Joseph Stieb (Author of The Regime Change Consensus)

Joseph Stieb rated a book really liked it Waging a Good War: A Military History of the Civil Rights Movement, 1954-1968 by Thomas E. Ricks	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
This book intrigued me bc I like Ricks and I wanted to know what a "military history of the CRM" would look like. I'll say up front that the title is a big misleading: this is a strategic history of the CRM that uses military metaphors. But that lens ...more
2 hours, 19 min ago · 2 likes · like · see review
Joseph Stieb rated a book it was amazing Furious Minds: The Making of the MAGA New Right by Laura K. Field	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
An absolutely essential guide to the many tribes of the MAGA New Right. This intellectual movement has arrived at maturity in the early 2020s after the chaos of the first Trump years. Field excavates the factions of this movement, which has coalesced ...more
Jan 20, 2026 08:48AM · 7 likes · like · see review
Joseph Stieb made a comment on his review of Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1) " yeah right? "
Jan 18, 2026 06:56AM · see review
Joseph Stieb rated a book really liked it Injustice: How Politics and Fear Vanquished America's Justice Department by Carol Leonnig	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Useful book for understanding Trump's assault on the DoJ for the full span of his presidencies. Up front, my critiques are that it is very much "one thing then another" journalism that, while very well reported, didn't have enough of the periscope mo ...more
Jan 16, 2026 07:28AM · 6 likes · like · see review
Joseph Stieb rated a book it was ok Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1) by William Gibson	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Could not make hide nor hair of this book. Cool style and language, but no idea what was happening. At least it wasn't too long. ...more
Jan 15, 2026 06:52AM · 2 likes · like · see review
Joseph Stieb rated a book really liked it Awake by Jen Hatmaker (Goodreads Author)	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
This was really good at times, but I don't think the effusive writing style was my cup of tea. It's an interesting look at the unique trauma of someone raised in an evangelical community who got married at 19 and never really developed her own apprec ...more
Jan 11, 2026 03:55PM · 2 likes · like · see review
Joseph Stieb rated a book it was amazing We the People: A History of the U.S. Constitution by Jill Lepore	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
I've always absolutely loved Jill Lepore's writing, and in this book she's outdone herself. This is a critical book for this moment in history, but also one that I'm sure I'll refer back to for years in my own teaching. Writing the history of the Cons ...more
Jan 10, 2026 07:54AM · 1 like · like · see review
Joseph Stieb rated a book really liked it Milton Friedman: The Last Conservative by Jennifer Burns	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
Burns is an outstanding historian, and her talents are on fully display in this book. This is a careful and thoughtfully researched study of Friedman, one of the most significant economic thinkers of the late 20th century. The book is about both Frie ...more
Jan 07, 2026 12:47PM · 5 likes · like · see review
Joseph Stieb made a comment on his review of Every Day Is Sunday: How Jerry Jones, Robert Kraft, and Roger Goodell Turned the NFL into a Cultural & Economic Juggernaut " Thanks! Yes, that's a great point. It's arguably the last unifying cultural product in the country! The conversation cuts many ways. ...more "
Jan 02, 2026 09:26AM · see review
Joseph Stieb rated a book really liked it Every Day Is Sunday: How Jerry Jones, Robert Kraft, and Roger Goodell Turned the NFL into a Cultural & Economic Juggernaut by Ken Belson	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
An interesting look at how the NFL built itself into the world's wealthiest and America's most dominant sports league. Belson examines the rise of free agency, revenue sharing, TV deals, and the monetization of various other aspects of the league (ga ...more
Jan 01, 2026 08:29AM · 3 likes · like · see review

Joseph Stieb rated a book really liked it

Waging a Good War: A Military History of the Civil Rights Movement, 1954-1968
by Thomas E. Ricks

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This book intrigued me bc I like Ricks and I wanted to know what a "military history of the CRM" would look like. I'll say up front that the title is a big misleading: this is a strategic history of the CRM that uses military metaphors. But that lens This book intrigued me bc I like Ricks and I wanted to know what a "military history of the CRM" would look like. I'll say up front that the title is a big misleading: this is a strategic history of the CRM that uses military metaphors. But that lens gains credibility because A. The CRM was so incredibly strategic, following key principles of strategy, operations, and tactics and B. CRM activists thought of themselves as engaged in non-violent coercion (not simply moral suasion) against key vulnerabilities in the Jim Crow system and C. Their experience of constant stress and the potential of violence was not unlike war, and many came away from their experiences dealing with immense trauma.

