Rating: 
Summary: Conspiracy?or just incompetence?
Review: When I first picked up this book I thought that there would be implications of some sort of conspiracy between President Bush and the Saudi government that backs terror. There is nothing in the book that proves that. What it does show is a very complicated relationship between our current president, his father, the family that controls Saudi Arabia and those responsible for the 9/11 attacks. What this book is totally consistent with is Richard Clarke's recent charges that Bush failed to heed the warnings that 9/11 was about to occur. It also has new details about the tangled web of relationships between the Bushes, the Saudis and the oil industry. Unfortunately the media gave far more attention to Richard Clarke's recent allegations than to the information contained in this book. The media would do well to also focus in on the Bush-Saud connection.
Rating: 
Summary: Surprised!
Review: I read this book with some trepidation, even as I was going through the fairly persuasive text. Sure, the Bush family had close ties with the Saudis - but is that really a bad thing? Isn't that how power works, and don't we have to have some of our leaders tied in to other world leaders? On that point, I found some of Unger's implications to be (perhaps) colored by a cynical bent toward the Republicans, though as a previous reviewer pointed out, he does not blow smoke where there is no fire.Still, after all that, I thought the book nothing more than a good background piece to fill in some of the details on our complicated involvement in the Middle East. I dismissed Unger's warnings of potentially more nefarious dealings between the families, even considering that all of those pages about Saudi Arabia's role in 9-11 were blacked out (by an administration that uses "classified" as a tool to control information). Then comes Woodward's book, detailing a secret meeting between the President and Prince Bandar, where the President showed Bandar the war plans for Iraq! Where Donald Rumsfeld told this Prince of a kingdom that can hardly be described as trustworthy to US interests that, regarding whether or not we would actually invade Iraq, he could "take it to the bank"! Where Bandar and Bush apparently discussed maniputaing oil prices for the sake of Bush's political gain! I know that some of the details or interpretations of Woodward's account are in dispute, but even the administration does not argue the point that Bandar was privately brought in and shown those plans before Bush's State of the Union Address, where he assured Congress that he was working hard for a peacful solution (obviously an outright lie - the decision had already been made to invade). Is it not amazing that a Saudi Prince was put more in the loop on a US invasion than our own Senate and House leaders? In context of this stunning revelation, read Craig Unger's book and you will be very worried about where this country is heading. In context of this stunning revelation, a 3 or 4 star review from this reader jumped to the full 5. All the pieces are falling together, from Clarke to Unger to O'Neill to Woodward's incredibly balanced account, and the picture presented by the completed puzzle will not show favorably on the secretive Bush Administration.
Rating: 
Summary: One star because I can't give it none.
Review: Evidently the leftists didn't listen to Bob Woodward and others discrediting any "secret" deal to lower oil prices before the election. Not true. Do your homework, lefties, and read the book before you write a review. Did it ever occur to you that these authors are producing books for the same reason they say the Arabs are influencing oil prices.....to influence the election? Duh! Huh? Get a brain. Just because there were terrorists on the hijacked plane in no way establishes Saudi Arabia as being a terrorist state, any more than John Walker Lindh joining the terrorists means all Americans are terrorists. These books are rubbish, written to ignorant people who are easily influenced by the Bush bashers. I know our public schools are bad, but I didn't know they graduated such ignoramuses.
Rating:
Summary: Cheers From A Flaming Liberal
Review: After reading this book, I am enlightened. Now I know why we attacked Iraq when in fact there were 16 Saudis and NOT ONE IRAQI ON THOSE PLANES ON 9-11. Now I know why we were told Iraq was an immediate threat to our security, and why terrorists were being trained in Iraq when neither was true. This war is not about terrorism at all. It is all about Bush family connections to the Saudis and big oil. The Bush Administration is nothing but a bunch of oil profiteers, liars, and thieves. This is indeed the most corrupt presidency in our history. Commander in Chief my foot, Commander in Thief is the correct title. Impeach Bush and his unsavory band of crooks now.
Rating:
Summary: Fantastic book !
Review: I never realised how influential the Saudi's were with the Bush family until i read this book. Great book to read but politically biased in his observations.
Rating:
Summary: Follow the Money indeed
Review: Follow the money indeed...years and years of our hard earned tax dollars funneled off to create the monsters we are currently spending additional billions and blood to stop. How could this "free" democratic country let something like this happen?
