American Ideology

Third edition. Is the United States facing a societal "divorce"? Roughly two thirds of Americans believe another civil war could occur in today's political climate. And it is easy to understand why. Three impeachments in the last four presidencies. A weak US presidency. A partisan divide perhaps greater than that of the 1860s. With perhaps impeccable timing, this Wall Street Journal best-selling author contemplates an exit strategy for what has become a broken democracy.

Larry Diamond has made it his life's work to secure democracy's future by understanding its past and by advising dissidents fighting autocracy around the world. Ill Winds' core argument is stark: the defense and advancement of democratic ideals relies on US global leadership. If we do not reclaim our traditional place as the keystone of democracy, today's authoritarian swell could become a tsunami, providing an opening for Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, and their admirers to turn the 21st century into a dark time of despotism.

The year 2020 was a tumultuous time in American politics. It brought a global pandemic, protests for racial justice, and a razor-thin presidential election outcome. It culminated in an attack on the US Capitol that attempted to deny Joe Biden's victory. The Bitter End explores the long-term trends and short-term shocks that shaped this dramatic year and what these changes could mean for the future. Ultimately, instead of the country coming together to face national challenges—the pandemic, George Floyd's murder, and the Capitol riot—the challenges only reinforced divisions.

Duca investigates and explains the issues at the root of our ailing political system and reimagines what an equitable democracy would look like. It begins with young people getting involved. This includes people like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the youngest woman ever to be elected to Congress; David and Lauren Hogg, two survivors of the Parkland, Florida shooting who went on to become advocates for gun control; Amanda Litman, who founded the nonprofit organization Run for Something, to assist progressive young people in down ballot elections; and many more.

The first European settlers saw America as a paradise regained. The continent seemed to offer a God-given opportunity to start again and build the perfect community. Those messianic days are gone. But as Alex Krieger argues in City on a Hill, any attempt at deep understanding of how the country has developed must recognize the persistent and dramatic consequences of utopian dreaming. Even as ideals have changed, idealism itself has for better and worse shaped our world of bricks and mortar, macadam, parks, and farmland.

Upon leaving the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin was asked what sort of government the delegates had created. His reply to the crowd: "A republic, if you can keep it." Now America's most respected governor explains just how close we've come to losing the republic, and how we can restore it to greatness

In Real Americans, Jared A. Goldstein boldly challenges the conventional wisdom that a shared devotion to the Constitution is the essence of what it means to be American.

Congressional scholars Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein identify two overriding problems that have led Congress—and the United States—to the brink of institutional collapse. But they offer a panoply of useful ideas and reforms, endorsing some solutions, like greater public participation and institutional restructuring, while debunking others, like independent or third-party candidates. Above all, they call on the media as well as the public to focus on the true causes of dysfunction rather than just throwing the bums out every election cycle.

In the lead-up to every election cycle, pundits predict that Latino Americans will overwhelmingly vote in favor of the Democratic candidate. And it’s true - Latino voters do tilt Democratic. Hillary Clinton won the Latino vote in a “landslide”, and Barack Obama “crushed” Mitt Romney among Latino voters in his reelection. But those numbers belie a more complicated picture. Here, historian and political commentator Geraldo Cadava illuminates the history of the millions of Hispanic Republicans who, since the 1960s, have had a significant impact on national politics.

When Ronald Reagan warned that freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction, was he pointing to Generation Z? Today’s young adults have been indoctrinated since preschool in the lie that America is fundamentally unjust. They have watched their parents hand over their freedom to big government, and they themselves are captivated by a deceptive ideology of unprecedented radicalism.

The Red Caesar Code: A Guidebook for the Installation of the American Dictator is a timely short-form work that investigates the political and social dynamics that have led to a precipice in the political landscape of the United States, and indeed the world.

Written by an admired leader of the Republican party, Rally Point: Five Tasks to Unite the Country and Revitalize the American Dream looks past the 2016 election, past the finger pointing and conventional political thinking, to focus on clear primary principles that conservatives must debate and defend to protect the future of America.

En las elecciones del 2004, hubo 3 millones más votantes hispanos que en el año 2000. Los hispanos pusieron al presidente George W. Bush en la Casa Blanca en el 2000 y luego lo reeligieron en el 2004. Es imposible ignorar una influencia tan grande y un voto tan importante.

El cambio más dramático que está viviendo este país no tiene nada que ver con la guerra contra el terrorismo o con la economía; tiene que ver, simplemente, con la revolución demográfi ca impulsada por los latinos. Es la Ola Latina.

American populism has always been home to a fascinating assortment of charismatic leaders, characters, kooks, cranks, and sometimes charlatans who have led the charge of ordinary folks who have gotten wise to the ways of the swamp. Every Man a King tells the stories of America's populist leaders, from Andrew Jackson and Teddy Roosevelt to Ross Perot, Pat Buchanan, and Donald Trump. It is a rollicking history of an American attitude that has shaped not only our current moment, but also the long struggle over who gets to define the truths we hold to be self evident.

The American way - independence, entrepreneurialism, liberty - has been under assault for decades. The cultural foundations of the United States and its institutions are devolving along the line of some futuristic apocalyptic novel and producing social, moral, and economic dry rot that can lead only to chaos and ruin. Attacks on individuality, freedom, and personal responsibility for most of the last century have resulted, as Alexis de Tocqueville once predicted, in a gradual degradation of the people and the descent into slavery of once-free people.

As a biomedical sciences student, Isabel Brown never anticipated finding herself immersed in a world of leftism, silenced by the thought police, and afraid to speak up for conservative values, but this is the reality that defined her college experience. Isabel's story is a compelling memoir about the current state of affairs on America's college campuses - unveiling the truth that university administrators don't want you to hear - and a reminder of the need for true ideological diversity.

In The Politics of Petulance Alan Wolfe argues the core of our problem isn't Trump himself - it's that we are mired in an age of political immaturity. That immaturity is not grounded in any one ideology, nor is it a function of age or education. In 2016, many Americans were offered tantalizingly simple answers to complicated problems, and, like children being offered a lunch of Pop Rocks and Coke, they reflexively - and mindlessly - accepted. The good news is that we've been here before. Wolfe reminds us that we know how to grow up and face down Trump and other demagogues.

In Grace Canceled, popular talk radio host and political activist Dana Loesch confronts the Left's zero-tolerance, accept-no-apologies ethos with a powerful call for a return to core American principles of grace, redemption, justice, and empathy. Diving deep into recent cases where public and private figures were shamed, fired, or boycotted for social missteps, Loesch shows us how the politics of outrage is fueling the breakdown of the American community. How do we find common ground without compromising?

Curtis J. Austin chronicles how violence brought about the founding of the Black Panther Party in 1966 by Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale, dominated its policies, and finally destroyed the party as one member after another - Eldridge Cleaver, Fred Hampton, Alex Rackley - left the party, was killed, or was imprisoned.

In How Do I Tax Thee?, libertarian commentator and rising media star Kristin Tate takes us on a tour of the ways the government bleeds us dry in innumerable daily transactions and at various stages of life. We all know the government taxes our pay: Federal, state, and local taxes are withheld by employers, as are Social Security payments. But what about the many other ways the government drains money from our wallets?