Rating: 
Summary: AMERICAN EMPIRE?
Review: SOUND BITE BUZZ WORDS. HOW ABOUT THE AMERICAN EMPIRE POST WWII? LETS SEE...FRANCE? YES OF COURSE, THEY ARE UNDER THE YOKE OF AMERICAN CAPITALISM AND EMPIRE; GREAT BRITAIN? YES, THEY BOW TO AMERICAN POWER; ITALY, GERMANY, RUSSIA, AUSTRALIA, CHINA, SOUTH AFRICA, ETC. AD NAUSEUM? THEY ALL TREMBLE BEFORE THE IMPERIAL POWER OF THE USA. I AM SICK AND TIRED OF THE TIRADES FROM PEOPLE WHO SEE THE WORLD THROUGH RED COLORED GLASSES. MS. CHAREN HAS COMPILED A TROVE OF INFORMATION THAT BETRAYS THE INTENTIONS OF THE POLITICAL "LEFT" FOR WHAT THEY REALLY ARE...READ THE BOOK AND FIGURE IT OUT FOR YOURSELF.
Rating: 
Summary: Good Information But NOT Very Deep........
Review: Mona Charen has written a book that is written well and it is obvious that she knows the subject matter. However, I feel as though after reading the book I learn nothing that I haven't read before. I hate not recommending this book because I like agree with Mona Charen, but hopefully her next book will be a better effort.
Rating: 
Summary: Learn from history
Review: Terrific book! It has been said that if we do not learn from history, we are destined to repeat it. Ms Charen's book shows that many in the recent past and also currently have failed to heed that advice. I learned how so many of the government's leaders chose to ignore catastrophic events in other countries and instead focused their words upon the faults and failures of the USA. Ms Charen gives us the additional information we would never have had that explains their unwitting and sometimes intentional oversight. One of the best books I have read recently.
Rating:
Summary: Friends in Evil Places
Review: Syndicated columnist Mona Charen provides an encompassing explication of the Left's blind sanction of communism that spares no disquieting details. Even many of us who have long been strongly anti-communist are either unaware or defensively forgot the extent of the ideology's horrors. The section devoted to Cambodia is liable to give even the hardiest among us nightmares. Nor does she flinch in her dispatches on Nicaragua, Laos, Vietnam, or the Soviet Union itself in this enlightening discussion of communist ruins.
While its atrocities are necessary as a backdrop to her narrative it is the title characters, the useful idiots among the American elite, who comprise the essence of this work. She discusses how either through naiveté, stupidity, or genuine affirmation, numerous liberals gave aid and comfort to ruthless regimes that inflicted untold suffering upon millions and millions of innocent people. Although Communism's bankruptcy has been proven wherever it was tried, Mrs. Charen argues that some liberals still fail to accept the facts. Her strongest chapter is called 'Post-communist Blues' and discusses how in spite of overwhelming evidence leftists still won't fully acknowledge that communism was a devastating force, and America's resoluteness was the counterforce that saved countless lives and rescued others from abject misery as she fulsomely documents. She posits that two post-Soviet union occurrences have exposed the radical left's true colors, which are several shades of red. The Elian Gonzales debacle and the September 11 gave liberal glitterati the chance to demonstrate what they learned from communism's collapse, and their actions vociferously answered 'not much.' She uses the Elian Gonzales case to highlight one of the Left's great contradictions. While liberals--to their credit--typically decry any hint of racial or ethnic bigotry, one group is exempt from this egalitarianism. Cubans are suitable fodder for leftwing discrimination. She states that not only did 'the Elian Gonzalez affair (provide) ample evidence that American liberals had learned nothing about the nature of communism from history,' but 'liberals in the press and government betrayed a crude contempt toward Cuban-Americans' regarding the tragic situation. Referencing many hateful comments published in liberal-leaning mainstream newspapers, she regrets that Cubans make up 'the only minority community in America who receive brickbats from the press.' As with Nicaragua, El Salvador and every other fallen communist bastion she predicts that after Castro's demise, 'the attitudes of American liberals toward that regime will be revealed for what they are--a disgrace.' Those blessed with even a modicum of commonsense could argue that they have already been exposed as such. In a different section, she notices that the anti-Cuban bias of liberals was further displayed by the handling of diplomat Otto Reich. She quotes a few progressives who were troubled by his Cuban refugee status which allegedly could make him partial on certain matters. Mrs. Charen snidely asks, 'has there ever been a suggestion, ever, that someone who fled nazism or apartheid was morally suspect on that account?' Regarding the September 11th attacks, Mrs. Charen serves up a smorgasbord of moral relevance spewed by liberal thinkers implying or outright asseverating that America brought the depraved assault upon itself. She aptly surmises 'this is the sort of vapid blather that often travels under the name 'Liberalism.'' In fairness, she mentions that certain leading lights of the left were blown to their senses by the unprovoked acts of war. She sites Professor Sean Wilenz, a committed Clinton apologist who refuted the pallid assertion that terrorism is rooted in penury. He averred, 'to say that poverty explains terror is to slander those caught in poverty who choose to lead worthy lives.' Perhaps the great irony of Communism is that although it heyday has long passed, and its many failures have been comprehensively exhibited for the entire world to see, leftists cannot let go of their reverence for its mystique. Several million innocent victims, countless ruined lives, and unimaginable suffering aside, liberals seems to be convinced that the system has a few kinks, but give it time and it will right itself. Reality, Mrs. Charen argues, tells a vastly different story and a very sad one at that.
