Reaganomics At The Beginning
921977
Oliver Stone's "Wall Street" chronicles the rise of unbridled greed, of reckless gambling with the other people's money, of soulless financiers whose God is cash.  Some of the details are dated now -- the opening shots of the World Trade Towers, the IBM dumb terminals everywhere, Motorola "brick" wireless phones, the dollar amounts thrown about as astronomical in 1985 -- but the story behind the details and the motivations of the characters are as good a lesson as you're going to find.  As a matter of fact, in the extras it is revealed that the director and cast used Bear Stearns as the model for their portrayals.  How ironic then that the tagline for the film, "Greed is good," should end up eulogizing the era of narcissistic excess that the movie portrays.
2921642
After the 2008 crash, TARP, and all the other alphabet list of Fed intervention and political machination, I immersed myself in learning what is really happening with our markets and country.  This book provides a solid foundation for that understanding.  It breaks new ground in identifying specific causes, and unnecessary prolongation, of the Great Depression. Smoot-Hawley tariffs and the Crash of 1929 are identified as mercantilist actions which were then compounded by wave upon wave of destructive economic legislative and executive actions, assuring the decade long Great Depression.  It traces from 1880 to the present the forces which drain capital from the middle class by using government influence.  Official malfeasance which serves the interests of the mercantilist is occurring at an alarming rate today and portends the end of our Republic if allowed to continue unchecked.  Framed in the perspective of classical economics, it lifts the curtain on the forces that actually determine markets and events.  It is a wake-up call for anyone alarmed by the current political and financial turmoil.
3883550
Presents a concise historical context for various current economic systems as they stood at the time of writing. As such presents a 'current' perspective which is effectively a historical snapshot of how things were perseved when the book was written in the 1970's.  Avoids the hindsight view of the inevitability of the collapse of communism which flavours econmic historical reviews today.
1324272
After enjoying Jimmy Carter's recent "White House Diary", I had to read this book to continue the story of the next 8 years, 1981-1988, with Ronald Reagan in the White House.  Yes, I carefully read the entire 700 pages with pleasure.  Countless books have been written about Reagan but these diary entries - well, they add dimension.  Here Reagan reveals his likes and dislikes, arguments and opinions, and defines his faith in God, all on a daily basis for 8 long years! The reader can easily "read between the lines" and identify. This diary is not dry at all.

Douglas Brinkley edited and compiled daily entries by our 40th.  president and provides an accurate well-written introduction. He could have added to the short table of contents by including two or three highlights of each year.  Each of the 8 chapters covers one year of daily entries beginning with Reagan's Inaugural and ending with the Inaugural of George W.H. Bush. Can you remember March 30, 1981?  Reagan and others with him were shot after exiting a hotel where he had given a speech. He wrote about that terrible day in longhand and it is included inside the cover of the book.

The glossary is excellent (Colin Powell, NSA 1987-1989; Sandra Day O'Connor, etc.)  This reminds readers of the key players in the decade of the eighties.  A complete index is provided.

Entries of the final year reveal an increasingly tired President.  Reagan was elected to office in his early seventies and served 8 years - who wouldn't be happiest riding horseback at the ranch in California or watching old movies at Camp David!  The President has a schedule that is filled every day, even weekends are not his own.  Ronald Reagan proved up to the task in his own unique way.

