John Mueller - Böcker

Are We Safe Enough? Measuring and Assessing Aviation Security explains how standard risk analytic and cost-benefit analysis can be applied to aviation security in systematic and easy-to-understand steps. The book evaluates and puts into sensible context the risks associated with air travel, the risk appetite of airlines and regulators and the notion of acceptable risk. It does so by describing the effectiveness, risk reduction and cost of each layer of aviation security, from policing and intelligence to checkpoint passenger screening to arming pilots on the flight deck.

Quantifies the risks, costs and benefits of various aviation security methods, including policing, intelligence, PreCheck, checkpoint passenger screening, behavioral detection, air marshals and armed pilots Focuses on security measures that reduce costs without reducing security, including PreCheck, Federal Flight Deck Officer program and Installed Physical Secondary Barriers Features risk-reduction insights with global applications that are fully transparent, and fully explored through sensitivity analysis

Since 2001, the United States has created or reorganized more than two counterterrorism organizations for every terrorist arrest or apprehension it has made of people plotting to do damage within the country. Central to this massive enterprise is 'ghost-chasing,' as less than one alarm in 10,000 is an actual threat-the rest all point to ghosts. And the vast majority of the leads deemed to be productive have led to terrorist enterprises that were either trivial or at most aspirational. As John Mueller and Mark Stewart suggest in Chasing Ghosts, this is often an exercise in dueling delusions: a Muslim hothead has delusions about changing the world by blowing something up, and the authorities have delusions that he might actually be able to overcome his patent inadequacies to do so. Mueller and Stewart systematically examine this expensive, exhausting, bewildering, chaotic, and paranoia-inducing process. They evaluate the counterterrorism efforts of the FBI, the National Security Agency, the Department of Homeland Security, and local policing agencies. In addition, applying a new set of case studies, they appraise the capacities of the terrorist 'adversary' and discuss what they calls 'the myth of the mastermind.' They also assess public opinion, a key driving force for counterterrorism efforts. The yearly chance an American will be killed by a terrorist within the country is about one in four million under present conditions. However, polling data suggest that, although over a trillion dollars has been spent on domestic counterterrorism since 2001, Americans continue to be alarmed and say they do not feel safer. No defense of civil liberties is likely to be terribly effective as long as officials and the population at large continue to believe that the threat from terrorism is massive, even existential.Mueller and Stewart do not argue that there is nothing for the ghost-chasers to find-the terrorist 'adversary' is real and does exist. The question that is central to the exercise, but one the ghost-chasers never really probe, is an important and rather straight-forward one to which standard evaluative procedures can be applied: is the chase worth the effort? Or is it excessive given a serious consideration of the danger that terrorism actually presents?

In the years following 9/11, the United States spent billions and billons on powerful surveillance and security systems and created a massive new government agency, the Department of Homeland Security. John Mueller, one of America's most trenchant critics of America's drive for enhanced security at all costs, has argued that while these measures have largely been unnecessary, the public succumbed to an alarmist media and a shrewd governmental scare campaign and came to support these measures. The price, Mueller has contended, has been a massive misallocation of resources. In previous books, Mueller focused on why national security threats are 'overblown,' but in Terrorism, Security, and Money, he teams up with Mark Stewart, a civil engineering professor and recognized authority on risk assessment for the built infrastructure, to put forth a more rational and cost-effective approach to managing domestic security. Instead of offering a critical account of the situation we're in, Mueller and Stewart instead focus on providing solutions based on the risk assessment science. After cataloguing the mistakes that the US has made (and continues to make), like spending wildly on ill-considered plans to mitigate unlikely threats, they offer tools-based probabilistic risk assessment that have the potential to redirect our efforts toward a more productive--and far more cost-effective--course.

In the years following 9/11, the United States spent billions and billons on powerful surveillance and security systems and created a massive new government agency, the Department of Homeland Security. John Mueller, one of America's most trenchant critics of America's drive for enhanced security at all costs, has argued that while these measures have largely been unnecessary, the public succumbed to an alarmist media and a shrewd governmental scare campaign and came to support these measures. The price, Mueller has contended, has been a massive misallocation of resources. In previous books, Mueller focused on why national security threats are 'overblown,' but in Terrorism, Security, and Money, he teams up with Mark Stewart, a civil engineering professor and recognized authority on risk assessment for the built infrastructure, to put forth a more rational and cost-effective approach to managing domestic security. Instead of offering a critical account of the situation we're in, Mueller and Stewart instead focus on providing solutions based on the risk assessment science. After cataloguing the mistakes that the US has made (and continues to make), like spending wildly on ill-considered plans to mitigate unlikely threats, they offer tools-based probabilistic risk assessment that have the potential to redirect our efforts toward a more productive--and far more cost-effective--course.

