Patriotism, democracy, and common sense

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William I. Robinson

A penetrating analysis of the controversial U.S. role in the 1990 Nicaraguan elections - the most closely monitored in history - this book exposes the intervention in the electoral process of a sovereign nation by the Central Intelligence Agency, the Department of State, the National Endowment for Democracy, and private U.S.-based organizations. Robinson begins by tracing the evolution of U.S. foreign policy in recent decades and reviewing U.S.-Nicaraguan relations since the Carter administration. He then describes specific aspects of the "electoral intervention project," bringing to light the clandestine activities of U.S. officials. Finally, he examines the implications of such an undertaking for U.S. foreign policy and for social change in the Third World in the post-cold war era, arguing that it is a dangerous harbinger of a new interventionism conducted under the pretext of promoting democracy. Drawing on an extensive array of confidential documents and on interviews with representatives from U.S. and foreign government agencies, private organizations, and anti-Sandinista groups in Nicaragua, the author offers a chilling account of a foreign policy venture that was at the very least duplicitous and quite possibly illegal as well.

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Robert L. Hutchings

As director for European affairs at the National Security Council in 1989-92, Robert Hutchings was at the heart of U.S. policymaking toward Europe and the Soviet Union during the dizzyingly fast dissolution of the Soviet bloc. Hutchings adds a scholar's balanced judgment and historical perspective to his insider's view from the White House as he reconstructs how things looked to policymakers in the United States and in Europe, describes how and why decisions were made, and critically examines those decisions in the light of what can now be known. He assesses the critical support of U.S. diplomacy for the East European revolutions and the unification of Germany - offering fascinating character sketches along the way - and describes how U.S. relations with Moscow were managed up to the collapse of the USSR. Hutchings also discusses the difficulties in forging a post-cold war European order and U.S. failures in dealing with a disintegrating Yugoslavia.

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Robert Paul Browder

"Covering the years from 1929 to 1935, this is a careful and objective analysis of Soviet-American relations centering around United States recognition of the Soviet Union in 1933, the negotiations leading to recognition, and the disillusionment that followed"--Cover.

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E.J. Dionne Jr. and Joy-Ann Reid

Barack Obama's political life can be chronicled through a series of major addresses in which he spoke to the nation with a voice uniquely his own. His eloquence, both written and spoken, propelled him to national prominence and ultimately made it possible for the son of a Kenyan man and a white woman from Kansas to become the first black president of the United States.