A People's History of the United States: 1492 to Present
by Howard Zinn

New York Times Book Review
Professor Zinn writes with an enthusiasm rarely encountered in the leaden prose of academic history, and his text is studded with telling quotations from labor leaders, war resisters, and fugitive slaves. There are vivid descriptions of events that are usually ignored. . . a reversal of perspectives, a reshuffling of heroes and villains.

The Best Democracy Money Can Buy: An Investigative Reporter Exposes the Truth about Globalization, Corporate Cons, and High Finance Fraudsters
by Greg Palast

From Publishers Weekly
Muckraking has a long, storied tradition, and Palast is evidently proud to be part of it. In this polemical indictment of globalization and political corruption, Palast (a reporter with the BBC and London's Observer) updates the muckraking tradition with some 21st-century targets: the IMF, World Bank and WTO, plus oil treaties, energy concerns and corporate evildoers of all creeds. Some of Palast's reports are downright shocking (if familiar). He shows, for example, how the WTO prevents cheap AIDS drugs from reaching victims in Africa and how World Bank loan policies have crippled the economies of Tanzania and other developing countries. On the home front, he details Exxon's horrific safety record before the Valdez disaster and reveals the price-gouging by Texas power companies during the California energy crisis. In Britain, Palast exposes the "cash for access" policies of the Blair administration, and blasts the legal system for shielding Pfizer Pharmaceuticals from lawsuits by victims who had defective Pfizer valves installed in their hearts. These are all good, important stories. Most of them, however, have been published before. This book is essentially a collection of Palast's newspaper articles, hastily stitched together with some commentary and exposition. As such, it lacks cohesiveness and the depth his subjects deserve. In addition, Palast's bombastic style and one-sided perspective do much to undermine his own credibility. How seriously should readers take a journalist who labels former U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers an "alien" and dismisses Wal-Mart shareholders as "Wal-Martians"? There is much of value here, but readers who want a full-bodied, serious analysis of how globalization is affecting developing countries or how corporate giants pay for political favors should look elsewhere. - Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Forbidden Truth: U.S.-Taliban Secret Oil Diplomacy, Saudi Arabia and the Failed Search for bin Laden
by Jean-Charles Brisard, Guillaume Dasquie, Lucy Rounds (Translator), Wayne Madsen

From Publishers Weekly
There's a lot that's intriguing in this examination of the economic links between the United States and Middle East oil and the diplomatic side of the war on terrorism-but this exposÇ occasionally suffers from insinuations that outstrip the evidence presented. The authors, both French intelligence experts, attempt to detail how "political channels, financial networks, oil stakes and secret diplomatic deals" helped support Osama bin Laden and his band of fundamentalist terrorists. They do spell out how worldwide Islamic charities helped fund terrorism and the fact that al-Qaeda received substantial funds from Saudi sources. Relying on both primary and secondary sources, the authors also add nuance to our understanding of the situation, noting, for example, that Libya, after an assassination attempt against Khadafy, was the first country to issue a warrant for bin Laden's arrest, in 1998. Among their more surprising charges (though they admit there is no direct evidence of the links) is that scandal-ridden BCCI-of which one of bin Laden's brothers-in-law is a former top executive-"is now at the center of [bin Laden's] financial network," supporting him with an intricate chain of business, banking and family ties. Other points-such as the implication that Bush administration officials have some guilt in the September 11 attacks because they worked for oil companies that had dealings with Saudi oil companies and had an interest in oil pipelines running through Afghanistan-rely also on heavily circumstantial evidence. This was a bestseller in France, but here it may be buried in the flood of September 11 books. - Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.