Ever since the first atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, the prospect of nuclear annihilation has haunted the modern world. But as John Mueller reveals in this eye-opening, compellingly argued, and very reassuring book, our obsession with nuclear weapons is unsupported by history, scientific fact, or logic. Examining the entire atomic era, Mueller boldly contends that nuclear weapons have had little impact on history. Although they have inspired overwrought policies and distorted spending priorities, for the most part they have proved to be militarily useless, and a key reason so few countries have taken them up is that they are a spectacular waste of money and scientific talent. Equally important, Atomic Obsession reveals why anxieties about terrorists obtaining nuclear weapons are essentially baseless: a host of practical and organizational difficulties make their likelihood of success almost vanishingly small.Mueller, one of America's most distinguished yet provocative international relations scholars, goes even further, maintaining that our efforts to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons have produced more suffering and violence than the bombs themselves, and that proliferation of the weapons, while not necessarily desirable, is unlikely to be a major danger or to accelerate."The book will certainly make you think. Added bonus: It's immensely fun to read."--Stephen M. Walt, ForeignPolicy.com"Meticulously researched and punctuated with a dry wit. Mueller deserves praise for having the guts to shout that the atomic emperor has no clothes."--Arms Control Today"Mueller performs an important service in puncturing some of the inflated rhetoric about nuclear weapons.... An unusual and fruitful perspective on nuclear history."--Science Magazine

Polls are at their best as indicators of public opinion when they allow comparisons over extended periods of time. Yet all too often changes in question working and in questionnare content make over-time comparisons impossible. This work overcomes this difficulty by bringing together for the first time a compendium of results using identically worded questions on a wide range of social, political, and economic topics of importance to the American people.Chapter introductions summarize trends in the various areas surveyed and discuss problems of interpretation. The chapters on political behavior and attitudes present findings on party identification, political tolerance, voting, civil liberties, international affairs, and related issues. Chapters on work, the family, and sexuality cover such topics as job prestige and satisfaction, the role of women, divorce, family size, sex education, abortion, premarital and extramarital sex, homosexuality, and pornography. Other issues addressed include crime and violence, race, death and dying, life style, and general attitudes toward life. Trend analysis based on General Social Surveys conducted regularly by The National Opinion Research Center of the University of Chicago since 1972 is supplemented by data from 25 other sources extending as far back as the 1930s. The questions chosen are meaningful and standardized and have been asked in interviews over a significant period. Survey results are displayed in a highly readable format that facilitates comparisons over time. An appropriate choice for the library reference collection, this book is a valuable research tool and source for scholars in political science, psychology, and sociology, as well as journalists, policy makers, and other professionals concerned with public opinion.

As we enter a new century, world affairs have been transformed. The leading countries confront no compelling or immediate major threats of a military sort; they all see the world in essentially the same way; there has been an enormous expansion of international trade and economic interconnections; and rapid technological expansion has facilitated i

This book collects the key essays, together with updating notes and commentary, of Professor John Mueller on war and the role of ideas and opinions.Mueller has maintained that war (and peace) are, in essence, merely ideas, and that war has waned as the notion that 'peace' is a decidedly good idea has gained currency. The first part of the book extends this argument, noting that as ideas have spread, war is losing out not only in the developed world, but now in the developing one, and that even civil war is in marked decline. It also assesses and critiques theories arguing that this phenomenon is caused by the rising acceptance of democracy and/or capitalism.The second part argues that the Cold War was at base a clash of ideas that were seen to be threatening, not of arms balances, domestic systems, geography, or international structure. It also maintains that there has been a considerable tendency to exaggerate security threats—currently, in particular, the one presented by international terrorism—and to see them in excessively military terms.The third section deals with the role public opinion plays in foreign policy, and argues that many earlier conclusions about opinion during the Korean and Vietnam Wars, including especially ones concerning the importance of casualties in determining popular support for war, apply to more recent military ventures in the Persian Gulf, Bosnia, Iraq, and Afghanistan. It also assesses the difficulties leaders and idea entrepreneurs often encounter when they try to manage or manipulate public opinion.This book will be of much interest to students of international relations, security studies, foreign policy and international history.

