The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History,   ISBN:9780895260475

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(Note: I originally posted this a month or so ago as "a kid's review" by accident. You'll have to take my word that I'm the "kid" in question.)

Thomas E. Woods is clearly of the Pat Buchanan/Ron Paul school of conservativism, where every single thing the government does is inherently evil and that any American involvement in world affairs is wrong. (Despite many reviews on here, he is not in any way, shape or form a "neo-con".) Not only that, but Woods is also a founding member of the League of the South, which openly advocates Southern secession from the Union and white supremacy. The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History, posturing as some sort of "cool", provocative alternative depiction of America, is colored by this ignorant, small-minded point-of-view, an irreverent screed not worthy of a thinking person, let alone a pHD.

Woods makes a number of laughable claims throughout, many of which are hard to stomach, to say the least. Some of the more egregious include:

- Woods has some, shall we say, creative interpretations of the Constitution. The very fact that states entered into a Union specifically to form a strong government is an argument "libertarians" like Woods constantly misunderstand. The Articles of Confederation, which WERE a voluntarily, impermanent contract of states, was a complete failure, and the Constitution was convened SPECIFICALLY to create a STRONGER Union of states. And about all that Woods musters to argue for a Constitutional right for secession is a very questionable interpretation of the Ninth Amendment and a handful of quotes from the virulently pro-secessionist John C. Calhoun. Nice research.

- The quote about Ulysses S. Grant surrendering his sword to the Confederacy if he thought the war was about slavery is apocryphal, unsourced nonsense. Nor is Wood's claim about Grant owning slaves up to snuff either; he owned one slave through his wife's family and Grant freed him almost immediately. It's not untrue, but at best it's intellectually dishonest. It also doesn't take into account Grant's strict enforcement of Reconstruction and campaign against the Ku Klux Klan during his time as President - but then again, context is usually anathema to ideologues.

- Yes, slavery was not the only cause of the Civil War, and yes, not every soldier or leader in the South (or North for that matter) had an interest in slavery. All this proves is that different people had different motivations for fighting, and that slavery was a complex issue whose perfidious tentacles reached in every direction. All of the reasons Woods tries to rebutt the idea that slavery is the cause of the war, are hackneyed and reductive; economic issues, "states rights" (long a codeword for protecting institutional bigotry), tariffs, and "Northern dominance" all tie back to slavery in one form or another. About the best argument Woods can make is that Northerners were racist too, which is unquestionably true; but one side was fighting to abolish slavery, and was side was fighting to preserve it. Moral equivalence is the refuge of the intellectually bankrupt, and it doesn't even begin to bridge the gap here.

- Despite a lengthy chapter on the alleged "evils" of Reconstruction, Woods does not once mention the KKK or the violence perpetrated against blacks and White Republicans in the South throughout the period. The way Woods tells it, the defeated Southerners were just minding their own business until the Black Republican Einsatzgruppen came South and started terrorizing ex-Confederates, apparently for the fun of it. Well, it's easy to paint such an idiotic, simplistic view of Reconstruction if you completely ignore one side of the issue.

- Woods' chapter on World War I is beyond laughable. According to Woods Germany was the "least responsible" for the outbreak of the war - this regarding a country who had been constantly provoking conflicts with France and Britain over Morocco and West Africa - not to mention his meddling in the Middle East and India. German atrocities in Belgium were indeed greatly exaggerated by Allied propagandists, but to hear Woods tell it, they didn't exist in the first place. Woods cites Luxembourg's willingness to allow German troops through its country as a model Belgium should have followed, conveniently ignoring that Luxembourg had neither an army to oppose Germany nor an alliance with Britain or France. Britain's blockade of Germany is treated as an evil on par with the Holocaust, but apparently Wilhelm's unrestricted submarine warfare is okay. Wilhelm's sinking of American ships is ignored, the Zimmermann telegram not mentioned, and Wilson portrayed as an ideologue eagerly seeking to plunge America to war.

