Machine Politics

Sensational media reports speculate about the "rise of the machines" but fail to see that there's no real intelligence in AI. It is not an all-seeing master, but rather a functional tool that must combine with the intelligence we possess to be effective. With The AI Republic, Terence Tse, Mark Esposito, and Danny Goh have not written a book for coders, but for everyone curious about a future shaped by AI. They demystify this life-changing technology and explain how we can build a shared space where humans and intelligent automation work together.

In Robotaxi Revolution, Dr. Samuel Xiangming Li explores the transformative impact of autonomous taxis on the future of transportation and society. These self-driving vehicles, powered by cutting-edge AI and advanced sensor technologies, are set to redefine personal mobility, disrupt the auto industry, and reshape urban infrastructure. From ride-hailing services to the decline of car ownership, robotaxis promise to bring greater convenience, reduced emissions, and safer roads.

No longer an uncertain technology of the distant future, artificial intelligence is starting to shape every aspect of our daily lives, from how we think to who we love. In this urgent polemic, leading barrister Susie Alegre explores the ways in which artificial intelligence threatens our fundamental human rights—including the rights to life, liberty and fair trial; the right to private and family life; and the right to free expression—and how we protect those rights.

Bob Muglia helps us understand how innovation in data and information technology have led us to AI—and how this technology must shape our future. The long-time Microsoft executive, former CEO of Snowflake, and current tech investor maps the evolution of the modern data stack and how it has helped build today's economy and society. And he explains how humanity must create a new social contract for the artificial general intelligence (AGI)—autonomous machines intelligent as people-that he expects to arrive in less than a decade.

It seems that just about every new technology that we bring to bear on improving our lives brings with it some downside, side effect, or unintended consequence. These issues can pose very real and growing ethical problems for all of us. For example, automated facial recognition can make life easier and safer for us—but it also poses huge issues with regard to privacy, ownership of data, and even identity theft. Technology Is Not Neutral addresses one of today’s most pressing problems: How to create and use tools and technologies to maximize benefits and minimize harms.

AI is a present reality: we live at the threshold of an AI-dominated era. AI is more than a Technology wave. In the 21st century and beyond it is the very core source of power that fuels politics, business, and society: our minds, our work, and our homes. AI also rewrites the rules and forces us to lose no time in rethinking fundamental questions of our humanity. Our human brains will soon be required to adapt at hyper speed to a new paradigm of omnipresent machine intelligence. We all have to deal with both its opportunities and threats in a conscious manner.

A Human Algorithm: How Artificial Intelligence Is Redefining Who We Are examines the immense impact intelligent technology will have on humanity. These machines, while challenging our personal beliefs and our socio-economic world order, also have the potential to transform our health and well-being, alleviate poverty and suffering, and reveal the mysteries of intelligence and consciousness. International human rights attorney Flynn Coleman deftly argues that it is critical we instill values, ethics, and morals into our robots, algorithms, and other forms of AI.

As thinking machines make more decisions on our behalf, they can enrich, enable, and influence our lives. The increasing use of AI raises critical questions about our values, cultures, economies, and power relationships. And the answers may depend upon your race, gender, age, behavior, and nationality. In clear and accessible prose, Olaf Groth and Mark Nitzberg explore the history of intelligent technology, revealing how close we are to designing machines that have some sort of consciousness - and that we must now decide how to give those machines a conscience.

What's wrong with preferring domestic assistants with feminine personalities? We like our assistants to conform to gender stereotypes - so what? For one thing, Strengers and Kennedy remind us, the design of gendered devices reinscribes outdated and unfounded stereotypes. Strengers and Kennedy offer a Smart Wife "manifesta", proposing a rebooted Smart Wife that would promote a revaluing of femininity in society in all her glorious diversity.

In his blockbuster new book, To Save America, former Speaker of the House and best-selling author Newt Gingrich issues a dire warning for America. Gingrich argues that the big-spending, big-government programs and bureaucracies of the secular socialist Left are the greatest threat to our nation’s survival since the Civil War.

200-Word Summary of “America’s AI Action Plan” (July 2025): "America’s AI Action Plan," developed under the Trump Administration, outlines a strategic roadmap to secure U.S. dominance in artificial intelligence. The plan is built on three pillars: accelerating AI innovation, building robust infrastructure, and leading international AI diplomacy. It calls for removing bureaucratic barriers to innovation, promoting open-source AI, safeguarding free speech in AI systems, and rapidly expanding AI adoption across industries and government.

This reissue of Willeford's 1963 pulp classic is a timely reminder that madness is truly the dark heart of politics. Written at a time when people still had faith in their elected leaders, Willeford's book laid bare the American dream. There is an almost Chekhovian wistfulness in the treatment of his stories, which belies their considerable - and still relevant - impact.

Solomon Bull is the son of a rebel who died in the '80s fighting for the American Indian Movement. He trains for an Arizona race called Desert Dog, designed to shred a man, while using monkey-wrench tactics to unseat a corrupt senator. Pursued by a smoking-hot agent from the Treasury's Terrorism and Financial Intelligence office, a doe-like prostitute with burn marks on her back and a sick story about a demented senator, and by Cal Barrett - Desert Dog organizer and brain behind Operation Guillotine - Solomon Bull has a difficult choice and no time to make it.

Blood Highways is the heart-wrenching account of the biggest product liability case in history: the Ford-Firestone fiasco. At the center of the story are two people: Tab Turner, a charismatic trial attorney from Arkansas, who has made a career out of forcing Ford and other automakers to own up to knowingly trade human lives for profits; and Donna Bailey, a single mother and outdoor enthusiast who fought back from the brink of death to confront those ultimately responsible for her accident.

Weekly Standard editor Daniel Halper provides a meticulously researched account of the brilliant calculations, secret deals, and occasionally treacherous maneuverings that led to the Clintons’ return to political prominence. In the twelve years since the Clintons left the White House, they...

When Anna Broinowski learned that fracking had invaded downtown Sydney, she had a brilliant idea: she would seek guidance for a kryptonite-powerful, anti-fracking movie from the world's greatest propaganda factory - apart from Hollywood. After two years of trying, she was allowed to make her case in Pyongyang and was granted full permission to film. She worked closely with the leading lights of North Korean cinema, even playing an American in a military thriller.

Leading neuroscience researchers are racing to unlock the secrets of the mind. On the cusp of decoding brain signals that govern motor skills, they are developing miraculous technologies to enable paraplegics and wounded soldiers to move prosthetic limbs, and the rest of us to manipulate computers and other objects through thought alone. These fiercely competitive scientists are vying for Defense Department and venture capital funding, prestige, and great wealth.

More than twenty years ago, 9/11 and the war in Afghanistan set into motion a hugely consequential shift in America's foreign policy: a perpetual state of war that is almost entirely invisible to the American public. War Made Invisible, by the journalist and political analyst Norman Solomon, exposes how this happened, and what its consequences are, from military and civilian casualties to drained resources at home.

Futurist Gerd Leonhard breaks new ground again by bringing together mankind’s urge to upgrade and automate everything - down to human biology itself - with our timeless quest for freedom and happiness.

We live in a world where data can help us make more informed decisions about how to navigate traffic, who to date, what to buy, who to network with and how to better manage our finances. But when it comes to our personal health and wellness, we have no roadmap. We need something to show us where we are in terms of our health, with landmarks for risks and opportunities. A GPS that makes it easier to move toward our personal health goals. A new way to look at health and life.