NYTimes: ‘Restless Giant’ Is “First-rate History”

Restless Giant: The United States From Watergate to Bush v. Gore, by James T. Patterson, the latest installment in the Oxford History of the United States series, received a glowing review in the NYTimes Sunday Book Review today. The first paragraph of the review tells the world what everyone in this office has known for a long time.

THIS is first-rate history by a first-rate historian. Unlike many of his brethren, James T. Patterson can write, and he understands the value of vivid detail, using “Annie Hall,” “Norma Rae” and “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” to help explain the women’s movement. What’s more, he can think, and he offers analysis and interpretation that is consistently sensible…

PATTERSON captures one of the era’s most deplorable trends, the increase in individual and group selfishness that has manifested itself in, among other things, huge executive salaries and irresponsible tax cuts. He also zeroes in on one cause of this trend that few others have perceived: the “rights revolution,” which brought laudable progress for blacks, women and the disabled, but as it spread to other individuals and groups often transformed itself into a sense of entitlement without accompanying obligation, of rights without duties.

LINK to review in the NYTimes.