- Woods says that the 1920's were a totally awesome time to be alive, and that Harding and Coolidge were among the best Presidents we ever had. The economy was booming, wasn't it? Woods asks. Well, yes, the economy was seemingly solid, but it was a false prosperity that ultimately collapsed. Not to mention that the "return to normalcy" in this time period led to the resurgence of the KKK and other racist groups, xenophobia and Red-baiting, and the inherent problems in Prohibition. Did Harding and Coolidge's policies have anything to do with the economic collapse of 1929? Apparently not - it just happened, as far as we can tell from Woods.

- Woods is on the same page as Pat Buchanan regarding World War II, namely that Churchill and FDR worked hand in glove to drag the world into war, glossing over or implicitly excusing Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan's aggressive actions. This ignores all the very obvious evidence that Hitler was not a rational statesman who just wanted to be left alone, but a murderous expansionist whose lust for power was insatiable. Yes, we could have avoided a world war if we'd let Hitler and Tojo grab all the land they wanted - that much is obvious, but I don't see that as much of a point. The reason the Allies made a stand over Poland, which Woods harps on as being a military dictatorship and militarily indefensbile, is that they had finally come to their senses regarding the Nazis. It wasn't "war-mongering" to finally confront a nakedly aggressive dictator after years of appeasing of him. Woods shares with Buchanan a virulent Anglophobia which is curiously common among paleoconservatives, seeing the British as the ultimate cause of evil in the world, a laughably oversimplified and anachronistic worldview.

- Harry Truman violates the Constitution by declaring the Truman Doctrine and committing troops to the Korean War. This is arguable in and of itself given how flexible the Constitution is regarding the use of military force. The funny part is that Woods spends several chapters delineating the pervasive Communist threat in and outside of the United States, then does an about-face and lambasts Truman for opposing Communism.

- In a similar vein, Woods treats Truman's intervention in Korea as a unique (for the time) action of a President "violating the Constitution" by sending troops abroad without Congressional approval. Really. No mention of Thomas Jefferson's Barbary Pirate Wars, or the US government's campaigns against Native Americans, or various other "small wars" in Latin America and elsewhere through the 19th and early 20th Centuries. It's not really surprising that Woods would ignore such evidence though.

- The absolute nadir of Woods' book is his treatment of Civil Rights. For a man who has elsewhere declared that Southern whites must not "give control over their civilization and its institutions to another race", it ought not be surprising, but his chapters on the Civil Rights Movement are scarcely better than an endorsement of segregation. He views Brown Vs. Board and the Civil Rights Act not as the government stepping in to ensure equality, but as a fascist government oppressing the rights of Southerners to govern themselves (and oppress their Negroes), and that Civil Rights leaders like Martin Luther King are dangerous ideologues who did more harm than good. This means, in Woods' eyes, the bigger issue is NOT that over 10% of America's population were being denied equal rights, but that the government was heavy-handed in giving them said rights! I'd say Woods doesn't get the concept of ends justifying means, especially true in the case of Civil Rights, but I'm not even sure that Woods would agree that the ends were justified.

It's one thing to have a point-of-view, and no history author is going to be entirely free of bias. But if you're going to go out of your way to present a biased worldview, at least do so in an entertaining manner. At the very least, Woods is honest about his bias, and the repellant bias crowed about on the front and back cover should warn the more intellectually honest readers away.

Customer Rating: 

This book rights the wrongs and brings truth to our table. Those who claim that this book is full of falsehoods bring to my mind the old adage, don't confuse me with the facts, my mind is already made up!

Customer Rating: 

Thomas E. Woods is clearly of the Pat Buchanan/Ron Paul school of conservativism, where every single thing the government does is inherently evil and that any American involvement in world affairs is wrong. (Despite many reviews on here, he is not in any way, shape or form a "neo-con".) Not only that, but Woods is also a founding member of the League of the South, which openly advocates Southern secession from the Union and white supremacy. The Politically Incorrect Guide to American History, posturing as some sort of "cool", provocative alternative depiction of America, is colored by this ignorant, small-minded point-of-view, an irreverent screed not worthy of a thinking person, let alone a pHD.

