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Thieves in High Places: They've Stolen Our Country--And Its Time to Take It Back

Thieves in High Places: They've Stolen Our Country--And Its Time to Take It Back

List Price: $24.95
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Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Don't Agonize- ORGANIZE!
Review: This is classic Hightower at his populist best. All his down-home metaphors and homespun Texas humor help the very bitter news about just how bad things have become go down a lot easier than similar books on the topic. But more importantly, Jim gives us a plan for doing something about it. No more wailing and gnashing of teeth. It's time to take the country back and we already have the tools. This is a very empowering book.

Whether you've just begun to wonder if the mainstream media is giving you the whole story or you're a full-blown conspiracy theorist, "Thieves in High Places" is a must read.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Read, learn to recognize, and then do something about it!
Review: I just finished the second best book I have read in over a decade... It's called 'Thieves In High Places, They've Stolen Our Country and It's Time to Take It Back' by Jim Hightower. Now before you go getting all political on me you should know that this book holds no punches regardless of any political persuasion. Let me tell you a little about it and then let me tell you why you should read it...

First some adjectives are in order: enlightening, empowering, informative, inspirational, major, motivating, teaching, thought provoking! These are a few of the feelings and thoughts I had when reading this book. And FUNNY was the greatest of them all! Hightower is absolutely hilarious in combining his wit and wisdom. Here are a few quotes from the book:

klep·to·crat na·tion
(klep'te krat na' shen), n. 1. a body of people ruled by thieves. 2. a government characterized by the practice of transferring money and power from the many to the few. 3. a ruling class of moneyed elites that usurps liberty, justice, sovereignty, and other democratic rights from the people.
4. the USA in 2003.

"Wobblycrats" - a term Hightower uses for the Democratic Party's leaders... "They've ditched the Red Wing work boot bunch and thrown in with the wing-tip crowd, going all wobbly on the whole concept of why America needs a Democratic Party." and, "It's not just a legislative failure, though, it's a failure of spirit and purpose." He opens the chapter with this quote: "The Democratic Party of the nation ain't dead, though it has been givin' a lifelike imitation of a corpse for several years." - George Washington Plunkitt, Tammany Hall boss, 1905

Besides using his humor to soften the truth of the bad news, Hightower dispenses "The Good News - even the smallest dog can lift its' leg on the tallest building" and "The Best News of All - America the beautiful, don't be an idiot" in which he provides concrete examples how the workaday people of grassroots America, "the powers that ought to be," across the country are taking their country back!

Hightower says; The greatest offense against our society these days is not any one law or a particular assault on our freedoms. Rather, it is the persistent, insidious effort by those who shape our culture to reduce the American citizenry to idiots. From corporate advertisers to political sermonizers, from boards of education to the entertainment programmers, their goal is idiocy.

By "idiots," I'm referring to more than the constant charge that we're all a bunch of idiots. That's just manufactured media fluff. Far from being a nation of numbskulls, people (and especially young folks) are smarter than ever. But to what end?

The original Greek word "idiotes" referred to people who might have had a high IQ, but were so self-involved that they focused exclusively on their own life and were both ignorant of and uncaring about public concerns and the common good.

Such people were the exact opposite of the Athenian democratic ideal of an active citizenry fully involved in the civic process, with everyone accepting their responsibilities to each other and all of humankind. This is the ideal that Jefferson and Madison built into our own nation's founding documents; the ideal that Lincoln embraced when he spoke of striving for a "government of the people, by the people, for the people;" the ideal that Justice Louis Brandeis was expressing when he wrote that "The most important office" in our land is "that of a private citizen." (Continues...)

You should read this book if for no other reason than I guarantee you will learn a lot and you will be inspired to do something about it!

One course of action Hightower has proposed can be found on his WebPages ......., he has an excellent WebLog of articles on current topics also, is the revitalization of "CHAUTAUQUA" Tours. Ok, I never herd of them either... The Chautauqua movement was founded in 1874 in the far southwestern corner of New York State in the town of Chautauqua. The founding idea was to have a place where families could gather together for several days of education, inspiration, enlightenment, and enjoyment. From miles around people came in the summertime to an encampment along the shore of Lake Chautauqua where they heard from speakers of national renown, listened to bands and glee clubs, enjoyed plays, dined together, and generally engaged in an open forum for the discussion of public issues, literature, music, and science.

