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Washington Burning: How a Frenchman's Vision for Our Nation's Capital Survived Congress, the Founding Fathers, and the Invading British Army
The Riveting Story of the Federal City and the Men Who Built It In 1814, British troops invaded Washington, consuming President Madison’s hastily abandoned dinner before setting his home and the rest of the city ablaze. The White House still bears scorch and soot marks on its foundation stones. It was only after this British lesson in “hard war,” designed to terrorize, that Americans overcame their resistance to the idea of Washington as the nation’s capital and embraced it as a symbol of American might and unity. The dramatic story of how the capital rose from a wilderness is a vital chapter in American history, filled with intrigue and outsized characters–from George Washington to Pierre Charles L’Enfant, the eccentric, passionate, difficult architect who fell in love with his adopted country. This Frenchman–both inspired by the American cause of liberty and wounded while defending it–first endeared himself to then General Washington with a sketch drawn at Valley Forge. Designing buildings, parades, medals, and coins, L’Enfant became the creator of a new American aesthetic, but the early tastemaker had ambition and pride to match his talent. Self-serving and incapable of compromise, he was consumed with his artistic dream of the Federal City, eventually alienating even the president, his onetime champion. Washington struggled to balance L’Enfant’s enthusiasm for his brilliant design with the strident opposition of fiscal conservatives such as Thomas Jefferson, whose counsel eventually led to L’Enfant’s dismissal. The friendships, rivalries, and conflicting ideologies of the principals in this drama–as revealed in their deceptively genteel correspondence and other historical sources–mirror the struggles of a fledgling nation to form a kind of government the world had not yet known. In these pages, as in Last Train to Paradise and Meet You in Hell, master storyteller Les Standiford once again tells a compelling, uniquely American story of hubris and achievement, with a man of epic ambition at its center. Utterly absorbing and scrupulously researched, Washington Burning offers a fresh perspective on the birth of not just a city, but a nation..
Price: $7.98
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Invading Mexico: America's Continental Dream and the Mexican War, 1846-1848
Popular historian Joseph Wheelan recounts James Polk’s strategy of last resort for prying California away from Mexico. He had tried to buy it; he had instructed his agents to encourage a settlers’ revolt. When these measures failed, the impatient president, while cynically condemning Mexico’s anger over America’s annexation of Texas, sent General Zachary Taylor’s army to the Rio Grande River, into territory that Mexico claimed as hers. By provocatively sending Taylor there, the president got his war — and, as bitter corollaries, the scathing criticism of congressional leaders on moral grounds, and Mexico’s lasting distrust of its powerful northern neighbor. The Mexican War was America’s first truly modern war. Steamships ferried troops, daguerreotypes captured the spectacle of infantry and cavalry marching off to battle, newspapermen reported from the front lines for the first time, and telegraphs helped speed news of victories to eager readers back home. For the first time, large numbers of the regular Army’s field-grade officers were West Point-trained. Weapons technology advances such as the mobile field artillery, the Colt six-shooter and the Sharp’s Rifle gave the U.S. Army daunting firepower. These advantages ensured victory even when Mexican troops outnumbered Americans by as much as 4-to-1. .
Price: $9.33
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Napoleon's Egypt: Invading the Middle East
In this vivid and timely history, Juan Cole tells the story of Napoleon's invasion of Egypt. Revealing the young general's reasons for leading the expedition against Egypt in 1798 and showcasing his fascinating views of the Orient, Cole delves into the psychology of the military titan and his entourage. He paints a multi-faceted portrait of the daily travails of the soldiers in Napoleon's army, including how they imagined Egypt, how their expectations differed from what they found, and how they grappled with military challenges in a foreign land. Cole ultimately reveals how Napoleon's invasion, the first modern attempt to invade the Arab world, invented and crystallized the rhetoric of liberal imperialism. You can visit Juan Cole's Blog, Informed Comment at http://www.juancole.com/ .
Price: $15.96
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The Bush Agenda: Invading the World, One Economy at a Time
In The Bush Agenda, Antonia Juhasz exposes a radical corporate globalization agenda that has been refined by leading members and allies of the Bush administration over decades and reached its fullest, most aggressive implementation under George W. Bush—and Bush Agenda adherents plan for it to outlast him. Juhasz uncovers the history and key role of U.S. corporations in the creation of this agenda—focusing on Bechtel, Lockheed Martin, Chevron, and Halliburton—then presents the Iraq War as its most brutal application to date. Expertly revealing the oil timeline driving the war, Juhasz charts exactly how the administration has fundamentally transformed Iraq's economy, locked in sweeping advantages to its corporate allies, and expanded its target to the whole Middle East. The results of these same corporate globalization policies—dislocation, extreme poverty, and increased violence and terrorism—have been demonstrated in regions from South America to Africa to the Middle East and Asia, and in the United States. Extensively researched and now updated with a new afterword, The Bush Agenda is a brilliant, informative analysis, revealing the hard truths about where the Bush administration and its corporate allies are leading the modern world—and what we can do about it. .
