Customer Reviews

Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George W. Bush

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

The author acknowledges that "many scholars believe that the exercise of executive power today runs counter to the original constitutional design," but he then suggests that the Founders were not necessarily against Executive Power despite their opposition to King George. He continues with different historical views of the "executive" power.

Mr. Yoo quotes a survey of 130 leading political scientists, economists and lawyers who rated the "best" Presidents in American history: Washington, Lincoln, FDR, Jefferson, Roosevelt, Reagan, Truman, Eisenhower, Polk and Jackson.

He addresses five of the top ten in their own chapters, while Truman, Eisenhower and Reagan are addressed in "The Cold War Presidents" chapter. [The Book consists of nine chapters: (1) Beginnings, (2) Creation, (3) George Washington, (4) Thomas Jefferson, (5) Andrew Jackson, (6) Abraham Lincoln, (7) Franklin D. Roosevelt, (8) The Cold War Presidents (from Eisenhower to Reagan), and (9) The Once and Future Presidency.]

Mr. Yoo explains that despite their Republican or Democrat party alignments, the greater Presidents "pushed the envelope" in using broad executive powers that often challenged both the Legislative and Judicial branches.

As a strict Constitutionalist, who is concerned about the risks of despotism, I do not share political views that accept ever-expansive powers of the President. However, Yoo's analysis and observations on the history of Presidential powers are worth reading for constitutional-conservatives and left-leaning progressives alike, because he provides insight on how, over the past 220 years, we arrived at where we are today.

John Yoo is a serious man. He understands that the Constitution is so precious that sometimes you have to destroy it in order the save it. To him, the Bill of Rights is a bunker on Omaha Beach, a threatening obstacle that has to be taken and burned in order to make our nation more pleasing to Our Dark Lord and Savior, Dick Cheney. Yoo wrote this book to justify such destruction.

He served this nation during very dark times. Our Great and Glorious Crusade Against The Unbelievers was underway, but Leader Bush was still stumbling, searching for a justification for His grand adventure. He needed political cover, and he needed it immediately. He summoned the Dark Lord from his undisclosed location and pleaded with him to provide it.

Cheney knew what had to be done. Saddam had to be tied to Al Qaeda. As a serious man, he understood that if evidence of such a tie was unavailable, it had to be created. Detainees would need to be coerced into making false confessions. It would require torture, an act that was considered unconstitutional at the time. Cheney turned to another serious man, Yoo--a man who would later tell Congress that the President can legally order a suspect to be burned alive or that his children be tortured--to write a justification for ignoring the Fifth and Eighth Amendments.

Yoo served the Dark Lord well by not only justifying torture but by destroying the Fourth Amendment to allow domestic spying as well.

I'm giving this book five stars--not because it is well argued or well written (it isn't) but because, like Yoo, I want to help shape our nation according to Lord Cheney's righteously Stalinesque vision.

It would be a much better book if Yoo added a few things. Serious men (and all serious people are men or at least have adam's apples) would support the use of suicide bombers in the defence of freedom. Surely, the College Republicans would eagerly volunteer to send the brown, black and poor on such missions. Suicide bombing needs a champion to advocate it as policy. Yoo would be perfect in that role yet he remains silent. Why is that?

The book would also be much more interesting if Yoo described what turned him into what he's become. Was it a frequent application of an Oxo Good Grips Brushed Stainless Steel Turner to the soft sweet flesh of his behind? Was it drinking non-fluoridated water? Does he deny his essence to women?

Perhaps he can add a chapter for the next printing.

CRISIS AND COMMAND: A HISTORY OF EXECUTIVE POWER FROM GEORGE WASHINGTON TO GEORGE W. BUSH explores the history of presidential power from the Founding of the Republic to modern debates on the war on terror. His approach considers political science, history and law to examine how the Presidency was created and run over the decades, and chooses five great Presidents who served during times of war to consider changing presidency routines and issues. Yoo presents a case for a link between executive power and how it expands with each crisis and emergency.