You may not agree with Reagan's revolutionary ideas for America but you will agree that his optimism was catching, his oratory skills unmatched and as Michael Korda wrote "Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers who cut through argument, debate and doubt, to offer a solution everybody can understand...".  Colin Powell, in his book "My American Journey," wrote this was an apt description of  Ronald Reagan.
3038772
[It is the role of conservatism to] stand athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is  inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who do.  -William F. Buckley, Jr., (National Review, 1955, First Issue)
Ronald Reagan recently turned 90 (2/06/01) and the outpouring of praise from nearly every pundit and politician was downright stunning, even coming, as it did, in the midst of Bill Clinton's typically disgraceful departure from a sordid presidency.  Granted, the encomiums from even his ideological enemies must have been attributable in part to just Reagan's personal character, which benefits so greatly by comparison to Bill Clinton's, but not entirely.  Some of the praise of his opponents, and most of the hosannas from his supporters, were for the ideas that Reagan represented, and which still dominate our politics today.
To see how colossal a figure Reagan remains on the political landscape, we need only look at what George W. Bush is proposing to do as president in the first years of the 21st Century :  cut taxes, build Star Wars, balance the budget, privatize Social Security and education, limit abortion, allow religious groups to deliver social services, and restore dignity to the Oval Office.  Thirty six years after his first major national speech (for Goldwater in 1964), and twenty four years after his first all out bid for the presidency (against President Gerald Ford in the 1976 Republican primaries), the national dialogue today is squarely centered on the ideas that Ronald Reagan introduced or advocated.  The only major elements that are missing are winning the Cold War, which he already won for us, and Welfare reform, which was enacted by the GOP class of '94 (his ideological children).  And what of the Party that he led ?  Ronald Reagan, it must be remembered, ran in the aftermath of Watergate, when the badly battered Republicans were a semi-permanent minority in Congress and on the state level.  Now the party controls both houses of Congress, and has for four consecutive elections, completely dominates the governorships and has achieved parity with Democrats in controlling state legislatures.  Regardless of what you think of him personally, or of his politics, the United States today is very much Ronald Reagan's America, and to a remarkable degree, we live in a world that he, nearly alone, envisioned.  The question for historians is why ?
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The strengths of the book then, and they are considerable, lie in D'Souza's generous reassessment of the Reagan legacy, particularly coming, as it did, before the current lovefest with Reagan began.  The weakness, and it too is significant, lies in his failure to adopt the Reagan model in writing the book.  If D'Souza had structured the book around the larger theme of Reagan's emphasis on freedom, and then stooped to answer specific criticisms only in this context, it would have helped greatly, would have given it a unity that it sadly lacks.  The book is instead a defense of Ronald Reagan as Jimmy Carter or Bill Clinton might have written it, absorbed by tiny matters to the detriment of great ones.  Ronald Reagan deserves, and hopefully will one day get, a biographer who is himself Reaganesque, who understands that it was the restoration of freedom that mattered, and that everything else--Iran Contra, tax hikes, budget deficits, etc.--important as each controversy may have appeared for a time, was just background noise.  But that book, unfortunately, remains to be written.
GRADE : B-
3767180
The reason I read this book was to learn more about this gifted politician.  A few things that grabbed me about it:

*Reagan agonized more about, and was much more engaged in, the details of issues than his detractors at the time believed. Here's an example regarding the question of an embargo on grain exports to the Soviet Union: "I've always felt it hurt our farmers more than it hurt Soviets.  Many of our allies filled the gap and supplied Soviets. But now how do we lift it without sending wrong message to Soviets?"

*On the other hand, his entries do tend to be quite terse.  Reagan focused heavily on day-to-day details, but was not particularly philosophical or reflective.  If you are looking for deep thoughts about the proper role of government, you will get few of them.

*On issue after issue, Reagan was much more pragamatic than some had thought at the time.  He rejects claims that he sought to roll back the New Deal (stating that he was instead "trying to undo the Great Society" of Lyndon Johnson), was willing to support "tax regulation to tighten loopholes" and endorsed a 1982 tax incrfease as "the price we have to pay for spending cuts."  He supported anticommunist guerillas in a variety of nations, but refused to support Mozambique's anticommunist revolt because he believed "they pillage and massacre."  And yes, he did believe that by selling arms to Iran, he was aiding "moderate leaders in the Army."

*I also got a sense of what issues Reagan really cared about.  I noticed lots of references to taxes, spending and the Cold War.  Social issues (except for abortion and drugs) he was less interested in; for example, he showed little interest in church-state issues (e.g. school prayer) or racial issues such as affirmative action.

On balance, Reagan comes across as a lot more like Gerald Ford than many would have guessed: a practical, pragmatic conservative.
3614837
I learned so much about President Reagan. He was the 1st President I voted for. The tidbits Mr. O'Reilly brought out was interesting. Keep the books coming!
3980542
That is what the 90's was all about according to this book; specifically easy money that came about due to speculation, easy credit laws, and loosened federal regulations of the financial sector.  The end of the Cold War and the resulting "peace dividend" brought about an era of optimism.  Added to this was the takeover of Congress and many state governments by Republicans bent on loosening rules on businesses and making a more investment - friendly environment.  Together, this created a bull market across the financial markets of the world, which in turn helped pushed up property prices.  The target of this new money, the Internet and businesses involved with it.  Hence the dot.com bubble.  This story of greed, speculation, and risk-taking is laid out by this Nobel-Prize winner of Economics and Clinton advisor; Joseph Stiglitz.  The book flows well and provides insider insight into what was going on in business and government circles both here and around the world.  Overall, a good read.
4006039
The 1990s, if you remember the second half of that heady decade, was when many economies went haywire.  For a while, Mexico was the talk of the town (if that town included economists) with its currency crisis and resulting debt crisis.  Mexico soon gave way to Asia: Korea, Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Indonesia were severely hit.  This was all in the context of Japan in recession since the beginning of the decade and experiencing, of all things, deflation and negative real interest rates.  And let's not forget Russia's devaluation and Brazil's economic woes.

