For nearly twenty years, Aaron David Miller has played acentral role in U.S. efforts to broker Arab-Israeli peace as anadvisor to presidents, secretaries of state, and national securityadvisors. Without partisanship or finger-pointing, Miller recordswhat went right, what went wrong, and how we got where we aretoday. Here is a look at the peace process from a place at thenegotiation table, filled with behind-the-scenes strategy, colorfulanecdotes and equally colorful characters, and new interviews withpresidents, secretaries of state, and key Arab and Israelileaders. Honest, critical, and often controversial, Miller’s insider’saccount offers a brilliant new analysis of the problem ofArab-Israeli peace and how it still might be solved.
A blistering journalistic exposé: an account of governmentnegligence, corporate malfeasance, familial struggle, drugs,politics, murder, and a daring rescue operation in the Colombianjungle. On July 2, 2008, when three American private contractors andColombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt were rescuedafter being held for more than five years by the RevolutionaryArmed Forces of Colombia (FARC), the world was captivated by theirpersonal narratives. But between the headlines a major story waslost: Who exactly are the FARC? How had a drug-funded revolutionaryarmy managed to hold so many hostages for so long? Had our costlyWar on Drugs failed completely? Hostage Nation answers thesequestions by exploring the complex and corrupt political andsocioeconomic situations that enabled the FARC to gainunprecedented strength, influence, and impunity. It takes us behindthe news stories to profile a young revolutionary in the making, anelite Colombian banker-turned-guerrilla and the hard-drivenAmeric
The assassination of John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963,continues to inspire interest ranging from well-meaning speculationto bizarre conspiracy theories and controversial filmmaking. But inthis landmark book, reissued with a new afterword for the 40thanniversary of the assassination, Gerald Posner examines all of theavailable evidence and reaches the only possible conclusion: LeeHarvey Oswald acted alone. There was no second gunman on the grassyknoll. The CIA was not involved. And although more than fourmillion pages of documents have been released since Posner firstmade his case, they have served only to corroborate his findings. Case Closed remains the classic account against which allbooks about JFK’s death must be measured.
“White takes us back to when great men believed in the powerof words to change the world. . . . This book . . . is a treasureto read, a spur to thinking, a small volume with fascinatinghistory.”–The Denver Post In The Eloquent President, historian Ronald C. White, Jr.,examines Abraham Lincoln’s astonishing oratory and explores hisgrowth as a leader, a communicator, and a man of deepeningspiritual conviction. Examining a different speech, address, orpublic letter in each chapter, White tracks the evolution ofLincoln’s rhetoric from the measured tones of the First Inauguralto the immortal poetry of the Gettysburg Address. As he weighs thebiblical cadences and vigorous parallel structures that makeLincoln’s rhetoric soar, White identifies a passionate religiousstrain that most historians have overlooked. It is White’scontention that, as president, Lincoln not only grew into aninspiring leader and determined commander in chief, but alsoembarked on a spiritual odyssey that led to a profo
Following on the success of their recent collaboration DearMr. President, Dwight Young and Margaret Johnson join forces onceagain to produce this charming collection of correspondence to andfrom First Ladies during their time in office. A wonderful giftbook for any American, Dear First Lady reminds us that ours is agreat government "of the people, by the people, and for thepeople," which entitles us to make our views known to our leaders.Although some of these missives were written by the famous or theinfamous, most are from ordinary Americans who wished to connectwith their First Lady. Amusing, appealling, heartbreaking, andheartwarming, the letters appear as full-size facsimiles whereverpossible so readers can see for themselves the substance and styleof these intriguing exchanges. Dwight Young annotates each letter with biographical andhistorical stories that illuminate the context and provide broaderinsights into the public and private lives of presidents’ wives.Richly illustrated with arch
The political memoiras rousing adventure story—a sizzling account of a life lived inthe thick of every important struggle of the era. April 1973: snow falls thick and fast on the Badlands ofSouth Dakota. It has been more than five weeks since protestingSioux Indians seized their historic village of Wounded Knee, andthe FBI shows no signs of abandoning its siege. When Bill Zimmermanis asked to coordinate an airlift of desperately needed food andmedical supplies, he cannot refuse; flying through gunfire and amechanical malfunction, he carries out a daring dawn raid andsuccess?0?2fully parachutes 1,500 pounds of food into the village.The drop breaks the FBI siege, and assures an Indian victory. This was not the first—or last—time Bill Zimmerman put his life atrisk for the greater social good. In this extraordi?0?2nary memoir,Zimmerman takes us into the hearts and minds of those making thesocial revolution of the sixties. He writes about registering blackvoters in deepest, most racist Mississippi; marc
Neglected by scholars and journalists alike, the years ofconflict in Vietnam from 1968 to 1975 offer surprises not onlyabout how the war was fought, but about what was achieved. Drawingfrom thousands of hours of previously unavailable (and stillclassified) tape-recorded meetings between the highest levels ofthe American military command in Vietnam, A Better War is aninsightful, factual, and superbly documented history of these finalyears. Through his exclusive access to authoritative materials,award-winning historian Lewis Sorley highlights the dramaticdifferences in conception, conduct, and-at least for a time-resultsbetween the early and later years of the war. Among his mostimportant findings is that while the war was being lost at thepeace table and in the U.S. Congress, the soldiers were winning onthe ground. Meticulously researched and movingly told, A Better Warsheds new light on the Vietnam War.
