Rating: 
Summary: could show a thing or two to some textbooks I know....
Review: "Why Americans Hate Politics" is a brilliant treatment of the major themes of American politics of the last 50 or so years from today's best political journalist. This book showcases exactly what is so good about Dionne's Washington Post columns: insights that are always penetrating, and never anodyne. Dionne nicely handles a wide spectrum of issues, such as feminism, the resurgence of religion in politics, supply side economics and the divisions in both modern liberalism and conservatism. At the same time, Dionne provides depth, breadth and context that are uncharacteristic of many textbooks that cover the same period. Dionne does not heed the traditional fissures between political history, intellectual history, economic history and civil rights history. Because of this tack, Dionne effectively conveys just how much was going on at any point in American political life. Finally, I appreciated Dionne's willingness both to mention and cite other works that provide a more thorough treatment of given subjects. Among the many titles I got from reading Dionne's book were Nicol Rae's "The Decline and Fall of Liberal Republicans," Kevin Phillip's "The Politics of Rich and Poor" and John Richard Neuhaus' "The Naked Public Square." Any book that gives me three suggestions of three more "must read" titles gets extra points.
Rating:
Summary: could show a thing or two to some textbooks I know....
Review: "Why Americans Hate Politics" is a brilliant treatment of the major themes of American politics of the last 50 or so years from today's best political journalist. This book showcases exactly what is so good about Dionne's Washington Post columns: insights that are always penetrating, and never anodyne. Dionne nicely handles a wide spectrum of issues, such as feminism, the resurgence of religion in politics, supply side economics and the divisions in both modern liberalism and conservatism. At the same time, Dionne provides depth, breadth and context that are uncharacteristic of many textbooks that cover the same period. Dionne does not heed the traditional fissures between political history, intellectual history, economic history and civil rights history. Because of this tack, Dionne effectively conveys just how much was going on at any point in American political life. Finally, I appreciated Dionne's willingness both to mention and cite other works that provide a more thorough treatment of given subjects. Among the many titles I got from reading Dionne's book were Nicol Rae's "The Decline and Fall of Liberal Republicans," Kevin Phillip's "The Politics of Rich and Poor" and John Richard Neuhaus' "The Naked Public Square." Any book that gives me three suggestions of three more "must read" titles gets extra points.
Rating: 
Summary: Why American Politics Works
Review: E.J. Dionne, Jr. gives us an informative journalistic account of modern American politics, and I learned many facts from this book. I have reservations about his thesis, however. If I understand it, Mr. Dionne argues that Americans are presented with false (rather extreme) choices by leaders of the two main political parties. This polarized and polarizing rhetoric turns people off. Most people are at the political center, and accept some premises from one party and its ideology and other premises from the rival party and its ideology. This is my problem. I do not think that Americans who are turned off by politics are turned off because of this perceived extremism. They are either bored by politics, or consider it a waste of time to try to understand it in depth. In fact, this perceived "extremism" is part of the sensational theater of politics without which Americans would pay even less attention to it. Let us face it: politics is both theater and business. Politician have to compete for attention with America's mind-boggling entertainment industry and American people's own challenges and travails. How does it do that? From time to time, both parties exaggerate and sensationalize their differences. Truth be told, the differences between the two main parties are almost nonexistent, as they always are in two party systems. And a two party system naturally results from a single-member district, simple plurality electoral system, i.e., first past the post system. Many people do not know that rhetorical differences between most Republicans and most Democrats are minor, because they lack a comparative perspective. In many countries of Europe, the rhetorical debate is quite ideologically wide-ranging. Moreover, when it comes to practical/policy differences between Democrats and Republicans, such differnces pail to insignificance. In short, elites play up rhetorical differences to make politics more, not less, interesting for most people. A cold empirical analysis shows that real policy differences of the two parties are marginal. This, by the way, is what in large part accounts for our political stability and public policy continuity. The genius of the system lies in its ability to adjust to the times without major political upheavals. And this is made possible by political elites whose verbal battles belie real and continuous cooperation.
Rating:
Summary: Great Reading!
Review: Facinating reading on the evolution of political thought through the last thirty years of the 20th Century. If you have an interest in politics and economics and are the least bit curious about ideas it can't be beat. When you finish you should follow up with "They Only Look Dead" which, sort of, takes up where this book leaves off. Dionne is a great writer and a solid thinker.
Rating:
Summary: Unbelievably informative...
Review: I am not a fan of E.J. Dionne's columns by any stretch of the imagination. A friend suggested I read this book, and I have to say I was VERY impressed. Dionne's account of the dynamics of American politics over the past fifty years is nothing short of remarkable. The book combines political theory, history, and biography in a way I've never experienced before. His interpretations of the evolution of liberalism and conservatism in postwar America are amazing - well-balanced between explaining the ideological abstracts of both sides and illustrating his discussions with the people and events that shaped them. It is high-end, dense political writing, and Dionne does it well. I look forward to reading his other books now... I'm still no fan of his columns though...
