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Made Love, Got War
First published in 2008. The strands of this book form a unique weave of personal narrative and historical inquiry. Made Love, Got War lays out a half century of socialized insanity that has brought a succession of aggressive wars under cover of―but at recurrent risk of detonating―a genocidal nuclear arsenal.
264 pages, Hardcover
First published October 1, 2007
About the author
Norman Solomon
63 books46 followersNorman Solomon is an American journalist, media critic, antiwar activist, and former candidate in 2012 for the United States House of Representatives.
Solomon is a longtime associate of the media watch group Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR).
In 1997 he founded the Institute for Public Accuracy, which works to provide alternative sources for journalists, and served as its executive director until 2010.
Solomon's weekly column, "Media Beat", was in national syndication from 1992 to 2009.
Solomon is a longtime associate of the media watch group Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR).
In 1997 he founded the Institute for Public Accuracy, which works to provide alternative sources for journalists, and served as its executive director until 2010.
Solomon's weekly column, "Media Beat", was in national syndication from 1992 to 2009.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
June 10, 2010
After reading War Made Easy, I found this book somewhat disappointing. The autobiographical nature of the first 3/4 of the book is interesting to me as a person with several experiences in common with Solomon. But I did find some of the detail without context, simply a chronology of events. The book encourages thinking and reading in small bits and pieces being divided into some very small segments and few in depth.
Solomon ends with this sentence: "If we want a future that sustains life, we'd better create it ourselves." This is in keeping with Solomon's bottom up community organizing experience and belief. His apparent comfort with politics and politicians seems contrary to this belief because politics is so giving a few people extraordinary power. He does not suggest an alternative to representative democracy as we see it in the U.S. He does briefly refer to small affinity groups in anti-nuclear organizing; I wonder if he would subscribe to the Small Is Beautiful point of view. It seems that he would, but he never really comes to terms with local politics where the ratio of representatives to represented is more manageable.
I think that I would agree with a lot that Norman Solomon thinks and the way he has lived his life. From the examples of debate dialogue that he includes in the book, he seems very conversant with the facts and details of an issue. But, through no fault of his own, his voice can usually be ignored as a part of such a small progressive movement. He must be a part of the left wing caucus of the Democratic Party. But starting and fighting war is a bipartisan mindset, with the Democrats as guilty as the Republicans. War is as American as Mom and apple pie. Solomon knows that as well as anyone and has spent most of his life trying to change that. After reading Made Love, Got War, it seems he has been tireless in that effort. He has been more successful in getting attention for the minority progressive antiwar view than most of us.
He didn't mention war tax resistance in the book, a failing for me, a war tax resister.
Solomon ends with this sentence: "If we want a future that sustains life, we'd better create it ourselves." This is in keeping with Solomon's bottom up community organizing experience and belief. His apparent comfort with politics and politicians seems contrary to this belief because politics is so giving a few people extraordinary power. He does not suggest an alternative to representative democracy as we see it in the U.S. He does briefly refer to small affinity groups in anti-nuclear organizing; I wonder if he would subscribe to the Small Is Beautiful point of view. It seems that he would, but he never really comes to terms with local politics where the ratio of representatives to represented is more manageable.
I think that I would agree with a lot that Norman Solomon thinks and the way he has lived his life. From the examples of debate dialogue that he includes in the book, he seems very conversant with the facts and details of an issue. But, through no fault of his own, his voice can usually be ignored as a part of such a small progressive movement. He must be a part of the left wing caucus of the Democratic Party. But starting and fighting war is a bipartisan mindset, with the Democrats as guilty as the Republicans. War is as American as Mom and apple pie. Solomon knows that as well as anyone and has spent most of his life trying to change that. After reading Made Love, Got War, it seems he has been tireless in that effort. He has been more successful in getting attention for the minority progressive antiwar view than most of us.
He didn't mention war tax resistance in the book, a failing for me, a war tax resister.
January 19, 2022
Made Love, Got War: Close Encounters With America's Warfare State
By Norman Solomon
Reviewed by Dee Knight
This is a remarkably personal memoir of Norman Solomon’s endless battles against the U.S. warfare state and the mainstream media that enable it. Solomon has remained a consistent voice of the Vietnam-era antiwar rebellion for almost three generations, often alongside the legendary Daniel Ellsberg (of Pentagon Papers fame).
The book provides the original stories of Solomon taking big-time decision makers to Iraq to see for themselves that Saddam Hussein had no “weapons of mass destruction,” as the Bush gang alleged while pushing for war. We also read Solomon’s on-air exchanges with mainstream media anchors who tried to discredit him, but ended up discrediting themselves.
Famous for "War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death," which detailed decades of war spinning by governments and their kept media, Solomon has basically institutionalized the endless and thankless task of exposing official deception by the war makers. As founder of the Institute for Public Accuracy, which works to provide alternative sources for journalists, and longtime associate of Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR), Solomon also leads Roots Action and Progressive Hub, watchdog groups dedicated to a plethora of progressive causes – from abolishing the death penalty and the electoral college to fighting for voting rights, and much more.
As a member of Solomon’s generation, I feel we could have bumped into each other at any number of protests – in Portland or San Francisco or Washington. But he was often a step ahead, or I may have been in Canada much of the time. But the heroic adventures he describes in "Made Love, Got War" were the adventures of our 1960s generation. In many cases Solomon brings the tension up closer than Norman Mailer or Abbie Hoffman, and he has done it for much longer. In fact he’s a long distance runner that keeps on running. While this memoir sometimes reveals a tone of sadness or a sense of irony at the stubbornly slow pace of change, his readers can be sure he’ll keep going. Read this book for a true sense of how he did it.
By Norman Solomon
Reviewed by Dee Knight
This is a remarkably personal memoir of Norman Solomon’s endless battles against the U.S. warfare state and the mainstream media that enable it. Solomon has remained a consistent voice of the Vietnam-era antiwar rebellion for almost three generations, often alongside the legendary Daniel Ellsberg (of Pentagon Papers fame).
The book provides the original stories of Solomon taking big-time decision makers to Iraq to see for themselves that Saddam Hussein had no “weapons of mass destruction,” as the Bush gang alleged while pushing for war. We also read Solomon’s on-air exchanges with mainstream media anchors who tried to discredit him, but ended up discrediting themselves.
Famous for "War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death," which detailed decades of war spinning by governments and their kept media, Solomon has basically institutionalized the endless and thankless task of exposing official deception by the war makers. As founder of the Institute for Public Accuracy, which works to provide alternative sources for journalists, and longtime associate of Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR), Solomon also leads Roots Action and Progressive Hub, watchdog groups dedicated to a plethora of progressive causes – from abolishing the death penalty and the electoral college to fighting for voting rights, and much more.
As a member of Solomon’s generation, I feel we could have bumped into each other at any number of protests – in Portland or San Francisco or Washington. But he was often a step ahead, or I may have been in Canada much of the time. But the heroic adventures he describes in "Made Love, Got War" were the adventures of our 1960s generation. In many cases Solomon brings the tension up closer than Norman Mailer or Abbie Hoffman, and he has done it for much longer. In fact he’s a long distance runner that keeps on running. While this memoir sometimes reveals a tone of sadness or a sense of irony at the stubbornly slow pace of change, his readers can be sure he’ll keep going. Read this book for a true sense of how he did it.
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June 24, 2023Great book!! I was born in 1950 and I grew up through the days and times described in this book. This a great review of the author's personal history and a history of the peace movement in the U.S. and the struggle for some of us in the population to turn our country toward a more equitable and peaceful society. We have to keep on with the struggle! Normon Solomon is helping us all with books like these!
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews