The Patriot Paradox
The Patriot Paradox

Author: William Esmont

Publisher: Devious Productions, LLC

Published: 2010-10-08

Total Pages: 207

ISBN-13:

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Ex-CIA analyst, Kurt Vetter is no stranger to tragedy and loss. Swearing off any connections to a life he once lead, he retreats to South America--on a self-imposed exile. But when he receives a mysterious package of encrypted files from his dead brother, he's drawn back into a dangerous world of treason and espionage--a world he swore he'd left behind for good. It's up to Kurt to uncover the message that his brother was desperate to convey--a message that could be the difference between life and death. When the files lead him across the world, he encounters Amanda Carter, an enigmatic woman linked directly to his brother, who just might have the information he needs to decipher what's hidden inside the files. Together, they uncover a plot far bigger than anything he ever anticipated--a rogue CIA mission to detonate a nuclear bomb. But with time running out and his brother's assassins closing in, Amanda and Kurt must face this alone. With millions of innocent lives at stake, they race against the clock to stop the attack. If they fail, the results could be explosive. The Patriot Paradox is the first book in the Reluctant Hero Trilogy, an espionage thriller and political mystery series that features gripping suspense, international intrigue, and a cast of characters whose exploits will enthrall you. If you enjoy action-packed spy stories by the likes of Vince Flynn, Robert Ludlum, and Tom Clancy, you’ll love the story! Get the first book in this gripping spy thriller series for free today! Suggested reading order: 1. The Patriot Paradox 2. Pressed 3. Blood in the Streets or get all three in The Kurt Vetter Trilogy The Patriot Paradox is set in a world that could be our own, where shadowy deep state government operatives scheme to shift the balance of power to suit their needs by whatever means necessary. Conspiracies abound.

Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson

Author: Alf Johnson Mapp (Jr.)

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2009

Total Pages: 468

ISBN-13: 9780742564404

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Follows Jefferson from his inauguration as President in 1801 to his death at the age of 83 on July 4, 1826. It embraces the eight years as Chief Executive in which he doubled the size of the United States by his daring Louisiana Purchase, sent Meriwether Lewis and William Clark on one of the world's greatest expeditions of exploration, and challenged the formidable Chief Justice John Marshall with a major program of judicial reform. It proves the falseness of the stereotype that Jefferson ignored national defense and tried to keep the Navy weak. The book shows him late in life, with ideas that have relevance today, planning a system of public education and founding the University of Virginia, and it reveals, better than any other biography to date, the intimate details of the lonely private battle he fought during his last tortured, but ultimately triumphant, decade.

Making Patriots
Making Patriots

Author: Walter Berns

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2002-09-15

Total Pages: 165

ISBN-13: 0226044513

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Although Samuel Johnson once remarked that "patriotism is the last refuge of scoundrels," over the course of the history of the United States we have seen our share of heroes: patriots who have willingly put their lives at risk for this country and, especially, its principles. And this is even more remarkable given that the United States is a country founded on the principles of equality and democracy that encourage individuality and autonomy far more readily than public spiritedness and self-sacrifice. Walter Berns's Making Patriots is a pithy and provocative essay on precisely this paradox. How is patriotism inculcated in a system that, some argue, is founded on self-interest? Expertly and intelligibly guiding the reader through the history and philosophy of patriotism in a republic, from the ancient Greeks through contemporary life, Berns considers the unique nature of patriotism in the United States and its precarious state. And he argues that while both public education and the influence of religion once helped to foster a public-minded citizenry, the very idea of patriotism is currently under attack. Berns finds the best answers to his questions in the thought and words of Abraham Lincoln, who understood perhaps better than anyone what the principles of democracy meant and what price adhering to them may exact. The graves at Arlington and Gettysburg and Omaha Beach in Normandy bear witness to the fact that self-interested individuals can become patriots, and Making Patriots is a compelling exploration of how this was done and how it might be again.

Johnny Cash and the Paradox of American Identity
Johnny Cash and the Paradox of American Identity

Author: Leigh H. Edwards

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2009-02-25

Total Pages: 514

ISBN-13: 0253220610

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Throughout his career, Johnny Cash has been depicted—and has depicted himself—as a walking contradiction: social protestor and establishment patriot, drugged wildman and devout Christian crusader, rebel outlaw hillbilly thug and elder statesman. Leigh H. Edwards explores the allure of this paradoxical image and its cultural significance. She argues that Cash embodies irresolvable contradictions of American identity that reflect foundational issues in the American experience, such as the tensions between freedom and patriotism, individual rights and nationalism, the sacred and the profane. She illustrates how this model of ambivalence is a vital paradigm for American popular music, and for American identity in general. Making use of sources such as Cash's autobiographies, lyrics, music, liner notes, and interviews, Edwards pays equal attention to depictions of Cash by others, such as Vivian Cash's publication of his letters to her, documentaries and music journalism about him, Walk the Line, and fan club materials found in the archives at the Country Music Foundation in Nashville, to create a full portrait of Cash and his significance as a cultural icon.

