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Book Review – Original Sin by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson
Like most informed voters, I followed the 2024 election and its results. In the six months since that election it seems like everyone is writing a book about it and its consequences or benefits (depending on your perspective) to the United States of America. This book, “Original Sin” by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson, is the latest.
Books about elections are good. They allow us to dive deeper into what happened and why. I have already read “Fight” earlier this year (my review here) and found it to be a fairly decent historical look at Kamala Harris’ presidential run, if you trust the sources that are cited.
“Original Sin” is a horse of a different color, for several reasons. I know the name Jake Tapper of CNN, though I haven’t counted on that outlet for my news needs in over a decade. I do not know the name of Alex Thompson. Still, I thought the book might be another interesting look at the 2024 election.
Tapper and Thompson state in their book that the title comes from this; “The original sin of Election 2024 was Biden’s decision to run for reelection—followed by aggressive efforts to hide his cognitive diminishment.”
For those unfamiliar with Christian doctrine, the Encyclopedia Brittanica explains, “”Original sin”, in Christian doctrine, the condition or state of sin into which each human being is born; also, the origin of this state. Traditionally, the origin has been ascribed to the sin of the first man, Adam, who disobeyed God in eating the forbidden fruit (of knowledge of good and evil) and, in consequence, transmitted his sin and guilt by heredity to his descendants.”
That’s a lot of weight to put on Joe Biden.
Look, I get that Biden was old. Hell, I’ll even stipulate that he was having the usual problems of old age. He’s not the first such president to hold office in his old age and obviously, with the subsequent election of Trump, isn’t the last.
But I want to know the answers to a couple of questions that Tapper and Thompson don’t address;
- Why did a reporter like Tapper know this and NOT report on it at the time he knew it. Why did he choose to wait, write a book he and Thompson could make money off of, instead of doing his job and reporting the news of it in real time? How can someone like that EVER be trusted to accurately and objectively report the news?
- Why aren’t Tapper and Thompson reporting on the obvious dementia of the CURRENT occupant of the White House? Why are they (and others) ignoring their duty to investigate and expose what is on full display to the rest of the country and world?
As Shalise Manza Young of The Contrarian writes; “Because the current President of the United States, you know, the guy who doesn’t read, lies incessantly, and has installed a cadre of vapid cosplaying Fox personalities, puppy killers and toxic creek-swimming nepobabies into some of the most important posts in the country, the president who has never been particularly intelligent…is now an incoherent mess.”
Biden may have been old, but he, his staff, and his cabinet were running the country in a marvelous way that benefitted ALL Americans, not just those who Trump likes or who pay him bribes. We’ve seen the full evidence of that ever since January 20th.
But what Tapper and Thompson have presented in “Original Sin” is short on verifiable sources and long on not much more than conjecture.
Editorial cartoonist Mike Luckovich is closer to the truth. Tapper is a heckler lining his pockets, not a political analyst reporting verifiable news in a timely manner.
I gave this book one star. Not recommended.
Rex Regrets…
Book Review – Careless People by Sarah Wynn-Williams
If you were on Facebook, are now on Facebook, or are thinking about joining Facebook in the future, then “Careless People” by Sarah Wynn-Williams is a book you should read if you want to see what Zuckerberg and his top leaders really have in mind for their “Meta-verse” and your life.
The book is subtitled “A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed and Lost Idealism” and it is spot-on in that regard. Remember when Facebook was just family and friends connecting with one another and sharing photos and life events with each other? Those were the days, eh?
Zuckerberg’ s initial frat-boy “Hot or Not?” foray at Harvard had morphed into what seemed to be a real desire to simply connect people at the beginning of what we know as Facebook. But it seems that as the power and money that could be amassed by trading people’s data was discovered and grew, so did his lust for more and more…to be obtained by any means necessary, including sharing that personal data with Communist Chinese officials. All to expand the size and reach of Facebook and its other Meta platforms like Instagram, WhatsApp, Threads and Messenger.
The book’s title comes from “The Great Gatsby” where F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, “They were careless people, Tom and Daisy- they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.”
While Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg were apparently not romantically involved, they were the same as Tom and Daisy in regard to the quote above. They both became morally and ethically bankrupt in order to hold on to and grow the reach of Facebook and its other Meta platforms. Wynn-Williams gives us insight into the conversations that took place regarding Facebook’s influence in handing the 2016 U.S. Presidential election to Donald Trump because they would not manage propaganda content on the platform and even embedded Trump campaign workers in their offices.
Wynn-Williams also shows us the metamorphosis of Zuckerberg from a “let’s connect people” idealist to an egotistical, drunk on power man who would even lie to congress during hearings about sharing Facebook data with China.
Today, he will still do whatever is necessary to stay in the good graces of those in power, as evidenced in this article from Forbes in January of this year.
Wynn-Williams shares how when her immediate supervisor was replaced by a man, Joel Kaplan, who was Sheryl Sandberg’s ex boyfriend, and that Kaplan began sexually harassing her and forcing her to work while on maternity leave after her second child’s birth almost killed her. When she tried to report the behavior to Kaplan’s supervisor and HR, nothing was done.
Unless you count firing her as nothing.
I completely left all Meta platforms a couple of months before the release of this book because of the kinds of things Wynn-Williams confirms about Zuckerberg and his company that I had already seen. Although I did not doubt my decision, I am glad go know my actions were justified. I wish I had listened to friends of mine earlier when they shared their concerns about the platform.
It IS too bad, because Facebook made it easy to stay connected with family and friends around the country and the world. I miss that. But it’s tendency to allow any kind of propaganda, hate speech, and racist behavior turned it into a toxic social media platform whose main purpose is to sell data about its members and allow forces of evil to divide them. I don’t miss that.
“Careless People” by Sarah Wynn-Williams is a fascinating look inside the leadership of Meta/Facebook and it’s evolution from a philosophy of connecting people to one of using the data of, and manipulating the feelings of, those same people.
Highly recommended.
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Tagged Book Review, Books, Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, Sheryl Sandberg
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Books are…
Book Review-What’s Next by Melissa Fitzgerald and Mary McCormack
After watching all seven seasons of “The West Wing” over the past 3 months, it was hard to just quit cold turkey. So I decided to read “What’s Next” by Melissa Fitzgerald and Mary McCormack, both former cast members of the hit TV show from two decades ago.
“What’s Next” reveals how the series was conceived and created, introduces us to the multitude of talented people it took to produce the show each week, the lifelong friendships that resulted from it, and the concept of service that it inspired.
For at its core, Aaron Sorkin’s “West Wing” is about service. Public service. His look at the senior staff of President Jed Bartlet is about people doing as much good for the citizens of the United States, and perhaps even the world, as possible. Fitzgerald and McCormack also bring to the fore the pubic service each cast member has been involved in their personal lives.
The book draws its title from the much-used phrase of that same President Bartlet. We actually get the origin of what he means by that phrase in a flashback scene later in the series when Bartlet is still a governor running for President. From the script:
GOVERNOR BARTLET
I understood the point. We’re going to South Carolina to set up Illinois. When I ask, “What’s next?” it means I’m ready to move on to other things, so…what’s next?
The depth of that phrase is brought home in the second season after Deputy Chief of Staff Josh Lyman is critically wounded by gunfire during what appeared to be an assassination attempt on the President. (Viewers know the real reason for the attack)
A groggy Josh, waking up in recovery from double-digit hours in surgery, tries to say something to Bartlet. The President has to lean his ear down close to Josh’s mouth to hear the strained whisper…“What’s next?”
Cue the soaring music.
The book is full of behind the scenes stories, which I love as much as the episodes. It also has a list of Top 10 episodes, which I would mostly agree with. And lots of remembrances from various cast and crew members.
What I was hoping to find, which was nowhere in sight, was a definitive answer as to WHO Toby was protecting when he refused to say where or from whom he heard about the military space shuttle. Was it really his deceased brother? The series never made it clear and it has remained a question for years among fans. I haven’t read or seen anything yet that says for sure. Maybe actor Richard Schiff will tell us one day.
While reading the book you come away with one conclusion. These people, the cast and crew, really seemed to like each other. Even Rob Lowe, who left the series over a salary/screen time dispute, appears in the book to still hold great affection for the cast and crew.
If you’re a fan of “The West Wing” this book is a must-read. Highly recommended.
