Murray Rothbard said that economics, law, and history are the most susceptible to propaganda. It is astonishing how historical narratives become established in real time. If we are not vigilant about remembering, recording, and reciting the history of the last quarter century, it will be shaped into a state-approved, establishment narrative—one that assures us political elites did their best with the knowledge they had, that progress was led by wise officials and their obedient followers (the “resistance”), and that objections came only from the selfish, cowardly, ignorant, or evil who were thankfully overcome.
In this state-approved court history, every war was a sincere quest for justice based on unimpeachable intelligence and all opposition came from “isolationists.” Economic crises were caused by deregulation and greedy capitalists, with the heroic state and central bank swooping in to save the day. The covid response was science-based, courageous, and unified—despite partisan obstruction and misinformation from a few selfish would-be “grandma-killers.” According to the legend, we followed the science, stayed safe, and banded together.
Much of the public—despite considering themselves to be independent thinkers—has accepted nearly every establishment lie of the last 25 years. They still believe institutions and policies are what their names suggest and, if they were being deceived, they would know it.
We cannot allow the establishment to write the history of 2000–2025. To that end, I’ve compiled a non-exhaustive bibliography for understanding this turbulent period. Not every work listed is endorsed without qualification, but each has been carefully selected. As always, read with discernment—eat the meat, spit out the bones.
Though the official beginning is 2000, many of the themes covered require context. We cannot understand 2000 without some understanding of the prior period. This is the challenge of any history. To avoid Harry Browne’s quip that “history began on 9/11,” a few relevant pre-2000 works are included.
This bibliography is organized into three domains: economics, foreign policy, and domestic policy.
Economic Theory and History
Mises Institute. Playing with Fire: Money, Banking, and the Federal Reserve. Auburn, AL: Mises Institute, 2024.
Morrison, Jimmy, and Tom Woods. The Bubble (Documentary), 2018.
Paul, Ron. “This Real-Estate Bubble Will Burst, as All Bubbles Do” (Parts 1 and 2). 2001–2002 speeches.
Ravier, Adrián, and Peter Lewin. “The Subprime Crisis: A Hayekian Perspective.” The Quarterly Journal of Austrian Economics 15, No. 1 (Spring 2012): 45–74.
Schiff, Peter D. The Real Crash: America’s Coming Bankruptcy — How to Save Yourself and Your Country. St. Martin’s Press, 2012.
Thornton, Mark. “Who Predicted the Bubble? Who Predicted the Crash?” The Independent Review 9, No. 1 (Summer 2004): 5–30.
Thornton, Mark. The Skyscraper Curse: And How Austrian Economists Predicted Every Major Economic Crisis of the Last Century. Mises Institute, 2018.
Foreign Policy
Abrams, Max. “Al Qaeda’s Scorecard: A Progress Report on Al Qaeda’s Objectives.” Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 29, no. 5 (2006): 509–529.
Arnove, Anthony. Iraq Under Siege: The Deadly Impact of Sanctions and War. Pluto, 2003.
Ashford, Emma. “Unbalanced: Rethinking America’s Commitment to the Middle East.” Strategic Studies Quarterly 12, no. 1 (2018): 127–148.
Atwan, Abdel Bari. The Secret History of al-Qa’ida. Saqi, 2006.
Bacevich, Andrew J. The New American Militarism: How Americans Are Seduced by War. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
Bamford, James. A Pretext for War: 9/11, Iraq, and the Abuse of America’s Intelligence Agencies. Doubleday, 2004.
Blum, William. America’s Deadliest Export: Democracy – The Truth About US Foreign Policy and Everything Else. London: Zed Books, 2013.
——. Freeing the World to Death: Essays on the American Empire. Monroe, ME: Common Courage Press, 2004.
——. Rogue State: A Guide to the World’s Only Superpower. Monroe, ME: Common Courage Press, 2000.
Clarke, Richard A. Against All Enemies: Inside America’s War on Terror. Free Press, 2004.
Cockburn, Andrew. Kill Chain: The Rise of the High-Tech Assassins. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2015.
