Whatever Happened to Party Government?


Book Description

The contentious history of a provocative report and its meaning for American political science




Listen, Liberal


Book Description

From the bestselling author of What's the Matter With Kansas, a scathing look at the standard-bearers of liberal politics -- a book that asks: what's the matter with Democrats? It is a widespread belief among liberals that if only Democrats can continue to dominate national elections, if only those awful Republicans are beaten into submission, the country will be on the right course. But this is to fundamentally misunderstand the modern Democratic Party. Drawing on years of research and first-hand reporting, Frank points out that the Democrats have done little to advance traditional liberal goals: expanding opportunity, fighting for social justice, and ensuring that workers get a fair deal. Indeed, they have scarcely dented the free-market consensus at all. This is not for lack of opportunity: Democrats have occupied the White House for sixteen of the last twenty-four years, and yet the decline of the middle class has only accelerated. Wall Street gets its bailouts, wages keep falling, and the free-trade deals keep coming. With his trademark sardonic wit and lacerating logic, Frank's Listen, Liberal lays bare the essence of the Democratic Party's philosophy and how it has changed over the years. A form of corporate and cultural elitism has largely eclipsed the party's old working-class commitment, he finds. For certain favored groups, this has meant prosperity. But for the nation as a whole, it is a one-way ticket into the abyss of inequality. In this critical election year, Frank recalls the Democrats to their historic goals-the only way to reverse the ever-deepening rift between the rich and the poor in America.




Burning Down the House


Book Description

A New York Times Notable Book! A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice The story of how Newt Gingrich and his allies tainted American politics, launching an enduring era of brutal partisan warfare When Donald Trump was elected president in 2016, President Obama observed that Trump “is not an outlier; he is a culmination, a logical conclusion of the rhetoric and tactics of the Republican Party.” In Burning Down the House, historian Julian Zelizer pinpoints the moment when our country was set on a path toward an era of bitterly partisan and ruthless politics, an era that was ignited by Newt Gingrich and his allies. In 1989, Gingrich brought down Democratic Speaker of the House Jim Wright and catapulted himself into the national spotlight. Perhaps more than any other politician, Gingrich introduced the rhetoric and tactics that have shaped Congress and the Republican Party for the last three decades. Elected to Congress in 1978, Gingrich quickly became one of the most powerful figures in America not through innovative ideas or charisma, but through a calculated campaign of attacks against political opponents, casting himself as a savior in a fight of good versus evil. Taking office in the post-Watergate era, he weaponized the good government reforms newly introduced to fight corruption, wielding the rules in ways that shocked the legislators who had created them. His crusade against Democrats culminated in the plot to destroy the political career of Speaker Wright. While some of Gingrich’s fellow Republicans were disturbed by the viciousness of his attacks, party leaders enjoyed his successes so much that they did little collectively to stand in his way. Democrats, for their part, were alarmed, but did not want to sink to his level and took no effective actions to stop him. It didn’t seem to matter that Gingrich’s moral conservatism was hypocritical or that his methods were brazen, his accusations of corruption permanently tarnished his opponents. This brand of warfare worked, not as a strategy for governance but as a path to power, and what Gingrich planted, his fellow Republicans reaped. He led them to their first majority in Congress in decades, and his legacy extends far beyond his tenure in office. From the Contract with America to the rise of the Tea Party and the Trump presidential campaign, his fingerprints can be seen throughout some of the most divisive episodes in contemporary American politics. Burning Down the House presents the alarming narrative of how Gingrich and his allies created a new normal in Washington.




First to the Party


Book Description

What determines the interests, ideologies, and alliances that make up political parties? In its entire history, the United States has had only a handful of party transformations. First to the Party concludes that groups like unions and churches, not voters or politicians, are the most consistent influences on party transformation.




The Next Realignment


Book Description

Introduction: the next realignment is coming -- America's first and second party systems: the early republic's love-hate affair with two-party politics -- America's second and third party systems: the rise of Jackson and collapse of the Whigs -- America's third and fourth party systems: the incredible story of William Jennings Bryan -- The fifth party system: how the New Deal forged the parties we know and maybe love -- The liberal and conservative myth -- The American ideal of liberty -- The progressive plan -- The virtue of a republic -- The fury of populism -- The choice: renewal or collapse -- The last hurrah of the fifth party system -- The pendulum of Great Awakenings -- The fourth Great Awakening and the 1960s -- The end of the industrial era -- An unravelling -- What happens next -- Renewal, not decline -- The party of the American Dream.




