Product Description: ‘Intelligent and Inspiring’, A Preface to Politics - Revolution and Culture by Walter Lippmann. The most incisive comment on politics to-day is indifference. When men and women begin to feel that elections and legislatures do not matter very much, that politics is a rather distant and unimportant exercise, the reformer might as well put to himself a few searching doubts...read more

An Unabridged Edition to Include Parts 1 through 8, And Original Footnotes -

The most incisive comment on politics to-day is indifference. When men and women begin to feel that elections and legislatures do not matter very much, that politics is a rather distant and unimportant exercise, the reformer might as well put to himself a few searching doubts. Indifference is a criticism that cuts beneath oppositions and wranglings by calling the political method itself into question. Leaders in public affairs recognize this. They know that no attack is so disastrous as silence, that no invective is so blasting as the wise and indulgent smile of the people who do not care. Eager to believe that all the world is as interested as they are, there comes a time when even the reformer is compelled to face the fairly widespread suspicion of the average man that politics is an exhibition in which there is much ado about nothing. But such moments of illumination are rare. They appear in writers who realize how large is the public that doesn't read their books, in reformers who venture to compare the membership list of their league with the census of the United States. Whoever has been granted such a moment of insight knows how exquisitely painful it is. To conquer it men turn generally to their ancient comforter, self-deception: they complain about the stolid, inert masses and the apathy of the people. In a more confidential tone they will tell you that the ordinary citizen is a "hopelessly private person."

(view table of contents)

This selection of correspondence written by the man who was America's political conscience spans the years from 1907 to 1969 and includes letters to President Frankin D. Roosevelt and responses to inquisitive graduate students

A comprehensive selection of the political analyst's works which present his views on such topics as the dilemma of liberal democracy

Compiles the transcripts of Sevareid's interviews, from 1964 to 1976, with respected and influential men and women involved with the events and people shaping American domestic and foreign policies

A collection of the late journalist's portraits of and reflections on important men and women of his time