American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21stCentury,Books,Free Shipping,B00119O0M8,

	American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21stCentury by Kevin Phillips
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Product Details Binding Hardcover Dewey Decimal Number 973.931 Format Bargain Price Manufacturer Viking Adult Number Of Items 1 Number Of Pages 480 Publication Date March 21, 2006 Publisher Viking Adult Availability Usually ships in 24 hours Product Description From the writer called our 'modern-day Tom Paine,'an explosive analysis of the axis of religion, politics, and fiscal imprudence that threatens to destroy the nation. Unabridged CDs - 11 CDs, 13 hours The title of political analyst Phillips's latest book may overstate his case (in the text, he prefers the term 'theocratic direction'), but his analysis likely will strike chords among those troubled by our current political moment. Phillips (American Dynasty) expounds upon historical parallels for each of his three subjects. In his section on 'Oil and American Supremacy,' for example, he points to Britain's post-WWI involvement in the Middle East as an analogy to Iraq, and in his section on radicalized religion, he warns of 'the pitfalls of imperial Christian overreach from Rome to Britain.' The five major measures of U.S. debt—from national to household—keep setting records, he observes in his section on 'Borrowed Prosperity,' and the real estate boom spurred by the Federal Reserve, he argues, cannot continue. Phillips identifies the escalating clout of the financial services industry and suggests that Americans should emulate policies in Asia that encourage savings and in Europe that encourage manufacturing. The lesson of the past, he warns, is that intractable national issues 'generate weak and compromising politicians or zealous bumblers.' A critic of the Bush family, Phillips sees little hope in Hillary Clinton. Expect him to make some provocative appearances on chat shows. (Mar.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Few political strategists have relied so extensively on history to understand the American political system as Kevin Phillips. Often identified as a former Republican strategist, Phillips has made a career of charting his disillusion with the GOP in books such as American Dynasty, a blistering look at the Bush family. His latest, American Theocracy, continues this scrutiny -- with mixed results. American Theocracy is three books in one. He argues that a 'reckless dependency on shrinking oil supplies, a milieu of radicalized (and much too influential) religion, and a reliance on borrowed money . . . now constitute the three major perils to the United States of the twenty-first century.' His first worry is oil. 'Over the last several hundred years each leading global economic power has ridden an emergent fuel resource into the pages of history,' he notes, citing Britain's 19th-century reliance on the coal industry as an example. But such reliance can prove disastrous if that resource dries up, which Phillips believes will happen. Citing the more pessimistic of geologists' projections about declining global oil reserves, he argues that our dependence on oil has ushered in an era of 'petro-imperialism' that spawned the war in Iraq. Phillips is equally pessimistic about the emergence of a 'debt and credit-industrial complex' that endangers the U.S. economy's foundations. 'Historically,' he writes, dominance of an economy by the financial-services industry, as has now taken place in the United States, has been 'a sign of late-stage debilitation, marked by excessive debt, great disparity between rich and poor, and unfolding economic decline.' He's clear on who's to blame: the supposedly conservative Republican Party, which, rather than governing in a fiscally responsible manner, has compromised the country's future out of both 'ignorance of history and a classic onset of greed.' But as the book's title suggests, it is the religious right that most occupies Phillips. He is not subtle in his descriptions of this group: 'The rapture, end-times, and Armageddon hucksters in the United States rank with any Shiite ayatollahs.' The GOP has been transformed into 'the first religious party in U.S. history,' Phillips argues, and it is ushering in an 'American Disenlightenment' that rejects the separation of church and state and ignores the teachings of science. Much of Phillips's focus is on the eschatology of evangelical, fundamentalist and Pentecostal Christians, including their understanding of the prophecies in the New Testament book of Revelation that describe the events leading to the world's end, events that some evangelicals believe may be foreshadowed by today's turmoil in the Middle East. 'Conservative politicians understood that for true believers their imminent rapture and the subsequent second coming of Jesus Christ were the only endgame,' Phillips argues. 