A Delta team captures a high-ranking Hezbollah commander and uncovers an Iranian plot to restart uranium enrichment. To avert an Israeli preemptive nuclear strike, the United States and Israel conduct a joint cyber-warfare operation to cripple Irans nuclear program. Their effort reveals something more sinistera long-drawn plan by China to bring America to its knees by collapsing its economy and shift the balance of power in Asia. With scaled-down forces in Asia and spread thin in keeping the Iranians at bay, the Americans only option is to send two men to stop the Chineseex-CIA John Okamoto, who once led the Phoenix Program, and his adoptive son, Eric Sloane, who led the operation against the Hezbollah commander. But they are fighting a cunning and ruthless enemy from Johns past. Eric must also face betrayal by the woman he loves and treachery from within his ranks. The fate of Pax Americana hangs in the balanceand the battle must be fought in the bourses of New York to the jungles of the Philippines and the islands in Okinawa.
The sayings known as Cheng yu are used frequently in Chinese. Chinese Proverbs features 86 of the more than 5,000 Cheng yu, reproduced in a large format. Alongside each phrase is an accessible and inspiring explanation, its literal translation in English, and what the particular strokes symbolize.
The Rise and Fall of the House of Bo is a shocking and revelatory exposé of China's most controversial 'statesman' Bo Xilai, by journalist John Garnaut, available exclusively as a digital-only Penguin Special. When news of the murder trial of prominent Communist Party leader Bo Xilai's wife reached Western attention, it was apparent that, as with many events in the secretive upper echelons of Chinese politics, there was more to the story. Now, as the Party's 18th National Congress oversees the biggest leadership transition in decades, and installs the Bo family's long-time rival Xi Jinping as president, China's rulers are finding it increasingly difficult to keep their poisonous internal divisions behind closed doors. Bo Xilai's breathtaking fall from grace is an extraordinary tale of excess, murder, defection, political purges and ideological clashes going back to Mao himself, as the princeling sons of the revolutionary heroes ascend to control of the Party. China watcher John Garnaut examines how Bo's stellar rise through the ranks troubled his more reformist peers, as he revived anti-'capitalist roader' sentiment, even while his family and associates enjoyed the more open economy's opportunities. Amid fears his imminent elevation to the powerful Standing Committee was leading China towards another destructive Cultural Revolution, have his opponents seized their chance to destroy Bo and what he stood for? The trigger was his wife Gu Kailai's apparently paranoid murder of an English family friend, which exposed the corruption and brutality of Bo's outwardly successful administration of the massive city of Chongqing. It also led to the one of the highest-level attempted defections in Communist China's history when Bo's right-hand man, police chief Wang Lijun, tried to escape the ruins of his sponsor's reputation. Garnaut explains how this incredible glimpse into the very personal power struggles within the CCP exposes the myth of the unified one-party state. With China approaching super-power status, today's leadership shuffle may set the tone for international relations for decades. Here, Garnaut reveals a particularly Chinese spin on the old adage that the personal is political. 'His insight is unique and well applied to this extraordinary, intergenerational set of events that Hollywood couldn't dream up if it tried' ABC Sydney John Garnaut is China correspondent for the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, in the Fairfax Media stable, and also writes for Foreign Policy magazine. He joined Fairfax in 2002 as an economics journalist after working as a commercial lawyer. His work on China has been recognised with several awards, including the 2009 Walkley Award for Scoop of the Year, for reporting the detention of Australian Rio Tinto executive Stern Hu. John lived in Beijing for two years in the 1980s, while his father was posted as the Australian ambassador, and returned there with his wife and children in 2007.
As friction in the South China Sea threatens to spark war, this primer brings a timely analysis of the changing power balance. As China rises, it is not in its interests to trigger a war. However, with that rise comes expanding interests; strategic, military, economic, and political, which it must protect. China is acquiring the means to defend those interests. Already China possesses the ability to bring regional nations into its orbit through economic self-interest. It will not be long before its military resources match its economic heft. Regional governments recognize the futility of opposing China and understand the benefits of cooperation. The contest for control of the South China Sea is over and China has won. China, assisted by the fecklessness of successive US presidents, has demonstrated the hollowness of American security guarantees in the region. During the coming decades Beijing will continue to pursue policies that persuade neighbors, and the United States, to face reality and accept Chinese hegemony in Asia. Increasingly China will set the terms in which others operate in Asia. The United States will not yield its primacy in Asia willingly. China’s wish to create strategic space acerbates long-dormant tensions. Survival is the primary goal of any state in an anarchic international system. War would sound the death knell for Asia’s rise and inflict serious damage on human progress more generally. So high are the stakes that policy makers are seeking solutions. Without compromise, leaders will use coercion as an instrument of policy. An agreed way forward is in everyone’s interest.
