"Has All the Progress of the Past 100 Years Come Undone?"

"The authors are at their best when they tease out these unexpected connections. If Vietnam's role in advancing civil rights provides one example, the way Vietnam simultaneously created new means of police brutality provides another. In the wake of the Watts riots of 1965, Lyndon B. Johnson funneled millions of dollars to local police departments, training police in military techniques developed in Southeast Asia. And as the authors make clear, many of the policies we associate with modern conservatism, from 'law and order' policies to deregulation, found key liberal sympathizers. The crackdown on urban black citizens began under Johnson while deregulation found a hero in Jimmy Carter."

Eric Herschthal in Slate reviews Glenda Elizabeth Gilmore and Thomas J. Sugrue's These United States.