Book Description
Barry Goldwater IS the conscience of a conservative. --Ronald Reagan New introduction by Patrick Buchanan.
Customer Reviews:
Why the barking moonbat RFK Jr??.......2007-08-29
I was going to add a newer addition to my library, as my earlier edition is pretty worn. I'll find an earlier edition in good condition rather than buy this one. Why the forward by RFK Jr, I'll never know...
Perfect book until the new Afterword by RFK Jr. CC Goldwater what were you thinking?.......2007-08-25
Mr. Conservative explains what the job of the Federal Government was originally intended to do. It was Not created to make Pyramid schemes like Social Security, not for health care, not for Education, not for creating jobs, not for creating bureaucracy after bureaucracy, not giving over our sovereignty to the United Nations etcetera etcetera. I was so satisfied reading this book up until the end. How can CC Goldwater let a Left Wing Hack Job like RFK Jr. write the Afterword? He is for all of the Government intrusion/handing over sovereignty to the U.N. that Barry Goldwater was completely against. And then he puts words in this great man's mouth! The audacity! RFK Jr. only gets a forum to speak because of his father, he is a LOSER!! Using the Afterword Forum to rail against modern day Republicans that he despises is pathetic. Hey RFK JR., I'm still waiting for you to agree to have windmills installed by your place in Nantucket...you private jet flying HYPOCRITE!!
The Essense Revisited.......2007-08-22
This is a great statement of true Conservatism. What was the point of an afterword by a Socialist Loser. That's the only reason I didn't rate this a 5 star. I would buy an earlier edition if I had it to do over again.
All Political Leaders Need to Read This Book.......2007-06-28
Given the horrible state of politics in our nation and federal infringement on state rights and the constitution, now more than ever all leaders especially conservatives need to read this book. And most importantly after reading it, they need to apply it in how they govern and formulate policy.
Excellent.......2007-03-16
A truly enlightened book. Written by a brilliant man. It is sad that it took 16 years for his votes to be counted when Reagan one the 1980 election. A must read for all Conservative and Patriotic intellectuals.
Book Description
The insider account that sets the record straight about the election that gave birth to modern conservatism in the United States
The 1964 presidential campaign lives on in conservative circles as an origin myth for the modern conservative movement. Even though their preferred (and now revered) candidate lost to Lyndon B. Johnson by a landslide, Barry Goldwater's failed presidential run was a major turning point of the twentieth century. Without Goldwater's philosophy to pave the way--and, just as importantly, without the strategic and political infrastructure created by the "Draft Goldwater" movement that preceded it--there likely would have been no Reagan or Bush administrations, and possibly no Nixon administration either. The policy positions and electoral strategies of the Goldwater campaign became standard tenets of Republican politics.
William Middendorf had better than a ringside seat for this pivotal campaign. A key member of the "Draft Goldwater" movement as early as 1962, he was Goldwater's campaign treasurer and, afterwards, a major force within the Republican Party. No one knows the real inside story better, and A Glorious Disaster tells that story in all its rollicking, agonizing, and never-before-published detail. Following his work on the Goldwater campaign and four years as treasurer of the Republican National Committee,
Customer Reviews:
An Insider's Look at the Beginnings of a Movement.......2007-06-26
Bill Middendorf offers a delightful insider's view of Barry Goldwater's trailblazing 1964 campaign for President.
As a true insider -- he was on the inner circle as campaign treasurer, a key fundraiser, an early Draft Goldwater leader and a seeming voice of seasoned maturity (at age 37) -- he certainly offers a view that is signficantly more robust than most historical accounts.
It's a very enjoyable read.
Of course, Goldwater was utterly shellacked in 1964. But in losing, his principled admirers won by helping establish the foundation for a conservative movement that would build and last for decades.
A fascinating insider account.......2007-02-26
J. William Middendorff II, A Glorious Disaster: Barry Goldwater's Presidential Campaign and the origins of the Conservative Movement ( 2006, basic books, new york, 303pp)
This is a fascinating and lively insider report from someone who really was an insider. Ambassador Middendorf played a significant role in the rise of modern conservatism within the Republican Party. As a Connecticut Republican with many friends in the moderate wing of the party he nevertheless early on saw the need for a new approach and a new movement.
