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A Faustian Foreign Policy from Woodrow Wilson to George W. Bush: Dreams of Perfectibility

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Written by Joan Hoff (Research Professor of History, Montana State University, Bozeman) A Faustian Foreign Policy from Woodrow Wilson to George W. Bush: Dreams of Perfectibility is a sharp critique of how America's post-September 11th foreign policy has increasingly taken on Faustian overtones. Tracing the roots of the ideological aspects that drive current American diplomacy back to the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Hoff reveals how belief in "exceptionalism" has shaped America's past and present efforts to remake the world in its own image. The result has been a medley of unethical Faustian pacts that the U.S. has made since 1920 to pursue its yearning for global supremacy. "In March 2005 it was revealed that the Bush administration had approved a secret program right after September 11 allowing the CIA to transfer suspected terrorists ('ghost prisoners') for imprisonment and interrogation in 'black hole' prisons in such countries as Egypt, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Pakistan, all noted for torturing their prisoners. This illegal kidnapping process is officially called 'extraordinary rendition' and is known colloquially as 'torture outsourcing.' Individual cases do not have to be approved by the White House or the State or Justice Department, as previous administrations had required." A troubling yet highly recommended analysis.

This book is exhausting to read because it has so much information in it. It chronicles the loss of constitutional powers by the Congress, and the gain of presidential powers through deception and outright theft. U.S. presidents have ever been on the take. Congressmen, despite their greed, have given away their power to govern and legislate. Presidents have become more and more like dictators. Read this book and weep for our country!