'We can estimate that for 20 to 30 percent of Christians, this chronology superseded or muted other issues,' such as economic self-interest and the absence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. But Phillips provides no source for this estimate. He also asserts, rather than proves, that such ideas animate the Bush administration -- worrying, for example, about 'White House implementation of domestic and international political agendas that seem to be driven by religious motivations and biblical worldviews.' This seems due in part to the low opinion Phillips has of born-again Christians, whom he sees as victims of a form of religious false consciousness. He argues that 'Some 30 to 40 percent of the Bush electorate, many of whom might otherwise resent their employment conditions, credit-card debt, heating bills, or escalating costs of automobile upkeep . . . often subordinate these economic concerns to a broader religious preoccupation with biblical prophecy and the second coming of Jesus Christ.' But contrary to Phillips's claims, speculation about the doomsday-era 'end times' -- which has been present among certain segments of America's Christian population for more than a century -- does not necessarily lead to the embrace of apocalyptic economic or foreign policy goals. It does not even guarantee sustained support for war; the percentage of white evangelical Christians who back the war in Iraq has dropped from 87 in 2003 to 68 in January 2006, according to Charles Marsh, an evangelical professor of religion at the University of Virginia. To suggest, as Phillips does, that the Bush administration, at the behest of born-again Christians, is intent on launching 'international warfare to spread the gospel' is astonishingly simplistic. This tendency for overstatement stems in part from Phillips's reliance on questionable sources, including partisan radio networks such as Air America and books (such as Esther Kaplan's With God on Their Side: How Christian Fundamentalists Trampled Science, Policy, and Democracy in George W. Bush's White House) that are far from balanced. He also cites statements by self-appointed evangelical spokesmen like Jerry Falwell as evidence of the religious right's extreme views. But a survey conducted last year by the PBS program 'Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly' found that most evangelicals themselves view Falwell unfavorably. Phillips is more successful with his summaries of religious history, where he relies on the work of well-regarded scholars such as Mark Noll of Wheaton College and George Marsden of Notre Dame. Yet even Phillips must admit that in terms of concrete policies, the so-called theocracy he describes has been surprisingly ineffective at turning its agenda into law. 'As of this writing,' he concedes, 'none of the half-dozen pieces of quasi-theocratic legislation drafted by the religious right . . . had achieved passage, but the time could come.' In fact, according to the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, white evangelicals' electoral influence is not on the rise; they constituted only 23 percent of the electorate in both 2000 and 2004. And the percentage of Bush voters who are white evangelicals remained constant at 36 percent in 2000 and 2004; as the Pew Center noted, Bush in 2004 'made relatively bigger gains among infrequent churchgoers than he did among religiously observant voters.' Still, Phillips sees the religious right's influence on nearly every major decision the Bush administration has made. He pins the invasion of Iraq not on the influence of advisers such as Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld but on the power of 'the tens of millions of true believers viewing events through a Left Behind perspective.' Whether discussing oil, the economy or American faith, when Phillips abandons his thoughtful explorations of history for the present, he produces polemics ill-suited to his talents -- seemingly written for an audience that wants its prejudices reaffirmed rather than examined. Years from now, historians studying the early 21st century will be able to judge how many of Phillips's dire predictions proved prescient. Lately, even the Bush administration has given lip service to the idea that the country needs to reduce its dependence on foreign oil. But in his disillusionment with the GOP, Phillips has allowed intemperance to infect his analysis. As a result, what could have been a thoughtful critique has become yet another book that caters to partisan passions. Reviewed by Christine Rosen Copyright 2006, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved. Kevin Phillips's book will make a lot of people want to move to a South Sea island. And Scott Brick's normally reassuring voice is only scarier because of the message he delivers. Phillips offers an in-depth examination of the relationship between the federal government, Big Oil, and the Religious Right. Brick's measured tones are reassuring, even as he talks about the impending collapse of oil, the bursting of the American housing bubble, and the future of America. It ain't pretty, but it's a work listeners won't be able to turn off. Using examples from the past, Brick calmly talks about a future in which our country's mistakes and missteps will return to haunt us. M.S. © AudioFile 2006, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine This former Republican strategist has written several books on the relationship between wealth