Bill was part of the draft Goldwater effort and part of the Goldwater Campaign and then Treasurer for the Republican National Committee as it bounced back from the disaster of 1964. He was in on an amazing number of meetings and worked with virtually every major conservative of that period.
His observations are insightful and in some cases unique.
Even though I had lived through virtually every campaign this book covers I still found myself with new reflections and new insights.
From the perspective of 2007 the most stunning reminder was the level of ruthlessness, dishonesty, and viciousness which characterized the Lyndon Johnson campaign and Johnson's entire behavior. It is worth reading as a reminder of what a 2008 Clinton campaign might be like.
Middendorf repeats a story I first heard from Tim Russert about Goldwater and Kennedy agreeing that in 1964 they would tour the country on Air Force One holding a series of debates and proving that there could be civility and collegiality even in presidential politics. Building on the debates of 1960 and enjoying each other's company a Goldwater-Kennedy contest would have led to a much healthier America.
Middendorf also reminds us that results can shift with remarkable speed. The Goldwater defeat was seen as the beginning of the end for the GOP yet two short years later in 1966 there was a remarkable rebound. The GOP lost 529 legislative seats in 1964 and gained 700 in 1966. The GOP lost 37 house seats and gained 47 in 1966.
One other fascinating reminder about how the world can change is the question of being a frontrunner for the nomination. On the Friday before the 1964 California GOP primary Nelson Rockefeller was ahead by 49 to 40 and on Tuesday Goldwater won the primary and with it the nomination. After the 1966 elections Governor George Romney was the front runner and polls showed him beating President Johnson 54 to 46, After he said "the greatest brainwashing that anybody can get when you go over to Vietnam....they do a very thorough job" his campaign collapsed.
This is a useful book for anyone who would like to understand the rise of modern conservatism and anyone who would like to better understand presidential politics.
Interesting memoir, but not historical analysis.......2007-02-14
When I read the title of this book, I expected an in-depth analysis of why the Conservative movement started with Barry Goldwater's failed candidacy for the Presidency in 1964. Unfortunately, that did not turn out to be the case.
The author of this book was a critical player in the Goldwater campaign, and, as such, has tremendously valuable memories of Goldwater's unsuccessful attempt to become President of the United States. This book, however, is nothing more than a political memoir - how this one individual got involved in the Goldwater campaign and what the ride meant to him. It is filled with exciting and fun stories, and is an enjoyable book to read, but most assuredly is not for the historian.
I believe that this book is a good start towards understanding whether or not Goldwater's ascendancy to the head position in the Republican party really did start the Conservative movement that has been so powerful in the last 25 years, but it certainly does not live up to its title.
I highly recommend this book to anyone looking for an enjoyable political memoir - if the reader is conservative, this book will delight. Even a liberal will enjoy the book, though some of the disparaging remarks about LBJ or Jimmy Carter may not bode well with those who possess a leftist slant.
Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear!.......2007-02-11
Wow. The origins of the conservative movement indeed!How much of a revolution was it? Consider this. In 1960,Richard Nixon received 50,000 contributions in his Presidential run,about the same as JFK.In 1964,Barry Goldwater received 1 1/2 MILLION!
This is the story of how a small band of pioneers plotted to literally draft a man who didn't want to run and who knew he would lose,but who changed the party and the entire world by doing so.
A glorious well-written historical work. As George Will wrote,"Barry Goldwater won..but it took 16 years to count the votes."
Highly Recommended.5 stars.
