A Presidents Story Too

A Presidents Story Too PDF Author: Brad McKim
Publisher: Outskirts Press
ISBN: 1977272029
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 482

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Book Description
Between Lincoln and FDR, the Presidency and the United States come of age In the wake of the Civil War, fourteen men will succeed Abraham Lincoln and attempt to reunify the United States. As their personal tales intertwine and overlap on their way to the Presidency, they defer to Congress until it is clear that Democrats and Republicans are more concerned with the prerogatives of power and patronage than Lincoln’s pledge of freedom and opportunity for all Americans. The 19th-century Presidents battle with Congress to reform how jobs and other benefits are dispensed, while the Presidents of the early 20th century find themselves presiding over a country that has transitioned from an agricultural economy—supported by slave and immigrant labor—to an industrial economy generating the wealth that thrusts the country onto the world stage. Through it all, the Presidents continue the novel practice of handing over power peacefully, even in the face of a Depression that will challenge the United States’ newfound status as a world power. “Brad McKim is a masterful storyteller. He seamlessly wove the stories of our first 15 presidents together into a compelling, interesting, and informative narrative.” —Scott Barker, Author, The Kings of War: How Our Modern Presidents Hijacked Congress’ War-Making Powers and What to Do About It “McKim weaves fascinating stories of presidential lives from their youth through early love affairs and careers, into political prominence. Not a retelling of common knowledge, this book reveals a fabric of personal stories not found in high school history books.” —Jeff Bensch, Author, History of American Holidays “I have read countless books on the country’s chief executives and I learned something about each president that I never knew before. I could not put A Presidents Story down and can’t wait to read the sequel!” —Bradley Nahrstadt, Author, Alton B. Parker: The Man Who Challenged Roosevelt

A Presidents Story Too

A Presidents Story Too PDF Author: Brad McKim
Publisher: Outskirts Press
ISBN: 1977272029
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 482

Get Book Here

Book Description
Between Lincoln and FDR, the Presidency and the United States come of age In the wake of the Civil War, fourteen men will succeed Abraham Lincoln and attempt to reunify the United States. As their personal tales intertwine and overlap on their way to the Presidency, they defer to Congress until it is clear that Democrats and Republicans are more concerned with the prerogatives of power and patronage than Lincoln’s pledge of freedom and opportunity for all Americans. The 19th-century Presidents battle with Congress to reform how jobs and other benefits are dispensed, while the Presidents of the early 20th century find themselves presiding over a country that has transitioned from an agricultural economy—supported by slave and immigrant labor—to an industrial economy generating the wealth that thrusts the country onto the world stage. Through it all, the Presidents continue the novel practice of handing over power peacefully, even in the face of a Depression that will challenge the United States’ newfound status as a world power. “Brad McKim is a masterful storyteller. He seamlessly wove the stories of our first 15 presidents together into a compelling, interesting, and informative narrative.” —Scott Barker, Author, The Kings of War: How Our Modern Presidents Hijacked Congress’ War-Making Powers and What to Do About It “McKim weaves fascinating stories of presidential lives from their youth through early love affairs and careers, into political prominence. Not a retelling of common knowledge, this book reveals a fabric of personal stories not found in high school history books.” —Jeff Bensch, Author, History of American Holidays “I have read countless books on the country’s chief executives and I learned something about each president that I never knew before. I could not put A Presidents Story down and can’t wait to read the sequel!” —Bradley Nahrstadt, Author, Alton B. Parker: The Man Who Challenged Roosevelt

The President's Book of Secrets

The President's Book of Secrets PDF Author: David Priess
Publisher: PublicAffairs
ISBN: 1610395964
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 401

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Book Description
Every president has had a unique and complicated relationship with the intelligence community. While some have been coolly distant, even adversarial, others have found their intelligence agencies to be among the most valuable instruments of policy and power. Since John F. Kennedy's presidency, this relationship has been distilled into a personalized daily report: a short summary of what the intelligence apparatus considers the most crucial information for the president to know that day about global threats and opportunities. This top-secret document is known as the President's Daily Brief, or, within national security circles, simply "the Book." Presidents have spent anywhere from a few moments (Richard Nixon) to a healthy part of their day (George W. Bush) consumed by its contents; some (Bill Clinton and George H. W. Bush) consider it far and away the most important document they saw on a regular basis while commander in chief. The details of most PDBs are highly classified, and will remain so for many years. But the process by which the intelligence community develops and presents the Book is a fascinating look into the operation of power at the highest levels. David Priess, a former intelligence officer and daily briefer, has interviewed every living president and vice president as well as more than one hundred others intimately involved with the production and delivery of the president's book of secrets. He offers an unprecedented window into the decision making of every president from Kennedy to Obama, with many character-rich stories revealed here for the first time.

