I've appreciated Stout's insights and perspective in a couple of her previous books, and this one does not lack such. It is, however, somewhat muddled and repetitive.

Her hypothesis that the events of 9/11 caused a sea-change in the way Americans see the world is plausible- though there are data that indicate that many of the factors she puts here were in bloom well before that tragedy. And her analogies between the very personal terrorism of domestic violence, and the broader scope of more broadly-aimed terrorist acts, is an excellent one. I also appreciated her checklist of traits that fear-mongers display in their quest for power, though I think it could have been somewhat clarified.

It is also interesting that our current political mess can be described as a conflict between absolutists and contextualists... which seem to have a significant genetic component to them!

The problem is that Stout veers to and from these points in a way that I found both repetitive and frustrating. My guess is that this fairly slim book was written rapidly, and then published rather than being sorted-out and edited. (Obviously I could be wrong about this!)

So- recommended for various insights; I just wish they had been offered more succinctly and coherently. ( )