Tom Kratman, A State of Disobedience

If you look at the Appendix of A State of Disobedience you will be able to tell if you would like this book. If you hate gun control, social security, Medicare of federal taxes of any kind that this is the book for you. If you love Jim Crow laws, states rights, and sharecropping you will like were this book is taking the US after its end. For all others don't even think about it.

With A State of Disobedience Tom Kratman has produced the piece that the National Rifle Association and Second Amendment Foundation have been waiting for. Unfortunately, it isn't exactly what they wanted.

"A State of Disobedience" uses the 'war on terror' as the foundation for a radically expanded federal government, curtailing civil liberties and crushing all opposition. The basis is important, provocative, and even profoundly educational; Kurt Vonegutt or Ronald Heinlein could have made a masterpiece out of it, but Kratman's work is surprisingly unfulfilling.

The plot proceeds along the expected lines: the federal government reachs a point where resistance to its plans cannot be ignored and switches an greatly enlarged federal law enforcement into combat mode. The Surgeon General even controls a law enforcement agency. The expanding atrocities comitted by these groups pull support away in favor of the rebellious Texans, and the President finds the 'world turned upside down'.

The characters are stereotyped to the point where character development is impossible. Out of every character in the book, only one seems to have the conflicting mix of emotions, ideals and needs to be real.

The characters' stereotyping also extends to the plot. The atrocities are not new, and neither is the premise. Similar works can be found in the public domain by running a query on Google. Although they received professional editing treatment, the meat is carved from the same animal as this book.

If some true moral conflict were involved, then the book would be much more tolerable.

A State of Disobedience

Tom Kratman

Baen, Dec 2003, $22.00, 314 pp.

ISBN: 0743471709

By 2060, whether terrorism is real or used by politicians to control the masses, several laws including the Patriot and Victory Acts curtail individual rights for the collective security of the nation. The current President Wilhelmina Rottemeyer is establishing a dictatorship after "stealing" the election. Now she begins to use the military to further her attempts at consolidating control in a police state.

In Waco, Texas, the military assaults the Del Gloria Mission killing twenty-six children among others. Texas Governor Juanita Seguin is horrified at the wanton unnecessary death and destruction. She concludes that more is coming from DC unless leaders like her lead the fight back. The second war of independence has begun in Austin.

Though conceptually quite interesting and overall well written in spite of a bungee jumping plot, this cautionary tale simplifies the conservative vs. liberal debate in this country by making everything on the right acceptable and everything from the left evil. Thus the President apparently is that malevolent incarnate Hilary destroying freedom while the Governor seems like the Greatest American hero George saving democracy. Ignoring that the Patriot Act was passed by a right wing Republican controlled House, equal sided Senate and signed by a right wing Republican President, the novel does raise issues of security vs. freedom in an exciting thriller. Though the fear should be of both extremes (shocking but Ruby Ridge occurred during the Bush the senior administration), Tom Kratman makes a strong case in this gripping futuristic political military thriller for when is it acceptable to go beyond civil disobedience to outright revolt against the government.

Harriet Klausner