Smart About the Presidents

Smart About the Presidents PDF Author: Jon Buller
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0448433729
Category : Juvenile Nonfiction
Languages : en
Pages : 66

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Book Description
Kids will love discovering the floor plan of the White House, a list of presidential perks, and lots of interesting info about all the presidents, from George Washington to Barack Obama. (Did you know he is the only president born in Hawaii?) Each page is jam-packed with trivia, fun facts, and information on the historical events of each presidency.

Author in Chief

Author in Chief PDF Author: Craig Fehrman
Publisher: Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster
ISBN: 1476786399
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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Book Description
“One of the best books on the American presidency to appear in recent years.” —Thomas Mallon, The Wall Street Journal “Fun and fascinating…It’s witty, charming, and fantastically learned. I loved it.” —Rick Perlstein Based on a decade of research and reporting, Author in Chief tells the story of America’s presidents as authors—and offers a delightful new window into the public and private lives of our highest leaders. Most Americans are familiar with Abraham Lincoln’s famous words in the Gettysburg Address and the Eman­cipation Proclamation. Yet few can name the work that helped him win the presidency: his published collection of speeches entitled Political Debates between Hon. Abraham Lincoln and Hon. Stephen A. Douglas. Lincoln labored in secret to get his book ready for the 1860 election, tracking down newspaper transcripts, editing them carefully for fairness, and hunting for a printer who would meet his specifications. Political Debates sold fifty thousand copies—the rough equivalent of half a million books in today’s market—and it reveals something about Lincoln’s presidential ambitions. But it also reveals something about his heart and mind. When voters asked about his beliefs, Lincoln liked to point them to his book. In Craig Fehrman’s groundbreaking work of history, Author in Chief, the story of America’s presidents and their books opens a rich new window into presidential biography. From volumes lost to history—Calvin Coolidge’s Autobiography, which was one of the most widely discussed titles of 1929—to ones we know and love—Barack Obama’s Dreams from My Father, which was very nearly never published—Fehrman unearths countless insights about the presidents through their literary works. Presidential books have made an enormous impact on American history, catapulting their authors to the national stage and even turning key elections. Beginning with Thomas Jefferson’s Notes on the State of Virginia, the first presidential book to influence a campaign, and John Adams’s Autobiography, the first score-settling presiden­tial memoir, Author in Chief draws on newly uncovered information—including never-before-published letters from Andrew Jackson, John F. Kennedy, and Ronald Reagan—to cast fresh light on the private drives and self-doubts that fueled our nation’s leaders. We see Teddy Roosevelt as a vulnerable first-time author, struggling to write the book that would become a classic of American history. We see Reagan painstakingly revising Where’s the Rest of Me?, a forgotten memoir in which he sharpened his sunny political image. We see Donald Trump negotiating the deal for The Art of the Deal, the volume that made him synonymous with business savvy. Alongside each of these authors, we also glimpse the everyday Americans who read them. Combining the narrative felicity of a journalist with the rigorous scholarship of a historian, Fehrman delivers a feast for history lovers, book lovers, and everybody curious about a behind-the-scenes look at our presidents.

Presidents of War

Presidents of War PDF Author: Michael Beschloss
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0307409619
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 754

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Book Description
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From a preeminent presidential historian comes a “superb and important” (The New York Times Book Review) saga of America’s wartime chief executives “Fascinating and heartbreaking . . . timely . . . Beschloss’s broad scope lets you draw important crosscutting lessons about presidential leadership.”—Bill Gates Widely acclaimed and ten years in the making, Michael Beschloss’s Presidents of War is an intimate and irresistibly readable chronicle of the Chief Executives who took the United States into conflict and mobilized it for victory. From the War of 1812 to Vietnam, we see these leaders considering the difficult decision to send hundreds of thousands of Americans to their deaths; struggling with Congress, the courts, the press, and antiwar protesters; seeking comfort from their spouses and friends; and dropping to their knees in prayer. Through Beschloss’s interviews with surviving participants and findings in original letters and once-classified national security documents, we come to understand how these Presidents were able to withstand the pressures of war—or were broken by them. Presidents of War combines this sense of immediacy with the overarching context of two centuries of American history, traveling from the time of our Founders, who tried to constrain presidential power, to our modern day, when a single leader has the potential to launch nuclear weapons that can destroy much of the human race. Praise for Presidents of War "A marvelous narrative. . . . As Beschloss explains, the greatest wartime presidents successfully leaven military action with moral concerns. . . . Beschloss’s writing is clean and concise, and he admirably draws upon new documents. Some of the more titillating tidbits in the book are in the footnotes. . . . There are fascinating nuggets on virtually every page of Presidents of War. It is a superb and important book, superbly rendered.”—Jay Winik, The New York Times Book Review "Sparkle and bite. . . . Valuable and engrossing study of how our chief executives have discharged the most significant of all their duties. . . . Excellent. . . . A fluent narrative that covers two centuries of national conflict.” —Richard Snow, The Wall Street Journal

