This book traces parallels between Twain's constant travels and developing writting style in a brief well written manor. The book encludes photographs and
journal entries that give us an up close look at a genious.

Adam J. Miller (Wizard@surenet.com)

Early American women, be they slave or free, had an incredibly hard life, with few civil or property rights. This book recalls some of the bold and brave women that stepped forward, against difficult odds, and demanded something be done. These women started the long and hard struggle to advance the cause of women and better their lives; a battle that is still being fought today. In addition to the burden of having and raising families, American women did much of the backbreaking work of clearing land, planting and harvesting, and filling the sweatshops of early industrial America. These women earned everything they got and then some. We could never have built our great country without their labors.

I have taken for granted many things about women. This book was a real eye-opener and gave me much to ponder. Read the book guys, and learn something.

Ken Smith, USVeterans.com

If there are any general readers left with an interest in economics, they will enjoy this accessible and informative book. I teach macroeconomics to undergraduates, and hope to find a way of using this book as an important supplement to conventional texts.

Stein gives us a history of fiscal and monetary policy from the Depression to the first Reagan term. The third edition claims to be updated to the start of the Clinton administration, but this simply means that Stein has added a few articles he'd written for the AEI or for the Wall Street Journal. Essentially, though, the book's story ends in about 1983, with most emphasis being given to the period from 1968. (Stein was at one point chairman of Nixon's Council of Economic Advisors.)

It sounds, then, as though "Presidential Economics" has two strikes against it. First, Stein refers to the Reagan administration in the present tense, whereas today's students are impatient with any material more than a couple of years old. It's actually one of my hidden agendas, though, to help students understand that the world hasn't always been as it is today, and that it may well change again tomorrow. Stein's book--indeed, almost any historical treatment--can be used to make this point.

The second apparent drawback (at least, to those who share my leftish tendencies) is that Stein is a firm believer in what he calls the "old-time [conservative] religion". Yet, perhaps because he is so frankly of the right--and, of course, because he writes so well--today's typically conservative student may well find compelling Stein's arguments against Reagan's "economics of joy". The argument against (certain forms of) supply-side, or perhaps monetarist, positions might be regarded with suspicion coming from someone with progressive pretensions (like me), whereas Stein is more likely to get away with it.

Stein's historical treatment allows the instructor to parachute in more technical material at will--the Phillips Curve, perhaps, or ye olde Keynesian Cross--either from a standard text or from the instructor's own notes. In this way the various macro models are given social, even institutional, life, and don't just follow one another as a series of abstractions (as in "if this is Chapter 17 it must be a New Classical position").

The data series used in the text generally end in 1983, but learning how to update them would, in any case, be a useful exercise for the class. I also plan on requiring students to dig up media commentary from, say, the fifties, to compare and contrast it with Stein's narrative. Students must learn that not everything can be found on the web.

I've been unable to find any more recent books that cover the last two, post-Stein, decades. I'd even settle for something less fluent and articulate than Stein, if only it wasn't polemic in a narrowly partisan kind of way. So far, though, I've been unable to find anything. (Does anyone have any ideas?) Thus, in putting some flesh on the bones of economic theory--even if, in doing so accessibly, it remains demanding, since economics is never, in that sense, an "easy read"--Stein's book continues to be relevant and useful, even vital.

Being such a newsworthy figure, the president has also been the subject of considerable attention from the research community. His ability to perform his job effectively rests in the relations that he is able to build with the various publics with which he has regular interaction. The primary actors on this stage include Congress, the people, and the media, although certainly not always in this order.

Liebovich does an admirable job chronicling the relationship between the president and the press. Books by Rozell are more detailed concerning specific presidencies, but Liebovich's effort is a nice addition to the fold.

"The Press and the Modern Presidency" suggests that the relationship between these actors is dynamic and any attempt to gauge the impact of one on another does well to consider not only the personalities of the participants, but also the changing nature of the relation across time.

It's worth reading. Presidential scholars must have it on their bookshelves. That said, it seems as if Liebovich is not always sure what angle to take in describing the press-president relationship. He wrote about the Kennedy/Nixon debates (don't believe the hype, he concludes) on through to Chapter 11 on "Clinton's bad boy image" (If the media were crucifying Clinton, he and the first lady were providing the wood, the hammer, the nails, and the ladder"). But then in the final chapter he throws in aspects of the 1994 and 1996 elections. It's not a direction one would expect; afterall, it's a book on the victors, not a campaign/election studies book.

Liebovich concludes with several pieces of advice for potential office-seekers: "...he or she will have to have conducted an exemplarypersonal life before and during the term of office and be relatively free of financial irregularities in a world where money buys influence everywhere." I chose this selection, because the book was written just before the Lewinsky scandal broke and I wonder if the paperback epilogue will be altered slightly as a result? Add it to your shopping cart.