The Primacy of Politics

I still believe in the importance of politics. I believe a nation's political culture sets the tone and either fosters or undermines all its other cultures from economic to religious. This is true because we live within a nation governed by a State, and despite the purpoted "death of the state" promulagated in the last 20 years by the historically illiterate, we still live within a State structure. The State has changed forms in the last 50 and 100 years as it did in the 50 and 100 before that, but it is still a State.

A great book to read on this topic of the primacy of Politics in American life is "The Rise of American Democracy:Jefferson to Lincoln" by Sean Wilentz. It is astonishingly interesting and brilliant and shows how the seeds of civil war were embedded in the political structure of the nation from the beginning. And if you are interested in elections it literally has AT LEAST 30 to 40 in depth pages on EVERY American election between 1796 and 1860. It helps on understand how elections have evolved into what they are today.

John.