Book Review

As if there aren't enough things I'm trying (and failing) to do, I will attempt to post some book reviews as they come along. Recently while listening to an interview with Dan Pfaff, he mentioned that he reads 15-30 minutes every morning and 30-60 minutes every night. 7 days per week. Sometimes related to training and its dependent sciences, other times seemingly unrelated topics. Because Dan is a damn genius, and because I need to read more anyway, I've tried to implement something similar in my own life. Now, there is plenty of work to be done, and there's still boatloads of reading I need to do specific to the training realm, but I'm trying to focus more of my "home" reading on non-training-related topics.
Some of these reviews will be more in-depth, others more surface-level, especially since, as Andreas Behm outlines here, there are levels to one's involvement in books. Some books I will simply be more invested in, and others I will more or less skim. Of course, as Stuart McMillan notes here, I also need to be doing far more RE-reading. But I digress.
The first book is titled "The Decline and Fall of the American Republic" by Bruce Ackerman.

It was recommended by Dan Carlin on one (or probably many) of his podcasts. It details the progression of the office of the presidency which, due to the myriad steps taken by previous holders of the office, is becoming more of a dictatorship. Essentially, rather than placing, and keeping, constraints in place which permit the checks and balances of the American political system to operate as they should, the presidents have increasingly surrounded themselves with lawyers and lackeys who have found every possible way for them to skirt the laws while progressively increasing their power. I found it especially interesting reading the first few chapters talking about campaigning and how a less-than-ideal candidate may come to power in the first place, and how this progression of power may eventually fuck us (my term). Admittedly my knowledge of the workings of the American political system are limited, however, I found it a very good read and worthy of the time spent. I did not dive in and found myself skimming parts, but overall I would recommend it to anyone.