So Ricks walks through the fairly standard story of the CRM with an eye to its strategic decision-making, as well as fair-minded critiques of its mistakes. I strongly agree with his critique that a key reason the CRM fragmented was a shift from activism as a way to seek discrete political ends to activism as a means of cultural expression (i.e. SNCC under Carmichael). And Ricks also makes a good point that King's later campaigns in Chicago and DC were not as well thought-out in a strategic sense, which may have been because of the sheer trauma he had already undergone.

Some historians might scoff at this book bc it is mostly based in secondary sources, although Ricks definitely did his homework. Still, I think the book is worthwhile for 2 reasons. First, focusing on the strategy of the CRM helps us explain its effectiveness and pushes back on the narrative that they suddenly changed everyone's minds. They DID change minds with their ideas and actions, but they succeeded in passing laws and dismantling segregation by identifying and exploiting pressure points in JIm Crow and the larger political system. Second, the mere fact that Ricks, a famous military writer, wrote this book will probably draw people in to reading serious history about the CRM in ways that (unfortunately) other authors might not.

So while this book isn't essential, it's still well done and useful. ...more

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Furious Minds: The Making of the MAGA New Right
by Laura K. Field

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An absolutely essential guide to the many tribes of the MAGA New Right. This intellectual movement has arrived at maturity in the early 2020s after the chaos of the first Trump years. Field excavates the factions of this movement, which has coalesced An absolutely essential guide to the many tribes of the MAGA New Right. This intellectual movement has arrived at maturity in the early 2020s after the chaos of the first Trump years. Field excavates the factions of this movement, which has coalesced around Trump: Hard Right edgelords, Nationalist Conversatives, Catholic integralists, Protestant neo-theocrats, postliberals, masculine reactionaries, Claremonters, and so on.

She spells out the differences between these groups deftly, but she also shows their commonalities. They are all fundamentally illiberal. They reject the basic pluralism of our liberal society, including gains by women and sexual minorities. They mostly reject free market economics in favor of a nationalist. They are either openly racist or flirtatious with race-science and a strictly ethnic/religious/racial definition of the nation. They loathe liberalism for (ostensibly) being value neutral, corrosive of traditions, communities, and "folkways," and for empowering groups they find to be vile. They will reject democratic processes if they keep leading to liberal outcomes, and many have turned openly to forms of authoritarianism. And they are almost all dudes who are obsessed with the supposed "gynocracy" and the crises of masculinity in the modern age. Their points of emphasis vary, but they all operate within this general intellectual orbit.

Field correctly warns liberal readers to not dismiss the New Right's ideas as mere irritable gestures. They have ideas, albeit bad ones, about what the nation is, what the good life is, what makes human beings happy, how society should be ordered (guess what? they are on top), and other fundamental political/philosophical questions. And their ideas clearly have appeal, as similar ideas have appealed to millions of people at different points in history. Liberals can't dismiss these ideas; they have to tackle them head on, and they have more than adequate intellectual resources to do so.

Field is a particularly excellent guide to this movement because she not only reads these people but knows them and attends their conference. As this is not a purely objective study, she also argues with them and convincingly shows the poverty and brutality of their thinking. Anyways, along with Matthew Rose's A World After Liberalism, this is probably the best book on modern far right ideas and people I've encountered. Strongly recommended (although it's also maddening!). ...more

Joseph Stieb made a comment on his review of Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1)

" yeah right? "

Joseph Stieb rated a book really liked it

Injustice: How Politics and Fear Vanquished America's Justice Department
by Carol Leonnig

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Useful book for understanding Trump's assault on the DoJ for the full span of his presidencies. Up front, my critiques are that it is very much "one thing then another" journalism that, while very well reported, didn't have enough of the periscope mo Useful book for understanding Trump's assault on the DoJ for the full span of his presidencies. Up front, my critiques are that it is very much "one thing then another" journalism that, while very well reported, didn't have enough of the periscope moments that zoom out on the story and give the reader a bigger picture. It also didn't really have an argument besides Trump assaulting and weaponizing the DOJ as no president ever has.