The Politics of Upheaval, 1935-1936, volume three of PulitzerPrize-winning historian and biographer Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr."sAge of Roosevelt series, concentrates on the turbulent concludingyears of Franklin D. Roosevelt's first term. A measure of economicrecovery revived political conflict and emboldened FDR's critics todenounce "that man in the White house." To his left were demagoguesHuey Long, Father Coughlin, and Dr. Townsend. To his right were thechampions of the old order ex-president Herbert Hoover, theAmerican Liberty League, and the august Supreme Court. For a time,the New Deal seemed to lose its momentum. But in 1935 FDR ralliedand produced a legislative record even more impressive than theHundred Days of 1933 a set of statutes that transformed the socialand economic landscape of American life. In 1936 FDR coasted toreelection on a landslide. Schlesinger has his usual touch withcolorful personalities and draws a warmly sympathetic portrait ofAlf M. Landon, the Republican candidate of 1936.
Robert Baer was known inside the CIA as perhaps the bestoperative working the Middle East. Over several decades he servedeverywhere from Iraq to New Delhi and racked up such an impressivelist of accomplishments that he was eventually awarded the CareerIntelligence Medal. But if his career was everything a spymight aspire to, his personal life was a brutal illustration ofeverything a spy is asked to sacrifice. Bob had few enduringnon-work friendships, only contacts and acquaintances. Hisprolonged absences destroyed his marriage, and he felt intenseguilt at spending so little time with his children. Sworn tosecrecy and constantly driven by ulterior motives, he was a manapart wherever he went. Dayna Williamson thought of herself as just an ordinaryCalifornia girl -- admittedly one born into a comfortablelifestyle. But she was always looking to get closer to theedge. When she joined the CIA, she was initially tasked withAgency background checks, but the attractive Berkeley graduatequickly distingu
Locked in the Cabinet is a close-up view of the way thingswork, and often don't work, at the highest levels ofgovernment--and a uniquely personal account by the man whose ideasinspired and animated much of the Clinton campaign of 1992 and whobecame the cabinet officer in charge of helping ordinary Americansget better jobs. Robert B. Reich, writer, teacher, socialcritic--and a friend of the Clintons since they were all in theirtwenties--came to be known as the "conscience of the Clintonadministration and one of the most successful Labor Secretaries inhistory. Here is his sometimes hilarious, sometimes poignantchronicle of trying to put ideas and ideals into practice. With wit, passion, and dead-aim honesty, Reich writes of those inWashington who possess hard heads and soft hearts, and those withexactly the opposite attributes. He introduces us to the careerbureaucrats who make Washington run and the politicians who, onoccasion, make it stop; to business tycoons and labor leaders whoclash by day an
For more than a half-century, Israel has been forced to defendits existence against international political disapproval, racistcalumny, and violence visited upon its citizens by terrorists ofmany stripes. While nations have always been made to defend theirmoral, political, economic, or social actions, Israel has theunique plight of having to defend its very right to exist. Covering Israel's struggle for existence from the Britishoccupation and the UN’s partition of Palestine, to the dashed hopesof the Oslo Accords and the second intifada, Yaacov Lozowick trainsan enlightening, forthright eye on Israel’s strengths and failures.A lifelong liberal and peace activist, he explores Israel’snational and regional political, social, and moral obligations aswell as its right to secure its borders and repel attacks bothphilosophical and military. Combining rich historical perspectiveand passionate conviction, Right to Exist sets forth theagenda of a people and a nation, and elegantly articulates Isra
Kindred spirits despite their profound differences inposition, Abraham Lincoln and Walt Whitman shared a vision of thedemocratic character. They had read or listened to each other’swords at crucial turning points in their lives, and both wereutterly transformed by the tragedy of the Civil War. In thisradiant book, poet and biographer Daniel Mark Epstein tracks theparallel lives of these two titans from the day that Lincoln firstread Leaves of Grass to the elegy Whitman composed after Lincoln’sassassination in 1865. Drawing on a rich trove of personal and newspaper accounts anddiary records, Epstein shows how the influence and reverence flowedbetween these two men–and brings to life the many friends andcontacts they shared. Epstein has written a masterful portrait oftwo great American figures and the era they shaped through wordsand deeds.
