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Ben Barnes on his book titled Barn Burning Barn Building: Tales of a Political Life, from LBJ to George W. Bush and Beyond.

The Abilene Reporter-News features Ben Barnes in an article titled “Barnes spins tales of Texas” on May 31, 2006. The article discusses Ben Barnes’ book Barn Burning Barn Building: Tales of a Political Life, from LBJ to George W. Bush and Beyond, in which Ben Barnes, a Democrat and former Lieutenant Governor of Texas, discusses modern American politics, the consequences of embittered political partisanship, and his own career.

Barn Burning, Barn Building is equal parts autobiography, political analysis, and insider information. Ben Barnes describes, with unmatched insight, how the Democratic Party rose to dominance in Texas in the 1960s and how the same party lost its grip on the Lone Star State in the early 1970s.

Along the way Ben Barnes peppers pages with amusing recollections, captivating characters (President Lyndon B. Johnson, Sam Rayburn, John Connally), and universal social issues, such as the Vietnam War, education, racism, and equal rights.

About Ben Barnes
Ben Barnes is a former prominent Texas politician and author of the newly released book, Barn Burning, Barn Building. Ben Barnes served in the Texas House of Representatives and was eventually elected Speaker of the House at age 26. In 1969 a 30-year-old Ben Barnes was elected the Lieutenant Governor of Texas; an office he won with the most votes ever by a Texas state office candidate. Ben Barnes has been profiled by numerous publications around the country.

More on the life and times of politician Ben Barnes.

Alaska Governor Sarah Palin has recently granted interviews after having been criticized during the campaign for being too shielded from the media. She has granted back-to-back interviews like the two Wednesdays she gave to CNN.

Analysts say that her newfound openness with the media is a sign that she’s open to a future run in 2012.

Although Palin is not ruling out a 2012 run, she says her children will come first. She declared shortly after the election results came in that she cannot imagine running for national office in 2012. Observers, however, believe that Palin, who will be up for re-election in 2010, could switch arenas and give the Senate a try.

There were speculations that if Sen. Ted Stevens, convicted of seven federal corruption charges in October for filing false statements on Senate ethics forms, wins over Mayor Mark Begich, would be expelled from the Senate; there will be a special election where Palin could run.

Palin, however, has not declared whether she would or would not consider a run. Some of her supporters are still hoping she would consider following former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee’s lead. Huckabee is now a political commentator and talk-show host for Fox News.

While no one exactly knows what Palin wants, it is clear that she has big plans for the future.

Sarah Louise Heath Palin was born on February 11, 1964 in Sandpoint, Idaho. The youngest governor of Alaska (she was 42 when she took office); she is also the first woman to hold the office in the state. To top being Alaska’s first female governor, Palin is also the first of the state’s governors to hold her inauguration ceremony in Fairbanks and not in Juneau.

After graduating from the University of Idaho with a bachelor’s degree in science, Palin became a sports reporter for several Alaskan stations. She also helped her husband, Todd, run his commercial fishing business.

Palin was recently selected by TV Guide as one of America’s top 10 most fascinating people of 2008 for a Barbara Walters ABC special which aired on December 4, 2008.

Real Right posted 5 Reasons Sarah Palin Would Lose a 2012 Bid.

Alaska legislators say they’ll take stimulus funds Sarah Palin rejected.

Obama and Palin meet at Alfalfa Club.

Outgoing US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has paid twin visits to India and Pakistan to subdue renewed conflict between the warring nations. An ongoing peace process threatens to deteriorate after a spate of terrorist attacks hounded Mumbai, India’s financial capital.

Indian authorities strived to convince their guest, who arrived December 3, of Pakistani culpability in the attacks. Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee had “no doubt” about the insinuation.

Over a 60-hour timetable starting November 26, 10 individuals opened fire at civilians around the metropolis, including the Taj Mahal Hotel, a hospital, and a Jewish center. In one of the country’s deadliest shootings, the perpetrators left 188 casualties, including 22 foreigners.

One attacker has been traced by authorities to Lashkar-e-Taiba, a Pakistan-based group of Muslim extremists. In this view, New Delhi is asking Islamabad to arrest 20 suspected terrorists, lest India resorts to stronger aggression.

Stopping short of outright accusation, Rice echoes India’s demands, telling Pakistan to cooperate because they have a “central role to play.” The State Secretary even censured Pakistani President Asif Zardari’s conviction that the massacre should be blamed on “stateless actors.” To date, Pakistan refuses to own up to the attacks.

Dr. Condoleezza Rice is President George W. Bush’s Secretary of State, the first black female in history to be appointed so. She also made the same record when Bush designated her national security adviser in 2001.

Prior to public service with Bush, she served as the first female — and first black —Provost of Stanford University for six years.

Rice, at 15, enrolled in the University of Denver, where she was trained by Josef Korbel, father of former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. Four years later, she earned the degree of political science with cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa honors.

Having taken interest in Soviet Union politics since college, Rice has proven herself an expert on the subject, publishing books like The Gorbachev Era and Uncertain Allegiance. In fact, she was selected Senior Director of Soviet and East European Affairs in the elder Bush’s administration.

Under the younger Bush, Rice is credited for negotiating with Russia over missile defense. She would later be known as one of the President’s staunchest supporters of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin and ex-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice speak of financial crisis.

Secretary Rice sides with Bush, not Cheney on staying mum about President Obama’s foreign policy.

Now that her husband is vacating the Oval Office, American First Lady Laura Bush has disclosed plans to live in Dallas, Texas. US President George W. Bush is set to depart from the White House on January 20, 2009.

