Books : Thieves in High Places: They've Stolen Our Country and It's Time to Take It Back
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by: Jim Hightower
List Price: $15.00Amazon.com's Price: $10.20 You Save: $4.80 (32%)Prices subject to change. Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 973.931
EAN: 9780452285651
ISBN: 0452285658
Label: Plume
Manufacturer: Plume
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 304
Publication Date: June 29, 2004
Publisher: Plume
Release Date: June 29, 2004
Sales Rank: 674393
Studio: Plume
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Editorial Review:
Product Description:
In Thieves in High Places, Jim Hightower takes on the Kleptocrats, Wobblycrats, and Bushites with hilarious results. Digging up behind-the-scenes dirt on stories the corporate news media overlooks (and don’t get him started on them!), Hightower reveals the real stories behind BushCo’s “Friday Night Massacres,” what’s happened to our food, and the Bush plan for empire.
With grassroots solutions, drawing on Hightower’s national Rolling Thunder Down- Home Democracy Tour—a traveling festival of rebellion against every tentacle of the corporate-politico power grab—Hightower is tapping into the activist network that is thriving at kitchen tables all over America. This is the real America the rest of the world doesn’t get to see, delivered with Hightower’s own hilarious brand of wit and outrage.
Amazon.com Review:
Author, populist, and radio commentator Jim Hightower is nothing if not direct. In Thieves in High Places, Hightower lambastes the current American power structure and exhorts his readers to fight against it. Hightower's indignation runs deep in this 'us versus them' exposé of corporate malfeasance, governmental abuse, the militarization of American society, and the Bush administration's empire building. In the first part of the book, Hightower illustrates how the Bush administration and Congress work with major corporations (including our nation's vast media conglomerates) to add to their obscene wealth at the expense of America's working class, our environment, and (most lamentably) our rights and liberties. 'The elites have pulled off a slow-motion coup, radically wrenching America's power balance from a people's democracy to Kleptocrat Nation.'
Hightower defines 'Kleptocrat Nation' as 'a body of people ruled by thieves...a government characterized by the practice of transferring money and power from the many to the few...[and] a ruling class of moneyed elites that usurps liberty, justice, sovereignty, and other, democratic rights from the people.' His catalogue of corporate greed and governmental complicity is breathtaking in scope, and though he admits that the fusion of business and government is not new, he persuasively states that 'never have so few done so much for so few.' Unfortunately, Hightower's serious message is delivered in such a 'down home' style, it may lose its impact on the more brainy among us. Also, one wishes there were more documentation for the copious examples and facts in the book. Still, Hightower's call to action is sincere, and his descriptions of the triumphs of average people over corporate power might give some fledgling activists some hope. Thieves in High Places urges Americans to reclaim control of our government--Hightower thinks we can with community organization and grass-roots movements. However, judging from his description of the current power structure, we are going to need all the help we can get. -- Silvana Tropea
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - So-so
I wouldn't go out on a limb and recommend this book; but I wouldn't degrade it either.
If you despise the current Bush Administration, or love and support them, your view won't be swayed either way.
Rating: - Lots of Complaining, but some good points
In the first 100 Pages of this book there is nothing but complaining. Too much complaining. The second half, he actually starts giving some interesting criticism, and ways to change. The first part of the book is 2 stars the second is 4-5 stars.
Rating:  - We've Been Sold and Don't Even Know It
Rarely does a political book hit the shelf that is valid for more than a year or two after it is released. On very rare occasions, a political book is so well written, and so on target that it can be used for years before it becomes obsolete and this is just such a book.
The author doesn't have a bone to pick with any one particular party, but rather with the way corporations have taken over the political system and are running the country for their own gain. He attacks BushCo, the ... Read More
Rating: - A Good Job Showing How Corrupt the U.S. Government Is
Tho the book does a good job showing how bad the U.S. Government is, but it also advocated overthrowing it in clever ways, like by referring to the Revolutionary War. Iit falls short in that it gives no solution as to how to make the government better in the long run, but rather how to make short term changes and is vague about how to do that as well. The main problem is that the author seems to leave out God as the best solution.
Rating: - It's the Corporations Stupid
Though no one will just come out and call it what it is, Jim Hightower comes the closest to saying, "Our government is being corrupted by public corporations and these corporations must be regulated." "Thieves in High Places" is written in Hightower's humorous, down-home Texas voice, but the book is deadly serious and Hightower exposes the destructiveness of unregulated corporate greed better than anyone I have read yet. There are the usual exposés of corporate and governmental corruption, they ... Read More
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