Nice light book.......2007-01-18
It really deserves 21/2 stars. I enjoyed it and maybe it was unrealistic to expect an in depth story of the draft and election from the Republican point of view but that's what I wanted.If you want a brief overview this is fine but not for the historian
Amazon.com
Not every presidential election is worth a book more than a quarter-century after the last ballot has been counted. The 1964 race was different, though, and author Rick Perlstein knows exactly why. That year, President Lyndon Baines Johnson, a Democrat, trounced his opponent, Barry Goldwater, a Republican senator from Arizona, in a blowout of historic proportions. The conservative wing of the GOP, which had toiled for so long as the minority partner in a coalition dominated by more liberal brethren, finally had risen to power and nominated one of its own, only to see him crash in terrible splendor. It looked like a death, but it was really a birth: a harrowing introduction to politics that would serve conservatives well in the years ahead as they went on to great success. Conservatives learned a lot in 1964:
It was learning how to act: how letters got written, how doors got knocked on, how co-workers could be won over on the coffee break, how to print a bumper sticker and how to pry one off with a razor blade; how to put together a network whose force exceeded the sum of its parts by orders of magnitude; how to talk to a reporter, how to picket, and how, if need be, to infiltrate--how to make the anger boiling inside you ennobling, productive, powerful, instead of embittering.
These were practical lessons that anybody in politics must pick up. For conservatives, the rough indoctrination came in 1964, and Perlstein (who is not a conservative) tells their story in detail and with panache. Before the Storm is not a history of conservative ideas (for that, read The Conservative Intellectual Movement in America, by George Nash), but a chronicle of how these ideas began to matter in politics. The victory of Ronald Reagan in 1980--to say nothing of Newt Gingrich in 1994 and George W. Bush in 2000--might not have been possible without the glorious failure of Barry Goldwater in 1964. As Perlstein writes, "You lost in 1964. But something remained after 1964: a movement. An army. An army that could lose a battle, suck it up, regroup, then live to fight a thousand battles more." --John J. Miller
Book Description
A bold and astute narrative history of conservatism's climb and one of the best-reviewed books of 2001.
Rick Perlstein's Before the Storm tells the story of the rise of the conservative movement in the liberal 1960s -- a story that, until this book, had never been told. The figure at the heart of the story is, of course, Barry Goldwater, the handsome renegade Republican from Arizona who loathed the federal government, despised liberals on sight, and mocked "peaceful coexistence" with the USSR. But Perlstein's narrative shines a light on a whole world of conservatives and their antagonists, including William F. Buckley, Nelson Rockefeller, and Bill Moyers. Vividly and thrillingly written, Before the Storm is already recognized as an essential book about the 1960s.
Customer Reviews:
A brilliant narrative history of the underdog American conservative movement of the 1960s.......2007-08-19
~Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American Consensus~ is a sweeping narrative history of the American conservative movement in the 1960s. The author Richard Perlstein, a liberal journalist, actually offers a fairly balanced and objective view of the American Right in the 1960s. He doesn't quite picture the American conservative as the racist Archie Bunker character from Norman Lear's All in the Family television show, but rather sympathetically reveals their concerns and convictions, which were deep rooted in the American psyche. Conservatives were animated by a love of country, a principled anti-communism that was sometimes paranoid, and a desire for fiscal restraint in government particularly at the federal level. Many hoped to repudiate the New Deal of FDR. Perlstein leaps right into the streets of conservative bastions like Orange County, California and Dallas, Texas, and offers a snapshot of the conservative movement in microcosm. With clarity, he communicates their concerns and response to the troublesome and insecure world around them. Against the backdrop of the beleaguered conservative movement of the 1960s were the tumults of radical Leftist activists in and out of the government. The Great Society of the Lyndon Johnson administration marked the ascendancy of welfare-statism in the United States, which proved especially baneful to principled conservatives and constitutionalists.
Perlstein's trenchant commentary is well-researched and offers a bombastic flare which captures the spirit of the insurgent, albeit beleaguered conservative movement. Against the backdrop of liberal dominated 1960s, the conservative movement in the 1960s solidified into well-organized constituency which eventually propelled the Reagan Revolution forward in 1980. While the political tides propelled an activist centralized government in Washington, D.C. to the helm, there was a deep-rooted libertarian streak to American conservatives which desperately desired to fight tooth and nail against political consolidation and central planning.