Woods makes a number of laughable claims throughout, many of which are hard to stomach, to say the least. Some of the more egregious include:

- Woods has some, shall we say, creative interpretations of the Constitution. The very fact that states entered into a Union specifically to form a strong government is an argument "libertarians" like Woods constantly misunderstand. The Articles of Confederation, which WERE a voluntarily, impermanent contract of states, was a complete failure, and the Constitution was convened SPECIFICALLY to create a STRONGER Union of states. And about all that Woods musters to argue for a Constitutional right for secession is a very questionable interpretation of the Ninth Amendment and a handful of quotes from the virulently pro-secessionist John C. Calhoun. Nice research.

- The quote about Ulysses S. Grant surrendering his sword to the Confederacy if he thought the war was about slavery is apocryphal, unsourced nonsense. Nor is Wood's claim about Grant owning slaves up to snuff either; he owned one slave through his wife's family and Grant freed him almost immediately. It's not untrue, but at best it's intellectually dishonest. It also doesn't take into account Grant's strict enforcement of Reconstruction and campaign against the Ku Klux Klan during his time as President - but then again, context is usually anathema to ideologues.

- Yes, slavery was not the only cause of the Civil War, and yes, not every soldier or leader in the South (or North for that matter) had an interest in slavery. All this proves is that different people had different motivations for fighting, and that slavery was a complex issue whose perfidious tentacles reached in every direction. All of the reasons Woods tries to rebutt the idea that slavery is the cause of the war, are hackneyed and reductive; economic issues, "states rights" (long a codeword for protecting institutional bigotry), tariffs, and "Northern dominance" all tie back to slavery in one form or another. About the best argument Woods can make is that Northerners were racist too, which is unquestionably true; but one side was fighting to abolish slavery, and was side was fighting to preserve it. Moral equivalence is the refuge of the intellectually bankrupt, and it doesn't even begin to bridge the gap here.

- Despite a lengthy chapter on the alleged "evils" of Reconstruction, Woods does not once mention the KKK or the violence perpetrated against blacks and White Republicans in the South throughout the period. The way Woods tells it, the defeated Southerners were just minding their own business until the Black Republican Einstazgruppen came South and started terrorizing ex-Confederates, apparently for the fun of it. Well, it's easy to paint such an idiotic, simplistic view of Reconstruction if you completely ignore one side of the issue.

- Woods' chapter on World War I is beyond laughable. According to Woods Germany was the "least responsible" for the outbreak of the war - this regarding a country who had been constantly provoking conflicts with France and Britain over Morocco and West Africa - not to mention his meddling in the Middle East and India. German atrocities in Belgium were indeed greatly exaggerated by Allied propagandists, but to hear Woods tell it, they didn't exist in the first place. Woods cites Luxembourg's willingness to allow German troops through its country as a model Belgium should have followed, conveniently ignoring that Luxembourg had neither an army to oppose Germany nor an alliance with Britain or France. Britain's blockade of Germany is treated as an evil on par with the Holocaust, but apparently Wilhelm's unrestricted submarine warfare is okay. Wilhelm's sinking of American ships is ignored, the Zimmermann telegram not mentioned, and Wilson portrayed as an ideologue eagerly seeking to plunge America to war.

- Woods says that the 1920's were a totally awesome time to be alive, and that Harding and Coolidge were among the best Presidents we ever had. The economy was booming, wasn't it? Woods asks. Well, yes, the economy
was seemingly good, but it was a false prosperity that ultimately collapsed. Not to mention that the "return to normalcy" in this time period led to the resurgence of the KKK and other racist groups, xenophobia and Red-baiting, and the inherent problems in Prohibition. Did Harding and Coolidge's policies have anything to do with the economic collapse of 1929? Apparently not - it just happened, as far as we can tell from Woods.