Rating:
Summary: Terrifying Truth Behind Today's Headlines
Review: From April 19, 2004: "NEW YORK (CNN) - A top Saudi official has assured President Bush that his country will increase oil production to lower gas prices before November to help the president's re-election prospects, according to a broadcast report Sunday." This book is well-written, meticulously researched and very, very scary. I am a moderate Republican, but in the past four years I have become shocked at the actions of the Bush/Cheney White House. There was a time when I thought the idea of America invading Iraq on a WMD pre-text and then giving the lucrative oil contracts to Cheney's Halliburton was nothing more than leftist rhetoric. Then it actually happened. I've spent the past four years with my jaw literally agape as this administration has schemed (and succeeded in many ways) to undo 100 years of environmental progress, gone to war on fabricated evidence (uranium in Africa), alienated key allies (and lost potential support for its trillion-dollar nation-building), and budgeted billions for Mars Exploration (why now?) and Nuclear Weapons improvements (not missile defense, but weapons improvements, for God's sake). Never before have so many pillar Republicans (O'Neil, Jeffords, McCaine, Whitman) come forth to warn the American people about the madness that is the Bush/Cheney White House. I stand aghast at what goes through Bush-supporters minds. 9/11 was conceived and carried out by Saudi Arabians - a kingdom which has our White House in its back pocket.
Rating: 
Summary: The political & economic consequences of dynastic bonding
Review: House of Bush, House of Saud : The Secret Relationship Between the World's Two Most Powerful Dynasties by Craig Unger is in many ways eerily similar to Kevin Phillips recent book, American Dynasty: Aristocracy, Fortune, and the Politics of Deceit in the House of Bush. Unger focuses his area of consideration as compared to Phillips, as he considers only the Saudi connection the Bush family has cultivated over the past 30 years, whereas Phillips considers these sorts of dynastic connections by the Bush's on a much more expansive scale. The two men come to very similar conclusions. Given their very different motivations, backgrounds and political orientations, that fact alone causes one pause as one considers what truly underlies the Bush family pursuit of political power. To my mind, Unger's book has serious flaws. These flaws pertain less to the manner of investigation he follows than they have to do with how his politics color his analysis. The fact that the Bush's have in fact deliberately cultivated ties with individuals and their associates whom even that must have recognized had very unsavory histories does not equate to protecting and harboring terrorists, as Unger seems to think. (Being oil men, the Bush's have had to dael with lots of despicable sorts, both domestic and foreign-it just goes with the territory, a situation not solely limited to the oil and gas industries anyway.) And, as President, Bush's responses to the actions of the house of Saud have to be guided and colored by the interests of the nation over a wide continuum of concerns and considerations. Unger here colors and evaluates both Bush presidencies too much from the standpoint of the family to family relationships and not enough through the prism of official channels and obligations. And, his tenor here notwithstanding, many of the less savory and more unfortunate aspects of the US/Saudi relations ship date back to FDR and WW II and clearly predate the Bush/Saudi family bond. Incestuous, underhanded deals have always been part of the bargain, as has been looking the other way as regards Saudi internal affairs. In that respect, Saudi Arabia's not all that different than China. The key question as this all relates to current events is if and how the family dynastic relations blinded Bush to seeing the evil that was growing within Saudi Arabia and the Islamic world and the threats they posed to the US. Unger puts forward a lot of information that suggests it did but by that point in the text his obvious personal political biases are so poignant that one has to question if he has colored the facts to fit his word view. On the other hand, the facts are myriad, manifest and persuasive if only in their expansiveness. All in all, despite the flaws, one has to concur with Unger for the most part. So in the end the book is persuasive but still has the unfortunate under taste of a bit of a political hatchet job. Given that it appears that Unger did not have to color things to make his point, the book also stands as something of a failure for Unger professionally.
Rating:
Summary: Euclidean Logic--unique concept these days.
Review: If you are looking for a book that barks back at the conservative pro-Bush pundits with innuendo and conspiracy theories, House of Bush House of Saud is not for you. What it does offer is an historical narrative of how the two sets of families and associates have interracted over the years, sliding down a slippery slope of influence peddling, rationalization, and placating of fringe elements on both sides. When there is no evidence of wrong doing, Unger plainly states it instead of blowing smoke and implying a fire. Those with an attention span in excess of 30-second sound bites will be amply rewarded as Unger's postulates and theorems lead up to his conclusions which he saves for the last few pages. So what did Kentucky Derby winner War Emblem have to do with 911? How did Islamic extremists tilt the election in Florida? Read the book and find out.
Rating:
Summary: Nonsense
Review: Total fabrication of the truth. Why not read a book on the subject like Morgan Norval's "The Fifteen Century War, Islam's Violent Heritage"?
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