Perlstein chronicles the failed Goldwater campaign of 1964, and illustrates how its mass appeal to free markets and constitutionally limited government rallied throngs of conservatives under the American banner. The powerful Rockefeller dynasty shifted all their fortunes in favor of the Johnson bid for the Presidency, and labored against Goldwater every step of the way. The Lyndon Johnson presidential campaign itself shamelessly exploited the heightened Cold War anxieties and insecurities in the wake of the tragic assassination of John F. Kennedy, Jr. This sensationalism was encapsulated in television advertisement which pictured a little girl in a field plucking a daisy, and then a brilliant flash of light followed by an atomic detonation. Johnson was always viewed by the American Right with suspicion. Johnson, a racist Texas politician by instinct and an opportunist, pandered to the worst socialist instincts of the Civil Rights movement with his Great Society proposal, and he made no qualms about the reality it was a vote-buying scheme.
Perlstein sympathetically elucidates upon some of the anxieties felt on the Conservative Right. The anxieties were multi-faceted and owed to racial and social strife, as well as the heightened Cold War tension with the communist world following the Cuban Missile Crisis. There was grave apprehension that elements of the American Left and the Civil Rights movement were conciliatory to the Soviets, or worse yet, treasonous pawns of Moscow. Herein, we see an erudite profile of the various factions of political activists on the Right from the Young Americans for Freedom to the more conspiratorial minded members of the John Birch Society. The Right lacked cohesiveness and men like President Eisenhower and William F. Buckley were viewed by some as trojan horses on the political Right. The conservative movements began to emulate the mass-organization of their antagonists on the Left. Groups like the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE) and Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI) were very articulate and erudite in the quality of scholarship they produced. Both defended the free-market economy and constitutionally-limited government with extraordinary intellectual rigor. While Yippies and student radicals were protesting on college campuses, articulate conservative activists like Phyllis Schlafly and Robert Welch pandered to the concerns of American conservatives. They pressed for repeal of New Deal policies and sounded alarms about communism and the emerging feminist movement. A former G-Man Dan Smoot who left the FBI, warned tirelessly of subversive plots from Moscow. Other enigmatic voices came and went. As pamphleteers and propagandists, activists on the Right told prescient tales of communist subversion in our midst. Given the radicalism of the Left from the Black Panthers to the SDS, some of their fears were certainly warranted; but some of their conspiratorial speculations often proved to be unfounded.
Perlstein stumbles from time to time, but overall this is a quality work. It is well-researched and possessed of extraordinary clarity and a meticulous quality that makes one wonder that it is possible for an outsider to the conservative movement to put such a monumental work together.
An important story, well told.......2007-05-12
Rick Perlstein has done a magnificent job telling one of the most important political stories of our time: the triumphant journey of American conservatism from the political fringes to the center of power. Or at least the opening chapters of that story: Perlstein focuses on the doomed 1964 presidential campaign of conservative icon Barry Goldwater, a short-term setback that, in the prescient words of William F. Buckley, "planted seeds of hope, which will flower in a great November day in the future.'' Although Perlstein writes from a left-wing perspective, he is scrupulously fair. Goldwater emerges as a principled, decent, somewhat simple-minded man, baffled and often disturbed by the intensity of his supporters. Perlstein clearly admires the passion and resourcefulness of Goldwater's early backers such as Clif White. He doesn't hesitate to expose the hard-ball tactics Lyndon Johnson and the Democrats used against Goldwater in '64; young Bill Moyers comes off as especially Machiavellian. Sometimes Perlstein's narrative is a bit jarring, as he struggles to smooth over the ups and downs of political campaigns. On page 280, for instance, Perlstein writes that Nelson Rockefeller "knocked them dead in New Hampshire.'' By the next page, Rockefeller's "popularity was plummeting, his chances of (success) remote.'' Similarly, the Goldwater campaign sometimes comes across as an unstoppable force; at others like the fringe effort it proved to be on election day.