Price: $2.40
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Prayer is Invading the Impossible
With God all things are possible Matthew 19:26 Prayer is not a mystical experience of a few special people, but an aggressive act in the face of impossibility—an act that may be performed by anyone who will accept the challenge of learning to pray. Jack Hayford's Prayer Is Invading the Impossible is a practical, how-to book that encourages you to do just that—pray! This best-selling book will show you how to: face seeming impossibilities.
be honest with God and yourself.
wage effective spiritual warfare.
find victory for life. "Prayer can change anything," Pastor Hayford writes. "The impossible doesn't exist. His is the power'. Ours is the prayer. Without Him, we cannot. Without us, He will not." Originally published in 1977, Prayer Is Invading the Impossible is Pastor Hayford's first book. Over the past 25 years, it has become a prayer classic. Read this Silver Anniversary Edition, and learn why!.
Price: $3.49
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Divine Intervention: True Stories of Heaven Invading Earth
There's a blaze of light in every word... This riveting collection of stories lifts us into the awe of knowing that Biblical accounts of encounters with God are available to all of us today. Ordinary believers and current church leaders tell you about their Encounters on the Road Less Traveled, Angel Sightings & Life-Changing Spiritual Experiences. As you read, know this God is as near to you as your own heartbeat. It is the Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom, too. Stories from filmmakers, prophets, pastors, housewives, students, and businessmen give a glimpse of a God's kingdom manifest as they: entertain angels unaware that they are not humans; experience a vision that transforms their ministry; encounter God on the road less traveled; and enjoy the presence of Jesus while becoming saturated in His love..
Price: $15.00
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The Threatening Storm: The Case for Invading Iraq
In The Threatening Storm, Kenneth M. Pollack, one of the world’s leading experts on Iraq, provides a masterly insider’s perspective on the crucial issues facing the United States as it moves toward a new confrontation with Saddam Hussein. For the past fifteen years, as an analyst on Iraq for the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Council, Kenneth Pollack has studied Saddam as closely as anyone else in the United States. In 1990, he was one of only three CIA analysts to predict the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. As the principal author of the CIA’s history of Iraqi military strategy and operations during the Gulf War, Pollack gained rare insight into the methods and workings of what he believes to be the most brutal regime since Stalinist Russia. Examining all sides of the debate and bringing a keen eye to the military and geopolitical forces at work, Pollack ultimately comes to this controversial conclusion: through our own mistakes, the perfidy of others, and Saddam’s cunning, the United States is left with few good policy options regarding Iraq. Increasingly, the option that makes the most sense is for the United States to launch a full-scale invasion, eradicate Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction, and rebuild Iraq as a prosperous and stable society—for the good of the United States, the Iraqi people, and the entire region. Pollack believed for many years that the United States could prevent Saddam from threatening the stability of the Persian Gulf and the world through containment—a combination of sanctions and limited military operations. Here, Pollack explains why containment is no longer effective, and why other policies intended to deter Saddam ultimately pose a greater risk than confronting him now, before he gains possession of nuclear weapons and returns to his stated goal of dominating the Gulf region. “It is often said that war should be employed only in the last resort,” Pollack writes. “I reluctantly believe that in the case of the threat from Iraq, we have come to the last resort.” Offering a view of the region that has the authority and force of an intelligence report, Pollack outlines what the leaders of neighboring Arab countries are thinking, what is necessary to gain their support for an invasion, how a successful U.S. operation would be mounted, what the likely costs would be, and how Saddam might react. He examines the state of Iraq today—its economy, its armed forces, its political system, the status of its weapons of mass destruction as best we understand them, and the terrifying security apparatus that keeps Saddam in power. Pollack also analyzes the last twenty years of relations between the United States and Iraq to explain how the two countries reached the unhappy standoff that currently prevails. Commanding in its insights and full of detailed information about how leaders on both sides will make their decisions, The Threatening Storm is an essential guide to understanding what may be the crucial foreign policy challenge of our time..
Price: $4.75
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Invading Secular Space: Strategies for Tomorrow's Church
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