The Unauthorized World Situation Report [Hardcover]

Patrick Foy (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 15, 2005

"Please forgive my taking so long to respond to the manuscript you sent me. That is, THE UNAUTHORIZED WORLD SITUATION REPORT. You are a very brave soul to take on the liars and the manipulators as you have. I would even go so far as to say that you have written yourself into a dangerous situation. There are too many of the entrenched who would be more than infuriated that you have blown the cover from their game.... Your fight against the inbred stupidity of the history of this century is a noble and a lonely one. I marvel at how you persist against the odds. I believe that your views are on the mark.... All those of us who are aware can do is to protect our own minds against this onslaught which has erased the sensibilities of almost all humans."--Charles Bukowski

"Your book is fantastic. I reserve the right to plagiarize it at will. Especially the parts about the origins of World War II."--Taki Theodoracopulos

From the Prologue...

Over the decades since the Second World War, it has become increasingly fashionable for the President of the United States to make a spectacle of himself in any number of remarkable ways. The sending of an annual "State of the World" message to the Congress of the United States is a prime example. Granted, on its own, this State of the World message is nothing to lose sleep over. The document in question is packed with self-serving nonsense and misinformation; it is routinely filed away and, in short order, forgotten about. Nonetheless, the implications of this "State of the World" message do merit our attention and at least five minutes of serious thought. Why? For the simple reason that these implications are fantastic, when viewed within the context of history.

Briefly stated, the President of the United States and the American Congress are presiding over the greatest free-for-all in recorded time, bar none, and yet they remain confused, dissatisfied and unfulfilled. It seems that they require something more--a larger horizon, a new distraction, perhaps a crusade to justify their own existence. They are not sure what. At the same time it must be perfectly obvious--even to themselves--that they are ignorant of many, many things. At the top of this list, I submit, is the inescapable Confucian truth, a truth which Ezra Pound--arguably America s greatest modern poet--attempted to hand-deliver to them just prior to the outbreak of the Second World War. Pound's message was simple, to the point and irrefutable: one must have order within oneself before one can bring order to others. Pound felt an absence of order at the center of things.

In addition to their bread-and-circus exploits pertaining to the domestic agenda, the politicians in Washington--having rejected Pound s message back in the late 1930's--now talk and act as if they were qualified to direct the affairs of the rest of planet as well. Such a conclusion is what an annual Presidential "State of the World" message, sent in all seriousness to the Congress of the United States, must logically imply. Looking at the factual record, that is precisely what many high-ranking officials in Washington D.C. have been working overtime to achieve. When Woodrow Wilson s inner circle decided in 1917 to railroad their hapless fellow citizens into the Great War on behalf of the tottering British Empire, the die was cast.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

From the Prologue...

Over the decades since the Second World War, it has become increasingly fashionable for the President of the United States to make a spectacle of himself in any number of remarkable ways. The sending of an annual "State of the World" message to the Congress of the United States is a prime example. Granted, on its own, this State of the World message is nothing to lose sleep over. The document in question is packed with self-serving nonsense and misinformation; it is routinely filed away and, in short order, forgotten about. Nonetheless, the implications of this "State of the World" message do merit our attention and at least five minutes of serious thought. Why? For the simple reason that these implications are fantastic, when viewed within the context of history.

Briefly stated, the President of the United States and the American Congress are presiding over the greatest free-for-all in recorded time, bar none, and yet they remain confused, dissatisfied and unfulfilled. It seems that they require something more--a larger horizon, a new distraction, perhaps a crusade to justify their own existence. They are not sure what. At the same time it must be perfectly obvious--even to themselves--that they are ignorant of many, many things. At the top of this list, I submit, is the inescapable Confucian truth, a truth which Ezra Pound--arguably America's greatest modern poet--attempted to hand-deliver to them just prior to the outbreak of the Second World War. Pound's message was simple, to the point and irrefutable: one must have order within oneself before one can bring order to others. Pound felt an absence of order at the center of things.

In addition to their bread-and-circus exploits pertaining to the domestic agenda, the politicians in Washington--having rejected Pound's message back in the late 1930's--now talk and act as if they were qualified to direct the affairs of the rest of planet as well. Such a conclusion is what an annual Presidential "State of the World" message, sent in all seriousness to the Congress of the United States, must logically imply. Looking at the factual record, that is precisely what many high-ranking officials in Washington D.C. have been working overtime to achieve. When Woodrow Wilson's inner circle decided in 1917 to railroad their hapless fellow citizens into the Great War on behalf of the tottering British Empire, the die was cast.

