Rating:  Summary: Read this book! Review: I saw Carville on C-span and he was great. He tells us to stick with the main themes that the Bush team has done wrong instead of nit picking over too many things (I know there are a lot of them but they can be worked on later). He tells us what they are and how to fight and argue back. If they start on gays, or whatever, don't be distracted go back and hit them with the facts about the deficit, losing our constitutional rights, getting the country back into the hands of the people instead of corporations, etc. It is these policies that matter. Pull together if you want this country to remain a country with individual rights. Look to see which of your congressional members voted for the patriot act,if they voted for it, then don't vote for them because it isn't just your rights that is in jeopardy, but it also keeps you from knowing what's going on with the terrorists. Buy the book, enjoy his recipes and fight to save our country.
Rating:  Summary: Loony Tunes Review: I don't know about his book but I do know that he really doesn't exist. He's just a cartoon character.
Rating:  Summary: Yes -- I have Review: Had enough? - Yes I have - of you Snakehead. Weren't your 15 minutes up when slick Willie finally put away his willy and slinked off to New York in the wake of his "loving" wife. I know we've all got to make a living but your continued pimping for the Clintons and their liberal spawn is really getting old. Go back to Cajun country and do a cooking show or something.
Rating:  Summary: If you only have time for one anti-Bush book, READ THIS ONE! Review: 2003 has been a great year for books that take Bush and the Republican party head on. If you don't have time to read all of them, READ THIS ONE (and if you DO have time for two, read the new Molly Ivins book as well)! Michael Moore, Al Franken, David Corn and Molly Ivins all have new books that are excellent, but James Carville manages to pack wit, important information, excellent talking points and a no B.S. attitude into a fast and exciting read. Although I find myself reading a lot of books on the Bush Administration, many of them have a "preach to the choir" quality that gets me fired up but doesn't really tell me anything new. Carville not only fired me up, but gave me new insight into hot issues (his section on school vouchers, for instance) and provided me (and all Democrats) with real solutions and action plans. I couldn't put it down, and will certainly be buying this one for friends to read before the '04 election! Plus, Carville's recipe for bread pudding in the back of the book is fantstic! A sweet ending indeed. Yum. :)
Rating:  Summary: Tools every progressive Democrat needs Review: Like him or hate him, there's no denying the political influence of James Carville, part of the "war chest" that helped Bill Clinton defeat George H.W. Bush in the 1992 election. And while the cover to this book may suggest it's going to be another tome of left-wing Bush-bashing, it's not. With his trademark wit and style, Carville examines a number of domestic policy issues and offers up suggestions on how to solve those problems. Carville has a very keen wit; reading the book is like sitting down with a favorite uncle who happens to know a heck of a lot about politics. And while some will disagree with Carville's solutions to issues like welfare reform and taxes, the point here is to provide Democrats with the ammunition they need to square off against a Republican opponent. Many a Republican contend the only thing Democrats have to offer to political discourse is hatred towards George W. Bush. With "Had Enough," Democrats now have some solutions to offer. As has come to be Carville's trademark, the book includes some of Carville's favorite Cajun recipes.
Rating:  Summary: Elegant, Missing Some Pieces, Great Bridge to the Future Review: Having reviewed, with appreciation, a number of the books that lambaste the extremist Republican carpetbaggers now in the White House (I am myself a moderate Republican who feels betrayed), I can say here that James Carville has done very, very well. He is vastly more elegant and politically focused than Al Franken, Jim Hightower, or Michael Moore, and dramatically easier to read than Paul Krugman, Matthew Crenson & Benjamin Ginsberg, or the cultural creative/new progressive/radical center readings (see Steele's List on Democracy & the Republic).