Accidental Presidents

Accidental Presidents PDF Author: Jared Cohen
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
ISBN: 1501109839
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 528

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Book Description
This New York Times bestselling “deep dive into the terms of eight former presidents is chock-full of political hijinks—and déjà vu” (Vanity Fair) and provides a fascinating look at the men who came to the office without being elected to it, showing how each affected the nation and world. The strength and prestige of the American presidency has waxed and waned since George Washington. Eight men have succeeded to the presidency when the incumbent died in office. In one way or another they vastly changed our history. Only Theodore Roosevelt would have been elected in his own right. Only TR, Truman, Coolidge, and LBJ were re-elected. John Tyler succeeded William Henry Harrison who died 30 days into his term. He was kicked out of his party and became the first president threatened with impeachment. Millard Fillmore succeeded esteemed General Zachary Taylor. He immediately sacked the entire cabinet and delayed an inevitable Civil War by standing with Henry Clay’s compromise of 1850. Andrew Johnson, who succeeded our greatest president, sided with remnants of the Confederacy in Reconstruction. Chester Arthur, the embodiment of the spoils system, was so reviled as James Garfield’s successor that he had to defend himself against plotting Garfield’s assassination; but he reformed the civil service. Theodore Roosevelt broke up the trusts. Calvin Coolidge silently cooled down the Harding scandals and preserved the White House for the Republican Herbert Hoover and the Great Depression. Harry Truman surprised everybody when he succeeded the great FDR and proved an able and accomplished president. Lyndon B. Johnson was named to deliver Texas electorally. He led the nation forward on Civil Rights but failed on Vietnam. Accidental Presidents shows that “history unfolds in death as well as in life” (The Wall Street Journal) and adds immeasurably to our understanding of the power and limits of the American presidency in critical times.

His Very Best

His Very Best PDF Author: Jonathan Alter
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1501125540
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 800

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Book Description
“Drawing on fresh archival material and extensive access to Carter and his family, New York Times bestselling author Jonathan Alter tells the epic story of a man of faith and his improbable journey from barefoot boy in the vicious Jim Crow South to global icon. We learn how Carter evolved from a timid child into an ambitious naval nuclear engineer and an indefatigable born-again governor; how as a president he failed politically amid the bad economy of the 1970s and the seizure of hostages in Iran but succeeded in engineering peace between Israel and Egypt, amassing a historic environmental record, moving the government from tokenism to diversity, setting a new global standard for human rights, and normalizing relations with China, among dozens of other unheralded achievements. After leaving office, Carter revolutionized the postpresidency with the bold global accomplishments of the Carter center”--Cover.

Why Not Me?

Why Not Me? PDF Author: Al Franken
Publisher: Penguin UK
ISBN: 0141018429
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 283

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Book Description
The dramatic rise and dizzying fall of Al Franken, the first Jewish president of the United States. From the first days of the Franken campaign as the candidate pledges 'to walk the state of New Hampshire, diagonally and then from side to side' as Al, aided by his covering sex addict and alcoholic deputy campaign manager, stuns the pundits by defeating Al Gore for the democratic nomination, then is swept into office carrying all fifty states. But from that moment of triumph it's downhill all the way...

The Impossible Presidency

The Impossible Presidency PDF Author: Jeremi Suri
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 0465093906
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 402

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Book Description
A bold new history of the American presidency, arguing that the successful presidents of the past created unrealistic expectations for every president since JFK, with enormously problematic implications for American politics In The Impossible Presidency, celebrated historian Jeremi Suri charts the rise and fall of the American presidency, from the limited role envisaged by the Founding Fathers to its current status as the most powerful job in the world. He argues that the presidency is a victim of its own success-the vastness of the job makes it almost impossible to fulfill the expectations placed upon it. As managers of the world's largest economy and military, contemporary presidents must react to a truly globalized world in a twenty-four-hour news cycle. There is little room left for bold vision. Suri traces America's disenchantment with our recent presidents to the inevitable mismatch between presidential promises and the structural limitations of the office. A masterful reassessment of presidential history, this book is essential reading for anyone trying to understand America's fraught political climate.

The Presidents Club

The Presidents Club PDF Author: Nancy Gibbs
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1439127700
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 658

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Book Description
Examines presidential power within the context of U.S. history and the ongoing relationships presidents and ex-presidents formed with one another.