Required reading for anyone who wants to understand how to work within Congress.The House and Senate have unique rules and procedures to determine how legislation moves from a policy idea to law. Evolved over the last 200 years, the rules of both chambers are designed to act as the engine for that process. Each legislative body has its own leadership positions to oversee this legislative process.To the novice, whether a newly elected representative, a lawmake...

Like the Rockefellers and the Kennedys, the Kochs are one of the most influential dynasties of the modern age, but they have never been the subject of a major biography -- until now.Not long after the death of his father, Charles Koch, then in his early 30s, discovered a letter the family patriarch had written to his sons. "You will receive what now seems to be a large sum of money," Fred Koch cautioned. "It may either be a blessing or a curse."Fred's legacy...

The New York Times bestselling exposé of what passes for business as usual in Washington todayThere was a time, not so very long ago, when perfectly rational people ran the Republican Party. So how did the party of Lincoln become the party of lunatics? That is what this book aims to answer. Fear not, the Dems come in for their share of tough talk— they are zombies, a party of the living dead.Mike Lofgren came to Washington in the early eighties—tho...

This Fight Is Our Fight: Elizabeth Warren's Passionate Call to Save America's Middle ClassIn This Fight Is Our Fight, #1 New York Times bestselling author and U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren offers a candid, inspiring look at why our middle class is under siege and how we can win the battle to save it. Drawing on her own experiences growing up in Oklahoma at the ragged edge of the middle class, Warren shows how a government that once looked out for ...

The New York Times bestselling author of The Party Is Over delivers a no-holds-barred exposé of who really wields power in WashingtonEvery Four years, tempers are tested and marriages fray as Americans head to the polls to cast their votes. But does anyone really care what we think? Has our vaunted political system become one big, expensive, painfully scriped reality TV show? In this cringe-inducing expose of the sins and excesses of Belt...

"An urgent and engaging look at how American politics have become the founding fathers' worst nightmare" ( The Daily Beast).America's political system is dysfunctional. We know it, yet the problem seems intractable—after every election, voters discover yet again that political "leaders" are simply quarreling in a never-ending battle between the two warring tribes.As a former congressman, Mickey Edwards witnessed firsthand how important legislative ...

An outspoken centrist, Senator Snowe stunned Washington in February 2012 when she announced she would not seek a fourth term and offered a sharp rebuke to the Senate, citing the dispiriting gridlock and polarization. After serving in the legislative branch at the state and federal levels for 40 years, including 18 years in the U.S. Senate, she explained that Washington wasn’t solving the big problems anymore.In this timely call to action, she explores the roots of her belief in pri...

With each passing day, Pakistan becomes an even more crucial player in world affairs. Home of the world's second-largest Muslim population, epicenter of the global jihad, location of perhaps the planet's most dangerous borderlands, and armed with nuclear weapons, this South Asian nation will go a long way toward determining what the world looks like ten years from now. The Future of Pakistan presents and evaluates several scenarios for how the country will develop, evolve, and act...

This ebook is now available from Bloomsbury Academic. Bloomsbury Academic publish acclaimed resources for undergraduate and postgraduate courses, as well as the general reader, across a broad range of subjects including Archaeology, Art & Visual Culture, Biblical Studies, Business & Management, Drama & Performance Studies, Economics, Education, Film & Media, History, Linguistics, Literary Studies, Music & Sound Studies, Philosophy, Politics & International Relations, Psychology, Religious ...

Polarization. Partisanship. Rancor. Character assassinations. Government shutdowns. Why can't our elected officials just get along and do their jobs?The United States was once seen as a land of broad consensus and pragmatic politics. Sharp ideological differences were largely absent. But today politics in America is dominated by intense party polarization and limited agreement among legislative representatives on policy problems and solutions.Americans pride themselves on the...

Special rules enable the Senate to act despite the filibuster. Sometimes.Most people believe that, in today's partisan environment, the filibuster prevents the Senate from acting on all but the least controversial matters. But this is not exactly correct. In fact, the Senate since the 1970s has created a series of special rules-described by Molly Reynolds as majoritarian exceptions”-that limit debate on a wide range of measures on the Senate floor.The deta...

This book explores how intra-party politics affects government formation and termination in parliamentary systems, where the norm is the formation of coalition governments.The authors look beyond party cohesion and discipline in parliamentary democracies to take a broader view, assuming a diversity of preferences among party members and then exploring the incentives that give rise to coordinated party behaviour at the electoral, legislative and executive levels. The chapters in thi...