American Politics Audiobooks | Politics

500 Days: Secrets and Lies in the Terror Wars

Kurt Eichenwald-New York Times bestselling author of Conspiracy of Fools and The Informant-recounts the first 500 days after 9/11 in a comprehensive, fly on the wall, compelling page-turner as gripping as any thriller. In 500 Days, master chronicler Kurt Eichenwald lays bare the harrowing decisions, deceptions, and delusions of the eighteen months that changed the world forever, as leaders raced to protect their citizens in the wake of 9/11. Eichenwald's gripping, immediate style and true-to-life dialogue puts readers at the heart of these historic events, from the Oval Office to Number 10 Downing Street, from Guantanamo Bay to the depths of CIA headquarters, from the al Qaeda training camps to the torture chambers of Egypt and Syria. He reveals previously undisclosed information from the terror wars, including never-before-reported details about warrantless wiretapping, the anthrax attacks, and investigations and conflicts among Washington, D.C., and London. With his signature fast-paced narrative style, Eichenwald-whose book, The Informant, was called "one of the best nonfiction books of the decade" by The New York Times Book Review-exposes a world of secrets and lies that has remained hidden until now.

Kurt Eichenwald (Author), Holter Graham (Narrator)

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The Price of Politics

Based on 18 months of reporting, Woodward's 17th book The Price of Politics is an intimate, documented examination of how President Obama and the highest profile Republican and Democratic leaders in the United States Congress attempted to restore the American economy and improve the federal government's fiscal condition over three and one half years. Drawn from memos, contemporaneous meeting notes, emails, and in-depth interviews with the central players, The Price of Politics addresses the key issue of the presidential and congressional campaigns: the condition of the American economy and how and why we got there. Providing verbatim, day-by-day, even hour-by-hour accounts, the book shows what really happened, what drove the debates, negotiations, and struggles that define, and will continue to define, the American future.

Bob Woodward (Author), Boyd Gaines (Narrator)

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Boss Rove: Inside Karl Rove's Secret Kingdom of Power

Craig Unger (Author), Mel Foster (Narrator)

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Just Plain Dick: Richard Nixon's Checkers Speech and the "Rocking, Socking" Election of 1952

A behind-the-scenes look at one of the most famous campaign speeches-Richard Nixon's "Checkers" speech, to be published on its sixtieth anniversary It all started with some businessmen bankrolling Richard Nixon to become a "salesman against socialization." But in this precursor to current campaign finance scandals, Nixon had some explaining to do to keep his place on Eisenhower's Republican ticket, so he took to the airwaves. In making his speech, Nixon left behind lines about a "Republican cloth coat" and a black-and-white cocker spaniel named Checkers. The speech saved and bolstered Nixon's political career and set the tone for the 1952 campaign. Just Plain Dick is political history and more. It's the story of a young man nearing a nervous breakdown and staging a political comeback. While the narrative focuses tightly, almost cinematically, on the 1952 election cycle-from the spring primary season to the summer conventions, from the allegations against Nixon through to the speech in September and finally the election in November-Mattson also provides a broad-stroke depiction of American politics and culture during the Cold War. Readers will see Nixon's contribution to current campaign styles. Here is a story of phony populism, a hatred of elites (tagged "eggheads" back then), and emotionally charged appeals erasing a rational assessment of a politician's qualifications. An entertaining and suspenseful read, Just Plain Dick is ideal election context for political junkies and those fascinated with 1950s America.

Kevin Mattson (Author), Keith Szarabajka, Keith Szarabajka (Narrator)

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Mugged: Racial Demagoguery from the Seventies to Obama

"This isn’t a story about black people - it’s a story about the Left’s agenda to patronize blacks and lie to everyone else." For decades, the Left has been putting on a play with themselves as heroes in an ongoing civil rights movement - which they were mostly absent from at the time. Long after pervasive racial discrimination ended, they kept pretending America was being run by the Klan and that liberals were black America’s only protectors. It took the O. J. Simpson verdict - the race-based acquittal of a spectacularly guilty black celebrity as blacks across America erupted in cheers - to shut down the white guilt bank. But now, fewer than two decades later, our "postracial" president has returned us to the pre-O.J. era of nonstop racial posturing. A half-black, half-white Democrat, not descended from American slaves, has brought racial unrest back with a whoop. The Obama candidacy allowed liberals to engage in self-righteousness about race and get a hard-core Leftie in the White House at the same time. In 2008, we were told the only way for the nation to move past race was to elect him as president. And 53 percent of voters fell for it. Now, Ann Coulter fearlessly explains the real history of race relations in this country, including how white liberals twist that history to spring the guilty, accuse the innocent, and engender racial hatreds, all in order to win politically. You’ll learn, for instance, how: A U.S. congressman and a New York mayor conspired to protect cop killers who ambushed four police officers in the Rev. Louis Farrakhan’s mosque. The entire Democratic elite, up to the Carter White House, coddled a black cult in San Francisco as hundreds of the cult members marched to their deaths in Guyana. New York City became a maelstrom of racial hatred, with black neighborhoods abandoned to criminals who were ferociously defended by a press that assessed guilt on the basis of race. Preposterous hoax hate crimes were always believed, never questioned. And when they turned out to be frauds, the stories would simply disappear from the news. Liberals quickly switched the focus of civil rights laws from the heirs of slavery and Jim Crow to white feminists, illegal immigrants, and gays. Subway vigilante Bernhard Goetz was surprisingly popular in black neighborhoods, despite hysterical denunciations of him by The New York Times. Liberals slander Republicans by endlessly repeating a bizarro-world history in which Democrats defended black America and Republicans appealed to segregationists. The truth has always been exactly the opposite. Going where few authors would dare, Coulter explores the racial demagoguery that has mugged America since the early 70s. She shines the light of truth on cases ranging from Tawana Brawley; Lemrick Nelson; and Howard Beach, New York; to the LA riots and the Duke lacrosse scandal. And she shows how the 2012 Obama campaign is going to inspire the greatest racial guilt mongering of all time.