African Presidential Candidates Parties Cabinets


Book Description

AFRICAN or STATES of SOMALIA LEADER MUST CHANGE OLD FASHION TO NEW STYLES. African Politician and Westering Politicians, Are they Some Infrastructure of the Leadership? Are they Some Public Administration three topics? Where are African Parliaments, Presidents, and Supreme Court? African Youngest did not a comparing them, plus contrasting? Are they worked Africans Some together? They must rebuild to Public Administration, Sharing, Cabinet, & Local Governments. Then, Somalia Cities must be a purpose of inscription. African did not have Supreme Court, Federal judgement, or difference informal is not to States of African. “African Union population is 2.5 billion. No African Union Federal, African Parties Cumulative will need new money 270 Billion (No money such as Coins) African Union Central Bank Trade between African States such as 5.9 trillion Coins in 2020 In 1963s, launch of the organizations of African Union (OAU) precursor to the African Union. In 1970s, Establishing of the Regional Economic Communications and States In 1991, Treaty of Abuja is signed setting up the African Union Economic States In 2002, OAU Reorganized any Re-launched as the African Union (AU) In 2004, Pan African Parliaments Established. In 2012, Endorsement of the Action plan on Boosting into African Trade (BIAT) In 2014, Finalization of the EAC, COMESA, SADC, In 2015, Summit of the African Union leading to the launch of the CFTA, negotiation Continent Tree Trade Area”. African Union will need a Public Administration. They will need a new tactics, new Highways, news train, new sewages. They will need a Nuclear Power, Nuclear of the waters system, new free borders, new trade system, new investment of infrastructure system between such as 54 States in of African Union. Youngest believed African Union leaders. African Union lost in the world since 1960s intendents. However, African Union would need a new system of highways, a federal African Union Parliaments, Supreme Courts, and new Ministers, and a new money, new infrastructure between inside 54 states. For example, Every Cities in Somalia will need a train or busses in African States. Somalia president are going to looking for new investments Trade, Economic, Farmers, animals. Somalia President is going to get a New Deal, trains, Airports, Freeways, and new Investments. However, State of Somalia people travel to West, South, North, and East African States. The Somalia president will need correspondingly include all public roads and private track management. International companies Agencies. States in the neighborhoods, world Banks, Privates companies, For example, President Somalia is going to rebuilding new public administration rule, and private Farm, Animals productions, text returns. It must a conforming an appearance to restrained admittance. The State of Somalia did not require world leaders, new investments such as nature resources, Gas, Oil, created new money to African Union. its own investment of good highways, new technique. Every state will need prerequisite my ideas, new assisted, new private corporations, AU new moneys, AU Central Bank most heavies traded new currencies. AU will need new infrastructure system such as transportation, Airports, Import and Exports, Heavy train deliveries system between State of Somalia costs to African Union States.







The Irish Question and British Politics, 1868-1996


Book Description

The problems of modern Ireland have attracted the attention of many British political leaders from Gladstone to Major. Attempts to formulate a 'solution' have been governed by the British perception of what the problem is, and by the structures, as well as the ideas of British party politics and British political life: Ireland was never a laboratory in which dispassionate political experiments could be conducted. Modern Ireland has been shaped by British policy, and this has itself been influenced by British political habits and traditions, social and economic reforms, and new governmental institutions have been applied by politicians both of the left and the right. The 'Framework Documents' represent the latest attempt to achieve what Gladstone, David Lloyd George and Neville Chamberlain sought, and failed to achieve: a lasting settlement of the political divisions within Ireland, and between Ireland the Great Britain. This book places the Irish question in the wider context of the history of the British Isles, and thus seeks to explain its special place in British history as the 'Oldest Question', and as a question for contemporary Britain. Fully revised and with a new chapter to bring the analysis up to 1996, this new edition of Professor Boyce's work will be widely acclaimed.




What's the Matter with Kansas?


Book Description

One of "our most insightful social observers"* cracks the great political mystery of our time: how conservatism, once a marker of class privilege, became the creed of millions of ordinary Americans With his acclaimed wit and acuity, Thomas Frank turns his eye on what he calls the "thirty-year backlash"—the populist revolt against a supposedly liberal establishment. The high point of that backlash is the Republican Party's success in building the most unnatural of alliances: between blue-collar Midwesterners and Wall Street business interests, workers and bosses, populists and right-wingers. In asking "what 's the matter with Kansas?"—how a place famous for its radicalism became one of the most conservative states in the union—Frank, a native Kansan and onetime Republican, seeks to answer some broader American riddles: Why do so many of us vote against our economic interests? Where's the outrage at corporate manipulators? And whatever happened to middle-American progressivism? The questions are urgent as well as provocative. Frank answers them by examining pop conservatism—the bestsellers, the radio talk shows, the vicious political combat—and showing how our long culture wars have left us with an electorate far more concerned with their leaders' "values" and down-home qualities than with their stands on hard questions of policy. A brilliant analysis—and funny to boot—What's the Matter with Kansas? presents a critical assessment of who we are, while telling a remarkable story of how a group of frat boys, lawyers, and CEOs came to convince a nation that they spoke on behalf of the People. *Los Angeles Times




Politics in Scotland


Book Description

Politics in Scotland is an authoritative introduction to the contemporary political landscape in Scotland and an essential text for undergraduate and postgraduate students of Scottish Politics. Written by leading experts in the field, it is coherently organised to provide a clear and comprehensive overview of a range of themes in contemporary Scottish Politics. Key topics include: • Government and electoral behaviour. • Representation and political parties in Scotland. • Public policy and Scotland’s relationship with the rest of the world. • Scottish politics both in the run up to and after the 2014 referendum. • The Future of Scottish government and politics. This textbook will be essential reading for students of Scottish politics, British Politics, devolution, government and policy.