Political corruption adversely affects the efficiency and effectiveness of governments, slows the rate of economic development and poisons public attitudes towards the legitimacy of the state. Affecting governmental and non-governmental organizations, developed and developing nations and millions of people's lives, it is a subject of great interest to students from a wide variety of academic disciplines. Using a concise, comparative approach based on original case studies Political Corruption in Comparative Perspective: Sources, Status and Prospects provides context and clarity on this complex problem. Cases analysed include countries and organizations as diverse as the United States, Brazil, Russia, China, Israel, India, Pakistan, NGOs and the United Nations. International contributors discuss the historical background of political corruption in a particular country, region or organization and focus on the causes and consequences of that corruption before offering overviews and opinion on how the problem might be addressed. The range of cases used ,each contributor's depth of knowledge and consistency of style applied throughout ensures that Political Corruption in Comparative Perspective: Sources, Status and Prospects is an important addition to the debate and fills a significant gap between academic study and general public knowledge of a truly global problem.
For more than a decade, America has been waging a new kind of war against the financial networks of rogue regimes, proliferators, terrorist groups, and criminal syndicates. Juan Zarate, a chief architect of modern financial warfare and a former senior Treasury and White House official, pulls back the curtain on this shadowy world. In this gripping story, he explains in unprecedented detail how a small, dedicated group of officials redefined the Treasury's role and used its unique powers, relationships, and reputation to apply financial pressure against America's enemies. This group unleashed a new brand of financial power -- one that leveraged the private sector and banks directly to isolate rogues from the international financial system. By harnessing the forces of globalization and the centrality of the American market and dollar, Treasury developed a new way of undermining America's foes. Treasury and its tools soon became, and remain, critical in the most vital geopolitical challenges facing the United States, including terrorism, nuclear proliferation, and the regimes in Iran, North Korea, and Syria. This book is the definitive account, by an unparalleled expert, of how financial warfare has taken pride of place in American foreign policy and how America's competitors and enemies are now learning to use this type of power themselves. This is the unique story of the United States' financial war campaigns and the contours and uses of financial power, and of the warfare to come.
Television's Community follows the shenanigans of a diverse group of traditional and nontraditional community college students: Jeff Winger, a former lawyer; Britta Perry, a feminist; Abed Nadir, a pop culture enthusiast; Shirley Bennett, a mother; Troy Barnes, a former jock; Annie Edison, a naive overachiever; and Pierce Hawthorne, an old-fashioned elderly man. There are also Benjamin Chang, the maniacal Spanish teacher, and Craig Pelton, the eccentric dean of Greendale Community College, along with well-known guest stars who play troublemaking students, nutty professors and frightening administrators. This collection of fresh essays familiarizes readers not only with particular characters and popular episodes, but behind-the-scenes aspects such as screenwriting and production techniques. The essayists explore narrative theme, hyperreality, masculinity, feminism, color blindness, civic discourse, pastiche, intertextuality, media consciousness, how Community is influenced by other shows and films, and how fans have contributed to the show.
In this, her final and perhaps greatest book, Molly Ivins launches a counterattack on the executive branch’s shredding of our cherished Bill of Rights. From illegal wiretaps and the unlawful imprisonment of American citizens to the creeping influence of religious extremism on our national agenda and the erosion of the checks and balances that prevent a president from seizing unitary powers, Ivins and her longtime collaborator, Lou Dubose, describe the attacks on America’s vital constitutional guarantees. With devastating humor and keen eyes for deceit and hypocrisy, they show how severe these incursions have become, and they ask us all to take an active role in protecting the Bill of Rights. Praise for Bill of Wrongs: “Should make anyone laugh, cheer and roar with rage.” –New Orleans Times-Picayune “[Molly Ivins is] wonderfully direct about the costs of our lost civil liberties. . . . Ivins’ voice–in all its drawling, acerbic, storytelling, fearless glory–is stilled now. . . . But her message lives on. And every thoughtful American ought to be listening.” –The Buffalo News “With her characteristic acerbic humor, Ivins and colleague Dubose dissect the myriad attacks the Bush administration has made on the Bill of Rights and how ordinary citizens have fought back.” –Booklist “Ivins’ own description of the book is spot-on: ‘a hopeful and gladsome romp through some serious terrain.” –The New York Observer “A truly compelling read . . . filled with devastating humor and razor-sharp commentary.” –Austinist
Constitutional Statecraft in Asian Courts explores how courts engage in constitutional state-building in aspiring, yet deeply fragile, democracies in Asia. Yvonne Tew offers an in-depth look at contemporary Malaysia and Singapore, explaining how courts protect and construct constitutionalism even as they confront dominant political parties and negotiate democratic transitions. This richly illustrative account offers at once an engaging analysis of Southeast Asia's constitutional context, as well as a broader narrative that should resonate in many countries across Asia that are also grappling with similar challenges of colonial legacies, histories of authoritarian rule, and societies polarized by race, religion, and identity. The book explores the judicial strategies used for statecraft in Asian courts, including an analysis of the specific mechanisms that courts can use to entrench constitutional basic structures and to protect rights in a manner that is purposive and proportionate. Tew's account shows how courts in Asia's emerging democracies can chart a path forward to help safeguard a nation's constitutional core and to build an enduring constitutional framework.
