Summary Of American Democracy In Peril By William Hudson

William Hudson's book American Democracy in Peril, has given several challenges facing democracy in American. Hudson's seventh challenge to America's democracy is the national security state. Starts the chapter off talking about Ronald Reagan's administration and their involvement in Central America. He talks about two important people that were involved in it such as CIA director William Casey who created the contra to prevent the Saninistas from supplying the rebels in El Salvador. Hudson also talks the Oliver North and John Poindexter and the Iran-contra and how they with the support of Casey created a hidden government inside the government that used government resources to achieve their own political agenda (Hudson). In the end, North

Centralization's attitude is only a few government officials, most the president and his advisors, make decisions on foreign and military policy. Hudson believes centralization hurts democracy due to the fact that a small group of people is making a major public decision and this is a strength in Hudson's agreement. One weakness in his argument is he does not believe leaders have to isolate themselves to make effective decisions. In certain cases, leaders have to surround their selves with people who are very knowledgeable about that certain topic. In leadership roles, such as the President of the United States, the leader has to make hard and complex decisions and make them in a timely matter. When these difficult decisions have to be made a leader does not need everyone opinion on the decision it can make the situation even harder to solve and will take more time. Hudson believes the decision the government officials make should be supported by the citizens. This is another point in the augment what is hard to agree with fully. If government leaders have to get the full support from the people they would really become unresponsive. Think about the policies brought before Congress, it takes Congress a long time to come to an argument. Now imagine if the President brought every foreign and military policy to Congress and the citizens, nothing could get done. Hudson takes about,

Hudson believes repression is going against the Bill of Rights and it is. Americans have the right to privacy and they have a right to speak against the government if they feel the government is not performing properly. In a "national security state", just like in forming a government, some natural rights have to be given up to protect one's life and property. In today's time, many terrorist groups are angry with the U.S for difference reason and some of the terrorist groups have members living in the United States. The police institutions such as the FBI, try to find and stop the terrorist from causing harm to Americans. Americans even agreed to give up a little privacy to prevent another terrorist attack like 9/11 from happening with the Patriot Act. Also, Hudson makes it as if everything an American citizen says against the government can get them thrown in jail and this is not true. People speak negatively of the government as a whole and individuals in it every day. People have blogs, cartoon drawings, and post on social media every day across the country harmful remarks about the government and most of the time they are