In its heyday early in the 20th century, there were 21 traveling Chautauqua companies operating on 93 circuits, reaching a phenomenal 35 million people a year!

At the turn of the 20th century, Theodore Roosevelt was so taken by the democratic value of the original Chautauqua Tours that he said, "The Chautauqua is the most American thing in America." (Continues...)

The serious purpose of this "Rolling Thunder Chautauqua Tour" is to forge new coalitions among local progressive groups and to strengthen existing coalitions. The idea of each Chautauqua is to get to know each other better, figure out ways to work more closely together, identify one or more uniting actions we can pursue together - and generally to leverage the tremendous activism that already exists at the American grassroots, making our progressive movement stronger as a whole than we are as separate parts.

Oh, and that other book I mentioned, its' called 'Trust Us, We're Experts: How Industry Manipulates Science and Gambles With Your Future' by Sheldon Rampton, John Stauber. This book is the single best tome I have seen on how we have gotten to the point we're at now and the techniques and tactics that are used to dupe the average American into blissful ignorance of, and the fostering of uncaring attitudes about public concerns and the common good.

Get them both and you will finally know what's up! lad

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Hightower's books are a call to action
Review: There is some truth to the criticisms sometimes leveled at Hightower's books. His prose is a bit rambling, or even silly at times. Also, the many sidebars do tend to chop up the flow of the book. Focusing on these flaws, however, misses the whole point. Hightower's books and speeches are meant to outrage and inspire (as well as entertain) the reader, and most importantly to convince the reader to take responsibility for his or her own government. He always shows the way to effective activism, rather than simply grousing about the problems (as do too many progressives). At some point the reader should put down the book and get to work on one or more of the issues he or she is concerned with. Hightower deserves to sell at least as many books as Michael Moore and Al Franken. If you are looking for elegant, flowing prose, look elsewhere. If you are a progressive with the energy and will to make a difference, and want to have fun doing so, read this book. Then get busy. We need you.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Hightower is at it again! That is good news!
Review: Jim Hightower, former Secretary of Agriculture in Texas, and firebrand populist Liberal is at it again with "Thieves in High Places: They've Stolen our Country -- And it's Time to Take it Back".

Hightower combines humor with politics to create a brand of populism that has built a loyal following and readership of his "The Hightower Lowdown Newsletter". Hightower also gives the reader alot of useful information on how to fight back and reclaim this country.

I've seen him a few timesat events and he is alot of fun to listen to.

Highly Recommended!!!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Must Read
Review: Whose country is this? Ask yourself this question then read "Thieves in High Places". Reality hurts, but Jim Hightowers sense of humor, sense of duty, and just plain ol' sense, helps to ease the pain and motivate us to get busy "setting things right". A good book written by a great American. Mark Twain couldn't have done a better job.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Michael Moore move over
Review: This book is a rallying cry to take our country back from the
corporate and political kleptocrats that are squeezing the heart out of our America -- small businesses, middle-class workers, family farmers, and other enterprising, grassroots folks. THIEVES IN HIGH PLACES will awaken readers not only
to what we're losing in America, but more importantly, to the
phenomenal future we have if we only reassert our democratic values and focus on our grassroots strength. My basic message is one of hope, that individual citizens can make a difference.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: A Disappointment
Review: Jim is a great spokesperson for the left, but the ideas expressed in this tome have no balance and therefore are not very credible. For example, Jim talks bad about corporate America, corporate profits, corporations giving to politicians and yet his own book is published by a multi-national corporation. Like most authors, I am sure Jim got an advance on his book's sales and by doing so he took money from a large corporation to get his message out about how bad big busines really is. Hahahahah The whole thing is laughable and there is indeed a sucker born every minute and I am sorry to say it will be the reader of this book once purchased.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Truth hurts but will set you free - hopefully
Review: It is a shame that many will condemn this book without ever reading it because the author will be labelled a "left wing liberal", even though they will not bother to define what a liberal is - it has become an all purpose rhetorical criticism of anything the far right doesn't want to think about - or have you think about.
This is a sharp, thoughtful view of the politics of destruction that rules Washington Conservatives, and makes some great observations that should provoke a lot of lively discussions among the confederacy of dunces that control the media right now - oh you know who I mean, Clear Channel, Karl Rove and King...er VP Cheney.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Brilliant With One Big Flaw
Review: They say a great actor can read the side of a cereal box and make you cry. I doubt it. Jim Hightower couldn't read the side of a cereal box if you paid him, not without dragging in about 85 analogies and bits of wisdom his neighbor told him about how to relate to hogs and chickens. But by the time he was through improving on that cereal box, you'd be stomping your feet and clutching your sides to control the laughter, and in the process you'd have learned what nutrition was in the box, how it got there, and how much the people packing the boxes got paid for their labor.