Ann Coulter (Author), Ann Coulter (Narrator)

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Fool Me Twice: Obama's Shocking Plans for the Next Four Years Exposed

This game-changing book reveals the blueprint for a second term that President Obama and his progressive backers don't want you to know. Months of painstaking research into thousands of documents have enabled investigative journalists and New York Times bestselling authors Aaron Klein and Brenda J. Elliott to expose the secret template for Obama's next four years-the one actually created by Obama's own top advisors and strategists. All the main areas of domestic policy are covered-jobs, wages, health care, immigration overhaul, electoral "reform," national energy policy. Each of the plans exposed seeks to permanently remake America into a government-dominated socialist state. A few of the schemes unveiled herein include detailed plans to enact single-payer health care legislation controlled by the federal government regardless of any Supreme Court decision to overturn Obamacare; Further gutting of the US military while using the savings for a new "green" stimulus program and the founding of a federal "green" bank to fund so-called environmentally friendly projects; The vastly reduced resources of the US Armed Forces will be spread even thinner by using them to combat global warming and global poverty and bolster the United Nations; An expansive new amnesty program for illegal aliens linked with a reduction in the capabilities of the US Border Patrol and plans to bring in untold numbers of new immigrants with the removal of caps on H-1B visas and green cards. While many have general concerns about Obama's second-term ambitions, Fool Me Twice lays bare the devastating details of a second Obama presidency. If he wins reelection in 2012, the America of equal opportunity for all, constitutionally limited government, economic freedom, and personal liberty will be but a distant memory. "Aaron Klein has unmasked the most radical-and therefore dangerous-president by far this country has ever seen. The radical forces that shaped Obama, as revealed in this telling investigation, were not the best of the radical sixties but the very worst-the anti-American, communist-supporting, terrorist fringe."-David Horowitz, bestselling author, on the authors' The Manchurian President

Aaron Klein, Brenda J. Elliott (Author), Mike Chamberlain (Narrator)

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The Founding Fathers' Guide to the Constitution

What does the Constitution really mean? How did the founding generation intend for us to interpret and apply the Constitution? Are liberals right when they cite its "elastic" clauses to justify big government, or are conservatives right when they cite its explicit limits on federal power? Professor Brion McClanahan, popular author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Founding Fathers, finds the answers by going directly to the source-the Founders themselves, who debated all the relevant issues in their state constitutional conventions. In The Founding Fathers' Guide to the Constitution, you'll discover how the Constitution was designed to protect rather than undermine the rights of states; why Congress, not the executive branch, was meant to be dominant and why the Founders would have argued for impeaching many modern presidents for violating the Constitution; why an expansive central government was the Founders' biggest fear, and how the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were designed to guard against it; why the founding generation would regard most of the current federal budget, including "stimulus packages," unconstitutional; why the Founding Fathers would oppose attempts to "reform" the Electoral College; why they would be horrified at the enormous authority of the Supreme Court; and why they intended Congress, not the Court, to interpret federal law. Authoritative, fascinating, and timely, The Founding Fathers' Guide to the Constitution is the definitive layman's guide to America's most important-and often most willfully misunderstood-historical document. "For generations, left-wing judges, professors, and lawyers have told us that we can never know what the Constitution was supposed to mean, so judges are free to do what they want. Yet, in The Founding Fathers' Guide to the Constitution, Brion McClanahan gives us a clear, clause-by-clause explanation of the original understanding of the Constitution. Constitutional government is possible, if only officials would be true to their oaths."-Kevin R. C. Gutzman, JD, PhD, New York Times bestselling author of The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Constitution

Brion McClanahan (Author), David Cochran Heath (Narrator)

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The Corruption Chronicles: Obama's Big Secrecy, Big Corruption, and Big Government

Tom Fitton (Author), Jim Meskimen (Narrator)

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Leading From Behind: The Reluctant President and the Advisors Who Decide for Him