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2025 Pulitzer Prize Book Winners
On Monday, May 5, 2025, the Pulitzer Prize winners for this year were announced. Since this is a book and writing blog, I want to concentrate on the list of the 2025 Pulitzer Prize Book Winners in their six categories.
But first, a little history.
In the late 19th century, Jospeh Pulitzer was the publisher of two newspapers; the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and the New York World. He was among the first to call for professional training of journalists and in fact upon his death left $2 million to Columbia University to set up a school of journalism.
According to The Pulitzer Prizes website: “In writing his 1904 will, which made provision for the establishment of the Pulitzer Prizes as an incentive to excellence, Pulitzer specified solely four awards in journalism, four in books and drama, one for education, and five traveling scholarships.” Categories have been added to and expanded over the years.
The first awarding of Pulitzer Prizes took place in 1917 and have continued to this day.
Here are the 2025 Pulitzer Prize Book Winners:
Fiction
James by Percival Everett
An accomplished reconsideration of ‘Huckleberry Finn’ that gives agency to Jim to illustrate the absurdity of racial supremacy and provide a new take on the search for family and freedom.
History
Two winners this year.
Combee: Harriet Tubman, the Combahee River Raid, and Black Freedom During the Civil War by Edd L. Fields-Black
A richly-textured and revelatory account of a slave rebellion that brought 756 enslaved people to freedom in a single day, weaving military strategy and family history with the transition from bondage to freedom.
Native Nations: A Millennium in North America by Kathleen DuVal
A panoramic portrait of Native American nations and communities over a thousand years, a vivid and accessible account of their endurance, ingenuity and achievement in the face of conflict and dispossession.
Biography
Every Living Thing: The Great and Deadly Race to Know All Life by Jason Roberts
A beautifully written double biography of Carl Linnaeus and Georges-Louis de Buffon, 18th century contemporaries who devoted their lives to identifying and describing nature’s secrets, and who continue to influence how we understand the world.
Memoir or Autobiography
Feeding Ghosts: A Graphic Memoir by Tessa Hulls
An affecting work of literary art and discovery whose illustrations bring to life three generations of Chinese women — the author, her mother and grandmother, and the experience of trauma handed down with family histories.
Poetry
New and Selected Poems by Marie Howe
A collection drawn from decades of work that mines the day-to-day modern experience for evidence of our shared loneliness, mortality and holiness.
General Nonfiction
To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause: The Many Lives of the Soviet Dissident Movement by Benjamin Nathans
A prodigiously researched and revealing history of Soviet dissent, how it was repeatedly put down and came to life again, populated by a sprawling cast of courageous people dedicated to fighting for threatened freedoms and hard-earned rights.
I am sad to say that I have not read any of these works, though I have been intending to read James for the past 6 months and hope to get to it soon.
But there you have it, the 2025 Pulitzer Prize Book Winners.
Uli
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Write Down Ideas When They Come
I used to try and do exactly this. I kept a pen and paper on the nightstand and if an idea came while I was starting to go to sleep, or during sleep while dreaming, or just as I was in that nether region of almost awake but not quite, I would write it down.
And THAT is what I would see in the full consciousness of the next day. Sometimes not even as legible as this, but still with no idea WHAT I meant when I wrote it.
Now I just write things down in a notebook I carry when I’m awake and fully conscious.
And there are STILL times I have no idea what I wrote or what it meant, lol!
Book Review – Fight by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes
“Fight – Inside the Widest Battle for the White House” by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes details the public and behind-the-scenes history of the 2024 Presidential election. Beginning with President Joe Biden’s lackluster debate performance against Donald Trump, moving to Biden’s decision to drop out of the race and for Vice-President Kamala Harris to run instead, and ending with the election night results of the Trump/Harris contest, “Fight” shows the timeline of events of the battle for our country’s highest office.
The authors claim to have some 150 sources for their material, with a large proportion of those being “off the record” or anonymous in nature. While this is understandable, given the nature of the subject, it does leave you with a number of people being identified as “high level staffer”, “well-placed source” or “inside strategist” to deal with. To be sure, they also cite party leaders and operatives such as Nancy Pelosi, Bill and Hillary Clinton, and Jim Clyburn in the course of their backstage revelations, but some of the “juiciest” quotes or accounts are attributed to those off the record sources.
