The book "In The President's Secret Service: Behind the Scenes with the Agents in the Line of Fire and the Presidents they Protect, by Ronald Kessler, was an interesting book, but it did have cons to it. I was very excited to read it and it turned out to be a book that I really did not enjoy reading. One of the things that puzzles me the most is the fact that Kessler emphasizes the need for the Secret Service to keep the trust of the first families yet the agents who are relaying all of these stories about different presidents to Kessler are in complete violation of what they are preaching. While this book is one of a kind and there are no books that I have ever read that relate to this, I felt like this book was almost unnecessary because the whole point of the Secret Service is that it is kept a secret as much as possible and everything the agents observe comes out in this book. It seems to violate what the Secret Service is about and gives the reader personal information about specific presidents that the reader might not necessarily want to know because it is embarrassing. While the book did have my attention because it provided unique information about a topic that I was unaware of, I quickly became bored while I was reading. About midway through the book became one long gripe about working in the Secret Service. Interesting chapters about the history of the Secret Service were not enough to balance out the repetitive complaints about poor management, low budgets, and cut corners. Unless the target audience is intended to be those considering a career in Federal law enforcement, it's really not necessary to spend so much time talking the reader out of joining the Secret Service. It seemed very irrelevant to what I though the story was about, I didn't think it was going to be a book about why not to join the Secret Service and I thought it was going to be more interesting stories that the agents told. The book even goes off talking about the FBI for awhile, which Kessler seems to think is a far superior organization. This book was ultimately disappointing, and it could have been done much better. I feel like some of the things said in this book were meant to embarrass our former presidents, the people that were once leaders of our nation. I don't necessarily think that that was right. For example, when Kessler is talking about President Jimmy Carter he talks about how "in order to make the think he came into work early, President Carter would walk into the Oval Office at 5 AM, then nod off to sleep" (Kessler 127). While something like that is a bit humorous, it is probably embarrassing for President Carter that this was revealed. But there is worse then that, at one point in the book Kessler talks about Vice President Spiro Agnew and says that "Secret Service Agents were aware of Agnew's affairs while in office, even though he claimed to be a champion of family values" (Kessler 115). Based off of my previous arguments before, it would seem obvious that I don't like this. It makes the Secret Service Agents look bad by revealing they knew all along about affairs going on inside the White House but keep their mouths shut about it. This is another example of Kessler revealing secrets kept by the Secret Service that people are not supposed to know about. It just doesn't seem right. I honestly do not know what the point of this book was. It is very difficult to understand what Kessler's point of view on all of this is. The things that he says about the Secret Service make it unclear as to what he really thinks. For example, as I mentioned before there is a part of the story where he almost talks down about the Secret Service and how the FBI is better but then goes on to say that "without Secret Service agents being as good as they are, assassination attempts on President Barack Obama and future presidents will be much more likely" (Kessler 249). Some of the things that were talked about in the book relate to issues we have talked about in class. For example, Kessler speaks about how agents say that "contrary to what he claims, Barack Obama has continued to smoke regularly" (Kessler 119). We had recently been talking about this in IPLE and whether or not Obama will be hurt in the election with the release of information the he smoke marijuana and crack when he was younger. And it appears that even though he says he doesn't smoke anymore, agents say that he still continues to do so. I really don't agree with Ronald Kessler's bias in this book. I don't think that uncovering the mysteries and secrets of the Secret Service was the best thing to do. While it was interesting and informative it, this whole book makes me think of him as kind of slimy that he would reveal all these secrets about classified information. In conclusion, I probably would not recommend this book to someone if they were trying to read a well written book. The writing style is kind of sloppy and the book is very gossipy. However, if someone was interested in a behind the scenes look at a very private organization, then I would recommend this book to them.

Review for Justin Lopez:

I think that Justin has a very well written review. It made me interested in reading The Prince. Justin explained Machiavelli's points very well and about his ways to achieve and maintain political power. Machiavelli seemed to have ideas that no one else has ever had which made me want to read the book. My favorite part about this review was in the third paragraph where Justin quotes Machiavelli and says that, "There is nothing more difficult to manage, or doubtful of success, or more dangerous to handle than to take the lead in introducing a new order of things". I agree with his explanation of this quote. It is a powerful quote and it can relate to how America is today, especially with the election coming up and many candidates trying to persuade people that their new ideas proves them worthy enough to be able to lead out country. I was also interested in Machiavelli ideas about the different methods of fighting and how if someone disobeys what they are supposed to do and the law doesn't change them, it is necessary to use the second method and use physical force in order to punish that person. Machiavelli was right in saying that even though as prince one is in a very powerful position, but there are not many positives to it seeing as how you have to be a leader and constantly focus on war and punishments for people. In conclusion, I think that Justin had a very well written review and it made me want to read The Prince.