Drift
The Unmooring of American Military Power
New York : Crown, [2012]
Format: Book
Edition: First edition.
Description: 275 pages ; 22 cm
The #1 New York Times bestseller that charts America's dangerous drift into a state of perpetual war.
"One of my favorite ideas is, never to keep an unnecessary soldier," Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1792. Neither Jefferson nor the other Founders could ever have envisioned the modern national security state, with its tens of thousands of "privateers"; its bloated Department of Homeland Security; its rusting nuclear weapons, ill-maintained and difficult to dismantle; and its strange fascination with an unproven counterinsurgency doctrine.
Written with bracing wit and intelligence, Rachel Maddow's Drift argues that we've drifted away from America's original ideals and become a nation weirdly at peace with perpetual war, with all the financial and human costs that entails. To understand how we've arrived at such a dangerous place, Maddow takes us from the Vietnam War to today's war in Afghanistan, along the way exploring the disturbing rise of executive authority, the gradual outsourcing of our war-making capabilities to private companies, the plummeting percentage of American families whose children fight our constant wars for us, and even the changing fortunes of G.I. Joe. She offers up a fresh, unsparing appraisal of Reagan's radical presidency. Ultimately, she shows us just how much we stand to lose by allowing the priorities of the national security state to overpower our political discourse.
Sensible yet provocative, dead serious yet seriously funny, Drift will reinvigorate a "loud and jangly" political debate about how, when, and where to apply America's strength and power--and who gets to make those decisions.
"One of my favorite ideas is, never to keep an unnecessary soldier," Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1792. Neither Jefferson nor the other Founders could ever have envisioned the modern national security state, with its tens of thousands of "privateers"; its bloated Department of Homeland Security; its rusting nuclear weapons, ill-maintained and difficult to dismantle; and its strange fascination with an unproven counterinsurgency doctrine.
Written with bracing wit and intelligence, Rachel Maddow's Drift argues that we've drifted away from America's original ideals and become a nation weirdly at peace with perpetual war, with all the financial and human costs that entails. To understand how we've arrived at such a dangerous place, Maddow takes us from the Vietnam War to today's war in Afghanistan, along the way exploring the disturbing rise of executive authority, the gradual outsourcing of our war-making capabilities to private companies, the plummeting percentage of American families whose children fight our constant wars for us, and even the changing fortunes of G.I. Joe. She offers up a fresh, unsparing appraisal of Reagan's radical presidency. Ultimately, she shows us just how much we stand to lose by allowing the priorities of the national security state to overpower our political discourse.
Sensible yet provocative, dead serious yet seriously funny, Drift will reinvigorate a "loud and jangly" political debate about how, when, and where to apply America's strength and power--and who gets to make those decisions.
Contents:
Prologue: Is it too late to descope this? -- G.I. Joe, Ho Chi Minh, and the American art of fighting about fighting -- A nation at peace everywhere in the world -- Let 'er fly -- Isle of spice -- Stupid regulations -- Mylanta, 'tis of thee -- Doing more with less (hassle) -- "One hell of a killing machine" -- An $8 trillion fungus among us -- Epilogue: You build it, you own it.
Subjects:
National security -- United States.
Militarism -- United States.
Political culture -- United States.
United States -- Military policy.
United States -- Armed Forces -- Appropriations and expenditures.
United States -- Foreign relations -- 1989-
United States -- Politics and government -- 1989-1993.
National security -- United States.
Militarism -- United States.
Political culture -- United States.
United States -- Military policy.
United States -- Armed Forces -- Appropriations and expenditures.
United States -- Foreign relations -- 1989-
United States -- Politics and government -- 1989-1993.
ISBN:
9780307460981
Availability | |||
---|---|---|---|
Call Number | Location | Shelf Location | Status |
GOV Military Mad | Sandhills Indoors | Nonfiction | Out (Due: 5/24/2024) |
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Includes bibliographical references (pages [253]-261) and index.