How, one has a right to ask, did the bimbosapiens on the Potomac come to acquire such an outlandish, such an unwarranted concept of their own responsibilities and importance? To begin to answer that question one must turn the clock back prior to the Great War of 1914-1918. One must return to the long-forgotten year of Manifest Destiny, to wit, 1898. That is when the American Republic--which in former times, as a colony of England, had thrown off the yoke of the British Empire--now decided to unleash itself upon a defenseless Spain, and to expropriate the Spanish colonies of Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines. It was an expand-your-horizon kind of experience. I am referring to the Spanish-American War. It is this war, a product of the Gilded Age following the Civil War, which inaugurated America's road to world hegemony and, perhaps, to eventual ruin. The United States has been on an extended, one-way ego trip ever since. At the end of the Twentieth Century, just passed, there was no end in sight. At the start of the Twenty-First Century, the mania has only intensified, and reached a new level of self-deception and self-destructiveness. There are no limits....

About the Author

Patrick Foy is an essayist and short story writer as well as a former altar boy. He graduated from Canterbury School in New Milford, Connecticut and from Columbia University in New York City, where he studied English literature, European history and American diplomatic history. He has written numerous short stories, some of which have appeared in The North American Review, Avenue and in The European. Many more go unpublished. He has worked as a magazine editor and photographer. Aside from writing, his other artistic endeavor is photography, and he has had exhibitions of his work in Switzerland. He has traveled widely in Europe, and resides in south Florida most of the year, where he plays regulation 6-wicket croquet and tennis. To augment his writing career, he deals in property. With humor and considerable candor, he has written The Unauthorized World Situation Report, which has been a work-in-progress for almost two decades. He is not on a crusade to change anyone's mind, only to broaden the boundaries of discussion.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 212 pages
• Publisher: Xlibris Corporation (August 15, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1413494013
• ISBN-13: 978-1413494013
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.8 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.9 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,978,728 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars About US World Policies, August 15, 2006

By 

German Girl - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Unauthorized World Situation Report (Paperback)

This book was a surprising discovery.It is all about what was going wrong with US Foreign Policies from the 20th century up to the present. A firework of facts and conclusions focussing on the war in Iraq and the Israel-Palestine conflict.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Well written big picture essay with some holes, September 6, 2009

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Earth that Was - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: The Unauthorized World Situation Report (Paperback)

According to the back cover, the author studied English literature and American diplomatic history in college. The book certainly illustrates mastery of both disciplines. This is well written and easy to read, indeed sometimes is a pleasure to read, and illustrates an excellent knowledge of the historical and diplomatic subject matter. The book isn't a traditional academic treatment and lacks the full bibliographic referencing that marks a more coventional scholarly work.

The book is essentially an extended critical essay, or series of essays, focusing on American foreign policy through the Twentieth century. The book really starts with the Great War, but the author sees things essentially heading down the wrong track from the Spanish American war, moving forward to the Great War and with the US essentially taking over the role (and bad habits!) of the British Empire following it's exhaustion. This wrong track has no "U Turn" in sight as late as the Kosovo and Iraq Wars. So far so good.

The author essentially claims that the UK and the US were the real "loose cannons" during the 20th Century and therefore must take a larger share of the blame for the century's tragedies than is usually apportioned. This viewpoint is still unorthodox and unconventional, at least in the anglophone world, so the author's single minded focus on Anglo-American faults can perhaps be forgiven. There are of course althernative explanations, including the observation that the most powerful nations, by definition, are more able to engage in wars of choice and their greater resources permit them to sustain and repeat errors. Nations lower on the pecking order have no such luxury.

A.J.P. Taylor was once remarked that it was not history which repeats itself but historians who repeat each other. So sometimes an outsider can bring new viewpoints into events that more specialist and narrow focused treatments can miss. For example, both Hitler and Roosevelt were elected in the same year. And by most of the usual economic metrics, Hitler did a much better job of restoring economic health, or at least the semblance of economic health, to his nation before WW2 than did FDR. The author suggests there may have been an element of, for want of a better term, personal envy, in Roosevelt's animosity for Hitler. I have never heard this argument made before, and "proving it" would be difficult, but it strikes me as something to think about.

But there are negative aspects as well. Not every point, and not every major point is supported. For example the author's claim that the zionist movement played a role in US entry in WW1 is simply asserted without any apparent evidence. The last few chapters of the book seem stylistically much weaker than the rest as if they were hastily amended to update the story to Gulf War 2.

An interesting read, and reader may find themselves returning to some of the particular anecdotes provided.