Losing Our Democracy: How Bush, the Far Right and Big Business Are Betraying Americans for Power and Profit by Mark Green

From the Publisher

Mark Green is the author or editor of 20 other books, including the #1 New York Times bestseller, Who Runs Congress? (4 editions) and What We Stand For: A Program for Progressive Patriotism. He has written numerous articles for newspapers and magazines like the New York Times, the Washington Post, The Nation and the New Republic. He has appeared over 200 times as a regular host on CNNís Crossfire and as the ìExaminerî on PBSís Firing Line with William F. Buckley, and more recently on a weekly news program on NY1 with Ed Koch and Al DíAmato.

Mark Green was elected New York Cityís first public advocate, a position he held from 1994 to 2001, and was the cityís 2001 Democratic nominee for mayor. He currently is president of the New Democracy Project, teaches at New York University and is seeking the office of New York State Attorney General.

Author photo by
Timothy Greenfield-Sanders.

Kirkus Reviews

"Hillary Clinton and Tom Paine vs. Ayn Rand and Robinson Crusoe." So Democratic politico Green summarizes the current political scene in this brightly written polemic. If you've been reading the headlines, have been keeping up with the work of Kevin Phillips, and are already disposed to think that the nation is a mess politically, then most of what Green has to say won't come as news. Still, this is a handy one-volume summary to keep near the dining-room table for arguments with your neocon neighbor, the one who thinks the Bush administration really cares for the average American. Not so, says Green, adding, "George W. Bush has embraced democracy more as a prop than a policy." His catalogue of Bush and company's misdeeds adds up to an impressive indictment, but it is his diagnosis of the underlying causes for them that resonates. For one thing, he argues, Republican rightists have been more successful at "marketing their brand" than has the opposition, in some measure because of the illegal and/or unethical machinations of bigwigs like the now-deposed Tom DeLay; for another, you've got to be rich or a superb fundraiser to enter politics these days-he notes that it cost Ken Livingstone 80 cents per vote in the London mayoral race of 2001, whereas it cost Michael Bloomberg $100 for the same thing in New York that same year-which gives well-to-do corporations even more access and power in the political process. Add fundamentalist Christianity, laissez-faire policies, the administration's fondness for outright lying and deception, a misguided war on terror and chaotic worldview, the Patriot Act, and the like, and even though the president "does not wake up daily and figure out how to sabotagedemocracy," his actions trump whatever good intentions he might have, with the loss of democracy the result. A compendium of talking points for the midterm, tetchy without being shrill. First printing of 75,000

Product Details

• Table of Contents

Table of Contents