This book collects the key essays, together with updating notes and commentary, of Professor John Mueller on war and the role of ideas and opinions.Mueller has maintained that war (and peace) are, in essence, merely ideas, and that war has waned as the notion that 'peace' is a decidedly good idea has gained currency. The first part of the book extends this argument, noting that as ideas have spread, war is losing out not only in the developed world, but now in the developing one, and that even civil war is in marked decline. It also assesses and critiques theories arguing that this phenomenon is caused by the rising acceptance of democracy and/or capitalism.The second part argues that the Cold War was at base a clash of ideas that were seen to be threatening, not of arms balances, domestic systems, geography, or international structure. It also maintains that there has been a considerable tendency to exaggerate security threats—currently, in particular, the one presented by international terrorism—and to see them in excessively military terms.The third section deals with the role public opinion plays in foreign policy, and argues that many earlier conclusions about opinion during the Korean and Vietnam Wars, including especially ones concerning the importance of casualties in determining popular support for war, apply to more recent military ventures in the Persian Gulf, Bosnia, Iraq, and Afghanistan. It also assesses the difficulties leaders and idea entrepreneurs often encounter when they try to manage or manipulate public opinion.This book will be of much interest to students of international relations, security studies, foreign policy and international history.

Democracy is overrated. Capitalism, on the other hand, doesn't get enough credit. In this provocative and engaging book, John Mueller argues that these mismatches between image and reality create significant political and economic problems--inspiring instability, inefficiency, and widespread cynicism. We would be far better off, he writes, if we recognized that neither system is ideal or disastrous and accepted instead the humdrum truth that both are "pretty good." And, to Mueller, that means good enough. He declares that what is true of Garrison Keillor's fictional store "Ralph's Pretty Good Grocery" is also true of democracy and capitalism: if you can't get what you want there, "you can probably get along without it." Mueller begins by noting that capitalism is commonly thought to celebrate greed and to require discourtesy, deceit, and callousness. However, with examples that range from car dealerships and corporate boardrooms to the shop of an eighteenth-century silk merchant, Mueller shows that capitalism in fact tends to reward behavior that is honest, fair, civil, and compassionate.He argues that this gap between image and reality hampers economic development by encouraging people to behave dishonestly, unfairly, and discourteously to try to get ahead and to neglect the virtuous behavior that is an important source of efficiency and gain. The problem with democracy's image, by contrast, is that our expectations are too high. We are too often led by theorists, reformers, and romantics to believe that democracy should consist of egalitarianism and avid civic participation. In fact, democracy will always be chaotic, unequal, and marked by apathy. It offers reasonable freedom and security, but not political paradise. To idealize democracy, Mueller writes, is to undermine it, since the inevitable contrast with reality creates public cynicism and can hamper democracy's growth and development. Mueller presents these arguments with sophistication, wit, and erudition. He combines mastery of current political and economic literature with references to figures ranging from Plato to P. T. Barnum, from Immanuel Kant to Ronald Reagan, from Shakespeare to Frank Capra.Broad in scope and rich in detail, the book will provoke debate among economists, political scientists, and anyone interested in the problems (or non-problems) of modern democracy and capitalism.

"War... is merely an idea, an institution, like dueling or slavery, that has been grafted onto human existence. It is not a trick of fate, a thunderbolt from hell, a natural calamity, or a desperate plot contrivance dreamed up by some sadistic puppeteer on high. And it seems to me that the institution is in pronounced decline, abandoned as attitudes toward it have changed, roughly following the pattern by which the ancient and formidable institution of slavery became discredited and then mostly obsolete."—from the IntroductionWar is one of the great themes of human history and now, John Mueller believes, it is clearly declining. Developed nations have generally abandoned it as a way for conducting their relations with other countries, and most current warfare (though not all) is opportunistic predation waged by packs—often remarkably small ones—of criminals and bullies. Thus, argues Mueller, war has been substantially reduced to its remnants—or dregs—and thugs are the residual combatants.Mueller is sensitive to the policy implications of this view. When developed states commit disciplined troops to peacekeeping, the result is usually a rapid cessation of murderous disorder. The Remnants of War thus reinvigorates our sense of the moral responsibility bound up in peacekeeping. In Mueller's view, capable domestic policing and military forces can also be effective in reestablishing civic order, and the building of competent governments is key to eliminating most of what remains of warfare.

