Booklist: America and the World, Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft

America and the World: Conversations on the Future of American Foreign Policy, by Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft
Basic Books/Perseus 2008
274 pages plus acknowledgments and index

Description
There is widespread agreement that something in American foreign policy is broken. Politics and habits of mind left over from the Cold War suddenly seem outdated, almost irrelevant. New challenges have arisen-the sudden prominence of terrorists and other non-state actors, the ascendancy of China as a world power, a widespread distrust of American intentions around the world-to which our responses are halting or ineffective. The problems run much deeper than any one administration: the nature of power itself is shifting. In traditional terms, the US is the most powerful nation since the Roman Empire, yet the limits on ehat its strength can achieve are greater than they were just fifteen years ago. It's essential that we understand and adapt to a new and ever-changing international environment.

Two of the most respected figures in American foreign policy are Zbigniew Brzezinski and Brent Scowcroft-both former National Security Advisers under markedly different administrations. While one author is a Democrat and the other a REpublican, they broadly agree on the need for a new approach. In America and the World they dissect, in lively and unscripted conversations moderated by Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, the most significant foreign policy challenges facing the US: whether we should withdraw our troops from Iraq or keep them there, how we should approach Iran, Israel and Palestine, hoow aggressively we should push to expand NATO to Russian borders, the importance of what Brzezinski has called the "global political awakening", how we can (and must) maintain our role in the Far East, and many other questions. They never hesitate to look into the soul of American policy and explain what we need to reform in order to turn the ship onto a better course. The decisions our nation takes in the next few years could well determine how long it remains a superpower. A deeply informed and provacative book that defines the center of responsible opinion on American foreign policy, America and the World is essential reading for everyone concerned with our country's international role.

Table of Contents
Introduction - David Ignatius
1. How we got here
2. Crises of our own making [Middle East]
3. Two unsolved problems [Arab-Isreal, Iraq-Iran]
4. The virtue of openness: China and the Far east
5. The State with unnatural boundaries [Russia]
6. The indispensable partnership [America and Europe]
7. The politics of cultural dignity [US's foreign policy]
8. The first hundred days [What the new president should do in his first hundred days]
Acknowledgments
Index
About the authors
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In the interests of Order and Method: My Schedule of Regular Posts
*Monday through Friday morning - schedules of President, VP and Secretary of State and her diplomats
*Monday through Friday afternoon - List of topics Limbaugh discussed on his program that day*Monday through Friday througout the day - My posts on anything that I feel like talking about. At least one or two a day, sometimes more.
*Saturday through Sunday morning - An addition to my booklist of political books - covering Democrats, Republicans and other interested parties.