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  Kingmaker - Secrets Lies and the...

  Sir Graham Brady

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  THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER A TIMES BOOK OF THE YEARTHE BESTSELLING INSIDER STORY OF WESTMINSTER'S BLOODIEST POWER BATTLES'Myths are debunked, prime ministers exposed and secrets revealed ... essential' The Times'Refreshingly honest' The Telegraph'Entertaining and approachable' The SpectatorDavid Cameron. Theresa May. Boris Johnson. Liz Truss. Rishi Sunak. Five prime ministers, one explosive memoir. Kingmaker lifts the lid on the leadership battles that have defined British politicsThe last fourteen years have seen turbulence at the centre of politics that is perhaps unique in British history. From coalition to Brexit, Covid to Partygate, Trussonomics to this year's election, our government has never felt so fractured. And as Prime Ministers have come and gone, one man has been at the heart of every leadership challenge, seeing all, but saying nothing. Until now.Sir Graham Brady was the Chairman of the 1922 Committee since 2010. As the leader of the group with the power to choose a new leader of the Conservative Party, it was his hand that held the executioner's axe over five consecutive Prime Ministers' heads.Elected to Parliament in 1997 as the youngest Conservative MP in the house, Brady comes from a lower middle-class background and fell into politics age 16 when he joined a campaign to save his grammar school. This book is the story of how a boy from Salford came to be the definitive political insider.With unique access to every key decision-maker of the past fourteen years, it offers insights into the character and choices of successive Prime Ministers and the administrations they led. Ultimately, it reveals where our most recent leadership failures originate, and asks hard questions about who will be fit to lead us tomorrow.

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  Hell No - Your Right to Dissent...

  Michael Ratner, Margaret Ratner...

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  “Compelling and useful reading” for activists, protest groups, and individuals, from America’s leading constitutional rights group (Booklist).   In the age of terrorism and under the current administration, the United States has become a much more dangerous place—for activists and dissenters, whose First Amendment rights are all too frequently abridged by the government.   In Hell No, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the country’s leading public interest law organization, offers a timely report on government attacks on dissent and protest in the United States, along with a readable and essential guide for activists, teachers, grandmothers, and anyone else who wants to oppose government policies and actions. Hell No explores the current situation of attacks upon and criminalization of dissent and protest, from the surveillance of activists to the disruption of demonstrations, from the labeling of protestors as “terrorists,” to the jailing of those the government claims are giving “material support” to its perceived enemies. Offering detailed, hands-on advice on everything from “Sneak and Peek” searches to “Can the Government Monitor My Text Messages?” and what to do “If an Agent Knocks,” Hell No lays out several key responses that every person should know in order to protect themselves from government surveillance and interference with their rights.   Concluding with the controversial 2008 Mukasey FBI Guidelines, which currently regulate the government’s domestic response to dissent, Hell No is an indispensable tool in the effort to give free speech and protest meaning in a post-9/11 world.  

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  Reflections on Violence

  Georges Sorel

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  More than a century after Reflections on Violence first appeared (1908) it remains a remarkably controversial essay. The concept of violence as a means to an end (social, religious, political or for aggrandisement) is hugely challenging as a philosophical subject - yet it is, of course, universally (and frequently) pursued. 
   
  The French thinker and political theorist Georges Sorel (1847-1922), fired up by his interest in Marxism and his anger at the injustice of the Dreyfus case, faced this challenge and in the seven chapters of Reflections on Violence he explored the question. It proved sufficiently stimulating over succeeding decades to be espoused by both Marxists and Fascists alike: class struggle, revolution and above all radical change were central to Sorel’s thought.   
   
  He acknowledges in his introduction: ‘...the normal development of strikes has included a significant number of acts of violence; but certain learned sociologists seek to disguise a phenomenon that everyone who cares to use his eyes must have noticed.’ Widely read (he regarded himself as self-educated), Sorel drew on many sources as he covered the ground, including Nietzsche, Proudhon, Marx, Eduard von Hartmann and Henri Bergson. He espoused a view of ‘myth’ as a driving impetus - heroic acts by ‘a whole band of companions’ - for change. Confrontation cannot be avoided. It has been suggested that Sorel’s regard for unequivocal confrontation was based more on impassioned conviction than direct physical violence, but it may be difficult to slip this past his many calls for ‘direct aggression'. He writes, ‘Proletarian violence, carried on as a pure and simple manifestation of the sentiment of the class struggle, appears thus as a very fine and very heroic thing; it is at the service of the immemorial interests of civilisation; it is not perhaps the most appropriate method of obtaining immediate material advantages, but it may save the world from barbarism.’  
   