I read this mainly to get a sense of why the DoJ and Biden admin failed to get Trump on trial for either seditious conspiracy to commit electoral fraud/block a constitutional process and/or his stolen documents case. The book was quite helpful in this sense. Here were some of the major factors:

1. An almost absolute lack of Republican cooperation and their relentless protection of Trump.

2. Biden and Garland wanted to restore the apolitical, professional reputation of the Department of Justice after 4 years of Trump weaponizing and politicizing it. This meant that Biden wanted to keep a firewall between himself and Garland's decisions about prosecutions. Garland, a consummate professional and decent person, was nonetheless not the right guy for the job. He decided to move too deliberately in building a case, in part waiting for the Jan 6 Committee to finish his work, and he failed to appoint a special prosecutor until almost 2 years after January 6. This put Jack Smith's team on the clock, racing against the electoral cycle, which was an untenable position. Garland valued the reputation of the DOJ too much, acting as if we still lived in a "normal" pre-Trump era.

3. Another issue had to do with the initial DoJ response and who was targeted for investigation. DoJ lawyers, Garland included, focused too much on lower-level offenders (i.e., people who broke into the Capitol or assaulted police) and not enough on the conspirators who drove Trump's plan to overturn the election. In other words, they went after low-hanging fruit in an attempt to avoid looking political when this was an inherently political thing. They particularly discounted the importance of the false elector scheme, which Trump was closely involved with, which was the core of the administration's insane idea that they could overturn the election. There was probably more info and stronger cases to be made against higher-level conspirators if the paradigm had been different from the jump. There was also an attitude among many DoJ agents, especially outside of DoJ, that the insurrectionists were simply "knuckleheads" and not serious threats to democracy.

4. Biden was, frankly, disengaged from this whole process. I know he is supposed to be disengaged, but he also could have removed Garland at any point and appointed someone more aggressive.

5. Finally, Trump v the US absolutely gutted the effort to prosecute Trump by deeming many of his acts before January 6 as "official acts" within his constitutional duty, thereby making him immune from prosecution. Despite the shoddiness of this ruling, it took the wind out of the prosecution, especially because it came so close to the election. There still technically could have been a trial that would look at whether Trump's electoral interference acts counted as "official" and therefore immune, and it's conceivable that prosecutors could have made a good case that Trump was acting illegally as a candidate, not legally as a president (which was the angle they were workshopping during the investigation). Sadly, we never got the chance to test this.

SO it may have been that the effort to prosecute Trump for a variety of crimes was doomed from the start because of the Supreme Court and the Republican Party. But I can't help concluding that Garland and Biden erred tremendously in not getting the ball rolling faster and getting him on trial within 4 years. So anyways, a frustrating but useful book on an important phase of recent US history. ...more

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Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1)
by William Gibson

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Could not make hide nor hair of this book. Cool style and language, but no idea what was happening. At least it wasn't too long. ...more

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Awake
by Jen Hatmaker (Goodreads Author)

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This was really good at times, but I don't think the effusive writing style was my cup of tea. It's an interesting look at the unique trauma of someone raised in an evangelical community who got married at 19 and never really developed her own apprec ...more

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We the People: A History of the U.S. Constitution
by Jill Lepore

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I've always absolutely loved Jill Lepore's writing, and in this book she's outdone herself. This is a critical book for this moment in history, but also one that I'm sure I'll refer back to for years in my own teaching.

Writing the history of the Cons I've always absolutely loved Jill Lepore's writing, and in this book she's outdone herself. This is a critical book for this moment in history, but also one that I'm sure I'll refer back to for years in my own teaching.

Writing the history of the Constitution is obviously daunting, so Lepore's method is to focus on the history of amendments. She compiled a database of all constitutional amendments ever proposed in the US (of which there are thousands) and then tracks the evolution of different phases of constitutional interpretation and change. In the first phase, the Founding Era, Lepore shows that the Founders did not view the Constitution as sacrosanct and expected it to be amended frequently, although they also created a high bar to amendment. She reminds the reader that ratification hinged on the amendability of the Constitution itself, as one of the first things the first Congress did was to pass the series of amendments known as the Bill of Rights.

The next phase of Constitutional History, from about 1800 to 1896, witnessed a decline in the frequency of amendments as the political system became increasingly sectional and pro/anti-slavery in nature. But she does show that at the state level, states moved to pass amendments that defined citizenship as for whites only in a way that the founding generation had largely rejected doing. So the whole argument that America was "founded for white people only," Lepore shows, is probably a product of the Jacksonian era of white populist nationalism than of the Founding Period.