Rating:
Summary: MONA CHAREN'S MUCH AWAITED FIRST BOOK A GRAND SLAM
Review: 'USEFUL IDIOTS', APTLY NAMED, NOT ONLY SERVES AS A COUNTERBALLANCE TO THE LIBERAL'S REVISSIONEST-VERSION OF COLD WAR HISTORY, BUT ALSO PUTS THEIR EQUALLY MISFORMED POSSITIONS ABOUT THE IRAQ WAR INTO WELL-NEEDED PERSPECTIVE. I LOOK FOWARD TO CHAREN'S NEXT BOOK WHICH I HOPE I WILL NOT HAVE TO WAIT FOR AS LONG AS THIS ONE. YES MONA, THAT MEANS YOU. GET TO WORK! WE WANT MORE!!!!
Rating:
Summary: An interesting read - would have given it 4 1/2 Stars
Review: I was very impressed with Mona Charen's book; I just wish that I had it at University when studying my Cold War and International Relations courses. Having witnessed the ravages of Communism in Albania I always felt disgusted with some of its champions here in the UK, feeling that they were more than selective about whom was supporting human rights in the world. That my lecturers were espousing some of the opinions that Mrs Charen disputes was very enlightening. The book - despite its overly martial title has certainly produced some very interesting points and facts that I was unaware of - especially as regarding Cuba (P J O' Rourke covers it well too in Eat the Rich) and the Elian affair. A well presented, well footnoted lucid argument that is a welcome addition to anybody interested in Libretarianism and modern political history. There were a couple of minor points I quibbled with but not enough to drop the book down to 4 stars.
Rating:
Summary: Lots of quotes to go with her opinion
Review: If you are open to reading some pretty outrageous quotes by some of America's most well known media, hollywood, academic and political leaders about everything from the Cuba to the USSR and Pol Pot to Kim Il-sung, definately do not pass up this book. Quite the expose of American leftist thought (past and present) on all things "red". Here is an exerpt, page 176 & 177:
[refering to a visit that Ronald Radosh (now of the New Republic) and several leftist sympathizers took to Cuba in the 1960's] ..... After visiting a Cuban mental hospital, members of the group were a little dismayed to learn that lobotomy was a widely practiced therapy for mental patients (long after the practice had been abandoned in the U.S.) In fact, most of those commited to mental hospitals in Cuba were lobotomized. One member of the group protested, saying, "This stinks. Lobotomy is a horror. We must do something to stop this. It's exactly what we're working against at home." But another pilgram, Suzanne Ross, was unperturbed: "We have to understand that there are differences between capitalist lobotomies and socialist lobotomies." ...... Mona Charen pulls out all the stops and posts (with references) quotes from dozens of those who believed communism to be the world's salvation and many of which to this day hold communism as morally equivalant if not superior to democracy. Plus.. it is a fast read.. definately worth your time and $$, that is if you want to hear the truth.
Rating:
Summary: The "Blame America First" Crowd's History--Lord, Save Us!
Review:
Thank God for Mona Charen! She reminds us, in this, her book, Useful Idiots, of the wrong-headed things that members of the liberal far-left said and did; things that some of us have apparently forgotten.