"War... is merely an idea, an institution, like dueling or slavery, that has been grafted onto human existence. It is not a trick of fate, a thunderbolt from hell, a natural calamity, or a desperate plot contrivance dreamed up by some sadistic puppeteer on high. And it seems to me that the institution is in pronounced decline, abandoned as attitudes toward it have changed, roughly following the pattern by which the ancient and formidable institution of slavery became discredited and then mostly obsolete."—from the IntroductionWar is one of the great themes of human history and now, John Mueller believes, it is clearly declining. Developed nations have generally abandoned it as a way for conducting their relations with other countries, and most current warfare (though not all) is opportunistic predation waged by packs—often remarkably small ones—of criminals and bullies. Thus, argues Mueller, war has been substantially reduced to its remnants—or dregs—and thugs are the residual combatants.Mueller is sensitive to the policy implications of this view. When developed states commit disciplined troops to peacekeeping, the result is usually a rapid cessation of murderous disorder. The Remnants of War thus reinvigorates our sense of the moral responsibility bound up in peacekeeping. In Mueller's view, capable domestic policing and military forces can also be effective in reestablishing civic order, and the building of competent governments is key to eliminating most of what remains of warfare.

As we enter a new century, world affairs have been transformed. The leading countries confront no compelling or immediate major threats of a military sort they all see the world in essentially the same way there has been an enormous expansion of international trade and economic interconnections and rapid technological expansion has facilitated international interconnections that substantially skirt standard political arrangements. This makes possible a reallocation of national effort from security to material concerns and a reasonable prospect for an unparalleled era of prosperity and peace.But less benign forces also persist. Ethnic conflict continues to plague the world, and a new challenge to the international order could be launched by an emergent or resurgent state. Moreover, the positive prospects of the global economy are not yet available for all nations. In result, politics - political choice - remains important.In this book, a group of political scientists, economists, and historians assess these important developments. They agree that important historical changes are occurring in international politics, but they differ in their perspectives and proffer different speculations about the new era and about the consequences of the emerging relationship between politics and economics. They also vary in the degree to which they are optimistic or pessimistic about the way things appear to be going.

It could be said that American foreign policy since 1945 has been one long miscue; most international threats - including during the Cold War - have been substantially exaggerated. The result has been agony and bloviation, unnecessary and costly military interventions that have mostly failed. A policy of complacency and appeasement likely would have worked better. In this highly readable book, John Mueller argues with wisdom and wit rather than ideology and hyperbole that aversion to international war has had considerable consequences. There has seldom been significant danger of major war. Nuclear weapons, international institutions, and America's super power role have been substantially irrelevant; post-Cold War policy has been animated more by vast proclamation and half-vast execution than by the appeals of liberal hegemony; and post-9/11 concerns about international terrorism and nuclear proliferation have been overwrought and often destructive. Meanwhile, threats from Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea, or from cyber technology are limited and manageable. Unlikely to charm Washington, Mueller explains how, when international war is in decline, complacency and appeasement become viable diplomatic devices and a large military is scarcely required.

Specific topics include writing accessible web applications and desktop applications using Visual Basic .NET and Visual C# .NET, developing special application capabilities, using Microsoft and other third-party tools to develop accessible features, developing accessible scripting solutions, and more.

In today's rapidly changing technological world, it is increasingly important that web and desktop applications be accessible to everyone, including those of us with special needs. However, the legal requirements for accessibility are often convoluted and diffucult to understand, making it impossible for most developers to comply with the laws. In the first book on the market to address the topic, Author John Paul Mueller leads you through the maze of Section 508 - the congressional law ensuring that all Americans have access to information technology - and offers comprehensive guidance on how to quickly and easily update your applications to conform to Section 508 requirements. To begin, Mueller outlines the Section 508 requirements that are relevant to web and desktop application developers, and explains the laws in language you can understand. Using extensive and varied program examples, Mueller continues on to teach you to write web and desktop applications that not only conform to Section 508 standards, but look forward to ensure long-term universal accessibility for all types of computer users. Specific topics include writing accessible web applications and desktop applications using Visual Basic .NET and Visual C# .NET, developing special application capabilities, using Microsoft and other third-party tools to develop accessible features, developing accessible scripting solutions, and more. The book even includes a directory of helpful organizations, agencies, and resources to help you with any further accessibility concerns you may have.

Expert author John Mueller provides a complete view of Web Matrix, Microsoft's free Web site creation program - everything from simple Web pages to Web Services and database development to mobile applications. Mueller covers all the major features of Web Matrix, including the ASP.NET page designer, SQL and MSDE database management, data bound UI generation, XML Web Services, building mobile applications, FTP workspaces, and community integration. The combination of coverage, viewpoint, and quality make this title unique.