want a socialist state where the liberal elite tell me and mine what we should do.  I am part of "we the people" and I think Mr. Obama needs to be "fired" at his next "review" time.

I highly recommend this book to all voting-age Americans!

Review: Uncle Sam's Plantation

Wow ... whether you're affiliated with the Democrats, Republicans, Tea-Party, or Independant parties you should read Star Parker's book, Uncle Sam's Plantation: How Big Government Enslaves America's Poor and What We Can Do About It.  This book is a riveting read proving that the Federal Government's involvement in welfare programs for the past decades (dating to just before Johnson's "War on Poverty") has actaully worsened the situation of America's poor (predominately African-Americans), run up the highest debt imaginable, and created an adversarial relationship between the haves and the have-nots, between people of ANY color, and generally wreaked havoc on our country.

Parker knows of what she speaks -- she herself was a self-professed "welfare junkie" who believed it was Uncle Sam's duty to provide for her and her child:  she is black, an unwed mother, an unemployed, homeless young woman.  She dumped the welfare programs and fixed her problems herself; she is founder and president of a non-profit think tank called Center for Urban Renewal and Education and a well-known advocate on people-based solutions to the social problems. 

I really enjoyed reading this book as I too believe we can do more good on a personal level, with occasional SHORT-TERM assistance from the government, than we can ever do with bigger and bigger government funded and run programs.  I loved her swimming pool analogy as well as her personal anecdotes and the statistical facts she includes.

And this book isn't just bashing Democrats or liberals.  This book shows that our government has gotten into things that it shouldn't, regardless of who is in the White House or which party rules the Capitol (altho traditionally, the most wastage and increased number of federal solutions to the War on Poverty comes during Democrat-led committees and administrations).  She defines and illustrates solutions that sound sane and workable -- and may just be what WILL finally end the War on Poverty (that we've been fighting for 40 years!). 

Highly recommend this book -- especially to politicians on either/both sides of the aisle -- read it, try and refute her analyses with facts and let me know what you decide should occur in our country.  Then VOTE that way.

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This book was received as part of Thomas Nelson's Book Sneeze program.  The above review is my honest critique of this revised and expanded edition of Uncle Sam's Plantation.


 

Review: William F. Buckley by Jeremy Lott

I've always been fascinated by William F. Buckley ... his was an interesting (charmed, some would say) existence. A wealthy, large family upbringing at the very best of schools (including boarding school in England and Yale for undergrad), a stint with the CIA "back in the day", and a prolific writing and broadcast career. To top it all off ... he was a staunch Catholic and conservative in his politics and philosophies.

Bill Buckley was "there" for all the big events in the 20th century -- born in the pre-dawn Depression Era, raised in New England and overseas, a quick tour in the Air Force, four years at the ivy-covered Yale and off to Mexico with the CIA, then back to New York area to wreak havoc for liberals and conservative fence-sitters. 

His writing and very public denunciation of all things liberal began just after graduating from Yale -- he wrote a book titled God and Man at Yale -- a book that caused an uproar since it brought the question of religion (or lack thereof) into academia.  It actually caused such a public outcry that the CIA thought better of having Buckley as an operative in Mexico and sent him back state-side.

So from the very first, Buckley's persona has been linked to his religious sense -- he was raised in a family that believed (and he continued to believe till his death in 2008 at 83) that God, family and country deserve absolute fidelity and loyalty.  In Jeremy Lott's new book, William F. Buckley, the reader gets a great view of just who Buckley was and what made him tick -- and his religious sense as a devout Catholic had much to do with his philosophy and conservatism.

Part of Thomas Nelson's "Christian Encounter" series, Lott's book traces Buckley's entry onto the public stage, through his third-party run for Mayor of New York (not to win, so much, as to be able to air his views in a public forum), his debates with liberal and conservative leaders led to the interviewee's verbal-slaughter on "Firing Line", and his writings (both fiction and non-fiction) that allowed further cultivation and honing of his mystique.