In the Vietnam era alone, just to name one example in which they took the side of an enemy that was busily killing our servicemen, they abused the United States with their chants of "Ho,Ho,Ho Chi Minh! The Viet Cong are going to win!" while waving the enemies' flag. Many of the anti-war "Political Pilgrims" went to North Vietnam and posed, smilingly looking through the sights of the NVA anti-aircraft guns,the purpose of which was to kill our airmen (Jane Fonda) and sneered at the suggestion that our POWs were being badly treated, while praising the "gentleness" of the enemy and comparing the United States (unfavorably) with the communist regime. Were they punished, upon their return, for their treachery and traitorous behavior? Far from it! In the case of Fonda, she went on to a lucrative career as an admired actress and exercise guru. One such "war protester" who led anti-American rallies in London, and made an admiring trip to the socialist paradise, the Soviet Union, was rewarded by his countrymen by being elected President of the United States. He admittedly "loathed" the armed services of which he became Commander-in-Chief! Who needs enemies, with friends like these? This book is not a diatribe, as some reviewers on the political left are fond of saying. Nor is it filled with invective, or name-calling. It is, rather, a history of many of the quotations of those who ALWAYS have taken the part of the communist regimes against our country, and always, always, always placed the blame on the country that nourished them and blessed them with privilege, wealth and comfort. Who are these people? Here are some of the names in this book, along with their own damning words. Let their own quotes condemn them: Ron Dellums, Susan Sontag, Bill Moyers, Jane Fonda, Dick Gregory, Donald Sutherland, Lillian Hellman, Owen Lattimore, George McGovern, David Crosby, John Kerry, Noam Chomsky, Graham Nash, Mary McGrory, Sidney Hook, Hendrick Hertzberg, George Ball, Seweryn Bialer, Corliss Lamont, Peter Collier, David Horowitz, Ramsay Clark, Rev. William Sloan Coffin, Jr., Mary McCarthy, Jonathan Schell, Al Hubbard, Tom Downey, Phil Ochs, and of course Tom Hayden--the list is long. And, of course, those icons of the left leaning press who pushed their own agenda with more regard for their anti-war views than the truth as they reported the struggle in Vietnam: Walter Cronkite, Peter Arnett, Morley Safer, and many others. This book is full of details that these folks must wish were forgotten Do I believe Mona Charen? What is not to believe? I remember hearing much of it myself, with absolute dismay at the time. In my case, I do not condemn the Democrat Party. I know many patriotic Democrats. The people Charen is pointing at are on the far-left. They are the ones who have always admired communism, made excuses for its excesses and failures, and found nothing but guilt and reason to hate the land of their birth. This book should be an eye-opener for those young people who are not politically aligned as yet, and will benefit from identifying the enemy within, as well as both those in the Democrat and Republican Parties who represent the true values of middle America. Those cynics who believe that this great country is the "World's Bully," and not deserving of their love and allegiance should visit some of the other nations--especially those whose inhabitants are desperate to escape--and come to America. Joseph (Joe) Pierre, USN (Ret)
author of Handguns and Freedom...Their Care and Maintenance
and other books
Rating: 
Summary: Charge of the Knucklehead Brigade
Review: Yet another superficial polemic aimed at the lucrative red-meat conservative market. If you too believe that the U.S. has never and cannot ever do any wrong, and love to demonize anyone who suggests otherwise, this is for you. Project all evil onto others and sleep well, despite the two million dead Vietnamese and uncounted victims of all the vicious dictators the U.S. supported during the "Cold War" -- it was all justified. As Bob Dylan pointed out, "God Is On Our Side."
Today's so-called "conservatives" seem to have totally forgotten about (or did they ever know?) the proud isolationist history of true conservatives. Bush's global crusade is designed to involve the U.S. on the frontlines of exactly the sort of foreign entanglements opposed by Sen. Robert Taft of Ohio and other Republicans of the past. The U.S. emerged from WWII with a planet-spanning empire. Nothing in 2003 makes any sense without an understanding of how that system was put in place or its goals (control of resources and markets, not freedom or liberty). For an authoritative analysis, read "A Preponderance of Power" by Leffler. Your time will be much better rewarded than by Charen's rant.
Rating:
Summary: thoughtful, a bit slow at times
Review: This book was not a brisk read - a bit thick, but nonetheless filled with more examples of the wacky left's implosion. Useful idiots is, by the way, an insulting term used to describe more liberal westerners taking communist deceptions at face value. Post-modern thought has rendered the left's brains filled with that sort of mush, and the presence of such dunderheaded thinking in the media is chronicled here. Mona Charen has always been intellectual rather than populist; those looking for the slam-bank style of a Coulter or a Savage might be better served elsewhere. Still, Charen has been writing thoughtful columns and books for many years and makes her case eloquently. I feel compelled to respond to Avery Z. Conner's comments from a review posted below. While he is a scholar of some renown, his books are on psychiatry, not politics or ideology. His comment is typical liberal name calling, and he uses his achievement as an author to qualify them. This is, of course, the very elitist attitude Ms. Charen skewers in her book. Mr. Conner's infantile comments aren't as much an insult as they are a validation. Come on, Mr. Conner...is a silly, sniggering insult all you can muster, a man of your intelligence? Did you even read the book, Mr. Conner, or is this your idea of a virtual protest? Besides, what kind of man wouldn't want to make out with Ann Coulter?!
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