Power Plays
Win or Lose — How History's Great Political Leaders Play the Game
(amazon)Dick Morris (View Bio)
Hardcover: ReganBooks, 2002; Paperback: ReganBooks, 2003.
POWER PLAYS describes the strategies, tactics, and maneuvers that people and groups have used throughout history to get and keep political power. A contemporary version of Sun Tzu's ART OF WAR, it teaches by example, using selected episodes of U.S. and world history from ancient to modern times. The fundamental principles of winning that these stories from history elucidate are universally applicable in business, military affairs, and politics.
"American journalism too often treats politics as a mere spectator sport full of duplicity, rather than as the machinations of participants in a complex democracy reflecting through their maneuvers the complex and often conflicting and hypocritical feelings of inattentive voters. Understanding these professional strategies sheds light on our democracy's inner workings and on how we can be manipulated. Since open attacks on opponents can ricochet, it's just as effective politically to lure opposition supporters or simply weaken their fervor by seeming to adopt some of their stands." — Los Angeles Times