BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS — Mr. Joe Bartuah, a veteran Liberian journalist currently residing in the U.S., has published two high-quality content books about the Liberian and American societies, which many scholars and public policy advocates opine, are destined to arouse a wide range of readership in Liberia, the United States and around the world for a long time.
Editor Bartuah’s two books are titled: AN AGENDA FOR A BETTER LIBERIA—A Common Sense Approach to Nation-Building and DONALD TRUMP AND THE POLITICS OF HATRED—The Racial Animus Leading to His Defeat. The first book is an upgraded, revised edition of the author’s maiden publication of November 2018, which he says, has now been put on a global platform for Liberians, friends of Liberia and all those interested in the West African country everywhere around the world.
Containing 14 chapters, the 437-page AGENDA FOR A BETTER LIBERIA book painstakingly analyzes Liberia’s chronic developmental challenges and proffers carefully crafted policy proposals, which author Bartuah, a former Managing Editor of The NEWS newspaper believes, if modified and scrupulously implemented, will mitigate Liberia’s developmental challenges and even accelerate its forward movement.
As for his new 582-page, 20-chapters book, it is not only about how former U.S. President Donald J. Trump’s assumption of the presidency on January 20, 2017 epitomized what the author calls “a seismic change” on the American political landscape, but also vividly reflects on how in 2011, Mr. Trump, then a private citizen, “adroitly employed a subtle racial stratification scheme and racial animosity couched in calumnies against President Obama as his springboard” to lob himself to the orbit of power. In 2011, Mr. Trump falsely claimed that then incumbent President Barack Obama was not born in the United States, a cunning falsehood that was later dubbed “birtherism” by pundits.
In spite of using such falsehood against former President Mr. Obama to make himself popular with American voters, especially Republicans, author Bartuah insists that Mr. Trump’s election in 2016 “further re-enforced the iconic image of American democracy as the beacon of hope and inspiration for humankind everywhere around the world”, because as he put it, nowhere else in the world would a “political neophyte” employ “predatory politicking”, basically declaring a sitting President as an undesirable alien in his own country, and then go on to succeed the very President.
As Mrs. Sarah C. Morrison, former Director of Public Affairs at the United States embassy in Monrovia observed in her foreword to Mr. Bartuah’s meticulously researched book, “Indeed, Joe’s comprehensive approach makes Donald Trump and the Politics of Hatred a must-read for students of history, political science and public policy—and essentially for all citizens who are interested in what the erudite author tags as an ‘informed street-corner perspective’”
The two books, which were published between December 8 and 22, 2023 by Kindle Direct Publishing, the publishing subsidiary of Jeff Bezos’ multinational conglomerate–Amazon.com–are currently being sold on the global Amazon E-commerce platform, with prices ranging from $9.99 for E-book to $15.99, $20 and $30.00 respectively for the paperback and hardcover editions.
The author holds double Bachelor’s degrees in English and Political Science from the University of Massachusetts Boston and a Master’s of Science in Public Affairs and International Relations from the McCormack Graduate School of Public Policy and International Studies, also in Boston, Massachusetts.