Lastly, Lepore shows that the Supreme Court, which was relatively quiescent in this period, generally did not interpret the Constitution according to the original intent of the Founders. As judges like Joseph Story and John Marshall spelled out the role of the Court, they not only lacked access to key documents about the Constitutional Convention (such as Madison's notes) but believed the Constitution should be interpreted with a variety of tools and in keeping with a changing society. There were a flurry of amendments toward the end of this period (mainly the REconstruction amendments), but the effects of these amendments were soon undermined by the Supreme Court's gutting of them and its enforcement of contract and property rights over everything.

This leads us to the third phase, which is the heightened period of constitutional amendment in the Progressive Era. This was in large part a response to the Court's stagnant reading of the Constitution and to the increasingly oligarchic nature of American politics, as well as the Progressives' argument that the Constitution should be treated like an evolving organism rather than a fixed structure. Another flurry of amendments in the 1910s brought direct election of senators, the income tax, and women's suffrage. This era was snuffed out by WWI and the Red Scare, but efforts to amend the Constitution again picked up after WWII. Many of these came from white Southerners trying to block civil rights reforms and protect white supremacy and the "right" to discriminate. But there was also a surge of amendment activism in the 1960s, especially from school prayer, environmental, and most of all feminist activists (the ERA).

The possibility of amendment, however, has receded further into the background because of the sheer difficulty of getting it done. A tiny portion of the population (about 13 states, regardless of population) can block the entire process. As a result, Lepore argues, since the amendment-proposal surge of the 60s and 70s, political attempts to "change" or re-interpret the Constitution have shifted to the Courts. This is, ironically, what both liberals and conservatives did as the feasibility of amendment became less and less. The Supreme Court became the new battleground in which the Constitution's meaning was decided, increasing partisan rancor and permitting a small, unrepresentative body to determine the nation's future.

Originalism, moreover, emerged out of the conservative movement's failure to amend the Constitution to arrest the changes of the postwar era. Originalists imagined they court interpret and apply the Constitution according to original intent or meaning (which, again, is a NEW school of constitutional thought) in a historically precise way, but in doing so they usually found that (surprise) the Constitution supports modern conservative political positions. At the same time, originalists cynically argued they weren't changing or even interpreting the Constitution but restoring it. They argued that people who want to change the Constitution's meaning need to amend it, even though that has become a political impossibility. The result, Lepore concludes, is a Constitution now bound in amber, treated as a relic, unable to change or respond to a changing world (which is what most Founders thought it should do), and increasingly losing legitimacy.

Lepore's thesis is that American constitutional culture is centered in the "philosophy of amendment." This is the idea that the people have a continual right to revise the fundamental rules of their government, and that this can be done by multiple pathways (state conventions or via Congress). It is essential for maintaining the legitimacy of the COnstitution and the active engagement of the people. It is particularly important to have amend-ability because the people who wrote the Constitution were not representative of the people who have been governed by it for centuries (women, African-Americans, Native-Americans, etc).

The greatness of the Constitution, she argues, is this philosophy of amendment, not any given rule, but the possibility of revision and adaptation. The Founders (mostly) wanted and believed it would be changed often and did not think they were gods issuing the unamendable 10 Commandments. But that is how they are now treated, and it is a fundamental sickness in our political culture. And with the rise of political parties and the expansion of the number of states, amendment became unreasonably difficult to the point of impossibility.

And yet, Lepore's examination of recent efforts to amend the Constitution should give us hope. There were real efforts and popular momentum in the 60s and 70s, for example, behind both the ERA and abolition of the Electoral College. Both of these got fairly close. There is no reason, she urges us, to treat the Constitutional playing field as fixed in the present day, even if it is very hard to change. Amending Article 5 itself might be the best place to start.

Anyways, I thought this book was brilliantly relevant without pandering or soft-balling anything to her mostly liberal audience. Lepore's vivid writing and breadth of knowledge keep this long book moving pretty well. It's a civic and historical masterwork. ...more

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Milton Friedman: The Last Conservative
by Jennifer Burns

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Burns is an outstanding historian, and her talents are on fully display in this book. This is a careful and thoughtfully researched study of Friedman, one of the most significant economic thinkers of the late 20th century. The book is about both Frie Burns is an outstanding historian, and her talents are on fully display in this book. This is a careful and thoughtfully researched study of Friedman, one of the most significant economic thinkers of the late 20th century. The book is about both Friedman and his larger intellectual milieu. She shows how he challenged and to some extent toppled the dominance of Keynsian economics with his monetarist approach. Friedman also is part of the larger trend of "economics imperialism" where economic methods/lenses were applied to ever more policy issues. For example, he played a role in ending the draft and replacing it with an all volunteer force after arguing in purely economics terms that the best way to draw talent into the military was by treating it as a career decision, not a matter of citizenship and service.

