What a great refresher course on government history! He writes like he speaks...with love, calmness, and compassion. Although a political book, Ben Carson weaves stories of his life into the book. He tells how he determinedly pulled himself out of poverty against all odds. Being from the inner city of Detroit, with a little time in Boston, where he and his brother fell far behind in school. He claims to have been the dumbest kid in the all white Detroit classes. His mother, divorced and concerned, turned off the TV and made Ben and his brother, Curtis, focus on homework and read two books each week from the local library and write book reports on each while she worked several jobs to make ends meet. The boys were angry at first, and the mother's friends warned her that they would grow to hate her. She didn't care. Ben began to love reading and learning. He first read "Chip, The Damn Builder", and other animal stories over the years up to Jack London's classic, "The Call of the Wild". He then moved into reading biographies of successful people and how they made their accomplishments. Instead of being laughed at in class, by his 7th grade year, he was now helping the other students.

Today, of course, we all know he's not just a successful brain surgeon, he also plays a political role because he loves and cares for this country, which isn't measuring up to what it should be. Education is empowering, but has severely declined. He writes that "when we instill morals and values into the educational process for young people,...we help them realize they have an obligation to become well educated and informed citizens, and to contribute to the system as opposed to draining it of its resources." (p. 59) "By remaining ignorant, we shirk our democratic duty and open ourselves to slick politicians who would usurp our rights." (p. 60) This nation was founded by God-fearing founders on which the foundation was laid. We've obviously lost our way, and that is what this book is all about.

He explains in the most direct and easiest layman terms, that even I can understand, how and why the Constitution was written. He briefly goes over the three branches of government and how they are suppose to function with checks and balances to keep any one branch from becoming too powerful...and how our government is failing and doing things more and more off the mark against the people's will and knowledge. You'll even learn a few truths of our founding fathers that were removed from school textbooks, and even some lies that liberal left have spread in an attempt to change the characters of our founding fathers and history itself. As more and more Americans feel that downhill spiraling anger and division rising, the big question today is do we still have it in us to endure hardships and sacrifice for future generations like in times past? Personally, I don't think so, I'm more of a pessimist, but Ben Carson is a lot more positive and has a lot more faith than I do. He believes their is still hope that we can turn this around.

Carson lays out his common-sense ideas on what could be done to solve a few of the biggest issues America faces today:

1. High cost of healthcare - Remove insurance companies from catastrophic health-care coverage, making it a government responsibility. Insurance would be allowed a 15% profit in which 5% would go to the government for paying out. Hospice is necessary, a good thing, for helping to take care of a person during their last days. But, he questions all the poking and prodding and extra unnecessary medical care when the person is obviously very old and dying and in their last days or months of living. Other countries seem to accept the fact that death is imminent.
2. Taxes - Jesus set the example...10% across the board, whether you make $1.00 or $1k or $1m.
3. Reducing government deficit - Start off cutting at 10% across the board...every single department of government. That's manageable. They'll find where they can cut wasteful spending, then when they are used to that budget, cut it again another 10%, and again, if necessary.
4. War - The choice to enter into war is not always so black and white. Carson is pretty tough on this one. When we are at war, and the terrorists infiltrate villages and hide amongst the people, he suggest we give the village a 24 hour notice that we are coming in and the innocent people should remove themselves. Then go in and turn it into dust, killing all who remain, even the women and children. This is war. After a time or two, the village people will be more willing to give up the terrorists rather than hiding them.
5. Welfare -He believes in a work/education for benefits philosophy. You don't keep rewarding bad behavior.

He does give his opinion into many of the other big issues of the day, such as: political correctness, socialism, class warfare, unions, racism, religious divide, gay marriage, to this lawsuit happy nation, the presses feeding frenzy and lies, and the corruption in our government. But, those things can only be solved by changing the people's mental attitudes. He takes a common no-nonsense belief that if we can just tone down the rhetoric and discuss things like rational human beings on issues without applying some political view, or trying to enforce your belief on everyone else, then we wouldn't be dealing with these escalating problems today.

In the end, Carson does a great job explaining the symbolism of the American flag, the bald eagle, and the Statue of Liberty, "In God We Trust" on our money, and the importance of it all. ( )

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Plagerism: http://www.buzzfeed.com/andrewkaczynski/ben-carson-book#.tlJVoV6ARw

This book offers many problems the US faces as well as common sense solutions. In most cases Dr. Carson uses examples from his own life as analogies to his solutions. It may surprise many to find that some of his solutions are not purely conservative in nature. For example, he believes the government should help fund catastrophic health insurance for citizens, while allowing them to buy other health-related insurance if they so desire.

This book was written in 2011/12, well before he spoke at the 2013 National Prayer Breakfast which started him on his eventual campaign to be president. For those of you who were disappointed in his efforts as a candidate, this book proves he was thinking about solutions for America's ills long before his leap into politics.

Full disclosure: I was/am a huge fan of Dr. Carson and believed him to be the best candidate. Conversely, I was devastated when he endorsed Donald Trump; someone I believe is the mirror opposite of everything Dr. Carson stands for. ( )

Great read, amazing individual. ( )