The reader will have to decide if they trust Allen and Parnes’ journalistic integrity in accepting the accuracy of so many unverifiable sources.
While reading this book I found my biggest issue to be how the authors treated Donald Trump as some sort of normal person and politician, rather than the pathological liar, con man, thief, grifter, egomaniac, racist, arrogant, ignorant, and incompetent buffoon that he is. Their portrayal seemed to be that he was nothing more than any other politician seeking office, rather than the convicted felon seeking to avoid sentencing for his crimes and visit revenge upon all his so-called “enemies” that he truly was.
So that was aggravating.
But the timeline is accurate and if you trust their sources for what went on behind the scenes then this book is a good history of what they (probably rightly) call the “wildest battle for the White House” that we’ll ever see in our lifetime.
Recommended.
Why do you write?
Book Review – The Black Echo by Michael Connelly
The Black Echo by Michael Connelly is the first Harry Bosch novel (of 25, currently) and was published in 1992. About a decade ago, when the Harry Bosch TV series first appeared on Amazon Prime, I fell in love with the character and stories. By the way, Titus Welliver IS Harry Bosch. He was the perfect casting choice for our hero. Anyway, I made a mental note at the time to start reading the novels in order, but like a lot of my mental notes it got lost in the shuffle.
A couple of weeks ago, while watching the final season of the spin-off series, Bosch: Legacy (also on Prime) I decided to follow through on that mental note I made so long ago.
I’m glad I did. I’m sure you get a many of Bosch’s motivations from the later novels, but this first one also gives you a lot to go on. He’s rough around the edges, single-minded and not always a team player. And those are his good points, lol.
When a man turns up dead Detective Harry Bosch of the LAPD begins investigating and finds the dead man is a former army buddy of his from his days in Vietnam. They both were “tunnel rats”, soldiers who bravely crawled through underground tunnels beneath villages and throughout the countryside, searching for enemy fighters. The book gets its title from the term they used when looking into a dark tunnel opening and feeling like the black of it echoed back on them.
Although the first book in the series, we find that we are well into Bosch’s career at this point. He has risen to the rank of detective but has suffered some career setbacks. A lot of them harken back to a case earlier in his career and he is seemingly never regarded as part of “the family” of LA’s finest. He has a moral compass and a bulldog sense of relentlessness that does not always endear him to his fellow law enforcement colleagues. Including his sometime partner, Detective Jerome “Jerry” Edgar, whom Bosch sarcastically calls “J. Edgar” as a reference to J. Edgar Hoover, first director of the FBI.
Bosch’s victim, it turns out, is tied to a major unsolved crime from a year before involving criminals tunneling underground into a bank safety deposit box vault. That crime is being investigated by the FBI. Bosch is assigned to work with a female FBI agent, Eleanor Wish, who is heading up the investigation. In fact, because of his past as an army tunnel rat, Bosch had initially been considered a suspect by the FBI. He was cleared because he was out of the country during the break-in. But Bosch never even knew he was a suspect until he is brought into the FBI investigation.
It soon becomes obvious the crooks were after one specific thing in one specific safety depict box, though no one was sure what that one thing was until Bosch ties it to former police officials in Vietnam who fled to the U.S. in the last days of the war. Now, it looks like another heist is planned at another bank using the same methods of tunneling in from underground and looking for the same thing.
During the course of the investigation, Bosch and Wish grow closer and become lovers. When they foil the second break-in attempt, Bosch is shot and wounded while the thieves are getting away. Harry has to go into the tunnel to try and track them down and in doing so, finds that Eleanor’s FBI boss John Rourke is waiting to kill him. Before he can do so, someone shoots Rourke from behind and Harry passes out from blood loss before seeing who it was.
When Bosch awakens in the hospital he has a multitude of questions; chief among them, was Wish in on the bank burglaries? And who was it that killed Rourke before Rourke could kill him in the tunnel?
Those questions are answered before the story ends, but I won’t spoil them for you here.
Michael Connelly is a detailed procedural police story writer, but he also layers in some great character and plot points that keep you interested when the procedural might be a tad boring. It’s a good mixture and obviously it has worked since the man has 25 Harry Bosch books and two TV series built upon those books.