——. Rumsfeld: His Rise, Fall, and Catastrophic Legacy. New York: Scribner, 2007.
Coll, Steve. Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001. Penguin Books, 2004.
Collins, Joseph J. WMD in Iraq: Evidence and Implications. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2004.
Conry, Barbara. “America’s Misguided Policy of Dual Containment in the Persian Gulf.” Cato Institute Policy Briefing, 1994.
Curtis, Adam. The Power of Nightmares, Part I: “Baby It’s Cold Outside.” Directed by Adam Curtis. BBC, 2004. Documentary film.
——. The Power of Nightmares, Part II: “The Phantom Victory.” Directed by Adam Curtis. BBC, 2004. Documentary film.
——. The Power of Nightmares, Part III: “The Shadows in the Cave.” Directed by Adam Curtis. BBC, 2004. Documentary film.
Downes, Alexander B., and Jonathan Monten. “Forced to Be Free?: Why Foreign-Imposed Regime Change Rarely Leads to Democratization.” International Security 37, no. 4 (2013): 90–131.
Feldman, James K., and Robert A. Pape. Cutting the Fuse: The Explosion of Global Suicide Terrorism and How to Stop It. University of Chicago Press, 2010.
Fitzgerald, Paul, and Elizabeth Gould. Invisible History: Afghanistan’s Untold Story. City Lights Books, 2009.
Gall, Carlotta. The Wrong Enemy: America in Afghanistan, 2001–2014. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014.
Gareau, Paul W. State Terrorism and the United States: From Counterinsurgency to the War on Terrorism. Zed Books, 2004.
Gold, Zack. “Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI): Al-Qaeda Affiliate Case Study.” Washington, DC: CNA, October 2017.
Gopal, Anand. No Good Men Among the Living: America, the Taliban, and the War Through Afghan Eyes. New York: Metropolitan Books, 2014.
Gregory, Anthony. “What Price War? Afghanistan, Iraq, and the Costs of Conflict.” Oakland, CA: Independent Institute, 2011.
Hazelton, Jacqueline L. “The ‘Hearts and Minds’ Fallacy: Violence, Coercion, and Success in Counterinsurgency Warfare.” International Security 42, no. 1 (2017): 80–113.
Horton, Scott. Enough Already: Time to End the War on Terrorism. The Libertarian Institute, 2021.
——. Fool’s Errand: Time to End the War in Afghanistan. The Libertarian Institute, 2017.
——. Provoked: How Washington Started the New Cold War with Russia and the Catastrophe in Ukraine. The Libertarian Institute, 2024.
Johnson, Chalmers A. Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire. Metropolitan Books, 2004.
Kinzer, Stephen. Overthrow: America’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq. New York: Times Books, 2006.
Lando, Barry M. Web of Deceit: The History of Western Complicity in Iraq, from Churchill to Kennedy to George W. Bush. New York: Other Press, 2007.
Linschoten, Felix, and Alex Strick van Linschoten. An Enemy We Created: The Myth of the Taliban–Al Qaeda Merger in Afghanistan, 1970–2010. Oxford University Press (Pakistan), 2012.
MacDonald, Michael. Overreach: Delusions of Regime Change in Iraq. Harvard University Press, 2014.
MacGinty, Roger. “Warlords and the Liberal Peace: State-Building in Afghanistan.” Conflict, Security & Development 10, no. 4 (2010): 577–598.
Mearsheimer, John J., and Stephen M. Walt. The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007.
——. Why Leaders Lie: The Truth About Lying in International Politics. Oxford University Press, 2011.
——. “Why the Ukraine Crisis Is the West’s Fault,” Foreign Affairs, 2014.
McCoy, Alfred W. A Question of Torture: CIA Interrogation, from the Cold War to the War on Terror. New York: Metropolitan Books, 2006.
Monteiro, Nuno P. “Unrest Assured: Why Unipolarity Is Not Peaceful.” International Security 36, no. 3 (2011): 9–39.
Pape, Robert A. Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism. Random House, 2005.
Porter, Gareth. Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare. Just World Books, 2014.