But that's a quibble. I learned a lot from this book. I never before realized the extent to which the money and venom of anti-union industrialists helped get movement conservatism started. I hadn't realized how early - pre-1964 -- Republicans started making inroads in the South, exploiting the white backlash against civil rights. I enjoyed many vignettes, including one on Lady Bird Johnson's courageous campaign trip across a hostile South. Perlstein is unsparing toward the era's elite political reporters, blinded by their own biases and comfy assumptions, who failed to see the movement emerging right before their eyes. Even after 516 pages of Perlstein's through reporting, intelligent analysis and fine story-telling I still can't really understand the conservative worldview. I'm a little like Adlai Stevenson, mystified when confronted by an unhinged rightwing protester. "What is wrong?'' he asked plaintively. "What do you want?'' Why did they see communist plots everywhere and a society lurching toward doom? Why did they overlook the violence and injustice in the South and see civil rights legislation as the first step toward a fascist dictatorship? I just don't get it.
Super-Dense Book.......2006-10-13
This book was an excellently written portrayal of presidential politics in the early 60's. Short of actually being there, "Before the Storm" gives a fully-developed experience of the time. Well done!
Political history at its BEST.......2005-05-23
Quite simply, this is an amazing work. It starts as the book the cover would suggest it is: tightly focused, part Goldwater biography and part tale of the conservative movement's early days. By the end, however, the story is less Goldwater and the election and far more a sweeping survey of American life in the early 60s. The campaign fades away, Perlstein masterfully weaves in tales of the civil rights movement, demonstrations, and other events, and Johnson becomes as central to the close of the story as does his opponent. And this only adds to the impact of the book, since both aspects are written amazingly well. Following the Goldwater campaign with all its missteps is as agonizing as the wider diversions are educational. In the end, there is a complete and engaging portrait both of the election and the massive changes in American society that it portended (not to mention how different things are today: the chaos of Goldwater's campaign is utterly surreal in comparison to the machines of current elecitons).
Perhaps most importantly, the book is amazingly even-handed. Perlstein's politics are obvious, but his observations come across as more therapeutic than enraged, almost seeming to sympathize with Goldwater as he tries to fight off the truly lunatic elements. It means that Before the Storm is a book that both conservatives and liberals can and should enjoy. Anyone seeking to understand why politics and society are what they are today should start here.
The Man who Lost in 64 emerged as the Big Winner.......2005-05-16
The LBJ campaign was where liberalism beared the fangs and claws it had hidden in the Kennedy election. Goldwater emerges here as a naive principled man thoroughly ill-suited to go up against an unprincipled win-at-any-cost candidate like Lyndon Johnson. Dick Nixon drew valuable lessons from both Goldwater's ineptitude and the scheming of LBJ.
A good follow up to this book would have been to interview all those who eagerly helped put LBJ back in the White House only to see him preside over the disaster of the no-win/unwinnable Viet Nam war and the crop of radical antiAmercian protestors it unleashed on the American political system.
Book Description
In the wake of the Nineteenth Amendment, Republican women set out to forge a place for themselves within the Grand Old Party. As Catherine Rymph explains, their often conflicting efforts over the subsequent decades would leave a mark on both conservative politics and American feminism.
Part of an emerging body of work on women's participation in partisan politics, Republican Women explores the dilemmas confronting progressive, conservative, and moderate Republican women as they sought to achieve a voice for themselves within the GOP. Rymph first examines women's grassroots organizing for the party in the decades following the initiation of women's suffrage. She then traces Marion Martin's efforts from 1938 to 1946 to shape the National Federation of Women's Republican Clubs, the party's increasing dependence on the work of women at the grassroots in the postwar years, and the eventual mobilization of many of these women behind Barry Goldwater, in defiance of party leaders.
From the flux of the party's post-Goldwater years emerged two groups of women on a collision course: a group of party insiders calling themselves feminists challenged supporters of independent Republican Phyllis Schlafly's growing movement opposing the Equal Rights Amendment. Their battles over the meanings of gender, power, and Republicanism continued earlier struggles even as they helped shape the party's fundamental transformation in the Reagan years.
