This wizard’s spell has spectacularly backfired. Tied together with a high-minded king’s daughter and a swellheaded old knight, will they ever break free?Balthazar's attempts to become a masterful magician aren’t going well. So with every troublesome conjuring ending in disappointment or disaster, he resorts to kidnapping a princess for ransom. But when his efforts to defend his prize accidentally summon a dangerous succubus, his struggle to undo the chaos only ent...

Few institutions in the world are credited with initiating and confounding political change on the scale of the United States Supreme Court. The Court is uniquely positioned to enhance or inhibit political reform, enshrine or dismantle social inequalities, and expand or suppress individual rights. Yet despite claims of victory from judicial activists and complaints of undemocratic lawmaking from the Court's critics, numerous studies of the Court assert that it wields little real power. Thi...

The most sophisticated theories of judicial behavior depict judges as rational actors who strategically pursue multiple goals when making decisions. However, these accounts tend to disregard the possibility that judges have heterogeneous goal preferences - that is, that different judges want different things. Integrating insights from personality psychology and economics, this book proposes a new theory of judicial behavior in which judges strategically pursue multiple goals, but their per...

Many books, fiction and nonfiction alike, purport to probe the inner workings of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. Many attempt to create spine-tingling suspense or allege that America's civilian spy operation has run amok and been infested with rogues and criminals. Not that The Craft We Chose lacks suspense, harrowing encounters or itsown share of villains.But this book is different. In fact it's unique–a straightforward, honest, surprisingly captivating memoir by one ...

"Chomsky is a global phenomenon . . . perhaps the most widely read voice on foreign policy on the planet."—New York Times Book Review"Unwavering political contrarian Noam Chomsky smart-bombs the US military's global Interventions. Shock and awe!"—Vanity FairBecause We Say So presents more than thirty concise, forceful commentaries on US politics and global power. Written between 2011 and 2015, Noam Chomsky's arguments forge a persuasive c...

Understanding American Politics provides a unique introduction to the contemporary political landscape of the United States by using as its core organizing feature the idea of "American exceptionalism," a concept that is at least as old as Tocqueville's study of American democracy.The second edition of Understanding American Politics maintains the unique strengths of the first edition while offering improved coverage of political institutions. A single omnibus cha...

How did a city long dominated by a notorious Democratic Machine become a national battleground in the right-wing war against the public sector? In Mayor 1%, veteran journalist Kari Lydersen takes a close look at Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel and his true agenda.With deep Wall Street ties from his investment banking years and a combative political style honed in Congress and the Clinton and Obama administrations, Emanuel is among a rising class of rock-star mayors promising to...

If the same-sex marriage debate tells us one thing, it’s that rights do not exist in a vacuum. What works for one side at the ballot box often fails in the courtroom. Conservative opponents of same-sex marriage used appeals to religious liberty and parental rights to win ballot measure campaigns, but could not duplicate this success in court. Looking at the same-sex marriage debate at the ballot box and in the courts, this timely book offers unique insights into one of the most fluid socia...

The outspoken Connecticut congresswoman provides "a powerful case for protecting and expanding America's safety net" (Elizabeth Warren).Cynical politicians like Mitch McConnell and Donald Trump argue that the people of the United States would be better off without food stamps, Obamacare, and workplace protections. Congresswoman Rosa L. DeLauro knows these folks are just plain wrong.Growing up in New Haven, Connecticut, DeLauro saw firsthand how vulnerable h...

Later this month, the Supreme Court will hear arguments in a case—Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby— that has arisen as society tries to reconcile corporate rights with religious liberty.Since the Hobby Lobby’s founding, the Green family has managed their

Court and policy makers have increasingly had to deal with—and sometimes even embrace—technology, from podcasts to the Internet. Televised courtroom broadcasting especially remains an issue. The debate surrounding the US Supreme Court and federal courts, as well as the great disparity between different forms of television courtroom broadcasting, rages on. What are the effects of television courtroom broadcasting? Does research support the arguments for or against? Despite three Supreme Cou...

The world order is structured in three levels; factions, authorities and collectives. Symbolically, it is a triangle, but more accurately a Pyramid.Factions are the power at the pinnacle, the authorities the instrument of power beneath and the collectives the builders of value at the base.It is a feudal arrangement, little different from the past, merely of greater sophistication.