The book is modeled on C.S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters much as Lewis, Himself, modeled Pilgrim's Regress on Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. The time is the present. An informal dorm-room discussion group is the backdrop. Ticker's liberal classmates, Tiffany, PJ, "Yellow-dog" Jake, Howard Bentley the III, and the conservative Reginald Strong, participate in the discussions, providing complications. All is captured in Uncle Red's letters and Ticker's implicit replies. The main content of the book is a ruthless unmasking of latter-day liberalism, both as it is practiced by the liberal elite who profit (not presented as a conspiracy theory) and as it is practiced by nave True Believers, the "Troobs." Philosophy, psychology, and tactics are laid bare. Conservatism emerges as the positive alternative. At its heart, the book is about good and evil: secular Man-centered and God-centered world views in opposition. There is both humor and intellectual exercise, as Uncle Red advises, explains, and constantly adjusts to complications. Uncle Red, in the tradition of Screwtape, is brutally, for family eyes only, honest in his (white is black) mentoring of Ticker. An "underbook" (as done by William Safire inhis novel Freedom), letter by letter, gives sources and commentary. The underbook, in a separate section at the end, serves the function of footnotes without disrupting the story's flow.
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"[R] eaders will soon find themselves captivated by this sprightly narrative, irresistibly drawn into a page-turning dialectic between good and evil; they will be delighted by the book's surprise conclusion. Whipple's "Underbook" appendix, validating what will seem to the uninitiated a fantastic tale, is an invaluable road map to political wisdom." -- James Campaigne, Director, American Conservative Union
A piercingly insightful novel, an expose of deceptive liberal tactics, and ordered treatise on sociology, economics and political science. "The Redtape Letters" can be called all of these. The book takes the form (a la C.S. Lewis's "The Screwtape Letters") of 86 letters from a distinguished liberal senator to his young nephew (Ticker) who is in college. Redtape is grooming the young man to be his successor as the foremost exponent of liberalism. This work is a modern classic.
Just as C.S. Lewis's book is revered and studied for its thoughtful understanding of how evil invades our lives, Lee Whipple's "The Red Tape Letters" will be perused, examined and quoted for it's razor sharp wit, intelligent analysis and its cogent exposition of how the palpable evil of liberalism has come to dominate the modern age. -- W.J. Rayment, The Conservative Bookstore Newsletter CONSERVATIVEBOOKSTORE.COM
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Entertaining and Educational Tome on the Making of a Liberal,
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This review is from: The Redtape Letters (Mass Market Paperback)
Lee Whipple has written a delightfully spicy account of how a devil might try to create a latter-day Liberal out of an ordinary citizen (in this case, a conservative college student from a blue-collar background). Ticker Tape is a Liberal college student, whose conservative roommate Dan has become an unwitting candidate for conversion. Ticker's Uncle Red shares some devilish ideas of how to bring this transformation to pass.(Please observe that there is a very large difference between the latter-day Liberals--who believe that government can solve just about every problem--and classical liberals who prefer limited government.) Early on (page 6), Uncle Red observes that "conservatism fails to make things Perfect." In the quest for perfection (who could fault this lofty goal?), Liberals create ever-expanding government bureaucracies to "organize" complex systems, and then devise complex and rapacious tax codes to generate the revenues needed to fund them. Any societal imperfection is game for government intervention. The Homeless? An ideal "hero class" that can be trotted out each Election Year as proof that more government programs are needed. Does someone lack health insurance? Aha! No insurance, therefore no health care, so a new monolithic National HMO is called for. Notice that equating "health insurance" with "health care" is quite a stretch, but since there are always needy (or sick) people around, the case for more government intervention becomes a no-brainer. (It would be interesting to see a study of how many people who do not have health insurance actually lack access to health care, but Liberals do not need such a study to see a crisis requiring massive restructuring of "the health care system.") In his book, "The Vision of the Anointed," Thomas Sowell observed that every problem can easily be morphed into a crisis, and every crisis into a "need" for some new government program. If the government program fails (or, if--as in the case of the Great Society--it appears to make matters worse), this is only proof that the programs must be pursued with even greater vigor and at even greater cost. Only the True Believers (or "Troobs," as Uncle Red calls them) can be trusted, because any and all opposition is viewed as mean-spiritedness and proof of a lack of feeling for the pain of those who are in need. Readers of this collection of letters may not come away convinced that Liberalism is a devilish scheme, but they will at least be more aware of some of the clever tactics used by Liberals like Senator Ted Kennedy (Old Ned in this book) to fight their political enemies. And, Liberal activists will find it harder to defend their claims to "the moral high ground" in their efforts to justify these tactics.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Worth political successor to CS Lewis' Screwtape Letters,
This review is from: The Redtape Letters (Mass Market Paperback)
The book is worthy to bear the namesake of one of Mr. Lewis' classics, The Screwtape Letters. Mr. Whipple manages to strike the same balance of humor, accessibility, depth of thought in piercing short chapters covering topics from philosophical thought and morality to tactical concerns of the day or through history such as abortion, poverty, elections and many others. His insights into how modern liberals often refute logical arguments with emotional justifications and/or pursuit of utopia rings true and may help many think more critically of topics being currently debated.
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