I highly recommend “The Black Echo” and encourage readers who are not familiar with Harry Bosch (or even if you only know him from the TV series) to start with this first book in the series. I’m looking forward to reading the next one.
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Magazines I Read
Reading has always been important to me. But it’s not just books I read.
I remember when I was 7 or 8 years old, sitting at the dinner table and my mom telling me to stop reading the mayonnaise jar label. That’s not to say she did not want me to read. In fact, she greatly encouraged my reading, especially when she took me to get my first public library card at age 10.
So I thought I’d take a look at the magazines I read on a regular basis and I was surprised to see how many I read, both on a weekly and monthly basis.
And here’s the best thing about them; I read them all for “free” because I get to read them online through the Libby App that my local library offers for its patrons. I put “free” in quotes because I pay taxes that my library uses to provide these services and products. Your library may also offer these services and products or ones like them.
Anyway, here’s a list of magazines I read each week or month. And if you have suggestions for magazines you enjoy, please let me know in the comments so I can take a look at those as well.
Weekly
The New Yorker
New York Magazine
The Week
Newsweek
New Scientist
Tech Life News
Monthly
Popular Science
The Writer
Wired
Macworld
MacLife
Rolling Stone
Writer’s Digest
Kiplinger’s Personal Finance
Popular Mechanics
Fast Company
Poets and Writers Magazine
Travel Magazine
Empire
Digital Photographer
Classic Rock
iPhone Life Magazine
iPad & iPhone User
Freelancer
Booklist
Booklist Reader
Tech Advisor
SFX
Star Trek Explorer (ceased publication last month)
Lightspeed-Science Fiction & Fantasy
Computeractive
Clarkesworld
Consumer Reports
Reader’s Digest
The Podcast Reader
Cartoon – You Would Not Believe The Battery Life On This Thing!
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Meme – I Read So I Don’t Choke People
Book Review – Unconditionally MAD, Part 1 – The First Unauthorized History of MAD Magazine by Mark Arnold
I began reading “Unconditionally MAD, Part 1 – The First Unauthorized History of MAD Magazine” by Mark Arnold shortly after the beginning of this year. It’s 472 pages in length, something I would normally finish in no more than three days. But I was taking my time because I wanted to absorb as much as I could (though that is problematic with a multi-year history such as this book) AND I was reading reading three to four other books concurrently.
My History With MAD Magazine
My exposure to MAD Magazine began when I was around 8 or 9 years old, which was the early 1960’s. I was already a huge comic book fan, so when one of my friends showed me a copy of MAD Magazine and its brand of humor, I was hooked. MAD felt more “adult” in its humor and almost rebellious in its nature. I read it every month for at least 10 years and then sporadically after that. I even bought the paperback collections of earlier features (remember, it had been in publication for a decade before I ever laid eyes on an issue) like “Spy Vs. Spy”, “The Lighter Side Of…”, and of course its movie and TV show satires.
So, this book was like a history lesson of one of the greatest humor magazines of all time (I always preferred MAD to Sick, Cracked and its other imitators, at least until National Lampoon arrived) AND a chance to re-visit the time when it was a large part of my life. Just as importantly, it gave me a “behind the scenes” look at what was happening with regard to the artists (always MY focus) such as Mort Drucker, Jack Davis, Paul Coker,Jr., Frank Berg, Don Martin, Sergio Aragones, Wally Wood, Al Jaffee and others as they provided the visuals for the stories in MAD.
In other words, “The Usual Gang of Idiots.”
Here’s a look at the cover of MAD Magazine that came out on July 1955, the month and year I was born.
Comprehensive And Detailed
“Unconditionally MAD, Part 1 – The First Unauthorized History of MAD Magazine” Is both a comprehensive look at the magazine’s 70-year history and an issue-by-issue breakdown of each issue’s content. Arnold cites multiple sources for many of his informational examinations of personal relationships between the Publisher (William C. Gaines) and editors, writers and artists. He does the same for historical questions of “what happened when”within the magazine’s illustrious past.
This is good…and bad. Having such a wide variety of accounts of the same subject (when they agree) adds to the veracity of the account. But sometimes the variety of accounts do NOT agree and it can be confusing attempting to figure out which one (if any) are accurate.