Customer Reviews:
Activist Women.......2006-07-13
Growing up as one of Jane H Macauley's daughters, I heard all the great backroom and campaign stories, but I never put them in the wider context of the growing engagement of women in politics until reading Rymph's fascinating account. My mother and her friends are passionate believers in the grassroots and the precincts, and crisscrossed the country to get out the vote. Feminist slogans peppered my childhood, and the ERA was the grail. The hijacking of the progressive and moderate Republican women's organization is an enlightening chapter -- let's hijack it back, ladies!
An endorsement from a Democrat.......2006-03-06
Examining how different factions of women sought access to and within the GOP, this book was a gripping read.
Beginning in the aftermath of the 19th Amendment's ratification, the book chronicles women's political activity. Rymph then goes on to explain how different factions developed different definitions of 'women' and 'Republicanism' as the decades subsequently passed.
The rise of the modern conservative movement came through the 1964 campaign. Many of the women party activists independently mobilized behind Barry Goldwater's campaign. They demonstrated that they would not just rubber stamp whomever the party bosses had wanted to receive the nomination.
Such action also illustrated that conservative Republican women were (if not necessarily how I and colleagues would immediately think of it) leaders with political power of their own which would effectively be flexed. Researched from a strictly nonpartisan and scholarly perspective, this work concedes that conservative women are politically effective.
I've read many other books on women and politics, but this work provided a never-before-read perspective. Prior to reading this book, I honestly had no idea that women's role in the Republican party was so complex.
Customer Reviews:
A "must read" for every conservative.......2003-01-25
Senator Barry M. Goldwater in this book of memoirs provides us with important background information to much of what was going on in Washington in the years in which he represented Arizona in the Senate. I found especially interesting and informative his discussions of the McCarthy era, his unsuccessful race against Lyndon Johnston for President in 1964, and the fall of the Nixon presidency. Goldwater was one of the most vocal representatives of conservatism before the rise of neo-conservatism, and much conservative wisdom and common sense can be found in this book.
Just think of that little girl with the daisy..........2001-01-03
And that should set you straight...
Ronald Reagan said of this book that "everyone in America should read this frank accounting of backstage Washington by an honest man. With No Apologies is required reading for those who want to know the inner workings of the political world." Of course, Reagan was on his way to senility, and that should tell you something.
Consign this one to the ash-heap of history.
This is the good one, before he got "old"........2000-11-30
As everyone sadly knows, Barry Goldwater -- never a quitter -- failed to quit while he was ahead. No one will ever know, I guess, whether he became senile in his old age; but as time progressed, the fierce champion of the Right became more and more the gadfly, happily reveling in taking abhorrent Leftist stands and letting the media use him, laughing at him all the while.
These memoirs are Goldwater before the fall, the man who gave us the modern conservative movement, still in rare form and fighting the good fight. Published in 1979, they include not only his political thoughts but his autobiography too (the book is worth buying simply for Goldwater's recounting of the Bay of Pigs and Cuban Missile Crisis, which have not generally been reported as this Armed Services Committee member actually witnessed them).
Ronald Reagan said of this book that "everyone in America should read this frank accounting of backstage Washington by an honest man. With No Apologies is required reading for those who want to know the inner workings of the political world." I couldn't agree more; and we may all be deeply grateful that the good Senator gave us this tome before his decline began.
Books:
- Conservatives Without Conscience
- Cuban Death-Lift
- Death of a Red Heroine
- Debunking 9/11 Myths: Why Conspiracy Theories Can't Stand Up to the Facts
- Defending Pornography: Free Speech, Sex, and the Fight for Women's Rights
- Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit
- Eisenhower on Leadership: Ike's Enduring Lessons in Total Victory Management
- Evita: An Intimate Portrait of Eva Peron
- Evita: The Real Life of Eva Peron
- Fear No Evil: A Novel
Books Index
Books Home
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State & Local Government
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The Conservative Mind: From Burke to Eliot
A Glorious Disaster: Barry Goldwater's Presidential Campaign and the Origins of the Conservative Movement
God and Man at Yale
Capitalism and Freedom: Fortieth Anniversary Edition
Mr. Conservative: Goldwater on Goldwater