  Translation: T E Hulme.

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  Right of Boom - The Aftermath of...

  Benjamin E. Schwartz

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  “[A] seasoned national security professional and gifted writer” offers an in-depth analysis of what might happen after a nuclear attack on US soil (Matthew Kroenig, author of Exporting the Bomb).   In the parlance of disaster preparedness, “right of boom” refers to the terrifying moments after a crisis hits. In Right of Boom, national security specialist Benjamin Schwartz examines what could happen after a nuclear explosion takes place in the United States—the event that many experts have acknowledged as the greatest single national security threat we face. While many assume such an attack would automatically trigger a globally devastating exchange of nuclear attacks, Schwartz demonstrates that the realities are far more nuanced and complex.   Hypothesizing an explosion in downtown Washington, DC, Schwartz maps out the likely ramifications while going deep into history to explore the limited range of options available to a commander in chief. Drawing from his experience as an analyst at the Departments of Defense, State, and Energy, Schwartz offers a fully panoramic view of a terrifyingly real possibility.  “Should be required reading.” —The Washington Free Beacon

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  The Battle for the Soul of...

  John C. Bogle

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  The legendary founder of Vanguard “presents an insider’s view of what’s wrong with corporate America and what can be done to improve it” (Burton G. Malkiel, author of A Random Walk Down Wall Street).New York Times-bestselling author of Enough and The Little Book of Common Sense Investing John Bogle has seen firsthand the innermost workings—and grotesque abuses—of the financial industry, and is renowned as an advocate for the small investor and for the restoration of integrity to the system. He knows that a trustworthy business and financial complex is essential to America’s continuing leadership in the world and to social and economic progress at home. In this book he reveals what went wrong and how we lost our way—and more importantly, how we can right our course. He argues for a return to a governance structure in which owners’ capital that has been put at risk is used in their interests rather than in the interests of corporate and financial managers. Given that ownership is now consolidated in the hands of relatively few large mutual and pension funds, the specific reforms Bogle details in this book are essential as well as practical—and should be considered by every investor, analyst, Wall Streeter, policy maker, and businessperson. “Deserves attention in the precincts of power.”—Publishers Weekly

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  Offences Against Oneself and An...

  Jeremy Bentham, Károly Mária...

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  The criminalisation of homosexuality over centuries has been one of the shocking injustices of European history - it existed from the middle ages and before and well into the 20th century. The death penalty (hanging or burning) was a commonplace feature in legal systems. These two remarkable texts - one from England in the 18th century and one from Germany in the 19th century - show how there was a growing awareness of the prejudice and the cruelty of its effect.  
   
  Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832), the prominent English writer, philosopher and jurist, wrote Offences Against Oneself in 1785. In characteristically measured and clear tones, he argued against the death penalty for sodomy and queried what was actually wrong with homosexuality in terms of the individual and society. Sadly, the public opposition, rooted in religion and public morals, cautioned him against publication, and it remained among his private papers at his death, not to emerge for decades afterwards.  
   
  Karóly Mária Kertbeny (1824-1882) was an Austro-Hungarian journalist and writer who lived in Berlin. The suicide of a friend of his, crushed by his preference for men, prompted Kertbeny to campaign on behalf of anti-homosexual legislation in Europe. It was Kertbeny who first coined the words ‘homosexual’ and ‘heterosexual’, which were later adopted by Kraft-Ebbing and others. In 1869 he published (anonymously) a pamphlet, An Open Letter addressed to the Royal Prussian Minister of Justice arguing that the Prussian sodomy law violated ‘the rights of man’ and should not be part of the proposed Penal Code for the North German Confederation. His closely written text demonstrates, very clearly, the hypocrisy and harm caused by the criminalisation of homosexuality for both men and women. He was ignored. The anti-homosexual legislation was adopted and, in 1871, incorporated into the legal system of the new Germany.  
   
  Both these documents are fascinating listening, illustrating the prevailing prejudice of society in the face of known, widespread activity and how the prejudice continued, despite the efforts of individuals who could see and demonstrate the illogicality and the hysteria surrounding the subject. 
   
  It is interesting to note that, in Europe, punishment for homosexual activity was first abolished in France in 1791 after the Revolution, but legal restraints continued to exist in England until 1967 and in Germany in 1968 (East) and 1969 (West).

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