The average American (and perhaps European) can be forgiven for yawning over such arcane topics as hedge funds, supply-side economics, and debt rescheduling.  But that is no excuse to ignore Paul Krugman's Return of Depression Economics, an engaging primer on how these economies went south and what governments can do to prevent similar disasters.  Krugman has always been, even before he went off the deep end in his column for the New York Times, controversial.  Vocal and egotistical, he has made a number of enemies in his brilliant career as one of the world's foremost economists.  He undoubtedly recruited a few more members to the Krugman anti-fan club with the publication of the Return of Depression Economics, where he calls supply-side economics a "set of silly ideas" and "a crank doctrine".  He argues that an orthodox free-market, laissez-faire ideology has clouded many economists' thinking, leading policy-makers to implement unsound policies that prolong developing countries' - and Japan's - recessions.

But forget Krugman's thesis.  His argument that Keynesian economics still has a place in today's world is less fascinating than his history of the crises in Latin America and Asia.  Krugman does his best to avoid jargon and present the subject to the layperson, writing in a casual, colloquial style.  Using the "Capitol Hill Babysitting Co-op" as a model, he easily explains what happens to economies when demand decreases and what the central government can do to stimulate this demand.  He walks the reader through how a lack of investor confidence can turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy and leave economies in a shambles.  And, of course, being Krugman, he takes every opportunity to point out when he was right in the past and others were wrong.
272567
A surprising and interesting look into the background and accomplishments of Ronald Reagan. It was enlightening to read about the issues that Reagan dealt with while managing to launch our country on a course of growth, international respect and patriotic pride.
2559148
This book is a one volume "epic history of American economic power" that focuses on the fantastic capacity of the United States as a machine to create wealth (if not to redistribute it); its approach is surprisingly similar to what a 19th century bourgeois apologist might have chosen, that of a believer in a vision of "progress" that would now appear old fashioned and naive, especially to the more left leaning readers. But one has to admit that one of the most striking aspects of American history is the sheer speed and size of all economic developments, and that, from the very start.
Of course this is due to the immensity and diversity of the territory and its natural resources, in wildlife, agricultural lands, timber, minerals, oil, etc. But also, as this territory filled with people, to its huge size as a market for industrial and later consumer products and services, combined with the absence of the many cultural and political obstacles that some may say still characterize "Old Europe".
As a consequence, America was and may still be a land of incredible opportunity for entrepreneurs, native or immigrant, and capitalists. This gave substance to "the American dream" and it is this powerful, seemingly unstoppable march that the author has chosen to emphasize and dramatize. He succeeded in writing an enjoyable book that reads like a novel. I would recommend it to anyone interested in the subject who prefers not to be bogged down in charts, graphs and econometrics. American economic history written in this way is fascinating and I picked up at least two anecdotes that are quite revealing. First, every stock exchange boom in American history attracted a lot of capital from abroad (this includes the 1990s dotcom bubble); European investors lost a lot of money each time, financing American growth without gaining much from it. Second, American farmers suffered a lot from the advent of the automobile. All the crops that used to feed horses were suddenly made "available" for humans, which depressed agricultural prices for decades and caused the State to intervene to support farmers. With the current development of biofuels (the new name for fodder), this trend is now going the other way...
4566425
Easy reading. Familiar names. Good review of relatively recent history. While I've always had a favorable opinion of Reagan, I now realize how different our society would be today if all of his ideas and ideals had prevailed.
3285550
I ordered this book from Amazon for a Political Science Course at my university.  The book arrived on time and in the condition described.  I would recommend this book to others interested in learning about the Reagan era.
3196497
This is a look at the individuals who were in charge of Wall Street when the market crashed in 1929.  It begins a year ealrier on New Years Day 1928 and proceeds to that fateful day that changed our country.  It was easy to read and I enjoyed it.  If you are looking for something that is more involved in economics, this is not the book.  It is the story of the people involved and responsible for the 1929 crash.
450828
In The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan, James Mann goes to pains to argue that Ronald Reagan was essentially a liberal during the end of the Cold War and that, it is a good thing he was.  As a result of Reagan's dovish policies in his second term, Mann argues, Gorbachev had the necessary space to pursue domestic reforms.  Mann highlights the vociferous opposition Reagan faced from his own party and conservative thinkers during his meetings with Gorbachev and his desire to reduce (and even eliminate) nuclear weapons.  Mann's analysis of the major figures of the era (Reagan, Gorbachev, Bush, Nixon, Kissinger, Powell, Schultz, Shevardnadze, Honecker, etc) is superb and fascinating.  We find many of these figures moving along different streams of political thought, sometimes because of political expedience and sometimes for larger goals.  At times Reagan was the hawk, proclaiming that Gorbachev tear down the Berlin Wall, at the dismay of disarmament officials at the State Department.  Other times Reagan was the dove, proclaiming the Soviet Union as a changed system, no longer the Evil Empire he had originally denounced.  The realists led by Nixon and Kissinger also undergo transformations, from supporting detente in the 70s to opposing the diplomatic efforts of Reagan.  Mann convincingly explains these disagreements among American anti-communists as a result of the core philosophical differences between the realists of the Nixon era and the Reaganites.  Also fascinating is Mann's analysis of the complex relationship between East and West German leadership and the implications of their actions upon the U.S. and the Soviet Union.  The result is a well-written account of the complexities of the Cold War - complexities which have been airbrushed in history that seeks to portray Reagan as a right wing simpleton.
What results is a rather elusive Ronald Reagan - a man who Mann portrays as every bit as disengaged as liberals believe he was, yet deft and calculating and ultimately right in his instincts when it came to Cold War policy.  Mann rightly argues that Reagan played a critical role in the end of the Cold War and that the proper question isn't necessarily whether Reagan won the war all on his own but what effect did he have.
Mann's book is supported by an extensive number of interviews he conducted with many of the major figures of the era.  My only criticisms center upon his over-insistence on the mistakes of Reagan's conservative opponents.  My suspicions is that many of Reagan's critics may not have had the same information that Reagan had in order to assess the Soviet Union as accurately as Reagan did.  Also, Mann's book would have been more complete had he included an analysis of the effect of Reagan's first term policies (SDI, the military build-up), etc.  While it is a fair argument as to whether these policies held end the Cold War, it would still be interesting to include this discussion for a broader view of Reagan's role.
3647029
In 1982, Peter Robinson was hired as a speechwriter in the Reagan Administration and came to realize that our fortieth president was someone who had many qualities worth emulating.

