Blood and Politics: The History of the White Nationalist Movement from the Margins to the MainstreamAvailable Now

“Zeskind’s rigorously researched and eloquent book is a definitive history of white nationalism.” —Publishers Weekly

“Zeskind offers a well-placed warning ” —Kirkus Reviews

“Recommended for all libraries.” —Stephen L. Hupp, Library Journal

“Exhaustively researched, Blood and Politics is not only a brilliant account of the origins, modes of operation, collaborations, and internecine disputes of white supremacist, neo-Nazi, Holocaust-denier, and anti-Semitic groups in America, but alerts us to the fact that despite—or perhaps because of—significant improvements in race relations and changing demographic patterns, we are likely to witness a resurgence of their activities.” —Drew S. Days III, Professor of Law, Yale University, and former U.S. Solicitor General

www.BloodandPolitics.com

Reviews

Los Angeles Times reviews Blood and Politics Print PDF

Written by Art Winslow | 21 October 2009

Los Angeles Times
By Art Winslow
 
June 14, 2009

Blood and Politics: The History of the White Nationalist Movement From the Margins to the Mainstream

Leonard Zeskind
Farrar, Straus & Giroux:

622 pp., $35

This April, when the Department of Homeland Security issued a report titled "Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment," the media world was briefly ablaze debating whether it was true.

"Rightwing extremists," the report maintained, "have capitalized on the election of the first African American president, and are focusing their efforts to recruit new members, mobilize existing supporters, and broaden their scope and appeal through propaganda."


Citing the economic downturn, it drew parallels to the 1990s, a fertile time in the development of militia-style factions. In a footnote, "rightwing extremism" is defined broadly as applying to groups, movements and adherents that are "primarily hate-oriented" toward particular religious, racial or ethnic groups, or "are mainly anti-government, rejecting federal authority," or may be dedicated to single issues such as opposition to abortion.

What favorable timing, then, for Leonard Zeskind's "Blood and Politics: The History of the White Nationalist Movement From the Margins to the Mainstream," which addresses all of these issues, provides a context in which to assess them and offers an extended look inside a little-understood cultural zone that is really a panoply of small groups.

Unless you too resent ZOG (the Zionist Occupation Government), Zeskind's decades-long perspective will help explain....

to read the rest of the review go to
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-ca-leonard-zeskind14-2009jun14,0,7466688.story

Moment Magazine reviews Blood and Politics Print PDF

Written by Rick Hellman | 21 October 2009

Moment magazine

September/October 2009

Racial Hatred: Made in America
Rick hellman
 
Blood and Politics: The History of the White Nationalist Movement from the Margins to the Mainstream
By Leonard Zeskind


Farrar, Straus & Giroux
2009, $37.50, pp. 645
 
When, in April, the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano, issued a clumsily worded news release about the threat of right-wing extremism, it ignited a firestorm of indignation from talk radio and other Republican precincts. How dare she insinuate, they fumed, that flag-waving patriots, who might include military veterans or voters attracted to quixotic candidates and esoteric political theories, could pose a threat to civil tranquility?

Then, on May 31, Kansas state troopers arrested a man with prior involvement in the so-called “freeman” movement—which asserts the unique principle of individual sovereignty apart from any government—in connection with the assassination that morning of abortion provider Dr. George Tiller as he greeted people in the foyer of his Wichita church.

To anyone who had, by that point, read Leonard Zeskind’s Blood and Politics: The History of the White Nationalist Movement from the Margins to the Mainstream, the incident was eerily familiar. The vigilantism associated with the anti-abortion movement is just one of many threads Zeskind weaves


To read the rest of the Review go to
http://www.momentmag.com/Exclusive/2009/2009-10/200910-Books-Blood_and_Politics.html

Book Review in The Forward Print PDF

Written by Dan Levitas | 29 May 2009

The Racists Around Us

White Nationalists in America

By Daniel Levitas

Published May 27, 2009, issue of June 05, 2009.

Blood and Politics: The History of the White Nationalist Movement From the Margins to the Mainstream
By Leonard Zeskind
Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 672 pages, $37.50.

To most Americans, including seasoned political observers, the machinations of white supremacists and professional antisemites are regarded, if at all, as crude carnival theater. After more than three decades of close observation, Leonard Zeskind, recipient of a 1998 MacArthur Fellowship for his independent scholarship on far-right, racist and neo-Nazi groups, is not so dismissive. More important, his first book, “Blood and Politics,” analyzes the past 35 years to provide a trenchant and troubling assessment of the future of what Zeskind terms “the white nationalist movement.”

Click the link to read more….

http://www.forward.com/articles/106665/

END

Book Review by Loretta Ross in The Public Eye Print PDF

Written by Loretta Ross | 29 May 2009

A Longtime Anti-Racism Activist’s Take on History
Reviewed by Loretta J. Ross
The Public Eye, Summer 2009

Blood and Politics: The History of the White Nationalist Movement from the Margins to the Mainstream - By Leonard Zeskind (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009, 656 pages, $37.50 cloth.)

Loretta Ross is National Coordinator of SisterSong, the women of color reproductive health collective based in Atlanta. She is coauthor of Undivided Rights: Women of Color Organize for Reproductive Justice.
 
It is so irritating to watch Pat Buchanan on MSNBC. There he was on Morning Joe, blaming the financial crisis on banks lending to people of color. His makeover as a respectable “conservative” pundit – conveniently forgetting his racist, homophobic, and anti-Semitic slippages – is a testament to the power of the mainstream media to shape a Wonderland world Alice would have recognized.

Thank goodness for Leonard Zeskind’s long-awaited book. It has restored my faith in the power of truth to trump travesty.

Thirty years in the making, Blood and Politics reads like a political thriller that details intimate knowledge about the origins, history, leaders and activities of the White supremacist groups in the United States. But Zeskind’s book is no laundry list. His analysis helps us make sense of the netherworld of ideas and relationships that populate and bind together denizens of the Far Right, the Religious Right, and the ultra-conservative movements he places under the banner of “White nationalism.”

for the complete review go to:
http://www.publiceye.org/magazine/v24n2/book-blood-politics.html

Kansas City Jewish Chronicle Review of Blood and Politics Print PDF

Written by Rick Hellman | 15 May 2009

Kansas City Jewish Chronicle article on Leonard Zeskind
May 15, 2009

simply click on the following URL / URI:

http://www.kcjc.com/200905158462/news/throwing-the-book-at-racists.html#pc_82

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