Crisis and Command is a fantastic book, I loved it. The book has 3 distinct phases: a) The Washington, Jefferson and Jackson, b) Lincoln and Roosevelt, and c) the Cold war presidents. The first few presidents had a constitution and very little legal precedent, hence the author provides an excellent historical context and addresses presidential decision making within that scope, spicing it up with whatever legal analysis behooves it; it is important to note that the author strives to keep the analysis within the historical context, avoiding revisionism. Lincoln and Roosevelt had to face huge challenges including historical and legal precedent; the author shifts the focus to provide balanced historical and legal perspective; the balance is good enough to keep a person without a strong legal background flipping the pages with interest. The cold war treatment is fundamentally legal; since most of us understand the historical context pretty well, the author shifts the focus to a very dense legal assessment of the presidents's decision making; it is not easy to follow, but an inquisitive mind will derive immense pleasure from subtleties of the arguments. The conclusion, as in most books of this nature, is necessary but by them I had lost interest.

I read that the Patriot Act was just renewed by the Democratic-controlled Congress and signed by Mr. Obama. So now it should be clear that all those deranged criticisms directed at Bush were exactly what Glen Greenwald recently admitted: poseur morality put forward simply for temporary political opportunity. What hypocrites!
And speaking of hypocrites - and naifs - look at the crazed vision of Bush and Cheney which so many of the posters here have running around in their enraged minds. What would these poor fools do if faced with a real dictator, a Josef Stalin perhaps, rather than a calm and civil man like Bush, whose diffidence in pursuing the WOT are well-known.
It reminds me of the "Real Last Episode of M.A.S.H.," the one never shown on TV. Hawkeye and BJ, after years of running down the military they were ostensibly part of, and gainsaying the mission of preserving the South Korean people and of war in general, are about to leave Korea. Suddenly, Chinese Communist soldiers overrun the American front and storm into the medical compound. Hawkeye, BJ and the other doctors and nurses are methodically tortured to death by the sadistic Reds before the US Army can counter-attack.
Credits. The End.

I purchased this book after watching Yoo on comedy central.

I found his book very hard to put down. It was easy to read, the content was very interesting, and Yoo makes a lot of sense.

Before reading this book, I did not know that I did not understand what the President's job is or the purpose of the executive branch. I now know and appreciate the difference a president can make.

This content needs to be taught in public schools. After reading the book, I've lent it to three other people who have thanked me for sharing it.

The cover is all scuffed up, looks like something I'd pick up at 1/2 Price Books, NOT new from Amazon. And since I bought it as a gift I don't have time to return it. So I'll just have to suck it up. Thanks a lot guys.

Agreed that this is an important contribution to current scholarship about relations between the branches, with attention to the executive branch.

Did Amazon or the publisher pull the Kindle version of this book? I d/l-ed the Kindle sample of this book and now the Kindle version is no longer available.

We're waiting for the Kindle edition. John Yoo's legal and constitutional intellect is so powerful that the left wants to prosecute him (and others) for giving President Bush legal advice. Note that Congress time and again refused to pass a law outlawing waterboarding as "torture" and instead let the current President issue an executive order about it. By putting Presidential actions in context throughout our history, all of us can benefit from his scholarship.

Update 2/25/10. The Obama administration's Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) has been smearing Mr. Yoo and Judge Bybee with unethical and unsubstantiated charges for their advice given to President Bush in their capacity as legal advisors in the Bush administration's Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel. Quite recently, the OPR's top ethicist, Mr. Margolis, presented the results of his investigation of the OPR's handling of this case. He castigates, not Yoo and Bybee, but the personnel of OPR for its unethical, biased, and incompetent report. Mr. Margolis totally rejected the OPR report, which forced the Obama Justice Department to drop all charges against the two and other members of the Bush legal advisors. End of Witch Hunt. Shame.

P.S. We're buying the book from Amazon and not waiting for the Kindle edition.