Barack Obama has never been fully vetted until now. In Leading from Behind, New York Times bestselling investigative journalist Richard Miniter presents the first book to explore President Obama's abilities as a leader, by unearthing new details of his biggest successes and failures. Based on exclusive interviews and never-before-published material, Leading from Behind investigates the secret world of the West Wing and the combative personalities that shape historic events. Contrary to the White House narrative, which aims to define Obama as a visionary leader, Leading from Behind reveals a president who is indecisive, moody, and often paralyzed by competing political considerations. Many victories as well as several significant failures during the Obama presidency are revealed to be the work of strong women, who led when the president did not: then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi; Secretary of State Hillary Clinton; and Valerie Jarrett, his closest adviser and an Obama family confidante, whose unusual degree of influence has been a source of conflict with veteran political insiders. In Leading from Behind, you will learn: Â· Why Obama's relationship with Israel was poisoned years before he met Israel's prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu Â· The real reason for Valerie Jarrett's strong hold over both Barack and Michelle Obama Â· ObamaCare wasn't Obama's idea. It was House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's. And the real reason he danced to her tune. Â· Obama delayed and canceled the mission to kill Osama bin Laden three times and then committed an intelligence blunder that allowed dozens of high-level members of al Qaeda to escape. Â· Why Obama destroyed a secret budget deal with House Speaker John Boehner that would have reformed entitlements, slashed spending, and reduced the national debt without raising taxes Â· Why Obama is determined to save Attorney General Eric Holder, even though he has mislead and stonewalled Congress about Operation: Fast and Furious Â· Why Obama decided to defy the Tea Party and ditch his plans to end earmarks In Leading from Behind, Richard Miniter's provocative research offers a dramatic, thoroughly sourced account of President Obama's White House during a time of intense domestic controversy and international turmoil.

Richard Miniter (Author), Richard Miniter (Narrator)

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Obama's Last Stand: Playbook 2012 (POLITICO Inside Election 2012)

A series of on the 2012 presidential election, POLITICO's Playbook 2012 provides an unprecedented real-time account of the race for the White House. The third edition, Obama's Last Stand, follows the reelection campaign of President Barack Obama as it struggles to find the winning formula in a political landscape that has changed dramatically since his history-making victory in 2008. Though battered and bruised after nearly four years in office, Barack Obama remains the most competitive player on the field in American politics today. In Obama's Last Stand, POLITICO White House correspondent Glenn Thrush chronicles the efforts of the president and his team to secure a second term in the face of a determined opposition, unfavorable economic headwinds, and a series of missteps by his own team. This is a revealing portrait of the president at the most precarious moment in his political life, with insights and anecdotes drawn straight from the notebook of one of the most perceptive reporters in America. The trash-talking schoolyard athlete in Obama is very much in evidence, especially when he speaks caustically about his Republican rivals, including the man he thinks is trying to steal his legacy, Mitt Romney. Yet apart from Romney and the uncertain economy, Obama's greatest obstacle on the road to reelection may be Obama 2008. He and his team of talented advisers must try to reconcile their nostalgia for that once-in-a-lifetime campaign with the realities of an election fundamentally altered by the advent of super PACs and the evaporation of Obama's superstar popularity. That challenge has led a campaign operation that once prided itself on flawless execution of strategy to commit several of the most dangerous unforced errors of Obama's political career. Yet the game is far from over. If Obama is sometimes his own worst enemy, he also has the talent and drive to reclaim this race. Spurred on by the realistic prospect of losing, and growing ever more impatient with the foibles of his campaign staff, Obama the competitor is gearing up for the most critical fourth quarter of his career. This is the story of the last stand that will either cement his legacy forever-or consign him to a roster of once-promising one-term presidents.

Glenn Thrush, Politico (Author), Mike Chamberlain (Narrator)

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Rebuild the Dream

In Rebuild the Dream, green economy pioneer Van Jones reflects on his journey from grassroots outsider to White House insider. For the first time, he shares intimate details of his time in government - and reveals why he chose to resign his post as a special advisor to the Obama White House. Jones puts his hard-won lessons to good use, proposing a powerful game plan to restore hope, fix our democracy and renew the American Dream. ****Please contact member services for additional documents****

Ariane Conrad, Van Jones (Author), J. D. Jackson, J.D. Jackson, Van Jones (Narrator)

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It's the Middle Class, Stupid!

It's the Middle Class, Stupid! confirms what we have all suspected: Washington and Wall Street have really screwed things up for the average American. Work has been devalued. Education costs are out of sight. Effort and ambition have never been so scantily rewarded. Political guru James Carville and pollster extraordinaire Stan Greenberg argue that our political parties must admit their failures and the electorate must reclaim its voice, because taking on the wealthy and the privileged is not class warfare-it is a matter of survival. Told in the alternating voices of these two top political strategists, It's the Middle Class, Stupid! provides eye-opening and provocative arguments on where our government-including the White House-has gone wrong, and what voters can do about it.. . Controversial and outspoken, authoritative and shrewd, It's the Middle Class, Stupid! is destined to make waves during the 2012 presidential campaign, and will set the agenda for legislative battles and political dust-ups during the next administration.

James Carville, Stan Greenberg (Author), James Carville, Stan Greenberg (Narrator)

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