Lott admires and respects his subject -- and has a similar turn of phrase to Buckley's now-famous way of writing.  Lott does a great job of subtly linking Buckley's religious sense to his understanding of why, for instance, nuclear proliferation was critical at the time (since the Communists only believed in the here-and-now, they had a great stake in ensuring the "button" was never pushed while most Americans were Christians who looked to an afterlife) or why Buckley supported Goldwater but not Nixon.  Buckley was involved in most of the latter-20th century political machinations -- either as an observer, critic or advisor.  And Lott's book traces all of these.

This is a short book -- barely 150 pages -- but each page is filled with Buckley-isms, conservatism and Catholicity.  It's a very readable volume with an excellent end filled with suggested further readings (which things to read or not) and resources.

I highly recommend this book for a great start (but don't stop there ... make sure you read some of his other writings and listen to his Firing Line interviews) to understanding this man who had such an influence on conservative philosophy in the second half of the 20th century.

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Disclaimer:  This book was received as part of Thomas Nelson's Book Sneeze program.  In exchange for the book, I agreed to write a review.  The words of this review are my honest reaction to this book.

Review: A Century Turns: New Hopes, New Fears

So, what were you doing in 1989? 

I was a newly hired Delta Air Lines corporate ladder-climber, wielding a recent MBA, marriage license and a brand-new baby boy.  I was (and still am) a Catholic, conservative and Republican (in that order). It was the dawn of a new decade, the last of the 20th century and we all had hopes and fears for the country.

For the next 20 years America would experience bad times and good times -- Iraq and Katrina, housing booms and economic busts, deaths of amazing people and births of children saved from abortion, technology advances beyond anyone's imagining.  Our country would move from a white conservative president to a black liberal president with little social upheaval, something that would be considered a miracle in any other country but the US!

But what do we really know about those 20 years -- other than we now have blogs, Wii, text-messaging, and higher national debt and a recession?  Read William J. Bennett's latest, A Century Turns: New Hopes, New Fears, and you will get a very good picture of how we got from there to here, and even a glimpse of where we're headed. 

This is actually volume three of Bennett's American history series titled America: The Last Best Hope .  But this one shifts a bit from the previous two:  Volume 1 and 2 of the series deal with the times 1492-1914 and then 1914-1989.  Dr. Bennett was personally involved in just a bit of the history-making of the last part of volume 2, but very actively involved in the events of the next two decades.  In volume 3 we are given his own personal thoughts and remembrances of the past 20 years in light of American history and politics. 

Dr. Bennett, who held various government jobs (including head of the Department of Education under Ronald Reagan from 1985-88) and currently acts as the Washington Fellow of the Claremont Institute, is a noted conservative Republican who has a great love and interest in American history  and politics; further he wants to ensure that all Americans understand where we were and where we're going.   Because of his life experience, particularly as a Washington insider during the 20 years of this book, the reader gets a clear understanding of not just what happened but why and what it all means.  Now, Bennett's world-view is from a conservative (some would say, extremely conservative) viewpoint and yet his book attempts to give credit (or blame) where it is due, no matter which side of the aisle. 

From Bush Senior's one-term presidency, to the morally-questionable two terms of Clinton, through the war years and domestic issues of Bush Junior's two-terms to the eve of an American president who is not only African-American but is also a fairly unknown quantity in Washington circles (he was serving his first Senate term when he ran for election).  This book reads like a novel.  The writing is excellent, highly readable and informative.



The subtitle of this book is quite appropriate: new hope and new fears.  For the past 20 years we've seen the hope of new technologies which make our lives better and the fears of some of these technologies; we've seen the hope of new democracies and the fear of terrorism; we've lived through the hopes of housing booms and the fear of economic downturns.  And yet, we're still America ... we're still here and working through our problems and celebrating our successes.  As Bennett ends his book on the eve of Obama's first term in the White House ... yes, there is fear but there is a strong hope in the future.

One thing I didn't like about this book was whenever the conservative politicians would err, Bennett always seemed to have a footnote that mentioned he was against the event and warned the person.  Hind-sight is ALWAYS 20-20 and Bennett loses a little credibility in mentioning these, whether they're true or not.  Also, I thought his discussion of Obama's meteoric rise to the White House was a bit soft on information or analysis.  Other than those issues, I would recommend this book strongly to all American citizens who want to understand our Country's last 20 years!

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from Thomas Nelson Publishers as part of their BookSneeze.com book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”