Background
Bennett, James Thomas was born on October 19, 1942 in Memphis, Tennessee, United States.
( Stifling Political Competition examines the history and...)
Stifling Political Competition examines the history and array of laws, regulations, subsidies and programs that benefit the two major parties and discourage even the possibility of a serious challenge to the Democrat-Republican duopoly. The analysis synthesizes political science, economics and American history to demonstrate how the two-party system is the artificial creation of a network of laws, restrictions and subsidies that favor the Democrats and Republicans and cripple potential challenges. The American Founders, as it has been generally forgotten, distrusted political parties. Nowhere in the U.S. Constitution are parties mentioned, much less given legal protection or privilege. This provocative book traces how by the end of the Civil War the Republicans and Democrats had guaranteed their dominance and subsequently influenced a range of policies developed to protect the duopoly. For example, Bennett examines how the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 (as amended in 1974 and 1976), which was sold to the public as a nonpartisan act of good government reformism actually reinforced the dominance of the two parties. While focused primarily on the American experience, the book does consider the prevalence of two-party systems around the world (especially in emerging democracies) and the widespread contempt with which they are often viewed. The concluding chapter considers the potential of truly radical reform toward opening the field to vigorous, lively, contentious third-party candidacies that might finally offer alienated voters a choice, not an echo.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0387098208/?tag=2022091-20
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B010YPQ9J6/?tag=2022091-20
(This work assesses, with scholarly scrupulousness and irr...)
This work assesses, with scholarly scrupulousness and irreverent wit, the ways in which the American male is being blamed, castigated, slandered, emasculated, and just plain harassed for a multitude of crimes and sins because of a single trait: "maleness." From cradle to grave, public policy and the teachings of the groves of the academe are increasingly shaped by an anti-male bias. Chapters examine the ways in which American men and maleness are punished in childhood; in school; in history texts; in language; in the wallet; in religion; and even in recreation. Although the book's tone is often light, the subject is a serious one that the mainstream media often avoids. The Politics of American Feminism debunks dated myths, defends individual liberty against feminist assaults, offers an impious take on the narrow focus of the women's movement, and has as a central premise that not only are men essential to the health of the nation and the survival of the species, but they also have a few salutary qualities as well.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0761837833/?tag=2022091-20
( The diet industry feeds on the hopes and the fears of ...)
The diet industry feeds on the hopes and the fears of those who need-or think that they need-to lose weight. Since the publication of the first known diet book in 1864, a host of sanctimonious preachers and self-proclaimed experts-often overweight themselves-have stoked fears of obesity effectively for both profit and political power, none more so than former surgeon general C. Everett Koop. In Public Health Profiteering, James T. Bennett and Thomas J. DiLorenzo offer a scathing and irreverent assessment of Koop's public and private career showing how a brilliant pediatric surgeon has evolved into a self-seeking and hypocritical public scold. During his term as Surgeon General under the Bush administration, Koop, enamored of the military trappings of title and uniform, saw himself as leading an army of public health administrators against an enemy. As often as not, the enemy took on the disquieting countenance of the American people. In Koop's view they were stupid, improvident, feckless, unable to make the simplest decisions about their lives. As Bennett and DiLorenzo show, he used his position as a bully pulpit for intemperate attacks on the tobacco and alcohol industries and to irresponsibly exaggerate the dangers of obesity. While taking a prohibitionist line, Koop himself smoked a pipe, drank martinis, and weighed in at a hefty 210 pounds. Although Koop claimed that he would never cash in on his office, his subsequent career tells a far different story. He has lobbied, hawked, and endorsed products for a host of firms: Wyeth Ayerst (makers of the dubious diet drug Fen-Phen), Weight Watchers, Jenny Craig, Intel, Neurocrine, Kelloggs, BioPure, and many others. Lively in style and carefully researched, Public Health Profiteering will be of interest to health policy specialists, political scientists, economists, and media analysts. James T. Bennett is professor of economics at George Mason University. He is founder and editor of the Journal of Labor Research and has authored many books and articles, including Health Research Charities: Image and Reality and Official Lies: How Washington Misleads Us, co-authored with Thomas DiLorenzo. Thomas DiLorenzo is professor of economics at the Sellinger School of Business and Management at Loyola College in Baltimore. He has co-authored many books and is widely published in academic journals as well as the popular press, including the Wall Street Journal and USA Today.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0765800748/?tag=2022091-20
( The past two decades have seen the growth of well-coord...)
