Saturday 13th September 2008 – 21:10 GMT, Ziemia Cieszynska

I've been reading the latest bestseller by angry commentators Dick Morris and Eileen McGann: Fleeced (or, how Barack Obama, media mockery of terrorist threats, liberals who want to kill talk radio, the do-nothing congress, companies that help Iran and Washington lobbyists for foreign governments are scamming us... and what to do about it) – you get the idea what kind of book it is.

It was interesting, but not exactly in the way I'd expected. Its title, its tone and the first couple of chapters chapter seem to give it away as a right wing, anti-government rant. The first chapter is all about how Barack Obama, if elected, “would take this country suddenly, sharply and dangerously to the far left”. Firstly as if this in itself, regardless of what it entailed, was necessarily a bad thing – it gives them away a little – but also (secondly) pure scaremongering – everyone must know there is a real difference between Obama's policies and those of the “far left”.

But what is interesting is how the rest of the book pans out. The premise is not so much anti-government as anti-everything – the sleeve even says as much: they are angry about “big business, big labor, big government and big lobbyists”. Everyone, in fact, who seems to be screwing over the little guy.

At times they seem to willfully miss the point in order to be able to justify wild rhetoric against Democrat policies. They manage to get angry about Obama's policy proposal to reverse Bush's tax cuts for the top 6% of earners: “if the Democrats retake the White House in November, our wallets will be considerably lighter once they're finished with us” - again, giving away that they really speak for the rich (“our wallets”) rather than for the little guy. And the vitriol with which they write about the Clintons suggests a personal rift (he was Bill's political consultant for 20 years).

But at other times they speak a language that grass roots campaigners from all perspectives understand – giving out the addresses and phone numbers of the Senators who Chair committees on various issues, and urging readers to kick up a fuss to make change happen. In a chapter on regulating the quality of imported consumer goods they even recommend establishing a “no sweat” trademark, similar to the present “fairtrade” one to enable American consumers to select only toys produced by adults under decent working conditions.

And their conclusion, when considering a whole range of issues for us to be angry about (sub-prime mortgages, murky credit card charges, poor educational standards, excessive hedge fund profits, corrupt military contracts in Iraq etc) is actually more, but better, government, not less.

Which brings me back to the paradox which made me want to read the book in the first place. Someone at RSe (very sorry I don't remember who – shout if it was you!) pointed out that Americans are uniquely (among citizens of democratic countries) sceptical of government, yet have been unwilling (or unable) to curb some of the more blatant – usually financial – abuses of power which would simply not be possible in other countries. Perhaps it shouldn't surprise us that the land of the pork barrel should be unwilling to trust the motives of those in power.

But America is also a land with a strong belief in progress, and in its own democracy. And if the consistently high ranking of this book on American bestseller lists is anything to go by, a lot of people are feeling alienated from business as usual politics. I suspect there could be considerable support for a populist political movement which genuinely shunned the corrupting influences of lobbyists, big business and the Washington “in crowd” in favour of truly defending the interests of the “little guy”.