Customer Reviews: Read 21 more reviews...
 Lucid, Funny, Controversial September 18, 2008
Mark Steyn was one of the reasons I used to read The Spectator - so I'm a fan.
He's not right on everything by any means - he was predicting the iminent capture of Osama Bin Laden by the US around five years ago, for instance - and neither is the USA.
But then, no person is always right, likewise no nation; while Steyn is occasionally too enthusiastic in his cheerleading for the United States, his essential point - that to live in the modern West is to live in the free-est, fairest and safest civilisation the world has ever seen - that's 'ever' - is surely correct.
It isn't perfect, and neither is this book. But I give both 4/5.
 Islamist publications say 2030... August 16, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Mark Steyn writes well and argues the case very convincingly. His message has only a mildly different stance to Michael Gove (Celsius 7/7) or Melanie Philips (Londonistan). So having read the narrative before and heard the argument, I firmly believe he is fundamentally right. If you want the research references, read Celsius or Londonistan, but if you just want the story, and accept that there are sound arguments to back up his case, that can be proven, then this tells it as well as the others, with a slightly more North American standpoint as opposed to a European one. That in itself is an interesting viewpoint.He makes it very clear why all western societies are under threat. I share his belief as to why America might survive too. The lefties want a ton of immigrants to make good the population(even though their thinking is very unsound) and mass immigration means that immigrants bring their cultures with them and fail to integrate. Steyn makes this last point very clearly indeed. The subject matter could be dry, yet he argues it so well that I must take my hat off to him as the book is very readable and well written.I doubt if anyone could describe the subject matter as enjoyable reading, but this book is a very good read, and one that you should be proud to have read and absorbed. The information here is profound and Steyn is repeating what others have said before, let America fear the wake up call of a Muslim Europe. He is at great lengths of sound argument to tell why that is not just possible, but highly likely. Islamist publications say 2030...
The Truth is Out There July 18, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
When I purchase and read the latest copy of The Western Standard, which is a Canadian conservative (yes, there is such a thing!) news magazine, the first article I always turn to is the column by Mark Steyn. For this reason, I purchased a copy of America Alone. As usual, Mr. Steyn brings to the readers attention the details that the politically correct mainstream media refuses to report. This book should be a compulsory read for all citizens of voting age in the Western democracies. Whether or not the book would open the eyes of a populace that has been fed a steady of diet of moral relativism/root cause/moral equivalance/multiculturalism by our self hating Leftist establishment would be interesting to find out.
Alas, Europe is now very likely a lost cause. Steyn's anology of the neutron bomb is right on the money; Europe within a generation or two will still have it's historic buildings and landmarks, but there just won't be any people with enlightened Western Christian based values living there. They will have been replaced by Muslims living under Sharia Law. Once that has happened, it remains to be seen whether or not the United States can survive in a Muslim dominated world bent on the destruction of The Great Satan.
The final irony is that Liberals who are so tolerant of everything will in the end find themselves living under the most intolerant religious political system ever devised.
UPDATE: Since I last posted this review on the Canadian Amazon.ca site, author Mark Steyn is being harrassed by the Canadian Human Rights Commission, a "pseudo" court operating outside the Canadian legal system which goes out of it's way to muzzle free speech. Canada, wake up. Our freedoms are under attack because we are so obsessed with political correctness.
Outstanding Question Marks May 13, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
As brilliant a piece of polemics as this is, Steyn needs to address the fact that Muslim fertility rates, in Europe as well as in the Middle East, are on the decline. Steyn's thesis rests on the fact that the fertility rates of native Europeans and Muslim immigrants stay about the same for the next 25-50 years and beyond, at least in relative terms. Recent findings by Westoff and Frejka show that this simply isn't true. Reality is a little less straightforward than Steyn makes it to be. Reader caution is adviced.
 In what way is this a serious book? November 15, 2007
10 out of 30 found this review helpful
I have given it a 1 because there's no zero option.
You can agree or disagree with Steyn's politics as you wish, but one fact is indisputable.
This book does not have a bibliography. Or footnotes.
That's right. A tome that professes to be a serious examination of issues around demographic change provides no sources or citations for the "facts" so gleefully sprinkled through it.
That, as far as I am concerned, disqualifies it completely from all serious consideration.
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