Hightower's new book, "Thieves in High Places," takes 200 pages to make about 200 important points using about 500 colorful metaphors, generating at least 400 belly laughs, and while you can read the thing in one evening, it'll stick with you for good.

For those who've read Hightower's earlier books "If the Gods Meant Us to Vote They Would Have Given Us Candidates," "There's Nothing in the Middle of the Road But Yellow Stripes and Dead Armadillos," or his newsletter "The Hightower Lowdown," or if you listen to his radio show or have heard him speak on his Rolling Thunder Down Home Democracy Tour, this book will not come as a huge surprise, but it may just be his best riffing and ranting yet, and you will enjoy it. For those new to Hightower, or even new to the idea that politics might be either useful or fun or both, get yourself a copy of this book and a quiet place where you can laugh out loud and think about it.

Much of this book, in fact, is explicitly addressed to people who have never been politically active before but who have finally gotten fed up enough to get involved. This book presents a case that the United States is moving toward fascism, and does so without exaggeration or hyperbole, does so in fact with gut wrenching humor and a prodding, inciting, encouraging call to get off our butts and fight back - now, before it's too late.

For those used to hearing this kind of talk or who work as political activists all the time, this book compares quite favorably to others that are out there - say Michael Moore's or Arianna Huffington's - and compiles in one place not just a superb collection of soundbites, but an immense arsenal of facts. You may even be surprised to discover that things are much worse than you've been told, but also that more Americans are already fighting back, that more of us get it than you have been willing to let yourself hope.

Hightower recounts a lot of grassroots successes, but he doesn't go easy on painting the disaster that is our current national government. Let me just mention a few high points (or low points). Pages 27 to 32 list in tiny font an endless stream of anti-environmental measures put in place thus far by the Bush administration. It's enough to make you start looking for another planet. Pages 57 to 62 make the currently quite important point that Joe Lieberman would not be much of a change.

Pages 81 to 88 lay out the even more important and less talked about case that the pit our money is being lost in - even more than it is being lost to the Bush tax cuts for millionaires - is the Pentagon budget, that over half of every tax dollar goes into this pit, and that other priorities, like schools, health care, and jobs, will take a back seat until limitations are imposed on military waste.

Pages 102-103 make the case quite compellingly that the Democratic Party has been on a losing course because it has tried to be Republican-Lite. Here's the Democratic bumper sticker according to Hightower:

"Hey-we-back-tax-cuts-for-the-rich-too-And-we-support-Bush's-war-and-also-his-Big-Honking-homeland-security-department-Though-we're-not-quite-as-sure-about-it-all-as-the-Republicans-are."

Pages 106-107 lay out what a winning platform for the Democrats would be: progressive taxation, single-payer health care for all, free quality education for all from preschool through college, alternative energy, and public financing of elections. Of course, there is one Democrat running for President with that very program: Rep. Dennis Kucinich, and I kept waiting - in vain -- for Hightower to say so.

What Hightower does say - and this may be worth the price of the book by itself - is that these progressive positions are actually very popular. On pages 118-122, Hightower lays out a collection of mainstream public polls that paint a picture of Americans as very progressive - something Fox News just doesn't tell us. This could explain the number of people bewildered by the fact that not only they but all of their friends as well disagree with what Fox News tells them is the popular point of view.

The only complaint I have with this book is that it closes with a fantasy about a mythical presidential candidate who walks and talks remarkably like Jim Hightower. If Hightower wants to run for President, I'll support him, but I'd almost rather see him keep up just the sort of agitating he's been doing and back the candidate who is articulating the same positions from within the Democratic party, namely Dennis Kucinich.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A breath of unpoluted air!
Review: A call to arms for the the majority of Americans who have become disillusioned with the political scene. Filled with, inspiring human interest stories, unreported gems of fact, and a chock-ful of humor to make an entertaining read. The uplifting message of this book empowers Americans to become citizens again to bring our country back to the democratic ideals of Thomas Jefferson. I highly reccomend this book to every American who want to do something to make this country and in result, the world a better place for us and our children.


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