Rating:
Summary: Gripping, Balanced, when is the sequel coming out?
Review: I found the book fascinating. Dionne presents a narrative history of the development of the left and the right from the Eisenhower administration through the Bush administration. He uses this to explain why politics had become so divisive and issue-less by the nineties, causing voter turnouts to drop so low and the citizenry to view the political process with disinterest and distaste. I just ate this book up. I particularly enjoyed it as an account of "how we got to where we are". In particular, the account of the internal struggles of the Republican coalition between social conservatives and free-market libertarians, and how they were glued together by anti-communism, was very well done. The book ends during 1991, so if you are young college kid who does not remember President Bush, Michael Dukakis, or Pat Buchanan, (let alone Reagan, Goldwater, McGovern, Stevenson) it may be hard to see how this connects to the present day. The reviewer who said this was too much of a beltway book simply had it wrong. The bulk of the book describes trends in attitudes and grassroots organizations and how this affected national politics. It does not dwell on party hacks and administration wonks. Some parts detail the intellectual development of the conservative movement and how it was anchored by magazines and institutions created by its backers. This is important because modern conservativism is markedly different from what preceded it, and its ideas did not come fully formed from the minds of Ronald Reagan and Rush Limbaugh. How those ideas came into being and were unified is an important part of the story. I cannot wait to see a sequel to this book that discusses the election and re-election of Bill Clinton, the Republican take-over of congress, and the "anti political" campaigns of Ross Perot, John McCain and (to some extent) Pat Buchanan. Regarding the hatred for politics in the title, Dionne theorizes it is because the two parties are trapped in ideology and are now resorting to drumming up turn-out in their bases by emphasizing emotionally charged, but largely unsolved or unsolvable, social issues such as abortion and race, rather than appealing to voters as a whole with solutions to work-a-day problems. On that note, I urge you to give this book to somebody you know who goes around quoting James Carville or Rush Limbaugh. It may get your friend to break the ideology habit.
Rating:
Summary: Confirmed by the passage of time.....
Review: I originally purchased and read "Why Americans Hate Politics" shortly after it was published. Recently, I came across the book in my library and read it again. Few modern-day books and in depth analyses manage to weather the test of time. Mr. Dionne's thesis, to his credit, is further affirmed in its accuracy just four days short of 2003. This achievement is only diminished by the frustration of knowing that we've sunken much deeper into this morass of "ideological polarization" vis a vis liberalism and conservatism as it affects today's political climate in the U.S. Mr. Dionne could hardly have predicted the proliferation of cable networks with their steady diet of disciples from both sides pummeling the viewer 24 hours a day. Neither could he have imagined the depths to which politicos, think tanks, and special interest groups would plunge as this "polarization" continues to feed upon itself some 12 years later. "Why Americans Hate Politics" should be on every required reading list in our colleges and universities as well as among engaged and concerned citizens in the United States - especially given current events.
Rating:
Summary: An explanation for how we got where we are
Review: Looking at some of the negative reviews on this page, I have to wonder whether these readers read the same book I did. I though Dionne's book was a political opus and the large number of awards it has received encourages my judgement. What Dionne explains is how we got to where we are today (or at least to 1992 when the book was written). This includes the ideological spectrum, the travels of each political party, and most importantly, why our people are so disgusted with politics. Because he is a liberal, Dionne's criticisms of his ideology and his explanations for the political failure of liberalism are particularly credible and insightful. I heartily recommend this book. If you share my opinion, see Robert Samuelson's "The Good Life and Its Discontents."
Rating:
Summary: An explanation for how we got where we are
Review: Looking at some of the negative reviews on this page, I have to wonder whether these readers read the same book I did. I though Dionne's book was a political opus and the large number of awards it has received encourages my judgement. What Dionne explains is how we got to where we are today (or at least to 1992 when the book was written). This includes the ideological spectrum, the travels of each political party, and most importantly, why our people are so disgusted with politics. Because he is a liberal, Dionne's criticisms of his ideology and his explanations for the political failure of liberalism are particularly credible and insightful. I heartily recommend this book. If you share my opinion, see Robert Samuelson's "The Good Life and Its Discontents."
Rating: 
Summary: A brief summary of the last 45 of so years of US politics
Review: This book is quite an advanced one to read at least with some political know how. It explains how Watergate and the Iran Contra affair and Vietnam altered the political spectrum. In doing so it made it more fragmented. But this was written before Clintons eight years and the Republicans taking the house and senate in 1994. And of course the current situation in Florida. Overal if you can take the reading of it, it's all good.
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