Customer Reviews

Profiles In Courage For Our Time

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This book is a compilation of short biographies of the winners of the Profile in Courage Award. It is a group effort, being the work of numerous historians and writers. I found these stories inspiring because many of them illuminate political leaders who took actions they knew would be detrimental to their careers. Yes, most of the award winners have been on the liberal side, but personally I find that a healthy antidote to the sort of "leadership" the mainstream media prefers to applaud these days. And don't forget good old Gerald Ford, whose biography (by Bob Woodward, no less) eloquently makes his case for his pardoning of Richard Nixon. Many readers will disagree with some of the choices for the awards and with some of the conclusions of the authors of these biographies. Nevertheless Profiles in Courage For Our Time is an inspiring effort meant to remind us of the highest qualities we should expect from our leadership.

I picked up this book hoping to be inspired by leaders who showed selfless sacrifice. Instead, I found myself reading about people who lacked character and caved in to political pressure. Like Carl Elliott, an Alabama legislator who signed a manifesto declaring that segregation was against the Southern way of life, joined the racist George Wallace on a campaign platform, and spent himself into poverty by buying TV ads with his Congressional pension while running for governor of Alabama. This is a man of courage? Then there's Judge Charles Price, whose crowing achievement seems to have been ruling that another judge could not display a plaque of the ten commandments in his courtroom. Lowell Weicker was lauded for pushing a state income tax through after his election, though he had opposed such a tax as a candidate. Oklahoma legislator Michael Synar, when faced with an audience of doctors questioning him about the Clinton health care plan, told them to go to hell and stormed out of the room. When I got to the part about the "courage" of Ford pardoning Nixon for Watergate, I gave up reading in disgust. Caroline Kennedy needs a new selection committee, one with a less liberal bias. Here are a few candidates the committee might want to consider for the next awards: Anwar Sadat, for tirelessly seeking Middle East peace and being martyred for it ... Bishop Desmond Tutu, a true moral leader who presided over South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission ... Winston Churchill, who sacrificed his political reputation to fight the policy of appeasement and to call for the shoring up of Britain's defenses against the Nazis' rising power ... and Dietrich Bonhoffer, the German theologian who was martyred for his resistance to Hitler. If you want to read an incisive and well-researched book on character, I highly recommend Os Guinness's book, "When No One Sees: The Important of Character in an Age of Image."

Featured in this book are people who made the tough decisions -
the right ones for the situation and often at the cost of their
careers. An example is Gerald Ford who pardoned Nixon so that
the country would not be mired in the Nixon mess for years and
could move on. He knew it would cost him re-election and it
did. Right or wrong, he did what he thought was right.
Courage of convictions - how many of us have it - the unsung
heroes in this book deserve the spotlight this book gives

them -

The "profiles" in this update to JFK's classic, are varied in both their subjects and their presentation. These accounts are not uniform in quality. Most stirring are those with a personal flavor such as Bob Woodward's profile of Gerald Ford, wherein we see a hidden profile of Woodward as well. However, others seem either too detached or tediously narrative, such as Michael Daly's "The Irish Peacemakers" which outlines the alphabet soup of the political/religious strife in Ireland, but does little to connect the overall themes of courage to anything outside the situation.

It is a good read, but not all the selections hold interest. I'd recommend particular excerpts for good classroom reading. I also commend the acknowledgement of politicians, leaders, and activists on both local and global levels.

Everyone profiled was either a close friend of Kennedy's or advanced the political agenda of the Kennedy foundation. This book is not about 'politicians who courageously risked their careers over ideals' but about politicians whose ideological work is in line with Kennedy Foundation agenda. They also tossed in a mention of the 9/11 firefighters, who while heroic, don't match the book's premise.

One profiled person deserved to be in the book -- Carl Elliot Sr, a man who died penniless because he supported civil rights in the deep south. Yes, he was a close personal friend of JFK, but unlike other men in this book, his courage ruined his political career and he was historically vindicated. This guy could be in the first Profiles.

The most undeserving man is Weicker, who lied about tax legislation to get elected in Connecticut, then cut corporate taxes and implemented a budget balancing flat tax. This gave to the rich and took from the poor. While the Kennedys may pay less taxes, this was not a courageous man.

Overall, a flawed imitation of the first Profiles of Courage, not worth your time unless you also share the ideals of the Kennedy Foundation, which appears to be the main criteria for selection. A trade on JFK's reputation without substance.

This is a great buy for anyone who admires real courage and those who define it not through grandstanding and media posturing but through selfless acts with outcomes that cannot be controlled. Courage is not simply reacting to a situation with correct but obvious actions, but rather stepping out of the box and a zone of self comfort to right a wrong situation regardless of the personal consequence. After September 11th, many politicians, right up to the top, have acted admirably, but have not done anything particularly courageous. This is not to say they are bad people or bad leaders, or that they have not acted correctly, but they either aren't like, or haven been given the opporutinty to be like, the individuals whose stories grace this well written, well researched and entertaining collection; People like Representative Elliot, who fought bigotry and hatred and was subjected to practical homelessness and bankrupcy long after the country came around because of it. Since the heady days of the 1960's, the nation has been searching for heroes like those men and women who led the country through the decade and into the future, some making, in the case of Ms. Kennedy's father and uncle, the ultimate sacrifice. Hopefully this book will help us to better identify those people who are quitely working through conviction and nobility to make the country and the world a better place.

Taking a page from her father's Pulitzer prize winning book Profiles in Courage, Caroline Kennedy wrote Profiles in Courage for Our Time.
A collection of essays by distinct individuals on winners of the Profile in Courage Award given by the Kennedy Library Foundation and are a cross section of America's heroes. One award was granted to the Heroes of September 11.
From Gerald Ford unpopular decision to pardon Richard Nixon to the resilient John Lewis who was literally beat up on the Petus Bridge in Selma, Alabama.
What I find most useful in this book is it gives you a good sense and background of individuals of which you may have heard their name but were not familiar with what exactly they did.

Mrs. Kennedy has once again demonstrated her keen inteligence and her practice of an on-going dialoque with the American people. The book keeps with the spirit of her father's work, is equally as lucid, yet adapted to our times. Mrs. Kennedy said in a discussion about the book that if her work turns out to be half as good as her parents, then she will be proud. Indeed, Mrs. Kennedy should be very proud.

Though it is laudable that Caroline Kennedy would want to keep her father's spirit alive by revising the concept of his original book to something more suited to courage in our time, the essays here highlight little known people. Some of their stories are touching or inspiring, and the writing is quite good. However, the book is devoted to liberal politicans, the message being that only liberals show courage. I don't think, for instance, that the men and women serving as rescuers at the world trade center tragedy worried about each other's politics. I think this book is really an attempt to cause schisms and controversies, none of which are constructive in these tenuous times. Great courage is shown by many, but C. Kennedy profiles only the few and only those who suit the political philosphy that the authors wanted to support. Most insulting to me, though, was that only one woman is profiled here. Only one woman has courage, in a world of 3 billion??? And how about the courage shown by political dissidents everywhere, not just in the US? Kennedy couldn't include everyone, but the stories here, though interesting, are only examples of some courage (token female included). These people didn't put their lives on the line, only their comforts. Nor does one incident, even one not performed single handedly, such as James Florio and the gun control bill, merit inclusion in this book, but single incidents are covered as if lifetime achievements. Sorry I read it -- despite the good press, the political bias, the masculine bias, the domestic bias, well, just made me angry.

This book gives 'cashing in' a bad name. Inept profiles of questionable courage. Caroline should be ashamed to trade on her deceased father's name this way.