References

This page lists some of the references I have found valuable that relate to the subjects of this blog. Occasionally, I will put comments about the reference directly below it. I will update it from time to time.

References on Economics

[E1] Skousen, Mark. The Making of Modern Economics: The Lives and Ideas of the Great Thinkers, 2d edition. Armonk, New York. M.E. Sharpe. 2009
This is my “go to” book on economics that I recommend to everyone who wants to understand the basics of economics. As much a history book as a book on economics, it explains the historical context in which economic ideas were developed.

[E2] Hayek, Friedrich A. The Road to Serfdom, Chicago. University of Chicago Press. 1944

A classic book by an advocate of neoclassical economics (specifically the Austrian School of Economics), this book warns of the dangers of  state control of the economy.

[E3] Woods, Thomas E. Jr. Meltdown: A Free-Market Look at Why the Stock Market Collapsed, the Economy Tanked, and Government Bail-outs Will Make Things Worse. Washington DC. Regnery Publishing. 2009

[E4] Wallison, Peter J. Hidden in Plain Sight. New York. Encounter Books. 2015

The last two references are concerned with the causes and effects of the 2007-2008 financial crises. Reference [E4] is written by a dissenting member of the 2010 Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, also known as the Angelides Commission, that was appointed by the U.S. government to investigate the causes of the crisis. This book also discusses the primary progressive response to the crisis, which was the Dodd-Frank act.

[E5] Samuelson, Paul A. Economics, 8th edition. New York. McGraw-Hill. 1970

A classic economics textbook with a Keynesian point of view.

[E6] Shlaes, Amity. The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression. New York. HarperCollins Publishers. 2008

[E7] Powell, Jim. FDR’s Folly: How Roosevelt and His New Deal Prolonged the Great Depression. New York. Three Rivers Press. 2003

[E8] Peirce, Hester and Broughel, James (ed). Dodd-Frank: What it Does and Why It’s Flawed. Arlington, VA. Mercatus Center. 2012

[E9] Wallison, Peter J. Bad History, Worse Policy: How a False Narrative About the Financial Crisis led to the Dodd-Frank Act. Washington DC, AEI Press. 2013

[E10] Friedman, Milton and Friedman, Rose. Free to Choose. New York. Harcourt Brace Jovanovic. 1980

A classic defense of the free-market with minimal government intrusion.

[E11] McCulloch, J. Huston. Money and Inflation: A Monetarist Approach. New York. Academic Press. 1975

Monetary theory of inflation with relatively simple mathematics.

[E12] Tuerck, David G. Macroeconomics: Integrating Theory, Policy, and Practice for a New Era. New York. Business Expert Press. 2015

A macroeconomics text book by a New Classical economist.

[E13] Barro, Robert J. Macroeconomics, Fourth Edition. New York. John Wiley & Sons. 1993

An excellent New Classical textbook on macroeconomics!

References on American Culture, Politics, and Government


[P1] Bowen, Catherine Drinker. Miracle at Philadelphia: The Story of the Constitutional Convention May to September 1787. Boston. Little, Brown and Company. 1966

[P2] Murray, Charles. Losing Ground: American Social Policy 1950-1980. New York. Basic Books. 1984

Murray’s book is a very seminal work on the limits of the federal government’s capability to fight poverty. He notes that much of Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty was counterproductive.

[P3] Alexis de Tocqueville. Democracy in America: All Volumes. Waxkeep Publishing. Kindle Edition. 2013

[P4] George Yancey and David A. Williamson. So Many Christians, So Few Lions: Is There Christianophobia in the United States?. Roman & Littlefield. Kindle Edition. 2015

This text helps illustrate how far progressive intolerance and their inclination toward authoritarianism have advanced.

[P5] Dean Reuter and John Yoo, Editors. Liberty’s Nemesis: The Unchecked Expansion of the State. Encounter Books. New York, 2016

An important recent publication on some of the many ways in which the American State is moving along Friedrich Hayek’s Road to Serfdom (Reference [E2]) toward a fascist state. Each chapter is an essay on a particular way in which the U.S. Constitution is being greatly eroded. There are chapters on Obamacare, freedom of religion, threats to free speech, the use of the IRS to silence conservatives, as well as a number of chapters discussing executive overreach through administrative laws and regulations.

[P6] Kim R. Holmes. The Closing of the Liberal Mind: How Groupthink and Intolerance Define the Left. New York. Encounter Books. 2016

References on Foreign Policy and National Defense 

[FP1] Grygiel, Jakob J. and Mitchell, A. Weiss. The Unquiet Frontier: Rising Rivals, Vulnerable Allies, and the Crisis of American Power. Princeton, N.J. Princeton University Press. 2016

An important book that points out what can happen to countries that fail to consult with reality on whether or not the idea of empire is an archaic concept.

References on History
[H1] Johnson, Paul. A History of the American People. New York. HarperCollins Publishers. 1997


[H2] Ferguson, Niall. Civilization: The West and the Rest. New York. Penguin Press. 2011


[H3] Lewis, Bernard. The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2000 Years. New York. Scribner. 1995




[H4] Lewis, Bernard. The Crisis of Islam: Holy War and Unholy Terror. New York. Modern Library. 2003

[H5] Ackerman, Kenneth D. Boss Tweed: The Rise and Fall of the Corrupt Pol Who Conceived the Soul of Modern New York. New York: Carroll & Graf. 2005

[H6] Lewis, Bernard. What Went Wrong?: Western Impact and Middle Eastern Response. New York. Oxford University Press. 2001

[H7] Sanandaji, Nima. Scandinavian Unexceptconalism: Culture, Markets and the Failure of Third-Way Socialism. London. The Institute of Economic Affairs. 2015

A very important monograph by a Swedish economist of Kurdish heritage that debunks the progressive belief in the success of Scandinavian “socialism”.

[H8] McNeill, William H. The Rise of the West: A History of the Human Community, Kindle eBook edition. Chicago. The University of Chicago Press. 1963

A classic text on the development of human civilization and the closing of the global ecumene.

[H9] Hibbert, Christopher. The Days of the French Revolution. New York. Morrow Quill Paperbacks. 1981

[H10] Herrold, J. Christopher. The Age of Napoleon. New York. American Heritage Publishing. 1985

References on Science

[S1] Spencer, Roy W. The Great Global Warming Blunder: How Mother Nature Fooled the World’s Top Climate Scientists. New York, Encounter Books, 2010

[S2] Kuhn, Thomas S. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Fourth Edition. Chicago. University of Chicago Press

[S3] Strogatz, Steven H. Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos: With Applications to Physics, Biology, Chemistry, and Engineering, Boulder, CO. Westview Press. 2015

An introductory textbook on chaos theory and its applications. The highest level of mathematics required is calculus of functions with a single independent variable.

References on Ideologies and Philosophy

[IP1] Sloman, Steven and Fernbach, Phillip. The Knowledge Illusion: Why We Never Think Alone. New York. Riverbed Books. 2017