The essence of Friedman worldview was freedom, as embodied in his book "Free to Choose." Friedman believed that free markets and free people, as well as a more restrained government, are the best path to prosperity and human flourishing. Burns makes a good case that Friedman's ideas helped usher in a period of globalization and prosperity that was unprecedented in human history but which also greatly drove inequality. She's fairly positive about Friedman, at least relative to most scholars, emphasizing that he really did care about poverty and inequality and tried to come up with market-oriented solutions (he also supported UBI and the earned income tax credit). She also depicts Friedman as a little bit cold; not a monster, but someone who could be rather blase about ignoring racism (he was a big supporter of school vouchers in the 60s when they were a clear ploy to prevent integration) or working with the Chilean dictatorship (although Burns' shows that his involvement there was pretty peripheral and that neoliberal reforms actually worked pretty well). Friedman was in his own way a reductive thinker who couldn't escape a purely economic lens to think about citizenship, fairness, and history in a more humane way.

In sum, this is a nice corrective to villainizations of Friedman and a thoroughly researched text. One caveat: There is A LOT of detailed financial/economic theory in this book, so while I found it rewarding overall, it was a bit dry at times. Still Burns' clearly mastered this complex material, which is a feat in and of itself. ...more

Joseph Stieb made a comment on his review of Every Day Is Sunday: How Jerry Jones, Robert Kraft, and Roger Goodell Turned the NFL into a Cultural & Economic Juggernaut

" Thanks!

Yes, that's a great point. It's arguably the last unifying cultural product in the country! The conversation cuts many ways. ...more "

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Every Day Is Sunday: How Jerry Jones, Robert Kraft, and Roger Goodell Turned the NFL into a Cultural & Economic Juggernaut
by Ken Belson

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An interesting look at how the NFL built itself into the world's wealthiest and America's most dominant sports league. Belson examines the rise of free agency, revenue sharing, TV deals, and the monetization of various other aspects of the league (ga An interesting look at how the NFL built itself into the world's wealthiest and America's most dominant sports league. Belson examines the rise of free agency, revenue sharing, TV deals, and the monetization of various other aspects of the league (gambling, the draft, the combine) etc. The NFL leadership, especially under Goodell, thought of itself less as a sport and more as a Fortune 500 company. It ruthlessly moved teams from smaller into bigger markets. It developed a "rising tide lifts all boats" approach to revenue sharing and TV deals that ensured greater parity and more even wealth across big and small market teams. It also clearly benefited from technological advancements, esp in camera work and information/social media, which made football more fun to watch at home. Goodell aggressively attacked norms about when football should be on TV, adding games on Black Friday, Saturdays, Christmas, and other times of the year.

Still, the one thing I was looking for in this book was more of a cultural analysis of how the NFL recovered from its overlapping crises of the early to mid-2010s: CTE and concussions, Ray Rice, Richie Incognito, Kapernick, a variety of abuse scandals, and a general cultural sense that football, as an inherently violent game, should fade away in our culture. The League deflected and co-opted these challenges strategically. It communicated with players who were angry about police brutality and built in some performative social justice stuff (as well as charitable giving). It settled with players dealing with lifelong problems from CTE, funded science that muddied the waters a bit on those injuries, and tweaked rules and equipment to try to reduce concussions. Finally, the League became much more willing to suspend players for misbehavior.

Belson explores the League's resurgence aptly, but I can't help think that the NFL benefitted from teh cultural reaction under MAGA. A key element of MAGA is defense of tough-guy masculinity embodied by football. MAGA also encourages people to not have a larger conscientiousness about social and health issues and to revel in your own selfishness. AMerican football is so traditional, so central to Americana and American exceptionalism, and so violent that it seems to fit right in with the darkness and irresponsibility of the MAGA worldview. And yet, at the same time, it's an undeniably great game and a spectacle of size, speed, athleticism, and pageantry that is really hard to ignore. Anyways, I'd be curious to see Belson's thoughts on the cultural elements of the NFL's recovery. ...more

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