Porter, Patrick. “Why America’s Grand Strategy Has Not Changed: Power, Habit, and the US Foreign Policy Establishment.” International Security 42, no. 4 (2018): 9–46.
Project for the New American Century. Rebuilding America’s Defenses: Strategy, Forces and Resources for a New Century. Washington, D.C.: PNAC, September 2000.
Risen, James. State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration. Free Press, 2006.
Scahill, Jeremy, and the Staff of The Intercept. The Assassination Complex: Inside the Government’s Secret Drone Warfare Program. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2017.
Schroen, Gary C. First In: An Insider’s Account of How the CIA Spearheaded the War on Terror in Afghanistan. New York: Random House, 2005.
Solis-Mullen, Joseph. The Fake China Threat: And Its Very Real Danger. Libertarian Institute, 2023.
Swenson, Geoffrey. “Why US Efforts to Promote the Rule of Law in Afghanistan Failed.” International Security 42, no. 1 (2017): 114–151.
US Department of State. Significant Terrorist Incidents, 1961–2003: A Brief Chronology. Bureau of Public Affairs, Office of the Historian, 2003.
Vine, David. Base Nation: How US Military Bases Abroad Harm America and the World. Skyhorse Publishing, 2017.
Whitlock, Craig. The Afghanistan Papers: A Secret History of the War. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2021.
Wright, Lawrence. The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11. Knopf, 2006.
Woodward, Bob. Bush at War. Simon & Schuster, 2002.
——. Plan of Attack. Simon & Schuster, 2004.
——. State of Denial: Bush at War, Part III. Simon & Schuster, 2006.
Domestic Policy
Aaronson, Trevor. The Terror Factory: Inside the FBI’s Manufactured on Terrorism. Brooklyn, NY: Ig Publishing, 2013.
Bamford, James. The Shadow Factory: The Ultra-Secret NSA from 9/11 to the Eavesdropping on America. Doubleday, 2008.
Bhattacharya, Jay et al. The Great Barrington Declaration. American Institute for Economic Research, 2020.
Bovard, James. Terrorism and Tyranny: Trampling Freedom, Justice, and Peace to Rid the World of Evil. Palgrave Macmillan, 2003.
Durham, John H. Report on Matters Related to Intelligence Activities and Investigations Arising Out of the 2016 Presidential Campaigns. Washington, DC: US Department of Justice, 2023.
Greenwald, Glenn. No Place to Hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA, and the US Surveillance State. Metropolitan Books, 2014.
Gurri, Martin. The Revolt of the Public and the Crisis of Authority in the New Millennium. 2nd ed. Silicon Valley: Stripe Press, 2018.
Holiday, Ryan. Trust Me, I’m Lying: Confessions of a Media Manipulator. New York: Portfolio/Penguin, 2012.
Kennedy, Robert F. Jr. The Real Anthony Fauci: Bill Gates, Big Pharma, and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health. New York: Skyhorse Publishing, 2021.
Lewis, Hunter. Crony Capitalism in America: 2008–2012. AC2 Books, 2013.
Napolitano, Andrew P. A Nation of Sheep. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2007.
Napolitano, Andrew P. Constitutional Chaos: What Happens When the Government Breaks Its Own Laws. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2004.
Paul, Ron. The Revolution: A Manifesto. New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2008.
Snowden, Edward. Permanent Record. New York: Metropolitan Books, 2019.
Stockman, David. The Great Deformation: The Corruption of Capitalism in America. 2013.
——. Trumped! A Nation on the Brink of Ruin…And How to Bring It Back. 2016.
——. Peak Trump: The Undrainable Swamp and the Fantasy of MAGA. 2019.
Taibbi, Matt, Michael Shellenberger, Lee Fang, and others. The Twitter Files. Substack and Twitter/X, 2022–2023.
Woods, Thomas E. Jr. Diary of a Psychosis: How Public Health Disgraced Itself During COVID Mania. 2023.
——. Real Dissent: A Libertarian Sets Fire to the Index Card of Allowable Opinion. 2014.