The past two decades have seen the growth of well-coordinated networks of political activists who have managed to obtain hundreds of millions of taxpayers' dollars for political lobbying. Although federal regulations prohibit such activities, loopholes in the law allow these monies to be masked as private resources. State and federal taxpayers, monies fund the lobbying efforts of private advocacy groups on both the political left and the right. In Tax-Funded Politics, James Bennett argues that governmental agencies, rather than combating theses abuses, aid and abet them in order to increase their own size and scope. Drawing on a broad range of examples, Bennett shows how the ideals of the nation's Founding Fathers have been subverted by molding and manipulating the will of the people through government-orchestrated propaganda. Government agencies, far from being indifferent to self-aggrandizement and the consolidation of wealth and power, are concerned with their own self-interest, whether it is enhancing their budget or supporting a particular political agenda. Likewise, nonprofit entities claim to operate solely in the "public interest" but also engage in political advocacy and lobbying activities. But when charities do the lobbying, blatant self-interest is wrapped in the halo of the "public interest." Tax-Funded Politics exposes dozens of mutually beneficial arrangements between government and charities involving hundreds of millions of dollars. It then explores their implications. Groups that receive government funds are loath to criticize failed government programs and are advocates for the expansion of the agencies that provide their support. Even charities learn not to bite the hand that feeds them. Although the vast majority of the funds are directed to nonprofit groups on the left of the political spectrum, so-called conservative organizations have also sought and received taxpayers' funds, despite promise to get government off our back and out of our pockets.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/076580235X/?tag=2022091-20
(A study of the long-term decline of the labour movement i...)
A study of the long-term decline of the labour movement in America, exploring the outlook for labour and unions in the 21st century. There are insights from contributors from a range of backgrounds - academic and non-academic, domestic and foreign, pro- and anti-union.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0765608510/?tag=2022091-20
( Not Invited to the Party demonstrates how the dominant ...)
Not Invited to the Party demonstrates how the dominant political parties--the Democrats and Republicans--have co-opted the system to their advantage. James Bennett examines the history and array of laws, regulations, subsidies and programs that benefit the two major parties and discourage even the possibility of a serious challenge to the Democrat-Republican duopoly. The American Founders, as it has been generally forgotten, distrusted political parties. Nowhere in the U.S. Constitution are parties mentioned, much less given legal protection or privilege. This provocative book traces how by the end of the Civil War the Republicans and Democrats had guaranteed their dominance and subsequently influenced a range of policies developed to protect the duopoly. For example, Bennett examines how the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 (as amended in 1974 and 1976), which was sold to the public as a nonpartisan act of good government reformism actually reinforced the dominance of the two parties. While focused primarily on the American experience, the book also considers the prevalence of two-party systems around the world (especially in emerging democracies) and the widespread contempt with which they are often viewed. Featuring incisive commentary on the 2008 election, and a foreword by third-party iconoclast, Ralph Nader, the book considers the potential of truly radical reform toward opening the field to vigorous, lively, contentious independent candidacies that might finally offer alienated voters a choice, not an echo.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1441903658/?tag=2022091-20
( Barely a day goes by without news of the latest public...)
Barely a day goes by without news of the latest public health threat from the American media. Some of us are told we live in a "cancer cluster"-an area with a disproportionate number of cancer deaths. During the summer months, those who live in or near urban areas are bombarded with daily smog measurements and air pollution alerts. City water supplies are frequently called health hazards. At times, it seems as though virtually everything we eat and drink is denounced as bad for us by some "public health expert." Our cars burn too much gasoline; we own too many firearms; we are too fat; some of us are too skinny. Americans today are living longer than they ever have before. Why the almost daily announcements of new public health threats and proclamations of impending crises? Bennett and DiLorenzo address this question and others here. They begin by examining the large public health bureaucracy, its preoccupation with expanding governmental programs, and its concern with political issues that too often have little to do with improving public health. Then they trace the evolution of the American public health movement from its founding after the Civil War to the 1950s. They describe the transformation of public health's focus from the eradication of disease to social policy as a by-product of the 1960s. Bennett and DiLorenzo catalogue the "radicalization" of the public health movement by discussing its numerous political initiatives. They include case studies of the politicization of the public health movement in America. The authors reveal various methods of statistical manipulation that certain public health researchers use to "cook the data" in order to achieve politically correct results. A final chapter discusses the implications of the transformation of public health from pathology to politics. This vigorously argued analysis sees the public health movement as claiming expertise on virtually every social issue, from poverty to human rights. Students of public policy and public health officials, along with readers interested in public health issues, will find this absorbing reading.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0765800233/?tag=2022091-20
(Unfair Competition is an in-depth investigation of the co...)