Sally McDonough, speaking for the First lady, refuses to reveal the exact address, although the White House has verified it would be in Preston Hollow. As to the house itself, D Magazine speculates it to be at 10141 Daria Place, where a one-story house, erected in 1959, stands. Stretching to 8,501 square feet, the house is built with four bedrooms, a cabana, a wide servants’ quarters, a detached garage, and 4 ½ baths.

Next door is a smaller house, reportedly to accommodate Secret Service agents. The residence is valued at $2.1 million.

According to Dallas Central Appraisal District papers, 10141 Daria Place was sold by Dan Boeckman to Robert A. McCleskey, in October 2008. McCleskey is a friend of the Bushes’ and is an accountant from Midland, Texas.

From 1988 to 1995, Laura and George had been based in Dallas, before moving to Austin when the latter became Texas Governor. During his presidency, the couple split their time between the White House and their ranch in Crawford.

Like George, Laura was raised largely in Texas, so the move is seen as only apt. She was born Laura Welch on November 4, 1946 in Midland, Texas. She is a licensed teacher, having been trained by Southern Methodist University; and a librarian, having finished her master’s at the University of Texas.

She married George in 1977, after which they sired the twins Barbara and Jenna.

As First Lady, she was concerned with matters of education, health, and human rights. Notably Mrs. Bush has been a distinguished spokeswoman for the United Nations Literacy Decade and was head of the White House’s Helping America’s Youth initiative. When she first became First Lady, she organized the Summit on Early Childhood Cognitive Development. She was instrumental, too, in the founding of Preserve America, a conservation program.

Laura has visited Afghanistan, where she demonstrated her devotion to education, most particularly among Afghanistan’s women.

The Laura Bush Foundation for Libraries.

NNDB profile of Laura Bush.

Ending two weeks of trial, charges against US Vice President Richard Bruce “Dick” Cheney were dismissed in a south Texas court December 1, 2008. The judge trashed a total of eight indictments implicating, among others, Cheney and ex-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales in lawless activities in private federal detention centers.

Cheney, who apparently has stakes in the Vanguard Group, which in turn has interests in The GEO Group, the operator of the prisons, was charged with taking part in an organized crime activity.

Tony Canales, lawyer for The GEO Group, won over Judge Manuel Banales by showing that two people questionably served as jurors that day. Banales even reproved Guerra and consequently warned him of engaging in similar cases. The judge, however, passed judgment notwithstanding probable cause.

Dick Cheney is the 46th Vice President of the United States of America, who was elected to the position in 2000, then for another term in 2004.

From 1989 to 1993, Dick Cheneyh held power as Defense Secretary for President George Herbert Walker Bush. Cheney carried out Bush’s Operation Desert Storm, the first Persian Gulf War, which drove Iraqi invaders out of Kuwait in 1991. He also oversaw the US military assault in Panama, dubbed “Operation Just Cause”.

President Gerald Ford earlier employed Cheney as White House Chief of Staff. Before Ford, Cheney held various top-tier positions under President Richard Nixon beginning 1969.

Starting 1977, Cheney represented Wyoming for six terms in the House of Representatives, wherein he was elevated to the chairmanship of the House Republican Conference. Cheney was also House Minority Whip in 1988.

Throughout his capacity as Vice President, Cheney’s role in the 2003 Gulf War remained his most seminal exploit yet. By linking Saddam Hussein and the Al-Qaeda terrorist network, he justified the war on Iraq, wherein he vocally alleged the unchecked presence of weapons of mass destruction. Even as political analysts suspected him of vested interests in Iraq’s rich oil deposits, Cheney stood staunchly behind Bush’s belligerent policy on Iraq, well into his second term.

Washington Post profile of the Dick Cheney Vice Presidency.

Dick Cheney says President Bush should not be blamed for economic crisis.

President-elect Barack Obama has extended Robert Michael Gates’ term as Secretary of Defense. He will be the only vestige of the Bush administration in Obama’s all-star cabinet, a “team of rivals” that includes Hillary Clinton.

Gates will be assigned the crucial task of undoing the Iraq War and obviating the controversial detention center at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay. The President-elect is confident Gates will agree with him in his vision.

Under Obama, Gates will follow a new order — withdraw American troops from Iraq in 16 months. The incumbent secretary was appointed long after Bush and his neo-conservative compatriots instigated the wars on Afghanistan and Iraq. He is expected to follow the President-elect’s orders. Obama heaped praises on Gates for crafting a “sustainable national security strategy, with bipartisan consensus at home.” The two see eye-to-eye in prolonging military presence in Afghanistan, where the al-Qaeda network and the Talibans are resurgent.
(http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2008/11/25/defense-secretary-gates-job-obama/) (http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gnPpwRiOsjgI0z57NytZve0-sHMgD94QRPJO0)

Defense Secretary Gates rose to the position on December 18, 2006, as the more realist replacement of Donald Rumsfeld. Unlike his predecessor, Gates has been somewhat cool towards US policy on Iraq, as outlined in the report of his Iraq Study Group.

Gates’ prolific career began with the Central Intelligence Agency, which initially employed him as intelligence analyst from 1966 to 1974. Then he made history by jumping swiftly from entry-level to directorial positions. After becoming CIA Deputy Director, Gates was tapped to substitute a cancer-stricken William Casey as Acting Director of CIA. However, he only fully became Director in 1991.

His CIA career coincided with a stint as deputy national security advisor to the first President George Bush. Before that, Gates became a member of the National Security Council from 1974 to 1979.

He first entered the CIA after gaining his master’s in history from Indiana University. It follows his graduation at the College of William and Mary College, with a degree in European history. In 1974, he earned his doctorate at Georgetown University.

Following his nearly three decades at CIA, Gates commenced a new phase in 1999, when he became interim dean of the Bush School at the Texas A&M University. In 2002, he became the university’s president, a post he held until his nomination as Defense Secretary.