I would also postulate the book might have been one-third its length if Arnold had not cited multiple (in some cases three or four) accounts that agree almost verbatim. There were many times I thought, “Wait, I just read that a few paragraphs earlier” because I indeed HAD read those same words a few paragraphs earlier. Needless to say, it felt overly repetitious.
Highly Recommended For Fans
That said, I would encourage every fan of MAD Magazine to get this book and read it. You will enjoy the trip through time and being able to relive the times you grabbed a copy of MAD Magainze off the magazine rack and read it from cover to cover. I loved it so much that I’m looking forward to reading Arnold’s sequel “Unconditionally Mad, Part B – The First Unauthorized History of Mad Magazine.”
I highly recommend this book!
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Book Review – On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons From The Twentieth Century by Timothy Snyder
“On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons From The Twentieth Century” is a book I have wanted to read since the election in November. The title alone should tell most people why. I finally had the opportunity to get into it about a week ago. Even though it is a book you could easily read in one sitting, I wanted to take the time to slowly digest each of the lessons the author lays out.
The author, Timothy Snyder, is a Professor of History at Yale University, as well as a a permanent fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna. He understands the historical events he presents.
Most of the lessons he offers in this 127 page book come from actual events that took place during the Soviet Union rise of Communism, the German rise of Naziism and the European rise of Fascism beginning in the early 1920’s.
This is not a deep, dry, philosophical look at those events. It is a short, to the point remembrance of attitudes, words and actions that led to states of tyranny in those countries. And a warning to us that, if we do not guard against such then our fate could be the same.
Written in 2017, those with a will to see will easily observe those self-same attitudes, words and actions in the man who was president at that time and, bafflingly, at this time.
The lessons he lays out are SO important that I simply want to list them with the same small explanation that Professor Snyder uses to accompany each statement. In the book, he typically spends two to six pages offering a deeper, historical look at the reasoning behind the lesson, so please don’t let this abbreviated list make you think that is all there is to the book.
- Do not obey in advance.
Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more repressive government will want, and then offer themselves without being asked. A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do. - Defend institutions.
It is institutions that help us to preserve decency. They need our help as well. Do not speak of “our institutions” unless you make them yours by acting on their behalf. Institutions do not protect themselves. They fall one after the other unless each is defended from the beginning. So choose an institution you care about—a court, a newspaper, a law, a labor union—and take its side. - Beware the one-party state.
The parties that remade states and suppressed rivals were not omnipotent from the start. They exploited a historic moment to make political life impossible for their opponents. So support the multi-party system and defend the rules of democratic elections. Vote in local and state elections while you can. Consider running for office. - Take responsibility for the face of the world.
The symbols of today enable the reality of tomorrow. Notice the swastikas and the other signs of hate. Do not look away, and do not get used to them. Remove them yourself and set an example for others to do so. - Remember professional ethics.
When political leaders set a negative example, professional commitments to just practice become more important. It is hard to subvert a rule-of-law state without lawyers, or to hold show trials without judges. Authoritarians need obedient civil servants, and concentration camp directors seek businessmen interested in cheap labor. - Be wary of paramilitaries.
When the men with guns who have always claimed to be against the system start wearing uniforms and marching with torches and pictures of a leader, the end is nigh. When the pro-leader paramilitary and the official police and military intermingle, the end has come. - Be reflective if you must be armed.
If you carry a weapon in public service, may God bless you and keep you. But know that evils of the past involved policemen and soldiers finding themselves, one day, doing irregular things. Be ready to say no. - Stand out.
Someone has to. It is easy to follow along. It can feel strange to do or say something different. But without that unease, there is no freedom. Remember Rosa Parks. The moment you set an example, the spell of the status quo is broken, and others will follow. - Be kind to our language.
Avoid pronouncing the phrases everyone else does. Think up your own way of speaking, even if only to convey that thing you think everyone is saying. Make an effort to separate yourself from the internet. Read books. - Believe in truth.
To abandon facts is to abandon freedom. If nothing is true, then no one can criticize power, because there is no basis upon which to do so. If nothing is true, then all is spectacle. The biggest wallet pays for the most blinding lights. - Investigate.
Figure things out for yourself. Spend more time with long articles. Subsidize investigative journalism by subscribing to print media. Realize that some of what is on the internet is there to harm you. Learn about sites that investigate propaganda campaigns (some of which come from abroad). Take responsibility for what you communicate with others. - Make eye contact and small talk.