This is a double-spaced book with big print and small pages, but it does the job. James Carville may be a ragin' Cajun with a smart mouth and a weak bladder (read the book) but he clearly has three things going for him: a brain that is in gear before he talks or writes; good friends strong on both policy and research; and a gift for cutting to the chase. Where I would want to have five of my author-advisors putting together a 1 page summary and 5 page detailed review for each of the key policy areas, Carville manages to do in one book what none of the Democratic candidates--not Dean, not Gephardt--have done: he breaks George W. Bush's back with six strokes of the rod: 1) provide for the common defense (homeland insecurity, screwed up military and foreign policy); 2) provide for the general welfare (deficits and debts matter a lot, tax cuts are a huge lie); 3) secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and posterity (education, environment and energy, health care--and notice the emphasis in the Constitution on *posterity*, which is the opposite of carpet-bagging); 4) Establish justice (campaign finance reform, corporate governance, myth of tort reform); 5) insure domestic tranquility (why entitlements matter, notes on lying, the religious right, and friends); and finally, 6) form a more perfect union. This is a quickie book, clearly tapping a multi-million person market for books that contain truth and oppose the impeachable activities of the extremists now looting America through their control of US government policy. It is a simplistic and imperfect book, but sufficient to persuade me that anyone who can muster 1000 brilliant experts covering the 250 critical policy and budget topics that must be mastered to win the general election, must, of necessity, have James Carville as the moderator and facilitator. The book has several useful graphics, and among them two stand out: one on the changes in the opinion of billions of people around the world from before 9-11 to after three years of Bush in power; the other on the $980 billion--almost one trillion--in uncollected annual tax revenue from corporations that tell their stockholders one thing and the IRS another. I absolutely agree with this author that among our highest priorities must be our restoration of America as good neighbor and global friend to legitimate governments (that cuts out the 44 dictators still operating as looting pals of the Cheney-Bush-Perle regime); and the capture of the lost corporate revenue that could, with other savings, fully fund the most important national security investments: in our people, their health and education, and the restoration of legitimate democracy in America. Perhaps most interestingly, Carville has avoided the rush to Dean that characterized myself and others who thought Dean would mature quickly and move from Amway parties to structured policy and outreach to all parties including moderate Republicans like myself. Carville cites George McGovern and Nancy Pelosi as special people, and I agree with that. Pelosi shined brightly on C-SPAN when she took on the disgusting and disgraceful tactics of the Republicans seeking to arrest Democratic senators (a Texas tradition, it seems) for doing their job. He also highlights the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and the Citizens for Tax Justice as meriting special attention, and I only wish that George Soros has earmarked funds for these rather than for organizations that have been too quick to support Howard Dean and abandon a centrist non-partisan policy development position. Buy this book. Read my other 435 or so reviews. And then, as Carville suggests, stop writing to your Senators and Representatives. Write instead to the editors of your local newspaper and start putting these people (Senators and Representatives) on the spot for betraying the public trust. Download the free NATO Open Source Intelligence Handbook (at oss.net or Google for it) and begin following Tom Atlee's concept for citizen wisdom councils. Take back the power, and don't wait for the Democrats to get their act together, it may be years.
Rating:  Summary: Better than the bible Review: This book should act as the bible for the Democratic party. All Democrats should worship James Carville because he can deliver us back into the promised land (white house, congress, house).
Rating:  Summary: THE TRUTH HURTS Review: Most conservatives and bush-ites will read this book (or, more likely have someone read it to them) and disagree with it. OF COURSE they will disagree with because it doesn't offer tips on screwing minorities or the poor. For that, they'll have to wait til their pill-head leader Rush to get out of rehab. The long and the short of it is that Carville is right and the current administration is wrong. All of the yelling and screaming cannot obscure that fact. The "President"'s supports and whine and argue all they want but the basic fact remains this adminstration borders on criminal and people like Carville and Moore are the only ones with the guts to point this out.
Rating:  Summary: This book is awesome Review: Another awe-inspiring book by the man who help Bill Clinton win the presidency. James Carville is a political genius and he has the uncanny ability to simplify complex issues. This book is truly a handbook at beating the evil republicans
Rating:  Summary: Had Enough? Review: "Had Enough?" I asked myself the same question when I walked into the voting booth in November 2000. Have I had enough of this low-life lying, skirt chasing felon as president? Yep. Did I want this scumbag's vice-president to take over as president? Nope. (And apparently neither did the people of either man's home state: both Arkansas and Tennessee went for Bush). As laughable as some of Carville's arguments are (international coalition in Iraq, "Bush's" deficits), what's even more humorous is that this man still has credibility after he and Bill Clinton promised us "the most ethical administration in history". Let's take on Carville's arguments one at a time. How about the grand ol' Halliburton case. According to Carville (and many other loud-mouth's on CNN) Bush is giving contracts to (his buddy's at) Halliburton. Completely ludicrous anyone who has ever worked in the engineering or construction industry knows that Halliburton is one of the few company's (Bectel is probably another one) that has the capabilities to run projects of this magnitude overseas. That Chaney and Bush have contacts with this company should be of no surprise: both men are veterans of the oil industry. Besides the Federal Government gives out hundred's of billions of dollars in contracts domestically, why then is it such a big deal that one company landed a 17 Billion dollar contract? Another popular myth of both Carville (and the Democrats) is that the United Nations could step in and make this situation better. Name me ONE major conflict the U.N. has EVER stepped in and taken care of Mr. Carville? NAME ONE?!!! To me, the U.N. lost total credibility during the cold war for not leading an "international coalition" against Soviet aggression world wide (i.e. their stirring up revolutions in Cuba, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Vietnam, and invading Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Afghanistan). The U.N. had their chance but failed to stand up. Even in the first war the U.N. was ever involved in: what countries took the vast majority of casualties? North and South Korea, China, and the United States. Some international coalition. It has always been up to us to do the standing up to aggressors. This is nothing more than recycled folk lore from the Vietnam era. The book even gets more outlandish when Carville starts talking about the "long-term projected deficits". According to him Bush has squandered Clinton's surplus. Nonsense, that surplus was a PROJECTED surplus; it depended on the economy remaining strong and certainly did not anticipate the war on terror (the expenses of). But here's the kicker: in the face of these ballooning deficits Carville (and all the Democrats running for President) say we need to spend even MORE!!! So how the heck are we going to balance the budget? You guessed it: tax hikes. Big ones. So much for the economic recovery. Overall, this book doesn't even pass the laugh test. Many of the Democratic Presidential Candidates don't either.
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