What You Should Know About Politics . . . But Don't: A Nonpartisan Guide to the Issues That Matter Kindle Edition

Most of the content is from the around 2010, but even though the players may have changed and some of the details are different this is a great review of politics in the United States. The author does a good job keeping their review balanced but the preferences do come through based on the framing of what are good or bad options. But over all, this is an excellent review of the different political challenges and options for many of societies requirements in the US. I found this book an excellent information dense review of the Political options in the US from a decade ago. The players may have changed but many of the basic political problems remain the same today. I found the book did an excellent job of giving the details around many of the Political decisions and situations. I found it amazing how many of the situations, I had forgotten. What I found most interesting thing how the different political parties have switched the issues they are focused on and the strategies they use to address them. It seemed to be that some of the Political parties have actually switched the how and what they are focused on, due to the level of detail and information in this book you get a real feel that politics is a dance where partners switch roles from time to time. This book is so information dense, it would really be worth reading the entire book or some sections several times.

While this book contains a lot of very valuable background information about how American government and politics work, its discussion of issues is seriously out of date. Although the reasons why are perfectly understandable, it is not fair for the publisher to continue putting out another edition of the work every four years without performing the serious overhaul the book now would require. As a result, readers would be better served by purchasing used copies of the 2012 edition of the book. Very little of it appears to have been changed since then.How this book came to be neglected in the fashion it has been is easily explained: Its author is not a professional political scientist, and she simply has moved on to other things. The only real mystery is why, apart from a pure profit motive, the publisher did not simply stop at the 2012 edition.The author is the very bright, very talented, and exceedingly well educated daughter - and only child - of former US senator Kent Conrad (D-ND) and his first wife, Pam Schafer (who herself is the daughter of a former governor of North Dakota). Since the book originally was published in 2008, Ms. Conrad presumably wrote it in or around 2007, when she would have been in her late twenties. (That's why the endorsement of Barack Obama on the cover actually is not that of PRESIDENT Barack Obama, it's that of SENATOR Barack Obama, who at the time was a senate colleague of the author's father preparing for, or already engaged in, the 2008 presidential campaign.)All of this is perfectly fine. For what it is, the book is excellent, particularly at providing important background information. If I were a sitting United States senator and my daughter had written this book, I would be a very proud man indeed. It is a work that fully deserves all of the accolades it originally received.This is the point, however, at which we go off the rails.The first line in the book's preface reads, "I'm surprised that nobody has written this book before me." Although that’s a very engaging entrée, this reviewer does not share the author’s surprise, for one very simple reason: The amount of time necessary to keep this book up to date would be more than a full-time job.The reality is that others actually HAVE written this book before – or certainly others that are an awful lot like it: Much of the work’s basic content mirrors that of numerous textbooks written for college-level American government and politics courses that are a staple of undergraduate curricula at institutions across the United States. It’s not hard to find them.The main thing that actually DOES make this book different is the seriously in-depth presentation it provides of several substantive political issues. While that fact gave the book currency and real value in 2008, it was value of a sort that rapidly erodes with each passing year in which the book is not comprehensively updated.The problem in this particular case with updating a book that requires full-time updating is that the author already has another full-time job: after writing the book, she moved to New York, got an advanced degree in art history, and appears to have gone to work for a high-end consulting firm of some sort. Her father elected not to run for the senate in 2012 (which may have been a prudent choice for a centrist Democrat, since the North Dakota electorate seems to have steadily drifted to the right and into the red ever since he made that choice). All of this leaves the book essentially orphaned, with no one to undertake the extraordinarily time-consuming task of keeping it up to date.Spelling out the numerous respects in which the book is now out of date would be substantially beyond the scope of this limited review. Suffice it to say that someone who bought this book in 2020 did not need a detailed description of the events leading up to the Gulf wars anywhere nearly as badly as they needed as clear an understanding as they could get of the Mueller report. They didn't need to understand the government's failure to adequately respond to Hurricane Katrina nearly as badly as they did its much more deadly failure to adequately response to the COVID-19 crisis. They needed to understand the identity of Jim Comey a lot more than they did that of Henry Waxman.If the author had been a professional political scientist, as most authors of American government and politics textbooks are, she would have had the time, resources, and support necessary to continuously update the book in the fashion necessitated by the speed of political, economic, and technological developments. She is not, though, and the publisher has not chosen to make the substantial investment that would be required to have someone else do that work.The result is an extremely informative, very well written, very insightful book about American government and politics and American political issues - as they existed a decade ago, not as they exist today. It is a work that continues to have substantial value, particularly for purposes of supplying important background information. Don't buy the 2016 or 2020 editions of this book, though; buy a used copy of the 2012 edition. That way you at least will know that you are consuming dated information for purposes of bettering your background understanding.Finally, if anyone from Arcadia Publishing is reading this, please, PLEASE don't just reprint this same book again in 2024 and call it a fifth edition. Your having done so in 2016 and 2020 were bad enough; doing so again would be a crime.

I bought this book pre-elections 2020. I wanted to brush up on my politics as I would be voting shortly. I think this was a great primer for the state of modern politics. Obviously it is VERY general, but it intends to be that way. The purpose of this book is not to go in depth, but to give a broad, general understandings of our government. I found it easy to read, easy to follow, and pretty neutral with issues and topics from both sides of the isle. I definitely recommend this book to anyone looking to dip their pinky toe into the waters of politics.

This was a good nonpartisan book on politics. It outlines each of the current issues along party lines and the prevailing arguments for each side. I also picked up a few useful tidbits along the way as well with some issues from a historical aspect. The only thing I would forewarn readers is that it could use another edition update as it focuses a lot on the Clinton and Bush administrations while only touching on Obama’s.

This is a book i have been looking for for a long time; impartial/objective view of politics that explains the components parts and terms in laymans language; author does a good job avoiding any bias they may have to illustrate examples of terms using both sides of the aisle; good book to reference whenever you hear a political term you are not familiar with; politics is uncessarily complex but this book does an excellent job clearing things up for you; Highly recommend this book for all.

Very good review of the issues. There is a bit of repetition that could have benefited from tighter editing. My biggest disappointment is that there were no substantive changes between the 3rd and 4th editions . I would have liked there to have been an update as to how recent events had impacted on the issues at hand (in fact, I can't find any reference to events after 2012).

In totality, the book is good and I would recommend it to others. The book is best at explaining complex situations in basic, understandable terms without being insulting. It appeared to me to have a slightly left slant, but not overwhelming so and not in a manner I would expect to be insulting to the majority of more right-leaning folks. There were a handful of statements made that I doubt the accuracy of. Further, I agree with many reviews that express disappointment that the latest addition is not really up-to-date, which is the reason for my 3 star review.

Loin d'un pamphlet politique, c'est une sorte de manuel de l'usager de la politique américaine, avec un effort louable pour présenter le bon et le mauvais des diverses institutions, pratiques et idéologies. M'a surtout été utile pour comprendre ce qui se passait à la fin de l'ère Trump.

Verry good explanation of all politic department!Really help understand where each parti stand.I recommend that book to anyone!

I chose my 5 rating because I never felt that I was being guided. I like to make up my own mind, once I have as much information as possible from all perspectives. This book delivered!

Good introduction to contemporary policy issues. However, it is misleading to claim that the book is updated every four years. The last meaningful update of the book dates back from 2012 and recent developments are clearly missing and should be added (e.g. Clean Power Plan, SCOTUS decisions on gay marriage...).