Gene Lalor has written an erudite and concise work, called A Immodest Proposal for Ending and Winning the War on Terror: A Curmudgeon's Plan for Survival, which is more a critique of our politically correct culture than it is a book concerning foreign policy, however, so the title is somewhat misleading. The “immodest proposal” is a reference to Jonathan Swift’s “modest proposal” which Lalor uses to illustrate that what he’s saying is far from extreme (by comparison). He offers a two phase plan for winning the war, but does not do so until the text’s final 25 pages. Thus, what he really seeks to do is cure a sick society. There’s no question, in my mind at least, that he’s 100 percent right with the diagnosis. The author is a retired teacher who has spent considerable time observing our public square. He has read voluminously and incorporates his learning into his narrative without making the pages burdensome. The world has changed much since he was a young man and mostly for the worse. Lalor peers into the future and he sees what Pippen sees when he gazes into the Palantír in The Lord of the Rings. His analysis is not charred by bitterness though. Lalor has a sense of humor and practices what he preaches. The achievements of his sons Bill and Kieran suggest to me that he’s a fine father and a good man. I hope he writes more in the future.