Rating: 
Summary: In short: Enlightening, moderate bias
Review: The first 80% of the book tries to be unbiased. I found it quite enlightening and I no longer think that the other side is crazy. Still wrong, but not crazy. :-)In the last 20% Lakoff comes out and states why he thinks empirical scientific evidence, mostly in the area of child rearing, justifies Liberalism.
Rating: 
Summary: There is No Common Ground
Review: The first part of this book is a reasonable attempt by a professed liberal to try honestly to understand the conservative mind. Its depiction of conservatives is a bit harsh and stark, but the occasional unfair stereotype or subconscious smear is easy to overlook, and the analysis is by-and-large fair.
The final argument, where the author explains why he chooses liberalism, is quite shallow, however: it can be summarized as ~"I'm a liberal because conservatives beat their children"~. This really is silly beyond the pale, but does not invalidate the rest of the book.
Its characterization of liberal morality as an extension of liberal childrearing theory, I think quite unwittingly, fits conservative stereotypes of liberals to a "T". Any conservative reading here that liberals expect children to learn self-reliance and self-discipline by being loved, respected, and tolerated will have to chuckle in agreement: it's precisely this inversion of respect from parent to child rather than from child to parent that is at the root of the cultural divide. But a conservative will with assurance conclude that anyone who actually believes this stereotypically liberal childrearing theory has never actually raised a child!
The value of the book will be to help liberals realize that conservatives are not stupid or illogical, they just have utterly different views of right and wrong: different premises to moral thinking, different axioms, different postulates. And that will clarify the left-right divide.
This book will also help conservatives understand how liberals think of them. If trying to be fair, liberals will see conservatives as prioritizing virtue AS self-reliance and self-discipline. If not trying to be fair, liberals will see conservatives as brutish, authoritarian, "Nazi" childbeaters. The book supports both views.
I found much to agree with, at a meta-level, in this book. The conclusion is depressing, however. It is impossible to see any common ground: right and left cannot agree even on what is right and wrong. The book offers no hope for a future synthesis, but rather for a deepening divide.
Rating: 
Summary: Intellectual Uncleanliness
Review: This book exemplifies what can happen to the scholarship level of an academic area of study when there is no significant internal pier-review or criticism. The author makes unsupported assertion after assertion, creates straw men, makes silly characterizations of the positions of those he disagrees with, makes faulty inferences and draws faulty implications throughout the book. The author claims to have carefully kept his political leanings out of the book. In fact, the entire book is an exercise in moral sophistry through redescription, and one more failed attempt at building a moral metaphysical system. Lakoff's underlying theory (assertion) that our metaphors control our mental conceptualization of the world is finally being critically examined and reviewed.(For a devastating critique, read "Concepts as Metaphors" by Matthew S. McGlone in "Understanding Figurative Language" edited by Sam Gluckberg).
Rating:
Summary: Revolutionary book
Review: This book is a must-read for anyone thougtful about politics who wonders why politics is about emotions and not about what works. It describes how people project their understanding of "proper" family structure onto the government. It also answer great questions as to: How do adulterous conservative get away with their crimes? and Why would conservatives be against a highly efficient and highly effective social program (for example, headstart)? Great read.
Rating:
Summary: A must read for understanding the Bush nightmare
Review: This is a must read for every American trying to make sense of the Bush administration and the conservative GOP nightmare.
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