and politics in this country, including the New York Times best-sellers Politics of Rich and Poor (1990) and Wealth and Democracy (2002). Phillips' abiding theme is given a workout again in his new book, with his major thesis spelled out on the first page of the preface: three demons threaten the continued well-being of the U.S. These are our 'reckless dependency on shrinking oil supplies,' a 'milieu of radicalized (and much too influential) religion,' and a 'reliance on borrowed money' (domestic and international debt, that is). His stiff--no harsh--words are aimed primarily at the Republican Party for allowing these three trends to have gotten out of control, but Democrats, without offering clear and tangible alternatives, are not let off the hook. The author's investigation into these three problems is set in a historical context as he posits the undeniable fact that all previous world economic powers have ultimately failed in continued strength (each one, however, believing 'they were unique and that God was on their side'). Phillips is eloquent, absorbing, and frightening, and this book will follow its predecessors onto the best-seller lists. Brad Hooper Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved A harrowing picture of national danger that no American reader will welcome, but that none should ignore. A harrowing picture of national danger that no American reader will welcome, but that none should ignore. (The New York Times Book Review) An indispensable presentation of the case against things as they are. (Time) Everyone should have access to what American Theocracy so powerfully tells us about our country at this critical time. (Chicago Sun-Times) The story of the impending end of American supremacy. . . . [Phillips] brings all the strands together and puts them into context. (Salon.com) Everyone should have access to what American Theocracy so powerfully tells us about our country at this critical time. The story of the impending end of American supremacy. . . . [Phillips] brings all the strands together and puts them into context. From the writer called our 'modern-day Tom Paine,'an explosive analysis of the axis of religion, politics, and fiscal imprudence that threatens to destroy the nation. Unabridged CDs - 11 CDs, 13 hours Praise for Kevin Phillips and American Dynasty: '[Phillips] is a deep thinker extraordinaire, who does a masterful job of connecting the military- industrial dots. . . . A searing indictment of the Bush Dynasty.' —Douglas Brinkley, Mother Jones 'Devastating . . . an important, troubling book that should be read everywhere with care, nowhere more so than in this city.' —Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post Book World Customers who bought this item also bought Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism Wealth and Democracy: A Political History of the American Rich American Dynasty : Aristocracy, Fortune, and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War On America The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America's Pursuit of Its Enemies Since 9/11 Customer Reviews for: American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21stCentury Rating - Hubbert's peek into the present. In the Republican years before Nixon resigned, I perused the editorials each Sunday in our Joplin Globe. Among the syndicated columnists, Jack Anderson & John Roche passed for liberal; Kevin Phillips & Max Rafferty (former superintendent of California Public Schools) were the conservatives. Between the latter, Phillips seemed the more reasoned. Of late, Phillips, who worked like the dickens to get Nixon elected & who like so many of the old Goldwater guard deserted the Republican orthodoxy, has ... Read More Rating - Unconvincing account by a disillusioned Republican Phillips doesn't personalize the book in this way, but this is clearly the story of how this life-long Republican activist and presidential advisor fell out of love with his party. As such, it's interesting and it parallels the political journeys of a number of people in my family. He believes the GOP is guilty of two bad sets of policies, those encouraging both public and private debt in the United States, and those policies supporting over-reliance on oil. What is really driving Phillips away from his party, ... Read More Rating - Incisive Kevin Phillips never fails to cut through the historical fog in documenting the sociopolitical forces at work in the shaping of our current society. Definitely worth your time. Rating - important book Kevin Phillip has written a well researched and powerful book exposing the stupidities of the Bush Administration and the perilous situation the US is now in. Everyone, especially thoughtful conservatives, should read this. Rating - christo-fascism and borrowed success I bought five hardcover copies at retail and gave them away to people who bought copies and gave them away. I paid my kids to read the book. Now the book can be bought cheap. You want the truth? You can't (maybe you can) handle it. see more reviews See all books by author Kevin Phillips

Books : American Theocracy: The Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil, and Borrowed Money in the 21stCentury