At a time when a lasting peace between the Palestinians andthe Israelis seems virtually unattainable, understanding the rootsof their conflict is an essential step in restoring hope to theregion. In The Iron Cage, Rashid Khalidi, one of the most respectedhistorians and political observers of the Middle East, homes in onPalestinian politics and history. By drawing on a wealth ofexperience and scholarship, Khalidi provides a lucid context forthe realities on the ground today, a context that has been, untilnow, notably lacking in our discourse. The story of the Palestinian search to establish a state beginsin the mandate period immediately following the breakup of theOttoman Empire, the era of British control, when fledgling Arabstates were established by the colonial powers with assurances ofeventual independence. Mandatory Palestine was a place of realpromise, with unusually high literacy rates and a relativelyadvanced economy. But the British had already begun to construct aniron cage to hem in t
“Kirstin Downey’s lively, substantive and—dare I say—inspiringnew biography of Perkins . . . not only illuminates Perkins’ careerbut also deepens the known contradictions of Roosevelt’scharacter.” —Maureen Corrigan, NPR Fresh Air One of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s closest friends and the firstfemale secretary of labor, Perkins capitalized on the president’spolitical savvy and popularity to enact most of the Depression-eraprograms that are today considered essential parts of the country’ssocial safety network. Frances Perkins is no longer a household name, yet she was one ofthe most influential women of the twentieth century. Based on eightyears of research, extensive archival materials, new documents, andexclusive access to Perkins’s family members and friends, thisbiography is the first complete portrait of a devoted publicservant with a passionate personal life, a mother who changed thelandscape of American business and society. Frances Perkins was named Secr
They would be called upon to lead a nation in one of its darkest hous-but were they up to the task? He had been the wild, hard-drinding scion of one of America's premier political families. She was the school librarian with a warm smile and a tracks of September 11. 2001, they rose to the challenge: He became the embodiment of America's fighting spirit and she assumed the role of "Fighting spirit and she assumed the role of "First Comforter" with effortless grace. Still. the true nature fo their relationship has remained a mytery. Until now. In the style fo his#1 new Yourk Times bestseller The Day Diana Died and The Day John Died, as Well as his bestselling books about another President and First Lady, Jack and Jackie and Jackie After Jacks, Christopher Andersen draws on important sources-many speaking here for the first time-to paint a vivid, sometimes startling, often inspiring portrait of America's First Couple. Among the intriguing insights and stunning revelations: Important new information abou
On September 11, 2011, the world will be watching astheNational September 11 Memorialopens on the site of the WorldTrade Center. With photographs and architectural plans never beforepublished, paired with comments in the very voices of those whowitnessed the event, those who struggled in its shadow for days andmonths after, and those who have dedicated the years since torebuilding a place of hope and meditation at Ground Zero, this bookwill stand apart from all the reston the tenth anniversary of thatworld-changing event. Heavily illustrated and elegantly designed,the book recalls the excitement and symbolism of the Twin Towers,the horror and chaos of the attack of 9/11, the fierce devotion andexhaustion as rescue of living victims became recovery of remains.But it also carries on from that date in history to tell the insidestory of the long, complex, and sometimes contentious efforts toturn eight acres of Downtown Manhattan into a lasting memorial tothose lost in New York, Pennsylvania, and at the Pentagon.
The complete American presidential inaugural addressesfeaturing historical background by a National Book Awardwinner A testament to the power of oratory, this stirring and oftensurprising collection includes all fifty-five United Statespresidential inaugural addresses, as well as a general introductionand commentary that provides historical context for each speech.Marking pivotal moments in American history, readers willlearn: ? How George Washington came to ad-lib “So help me, God” at theend of his first inaugural address ? Why Thomas Jefferson’s first inaugural address is consideredone of the finest ever delivered ? The historical background behind Franklin D. Roosevelt’s “Theonly thing we have to fear is fear itself” and John F. Kennedy’s “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what youcan do for your country.”
