David A. Horowitz analyses the tension between the so-called "new class" of knowledge professionals and their critics, who accused them of being out of touch with the common sense of everyday people, strangers to the "American way", even communists.

"The American political system, as devised by the Federalist authors, the architects of the Constitution, was structured so as not to rely upon intellectuals. The "machinery of government" would operate on its own, and America had little possibility of becoming "a nation of philosophers." Yet, as David A. Horowitz has demonstrated, intellectuals as a political class have been at center of numerous public controversies throughout American history. Horowitz probes the problem of our own varying mandarin class with thorough research, lucid writing, and thoughtful reflection. Should the "brains trust" be trusted? That is the question." -- John Patrick Diggins, Distinguished Professor of History, Graduate Center, CUNY"David A. Horowitz mounts a vigorous challenge in this book to the conventional wisdom of political historians, both on the left and right. Rebels against the rule of the "best and the brightest" have often altered the outcome of elections and the shape of government policies. Now, at last, they have a full and empathetic treatment of what they believed and what they accomplished." -- Michael Kazin, author of The Populist Persuasion: An American History and Professor of History, Georgetown University