American Doctrines

How George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, and John Adams navigated the nation through four major crises and caused the first stirrings of American nationalism.

In a remote corner of Oregon, James Pogue found himself at the heart of a rebellion. Granted unmatched access by Ammon Bundy to the armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, Pogue met ranchers and militiamen ready to die fighting the federal government. He witnessed the fallout of communities riven by politics and the danger (and allure) of uncompromising religious belief. The occupation ended in the shooting death of one rancher, the imprisonment of dozens more, and a firestorm over the role of government that engulfed national headlines.

In this brilliant exploration of American history and contemporary conservative politics, foreign policy expert John Hulsman draws on his years at the heart of Washington to present a compelling new vision of conservative realism. In our current Age of Insecurity, Hulsman suggests, there has never been a bigger need for the re-ascendance of realist principles in conservative circles. By drawing on U.S. history to illustrate realist precepts at the heart of the American story, The Last Best Hope provides a practical, realist foreign policy for a new age of American politics.

The child of an Irish man and an Irish American woman who split up before he was born, Michael Brendan Dougherty grew up with an acute sense of absence. He was raised in New Jersey by his hardworking single mother, who gave him a passion for Ireland, the land of her roots and the home of Michael's father. She put him to bed using little phrases in the Irish language, sang traditional songs, and filled their home with a romantic vision of a homeland over the horizon.

Duca investigates and explains the issues at the root of our ailing political system and reimagines what an equitable democracy would look like. It begins with young people getting involved. This includes people like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the youngest woman ever to be elected to Congress; David and Lauren Hogg, two survivors of the Parkland, Florida shooting who went on to become advocates for gun control; Amanda Litman, who founded the nonprofit organization Run for Something, to assist progressive young people in down ballot elections; and many more.

Has American democracy's long, ambitious run come to an end? Possibly yes. As William G. Howell and Terry M. Moe argue in this trenchant new analysis of modern politics, the United States faces a historic crisis that threatens our system of self-government - and if democracy is to be saved, the causes of the crisis must be understood and defused.

What's happening in global politics? As if overnight, many Democrats revolted and passionately backed a socialist named Bernie Sanders; the United Kingdom voted to leave the European Union; the vituperative billionaire Donald Trump became the presidential nominee of the Republican party; and a slew of rebellious parties continued to win elections in Switzerland, Norway, Italy, Austria, and Greece. John B. Judis, one of America's most respected political analysts, tells us why we need to learn about the populist movement.

Beginning with the debate between Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton over the future of the nation and continuing through the Civil War, the New Deal, the Reagan Revolution, and Obama and the Tea Party, many pols have asked, "What would the founders do?" instead of "What is the common good today?" Recently both the right and the left have used the founders to sort through such issues as voting rights, campaign finance, free speech, gun control, taxes, and war and peace.

Since the eviction of Occupy protestors from encampments in many cities throughout the world, smaller and more targeted occupations have continued. Workers in a Chicago factory occupied - with the support of their union - to protest layoffs. Teachers and students in Tucson staged a walkout to protest the removal of Chicano history books from the curriculum. Home foreclosures were disrupted, even avoided, by direct community action. But what does it all mean? What do we talk about when we talk about "revolution", if we talk about it at all?

These days it seems that nobody is satisfied with American democracy. Critics across the ideological spectrum warn that the country is heading toward catastrophe but also complain that nothing seems to change. At the same time, many have begun to wonder if the gulf between elites and ordinary people has turned democracy itself into a myth. The urge to defend the country’s foundations and to dismantle them coexist—often within the same people. How did we get here? Why does it feel like the country is both grinding to a halt and falling to pieces?

Twenty years after the Starr Report and the Clinton impeachment, former special prosecutor Ken Starr finally shares his definitive account of this period in American history. Now Starr finally shares his unique perspective on the investigation that began with the Whitewater land deal and spread to a wide range of President Clinton's actions, including accusations of sexual harassment and perjury in the Monica Lewinsky scandal. Starr's narrative includes behind-the-scenes details that have never before emerged as well as a new analysis from the perspective of history.

The Lost Cause ideology that emerged after the Civil War and flourished in the early 20th century in essence sought to recast a struggle to perpetuate slavery as a heroic defense of the South. As Adam Domby reveals here, this was not only an insidious goal, but it was founded on falsehoods. The False Cause focuses on North Carolina to examine the role of lies and exaggeration in the creation of the Lost Cause narrative. In the process the book shows how these lies have long obscured the past and have been used to buttress white supremacy in ways that resonate to this day.

Widely popular conservative blogger Pamela Geller and New York Times best-selling author Robert Spencer team up for this battle cry about the damage being done by the current administration's policies to the institution of the American presidency.

When Ronald Reagan warned that freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction, was he pointing to Generation Z? Today’s young adults have been indoctrinated since preschool in the lie that America is fundamentally unjust. They have watched their parents hand over their freedom to big government, and they themselves are captivated by a deceptive ideology of unprecedented radicalism.

Drawing comparisons to empires past, Johnson explores in vivid detail the likely consequences of US dependence on a permanent war economy, and what it will mean when the globe's sole "hyperpower" is no longer capable of paying for the vaulting ambitions of its leaders - and becomes the greatest hyper-debtor of all time. In his stunning conclusion, Johnson suggests that the crisis of a financial breakdown could ultimately prove to be the only path to a renewed nation.

The Red Caesar Code: A Guidebook for the Installation of the American Dictator is a timely short-form work that investigates the political and social dynamics that have led to a precipice in the political landscape of the United States, and indeed the world.

Dr. Tim Groseclose, a professor of political science and economics at UCLA, has spent years constructing precise quantitative measures of the slant of media outlets. He does this by measuring the political content of news, as a way to measure the PQ, or political quotient, of voters and politicians.

Congressional scholars Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein identify two overriding problems that have led Congress—and the United States—to the brink of institutional collapse. But they offer a panoply of useful ideas and reforms, endorsing some solutions, like greater public participation and institutional restructuring, while debunking others, like independent or third-party candidates. Above all, they call on the media as well as the public to focus on the true causes of dysfunction rather than just throwing the bums out every election cycle.

Editor and investigative reporter Jefferson Morley has been widely published in national periodicals and is the author of the critically acclaimed nonfiction work Our Man in Mexico. An eye-opening look at Washington’s first race riot, Snow-Storm in August also offers revealing profiles of Arthur Bowen, the slave blamed for the riot, and “Star Spangled Banner” lyricist Francis Scott Key, a defender of slavery who sought capital punishment for Bowen.

In Beyond the Messy Truth, Jones offers a blueprint for transforming our collective anxiety into meaningful change. Tough on Donald Trump but showing respect and empathy for his supporters, Jones takes aim at the failures of both parties before and after Trump's victory. He urges both sides to abandon the politics of accusation and focus on real solutions. Calling us to a deeper patriotism, he shows us how to get down to the vital business of solving, together, some of our toughest problems.