America the Unusual

Rating:
Summary: a good required reading
Review: I actually had to read America the Unusual for my intro to american goverment class and I actually enjoyed the book a great deal because it dealt with issues that need to be looked to understand why our goverment the why it is and how our goverment is different from that of Western Europe even though many american came from those countries and some of the same thinkers influenced both American and Western European goverments.

Rating:
Summary: Good facts, but opinions open to debate.
Review: I disagreed with many of the authors opinions in this book, but I will give him credit. He does at least give a fleeting glance at his opponents and dissenters.

As far as I can tell with my limited knowledge,his facts are accurate. While I do not agree with many of his points, I did find the book well laid out organizationally.

He was very clear in his stating of facts and his opinions. He also separated the two very well. He clearly noted when he was stating facts and when he was stating an opinion. I did notice one rather unsubstantiated generalization in the party unity portion of his argument, but I found very few examples of strongly biased generalizations.

The author seems to suggest a rather unrealistic goal of a compromise between the European system of democracy and the American government style. This idea would require too many changes in a society that generally resists change. This a strong book factually, though some of the opinions are open to debate.

I do like his idea of setting out exactly why America is so unusual. This would be a good book for students to read to gain a bit of knowledge of America as compared to European and other industrialized nations. Though I personally did not care for the book because of the opinions expressed, I do believe that it was worthwhile to read if only to pick up the idiosyncracies of the American style of government.

Peace, Mike