The Uprising: An Unauthorized Tour of the Populist Revolt Scaring Wall Street and Washington

David Sirota is a writer full of insight and grace. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book and received a rare transfusion of hope. He helps sort out the wheat from the chaff, the real progressives from the corporatists. Because of this, corporatist minions are popping up and entering their reviews to drag his ratings down. Sirota is a wordsmith who can apply the insights of Drew Westen and provide a how-to manual for communicating with the public.

I recommend this book to anyone who has had that gnawing feeling that something is not quite right in this country we love. Do you think the big corporations have too much power? Is the middle class disappearing? What did our founders really intend when they created the separation of powers? Did we lose control of our country...and how can we get it back? David Sirota writes about pockets of discontent that are beginning to bubble and boil all over the country. Small uprisings that are having an effect on corporations, in state policies, and in Congress. If you thought you were alone, read this book and find out that others are sharing your concern...in one way or another. This book will stir you up and widen your eyes. I learned so much from each chapter and had a good laugh or two along the way. David Sirota is a great writer who has his ear to the ground and shares his wealth of knowledge in this book. Read it.

You will learn something new from reading this book. David Sirota provides first hand accounts of populist movements around the US. I learned about the Working Family Party in New York and fusion. I also got a new perspective on Washington driven faux uprisings vs. real uprisings. The book has a great mix of personal story and the uprising description. It has a good flow to it and is divided up into distinct sections. If you don't like a section - just skip it. I enjoyed reading all of it.

Well-written, better than "Hostile Takeover." You can tell now by reading this book that Sirota has more confidence in his writing style and isn't afraid to pepper his stories with a very human narrator, something that's important in titles like this where readers are given a very close-up look at a particular institution. The book is extremely informative (I had never even heard of "Third-Party Fusion" before reading this book, and now I want to know how I can bring it to Wisconsin!), and the intimate glimpses inside Washington and everywhere else shows readers various sides of issues that we don't normally see in the corporate press. I'm actually quite surprised to see another reviewer attack Sirota because of his chapter on the Minutemen on the border. I thought the chapter was actually quite fair, maybe TOO fair given how many of the people he meets seem to be struggling to hide their racism, but that's just one opinion. Either way, it's an intimate glimpse into a movement, just like every other chapter, and every chapter offers something we can learn from.

The Populist Uprising has a long and rich history in this country, and in his new book noted author David Sirota demonstrates that this movement is alive and well (on both the Left and the Right) is alive and well. Sirota is a wonderful political writer who possesses that rare knack of being able to clearly outline his position without a lot of jargon that so plagues other political authors. Love him or hate him, Sirota has a lot to say, and this is one book that should be read by everyone.