Robinson talks about how the former president's misfortunes and life experiences brought him to a place of great serenity and how this helped his political career.  The author discusses how, contrary to myth, Reagan was a very hard worker, and also discusses the importance of Reagan's sense of humor.  Another great chapter describes the conflicts in the administration between pragmatists and "true believers", and Robinson asserts why a political movement must have both.

This volume shows that while winning the Cold War, restoring the nation's sense of confidence, and building the modern economy, President Reagan also managed to have a personal impact on many younger people who worked in his administration.
3547830
This is a useful survey of the USA's society and economy by Godfrey Hodgson, a British journalist and author, who is an Associate Fellow at the Rothermere American Institute at Oxford University.

Chapters deal with politics and the Constitution, the economy, immigration, technology, women, slavery and race, the frontier, society, foreign policy, the world and the new century. He explodes the myth that the market, not the government or the universities, built the Internet.

What he calls the `conservative ascendancy' is really just corporate power leading to a corporate state. All the polls show that the American people have far saner views than either wing of the capitalist party. But in the USA, money talks, so much so that its courts now hold that the First Amendment's protection of free speech protects the absurdly high levels of election spending.

The ruling class has turned the USA into the most unequal of all developed countries: its great and growing inequality means that it has the least opportunity, the least social mobility and the fewest escapes from poverty. The USA is failing economically: average wages were 10% lower in 1999 than in 1973. In 2000, it had lower annual incomes per head than Norway, Switzerland, Denmark, Finland, Sweden and Luxembourg. Between 1960 and 2000, productivity grew more slowly in the USA than in Britain, France or Italy.

 Hodgson raises, but does not answer, the question why, after the Soviet Union's suicide, world peace and prosperity did not ensue. What caused the wars and slumps of the 1990s? The Soviet Union's demise proved that it was not the Soviet Union that prevented peace and prosperity, but capitalism.