People of Paradox
People of Paradox

Author: Michael Kammen

Publisher: Knopf

Published: 2012-10-03

Total Pages: 418

ISBN-13: 0307827704

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In this major interpretive work Mr. Kammen argues that most attempt to understand America’s history and culture have minimized its complexity, and he demonstrates that, from our beginnings, what has given our culture its distinctive texture, pattern, and thrust is the dynamic interaction of the imported and the indigenous. He shows now, during the years of colonization, especially in the century from 1660 to 1760, many ideas and institutions were transferred virtually unchanged from Britain, while, simultaneously, others were being transformed in the New World environment. As he unravels the tangled origins of our “bittersweet” culture, Mr. Kammen makes us see that unresolved contradictions in the American experience have functioned as the prime characteristic of our national style. Puritanical and hedonistic, idealistic and materialistic, peace-loving and war-mongering, isolationist and interventionist, consensus-minded and conflict-prone—these opposing strands go back to the roots of our history. He pursues them down through the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries—from the traumas of colonization and settlement through the tensions of the American Revolution—making clear both the relevance of this early experience to ninetieth and twentieth-century realities and the way in which America’ dualisms have endured and accumulated to produced such dilemmas as today’s poverty amidst abundance and legitimized lawlessness. Far from being a study in social pathology, People of Paradox is a depiction of a complex society and am explanations of its development—a bold interpretation that gives an entirely new perceptive to the American ethos.

The Open Society Paradox
The Open Society Paradox

Author: Dennis Bailey

Publisher: Potomac Books, Inc.

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 241

ISBN-13: 1574889168

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How do we protect an open society from those who would use its freedom against us?

Worldly Philosopher
Worldly Philosopher

Author: Jeremy Adelman

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2014-10-26

Total Pages: 760

ISBN-13: 0691163499

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The life and times of one of the most provocative thinkers of the twentieth century Worldly Philosopher chronicles the times and writings of Albert O. Hirschman, one of the twentieth century's most original and provocative thinkers. In this gripping biography, Jeremy Adelman tells the story of a man shaped by modern horrors and hopes, a worldly intellectual who fought for and wrote in defense of the values of tolerance and change. This is the first major account of Hirschman’s remarkable life, and a tale of the twentieth century as seen through the story of an astute and passionate observer. Adelman’s riveting narrative traces how Hirschman’s personal experiences shaped his unique intellectual perspective, and how his enduring legacy is one of hope, open-mindedness, and practical idealism.

The Power Paradox
The Power Paradox

Author: Dacher Keltner

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2016-05-17

Total Pages: 210

ISBN-13: 0698195590

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A revolutionary and timely reconsideration of everything we know about power. Celebrated UC Berkeley psychologist Dr. Dacher Keltner argues that compassion and selflessness enable us to have the most influence over others and the result is power as a force for good in the world. Power is ubiquitous—but totally misunderstood. Turning conventional wisdom on its head, Dr. Dacher Keltner presents the very idea of power in a whole new light, demonstrating not just how it is a force for good in the world, but how—via compassion and selflessness—it is attainable for each and every one of us. It is taken for granted that power corrupts. This is reinforced culturally by everything from Machiavelli to contemporary politics. But how do we get power? And how does it change our behavior? So often, in spite of our best intentions, we lose our hard-won power. Enduring power comes from empathy and giving. Above all, power is given to us by other people. This is what we all too often forget, and it is the crux of the power paradox: by misunderstanding the behaviors that helped us to gain power in the first place we set ourselves up to fall from power. We abuse and lose our power, at work, in our family life, with our friends, because we've never understood it correctly—until now. Power isn't the capacity to act in cruel and uncaring ways; it is the ability to do good for others, expressed in daily life, and in and of itself a good thing. Dr. Keltner lays out exactly—in twenty original "Power Principles"—how to retain power; why power can be a demonstrably good thing; when we are likely to abuse power; and the terrible consequences of letting those around us languish in powerlessness.

The Patriot
The Patriot

Author: Gary Hart

Publisher:

Published: 1996

Total Pages: 216

ISBN-13:

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Offers a new political creed of practical idealism that addresses the challenges of modern leadership from the perspective of liberal nationalism, which emphasizes a patriotism based on civic virtue.

Paradox
Paradox

Author: Tom Vine

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2023-11-20

Total Pages: 259

ISBN-13: 100099418X

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History reveals countless attempts by great minds to solve life’s paradoxes. But what if these attempts miss the point? What if paradox is life? Contrary to the supposedly sublime linear logic that underpins our prevalent modes of theoretical and empirical enquiry, in this fascinating book, organizational anthropologist Tom Vine charts the pervasiveness of paradox across the academy: from arithmetic to zoology. In so doing, he reflects on the concept of paradox as a widespread existential ‘pattern’, a pattern which holds significant metatheoretical and pedagogical potential. Paradoxes, he argues, are not inconveniences or ‘fault lines in our common-sense world’ but are coded into our very existence. Paradoxes thus present their own vital logics that shape our lives: they thwart moral and ideological uniformity; they even out subjective experience between ‘the haves’ and ‘the have nots’; and they shed light on the opaque concepts of consciousness and agency. This book will appeal to anybody with a curious mind, particularly scholars and students with an interest in one or more of the following: complexity theory, critical pedagogies, ethnography, nonlinear dynamics, organization theory, and systems theory.