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Summary: The History your teachers would never dare teach you
Review: This book has pulled together concisely everything we knew to be true about liberalism, socialism and the communist sympathizers in the United States, but the mainstream press has always been afraid to say it. It saddens me to think that we are still dealing with rampant anti-Americanism (or should I say anti-Capitalism) today, even when the ugly truth about Communism has finally bubbled to the surface. Even as a student of history and politics I was shocked when I read this.Do you want the most important and relevent history lesson of the 20th Century and how it impacts events today? Then read this book.
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Summary: Left wingers can't see past the speck in Uncle Sam's eye
Review: This book examines the American Left's farcical inability to accept the notion that not only was the Cold War real, but the United States won and the Soviet Union (although not the Russian people) really was the bad guy. The Left just can't just come out and admit that the world, especially formerly enslaved Eastern Europe, is better (not perfect but better) subsequent to the USSR's demise. Hollywood pumps out film after film about the alleged evils of United States domestic and international shortcomings (of which there are many) and one-sided sympathetic portrayals of left wing heroes, but Charen says "Quick: try to think of a single movie about the horrors of Stalinism. This is not a failure of imagination. This is moral meltdown." Charen provides a memorable metaphor for American liberals' inability to realistically perceive the relative successes and moral positions of the United States and its Cold War adversaries. She points out that liberals turn the Lords' New Testament words inside out to the effect that liberals couldn't see past the speck of sawdust in the United States' eye in order to see the plank in the Soviets' eye. Useful Idiots is well written and makes its points, but for many readers Charen will be preaching to the converted. I recommend challenging your left-oriented friends to read and discuss this book with you.
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Summary: Enter here if you want the truth.
Review: Riveting historical review of the leftists' mistakes from the cold war to the present, their refusal to admit them, plus their uncanny ability to aid the most evil despot in every conflict since then. The true story of the left's role in the former Soviet Union, Cuba, Southeast Asia and Central America, and how they unwittingly assisted the Communists, earning them Lenin's own label of "useful idiots". Demonstrates how the left's well-known compassion is a pretext for the expression of its hostility to America. Extremely well researched and documented. Required reading for all individuals, especially those who have relied on the revisionist network news for the last 30 years.
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Summary: Great, informative book...
Review: We can never forget the idiom that history repeats itself. I was stuck by the parallels between the current anti-war fervor and the well-documented, reprehensible behavior of the 1980's American leftists. Should be read more than once...
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Summary: Useful Genius: How Mona Charen Gets It Right Again
Review: As always, this work of Mona Charen is interesting, edifying, and hard to put down. Not just a collection of opinions, this book is packed with history that leaves the reader hungering for more. After reading this book, I have a deeper understanding of world affairs, how we got to where we are, and the relevance of today's ideological struggles.
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Summary: same old, same old
Review: This book is written by a right-wing extremist in the usual tradition of blaming everything on one's opponent. Right-wing extremists or left-wing extremists, they all have the same strategy.
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Summary: A Liberally Independent Review
Review: Having lived through and witnessed much of the liberal arrogance cited, I applaud Charen as grossly direct and honestly to the point with her facts. I find this book refreshing in it's fact based information. Liberals are really taking a hit here, so here's a warning: if you are leaning extremely left, you won't want to read this book. It reflects a sinister side of the liberal left, which is frighteningly real. While some in every society will always have a tendancy to turn their cheeks and heads blindly to man's inhumanity to man, seeking blame elsewhere, Charen keeps the issues focused. Charen masterfully creates a sensitive and patriotic novel well needed in a time of our unsung heroes. Liberals have stepped on our culture for too long, and now Charen has taken them to task. Before you rest to judgement, you must read this book.
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Summary: Facism Vs. Humanism
Review: The most interesting aspect about books such as these (and their writers) is the numbing ease with which they distort, ignore and pervert the facts in order to give the appearance of being scholarly, thorough and fair. Ms. Charen is none of these as her title implies to any of her readers. She is simply one more person who has strayed into an area about which she knows little (or nothing). Her pretensions to the contrary--and what pretensions--are laughable as is her thesis about Central America. Has she ever lived there? I doubt that very much. Indeed, so much about the world is taken for granted that it finally begins to act as a sort of backround cliche; most intelligent people will automatically sense this and pass on this tediously written tome to Reaganism and its pathetic balderdash. The rest of you will just have to make your minds up for yourselves when you come across her invidious Weltanschauung. Did anyone in fact win the Cold War? I say no...we survived. Barely, as it happens, to judge from Ms. Charen's dismal book, which is chock full of the worst sorts of "arguements" and "proofs" all decked out in a psuedo journalistic prose copied (subliminally) from whichever newspaper she happens to read. Archie Bunker with a college education, in other words. But then, that isn't really very nice. Is it? Still, it's better than anything you'll ever read here.
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Summary: Brilliant, engaging... and haunting
Review: No doubt, the liberal apologists for America will attack this book from every direction. It can hold its own, nonetheless. If you're old enough to have watched U.S. political drama from Korea to September 11, Mona Charen's analysis is crystaline in clarity. Exceptionaly well researched and documented, it is also riveting... and scary. But it's a book that might make a difference. It's a book that should make a difference. If you loved Mondale and admire Fidel Castro, well, you'll not be pleased with it. If you liked Ronald Regan you'll probably do some cheering. If you are half-way objective it may scare the hell out you. How U.S. foreign policy has evolved and been reported in the main-stream press over the past 50 years is not a pretty picture. As this book underscores, blaming the world's problems on America has become a drum beat for many of our own "leaders" and too many of our "journalists." Both, by the way, take a beating in "Useful Idiots." And the book makes a powerful case they deserve it.
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Summary: Repetion repetition - all of it is the same old story
Review: The ever uncharitable Mona Charen is once again on her ... attack on "liberals". This "author" has no definition for her favorite (and only) target, the LIBERALS. ... Ms. Charen constructs straw men from nonsense topics of her own devising and then paints a picture of "liberal mendacity" and how the Right is Right. ... Her topics are so disparate and appear without any discernable common thread that one must conclude that they are chosen from a list of common political and social terms computer compiled from the past 100 years of public discourse. Ms. Charen chooses one topic from column A and two from Column B and then proceeds to knock down her straw man for his revealed liberal flaws. ... ... The little vignettes in this book are, for the most part, fairly hostile (and always condescending) towards her straw men and they are all substantially identical from story to story. It is all the same story. It is all the same story. It is all the same story (with apologies to Strunk & White). ... If you like reading the same story; and, if you like being told the same story with odd-ball topics that have little to do with today's world; and, you like repetition, then buy Ms. Charen's latest ...(there is so little substance here you will have to ask yourself: did I just read a political commentary ...?).
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