Unfair Competition is an in-depth investigation of the commercial activities of nonprofit organizations. Nonprofits have been granted many special privileges by the government, including exemption from taxation and subsidized postal rates. These privileges lower operating costs so nonprofits may carry out their public service mission more efficiently. The authors argue that the special privileges nonprofits enjoy give them an unfair advantage over for-profit firms, and they propose a solution to this escalating problem which has serious economic implications.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0819171808/?tag=2022091-20
( A direct consequence of the War on Terror launched aft...)
A direct consequence of the War on Terror launched after the attacks of September 11, 2001 is an awareness of the need for homeland security. This war is being used to justify a huge expansion of government powers and spending, but funds allocated for homeland security are often for programs far removed from anything that might be termed "defense" or "security." In Homeland Security Scams, James T. Bennett shows that this government spending is doing very little to make us safer, but a great deal to make us poorer, less free, and more dependent on the federal government. Regardless of the color of the "security alert" issued by the Homeland Security czar, the spending light is always green as pork barrel dollars are showered on programs of dubious worth. Lobbyists lobby for homeland security grants and contracts; corporations and state and local governments are becoming ever more dependent on federal subsidies; the vested interest in prolonging and intensifying the concern about homeland security increases; and lobbyists press for ever more money. As Bennett makes clear, with government money comes government control. Law enforcement and emergency response agencies at all levels of government are being effectively "nationalized." Police power is being concentrated, and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) envisions a "surveillance" state that the East German State Police under Communism would have envied. In this hard-hitting critique, Bennett argues that all the spending and surveillance will not win the War on Terror or preserve us from natural disasters. The foe cannot be beaten (we're having trouble even finding the enemy), cannot surrender, and still has awesome powers to lay waste to American cities and citizens. He argues that we should view terrorism as just one of many other serious threats to individuals and to nations. More sternly, he warns that the War on Terror is also a War on Privacy and a War on Liberty.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0765803348/?tag=2022091-20
Bennett, James Thomas was born on October 19, 1942 in Memphis, Tennessee, United States.
Bachelor of Science in Operations Research magna cum laude, Case Institute of Technology, 1964. Master of Science in Management Science, Case Institute of Technology, 1966. Doctor of Philosophy in Economics, Case Western Reserve University, 1970.
Student Graduate School Business, Columbia University, 1965.
Teaching fellow Case Institute of Technology, 1968-1969. Instructor business Cleveland State University, 1967-1968. Assistant professor economics George Washington University, Washington, 1970-1975.
Associate professor economics George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia, 1975-1977, Eminent Scholar and William P. Snavely professor political economy public policy, since 1975. Director John M. Olin Institute for Employment Practice and Policy. Chairman faculty senate George Mason University, 2002-2005.
Trustee Horowitz Foundation, since 2008. Board directors transaction Publications, since 2007.
(This work assesses, with scholarly scrupulousness and irr...)
( Stifling Political Competition examines the history and...)
( The past two decades have seen the growth of well-coord...)
( Not Invited to the Party demonstrates how the dominant ...)
( A direct consequence of the War on Terror launched aft...)
(A study of the long-term decline of the labour movement i...)
(Official Lies opens the curtain on our modern Wizard of O...)
( The diet industry feeds on the hopes and the fears of ...)
(This is a book that's been around for 20 years, but still...)
(Unfair Competition is an in-depth investigation of the co...)
( Barely a day goes by without news of the latest public...)
(POWER OF IDEAS RESEARCH METHODS PATTERNS OF GIVING)
(Book by Bennett, James T., Dilorenzo, Thomas J.)
(Book by Bennett, James T., Dilorenzo, Thomas J.)
(Book by James T. Bennett, Manuel H. Johnson)
Trustee Horowitz Foundation Social Policy, since 2006, transactions Publications, since 2007. Member American Economic Association, Southern Economic Association, Public Choice Society, Western Economic Association, American Statistical Association, Philadelphia Society, Mont Pelerin Society, Phi Beta Kappa, Sigma Xi, Tau Beta Pi, Alpha Lambda Delta, Phi Theta Kappa.
Married Sara Ellen Dorman, September 2, 1967.