en-US Sat, 24 Aug 2019 13:16:40 -0700 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 25474441 selected writings of bolivar 822 SimĂłn BolĂ­var Michael 0 to-read 4.00 1951
author: SimĂłn BolĂ­var
name: Michael
average rating: 4.00
book published: 1951
rating: 0
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date added: 2019/08/24
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]]> 15814204 New York Times bestseller. Now also an Oscar-nominated documentary

In Dirty Wars, Jeremy Scahill, author of the New York Times bestseller Blackwater, takes us inside America’s new covert wars. The foot soldiers in these battles operate globally and inside the United States with orders from the White House to do whatever is necessary to hunt down, capture or kill individuals designated by the president as enemies.

Drawn from the ranks of the Navy SEALs, Delta Force, former Blackwater and other private security contractors, the CIA’s Special Activities Division and the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), these elite soldiers operate worldwide, with thousands of secret commandos working in more than one hundred countries. Funded through black budgets, Special Operations Forces conduct missions in denied areas, engage in targeted killings, snatch and grab individuals and direct drone, AC-130 and cruise missile strikes. While the Bush administration deployed these ghost militias, President Barack Obama has expanded their operations and given them new scope and legitimacy.

Dirty Wars follows the consequences of the declaration that “the world is a battlefield,� as Scahill uncovers the most important foreign policy story of our time. From Afghanistan to Yemen, Somalia and beyond, Scahill reports from the frontlines in this high-stakes investigation and explores the depths of America’s global killing machine. He goes beneath the surface of these covert wars, conducted in the shadows, outside the range of the press, without effective congressional oversight or public debate. And, based on unprecedented access, Scahill tells the chilling story of an American citizen marked for assassination by his own government.

As US leaders draw the country deeper into conflicts across the globe, setting the world stage for enormous destabilization and blowback, Americans are not only at greater risk—we are changing as a nation. Scahill unmasks the shadow warriors who prosecute these secret wars and puts a human face on the casualties of unaccountable violence that is now official policy: victims of night raids, secret prisons, cruise missile attacks and drone strikes, and whole classes of people branded as suspected militants. Through his brave reporting, Scahill exposes the true nature of the dirty wars the United States government struggles to keep hidden.]]> 642 Jeremy Scahill 156858671X Michael 0 to-read 4.07 2012
author: Jeremy Scahill
name: Michael
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2012
rating: 0
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date added: 2015/05/12
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]]> 12527 288 Annie Dillard 0072434171 Michael 4 4.08 1974
author: Annie Dillard
name: Michael
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1974
rating: 4
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]]> 55135 672 Howard Zinn 1888363541 Michael 5 4.25 1997
author: Howard Zinn
name: Michael
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1997
rating: 5
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]]> 90540 A fast-paced narrative history of the coups, revolutions, and invasions by which the United States has toppled fourteen foreign governments -- not always to its own benefit

"Regime change" did not begin with the administration of George W. Bush, but has been an integral part of U.S. foreign policy for more than one hundred years. Starting with the overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy in 1893 and continuing through the Spanish-American War and the Cold War and into our own time, the United States has not hesitated to overthrow governments that stood in the way of its political and economic goals. The invasion of Iraq in 2003 is the latest, though perhaps not the last, example of the dangers inherent in these operations.

In Overthrow, Stephen Kinzer tells the stories of the audacious politicians, spies, military commanders, and business executives who took it upon themselves to depose monarchs, presidents, and prime ministers. He also shows that the U.S. government has often pursued these operations without understanding the countries involved; as a result, many of them have had disastrous long-term consequences.

In a compelling and provocative history that takes readers to fourteen countries, including Cuba, Iran, South Vietnam, Chile, and Iraq, Kinzer surveys modern American history from a new and often surprising perspective.

"Detailed, passionate and convincing . . . [with] the pace and grip of a good thriller." -- Anatol Lieven, The New York Times Book Review]]> 384 Stephen Kinzer 0805082409 Michael 5 4.16 2006
author: Stephen Kinzer
name: Michael
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2006
rating: 5
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]]> 78130 500 William Blum 1567512526 Michael 5 4.25 1995
author: William Blum
name: Michael
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1995
rating: 5
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]]> 12617
Based on a series of case studies—including the media’s dichotomous treatment of “worthy� versus “unworthy� victims, “legitimizing� and “meaningless� Third World elections, and devastating critiques of media coverage of the U.S. wars against Indochina—Herman and Chomsky draw on decades of criticism and research to propose a Propaganda Model to explain the media’s behavior and performance. Their new introduction updates the Propaganda Model and the earlier case studies, and it discusses several other applications. These include the manner in which the media covered the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement and subsequent Mexican financial meltdown of 1994-1995, the media’s handling of the protests against the World Trade Organization, World Bank, and International Monetary Fund in 1999 and 2000, and the media’s treatment of the chemical industry and its regulation. What emerges from this work is a powerful assessment of how propagandistic the U.S. mass media are, how they systematically fail to live up to their self-image as providers of the kind of information that people need to make sense of the world, and how we can understand their function in a radically new way.]]> 412 Edward S. Herman 0375714499 Michael 5 4.25 1988
author: Edward S. Herman
name: Michael
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1988
rating: 5
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