- Woods is on the same page as Pat Buchanan regarding World War II, namely that Churchill and FDR worked hand in glove to drag the world into war, glossing over or implicitly excusing Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan's aggressive actions. This ignores all the very obvious evidence that Hitler was not a rational statesman who just wanted to be left alone, but a murderous expansionist who. Yes, we could have avoided a world war if we'd let Hitler and Tojo grab all the land they wanted - that much is obvious, but I don't see that as much of a point. The reason the Allies made a stand over Poland, which Woods harps on as being a military dictatorship and militarily indefensbile, is that they had finally come to their senses regarding the Nazis. It wasn't "war-mongering" to finally confront a nakedly aggressive dictator after years of appeasing of him. Woods shares with Buchanan a virulent Anglophobia which is curiously common among paleoconservatives, seeing the British as the ultimate cause of evil in the world, a laughably oversimplified and anachronistic worldview.

- Harry Truman violates the Constitution by declaring the Truman Doctrine and committing troops to the Korean War. This is arguable in and of itself given how flexible the Constitution is regarding the use of military force. The funny part is that Woods spends several chapters delineating the pervasive Communist threat in and outside of the United States, then does an about-face and lambasts Truman for opposing Communism.

- In a similar vein, Woods treats Truman's intervention in Korea as a unique (for the time) action of a President "violating the Constitution" by sending troops abroad without Congressional approval. Really. No mention of Thomas Jefferson's Barbary Pirate Wars, or the US government's campaigns against Native Americans, or various other "small wars" in Latin America and elsewhere through the 19th and early 20th Centuries. It's not really surprising that Woods would ignore such evidence though.

- The absolute nadir of Woods' book is his treatment of Civil Rights. For a man who has elsewhere declared that Southern whites must not "give control over their civilization and its institutions to another race", it ought not be surprising, but his chapters on the Civil Rights Movement are scarcely better than an endorsement of segregation. He views Brown Vs. Board and the Civil Rights Act not as the government stepping in to ensure equality, but as a fascist government oppressing the rights of Southerners to govern themselves (and oppress their Negroes), and that Civil Rights leaders like Martin Luther King are dangerous ideologues who did more harm than good. This means, in Woods' eyes, the bigger issue is NOT that over 10% of America's population were being denied equal rights, but that the government was heavy-handed in giving them said rights! I'd say Woods doesn't get the concept of ends justifying means, especially true in the case of Civil Rights, but I'm not even sure that Woods would agree that the ends were justified.

It's one thing to have a point-of-view, and no history author is going to be entirely free of bias. But if you're going to go out of your way to present a biased worldview, at least do so in an entertaining manner. At the very least, Woods is honest about his bias, and the repellant bias crowed about on the front and back cover should warn the more intellectually honest readers away.

Customer Rating: 

Numerous mistakes and contortions are already pointed out in previous reviews; I'll add one I have seen yet. Woods refers to the 3/5ths stipulation for slaves as a generous compromise by Southerners at the Constitutional convention since they were giving up significant representation in national elections. If slaves had counted as a full person, Woods argues, the South would have had the advantage of more votes in national elections. Whoa! So Woods is giving the white slave owners the benefit of actually allowing the blacks to vote at all... and I suppose these slaves would also vote to continue slavery? Quite a stretch.

The entire book is a collection of ass-hat arguments justifying all manner of right wing peccadilloes: prayer in schools, unlimited gun rights, states' rights toward slavery, etc. He implies that the South treated blacks more humanely than the North among other things. I only got through the first couple chapters and had to put it down or my brain would melt.

Customer Rating: 

One of the earliest of the PIG books in the series, Mr. Woods lays out a basic framework for a fresh perspective in American History. This short 243-page ride takes us from the colonial origins of our nation's history to the close of the Clinton years. I found it highly readable, but I must deduct a star because I wished that he would have had endnotes to complement his statements, but in all fairness he does include endnotes in his later books. In terms of raw history the facts and figures were pretty accurate with a small exception stating that former New Jersey senator Harrison Williams was a Republican when in reality he was a Democrat who met an ignominious end in the early 1980s.

Mr. Woods basic survey does contain a bibliography that directs readers to books that expand on the points that he made in this guide. A job well done.