Category: 4 Star

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Review: The Muhammad Code – How a Desert Prophet Brought You ISIS, al Qaeda, and Boko Haram

4 Star, Religion & Politics of Religion
Amazon Page
Amazon Page

Howard Bloom

4.0 out of 5 stars A Worst Case Documentation of Islam as Evil

 EDIT of 20161201: Religion is one of the most complicated topics, and it is very hard for most people to grasp that at root most religions based on dogma, including Catholicism, are a mix of outright fabrication (for example, see Christ's Ventriloquists: The Event that Created Christianity), good intentions at various points in the “invention” history, and utterly despicable exploitation for personal and institutional profit. Within Islam — and I defer mostly to those who have actually read the Koran in the original in Arabic — there are moral and intellectual factions, each with their own interpretation, some warranting great fear, others great tolerance.

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Review: Sudden Justice – America’s Secret Drone Wars

4 Star, Atrocities & Genocide
Amazon Page
Amazon Page

Chris Woods

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Historical Overview of the US Government's Drone Assassination Program, November 23, 2016

This is one of three books on drone assassination that I am reviewing, the other two are Drones and the Future of Armed Conflict: Ethical, Legal, and Strategic Implications and We Kill Because We Can: From Soldiering to Assassination in the Drone Age. I was limited in my choices to the books offered by a professional journal for whom I am writing an integrated review, if I had had unlimited choice I would have included Kill Chain: The Rise of the High-Tech Assassins and The Assassination Complex: Inside the Government's Secret Drone Warfare Program.

All three books — and I suspect the others focused on this topic as well — agree on three things:

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Review: Drones and the Future of Armed Conflict – Ethical, Legal, and Strategic Implications

4 Star, Atrocities & Genocide
Amazon Page
Amazon Page

David Cortright, Rachel Fairhurst, Kristen Wall (eds.)

4.0 out of 5 stars Academic-Legal Perspective on the US Drone Assassination Program, November 23, 2016

This is one of three books on drone assassination that I am reviewing, the other two are Sudden Justice: America's Secret Drone Wars (Terrorism and Global Justice) and We Kill Because We Can: From Soldiering to Assassination in the Drone Age. I was limited in my choices to the books offered by a professional journal for whom I am writing an integrated review, if I had had unlimited choice I would have included Kill Chain: The Rise of the High-Tech Assassins and The Assassination Complex: Inside the Government's Secret Drone Warfare Program.

All three books — and I suspect the others focused on this topic as well — agree on three things:

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Review: We Kill Because We Can – From Soldiering to Assassination in the Drone Age

4 Star, Atrocities & Genocide
Amazon Page
Amazon Page

Laurie Calhoun

4.0 out of 5 stars Cultural-Ethical-Legal-Practical Indictment of US Drone Assassination Program, November 23, 2016

This is one of three books on drone assassination that I am reviewing, the other two are Sudden Justice: America's Secret Drone Wars (Terrorism and Global Justice) and Drones and the Future of Armed Conflict: Ethical, Legal, and Strategic Implications. I was limited in my choices to the books offered by a professional journal for whom I am writing an integrated review, if I had had unlimited choice I would have included Kill Chain: The Rise of the High-Tech Assassins and The Assassination Complex: Inside the Government's Secret Drone Warfare Program.

All three books — and I suspect the others focused on this topic as well — agree on three things:

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Review: The New Grand Strategy – Restoring America’s Prosperity, Security, and Sustainability in the 21st Century

4 Star, America (Founders, Current Situation), Strategy
Amazon Page
Amazon Page

A Few Gems, Too Little, Too Late, Not a Grand Strategy and Not Global By Any Stretch of the Imagination

I was paying attention in 2009 when Wayne Porter and Mark Mykleby did their best for the Chairman, and was present when Brent Scowcroft, among others, listened to the Wilson Foundation “launch” of the book's ideas in 2011. I also observed with interest as Patrick Doherty, then of the New America Foundation, tried to develop the ideas with one good meme — sustainability as the central concept – while suffering from arrogance, naivete, and shallow reading so very typical of the light-weight Washington “think tanks.” I bought this book because I think the original thinkers (Wayne Porter and Mark Mykleby) and their mentor (Mike Mullen) were on to something in 2009.

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Review: Nation on the Take – How Big Money Corrupts Our Democracy

4 Star, Democracy
Amazon Page
Amazon Page

Wendell Potter and Nick Penniman

4 Stars New Material on One Old Issue — Neglects the Other Eleven Electoral Reform Issues

There is new material in this book, the authors are passionate, informed, and articulate, and they raise an issue that is of vital importance. However, and I list ten other books below to make the point, this is not a new issue, nor is it the whole issue. There are twelve separate electoral reforms that must be implemented together, in a single simultaneous Electoral Reform Act, if we are to restore integrity to how we elect our representatives (at all three levels — the authors excel at showing how state and local initiatives are changing the fund-raising dynamic).

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Review: Hacker Hoaxer Whistleblower Spy – The Many Faces of Anonymous

4 Star, Democracy, Information Operations, Information Society, Information Technology, Intelligence (Wealth of Networks)
Amazon Page
Amazon Page

Gabriella Coleman

Anonymous is almost certainly not what you think it is. You have to live it to understand it, its implications, its functioning, and its place in society. Gabrielle Coleman lived it, as a fully disclosed academic anthropologist. This is her story as much as theirs.

The structure of Anonymous is like the structure of the internet: multiple channels, multiple entry points, self healing patches, and lots of redundancy. (Also lots of swearing, lots of personal attacks, and lots of suspicions. Testosterone is involved.) This enables a totally flat organization to achieve in minutes what giant corporations and government take years to effect. The exhilaration, the joy, the satisfaction participants savor is incomparable. Anonymous is far more than a labor of love; it is idealists executing on their dreams. Everyone should be jealous.

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