This is not just polite. It is part of being a citizen and a responsible member of society. It is also a way to stay in touch with your surroundings, break down social barriers, and understand whom you should and should not trust. If we enter a culture of denunciation, you will want to know the psychological landscape of your daily life. - Practice corporeal politics.
Power wants your body softening in your chair and your emotions dissipating on the screen. Get outside. Put your body in unfamiliar places with unfamiliar people. Make new friends and march with them. - Establish a private life.
Nastier rulers will use what they know about you to push you around. Scrub your computer of malware on a regular basis. Remember that email is skywriting. Consider using alternative forms of the internet, or simply using it less. Have personal exchanges in person. For the same reason, resolve any legal trouble. Tyrants seek the hook on which to hang you. Try not to have hooks. - Contribute to good causes.
Be active in organizations, political or not, that express your own view of life. Pick a charity or two and set up autopay. Then you will have made a free choice that supports civil society and helps others to do good. - Learn from peers in other countries.
Keep up your friendships abroad, or make new friends in other countries. The present difficulties in the United States are an element of a larger trend. And no country is going to find a solution by itself. Make sure you and your family have passports. - Listen for dangerous words.
Be alert to the use of the words extremism and terrorism. Be alive to the fatal notions of emergency and exception. Be angry about the treacherous use of patriotic vocabulary. - Be calm when the unthinkable arrives.
Modern tyranny is terror management. When the terrorist attack comes, remember that authoritarians exploit such events in order to consolidate power. The sudden disaster that requires the end of checks and balances, the dissolution of opposition parties, the suspension of freedom of expression, the right to a fair trial, and so on, is the oldest trick in the Hitlerian book. Do not fall for it. - Be a patriot.
Set a good example of what America means for the generations to come. They will need it. - Be as courageous as you can.
If none of us is prepared to die for freedom, then all of us will die under tyranny.
Not all of these lesson are easy to follow for some of us, but all of us can follow some of them. We can certainly LEARN from all of them.
“On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons From The Twentieth Century” points out the historical events that led to tyranny in other parts of the world during the twentieth century. Those events are ones that adults alive today should remember, if they were ever taught them. Even if they weren’t, they most likely have family members or know of someone who fought against those who wanted to rule in tyranny.
When laid out in such simplicity, we should all recognize and stand against those who would attempt to rise up as tyrants against us.
I highly, HIGHLY recommend this book.
Modern Library
Book Review – Wrestling With The Devil: Lex Luger
I was scanning through books available on Hoopla and this cover caught my eye. Though not a fan of “conversion” stories, I DID want to read about his childhood and what went on behind the curtain of his wrestling life, so I was excited to read this short book, “Wrestling With The Devil: Lex Luger” about the man billed as The Total Package.
Throughout my childhood and into adulthood I was a fan of “Professional Wrestling”, better known these days as “Sports Entertainment” and I even wrestled for a local promotion in Central Florida for a short amount of time.
So I was VERY familiar with the name Lex Luger. I was watching Florida Championship Wrestling when he made his debut and subsequently followed his career through his ascent into WCW and WWF over the years. I also followed the news of his descent into drug abuse and the tragic death of Elizabeth Hulette while she was with him in his apartment.
I happen to be the type of person who likes to know what goes on behind the scenes. How does that magic trick work? What went into that person making that decision? What caused that action to happen? So, of course, my curiosity was aroused at the prospect of reading about Lawrence Pfohl’s early life and transformation into Lex Luger. My interest lay in reading about what happened in the dressing room and on the road, because I already knew what had taken place in the ring itself.
His self-proclaimed “redemption” that was trumpeted on the cover really had no interest to me at all.
While reading this book you have to remember that everything in it is from Lawrence Pfohl’s point of view and that carries with it his own built-in survival instincts. In other words, I’m not entirely sure he is completely honest in his recollection of events. And it appears that lots of things you would expect to see in a person’s memoir are missing.
But that may also be because Pfohl, in his writing, appears to live up to the moniker of “The Narcissist” that WWE’s Vince McMahon gave him when he began wrestling for that promotion. This book is VERY self-centered and that self-centeredness oozes through every word, sentence, and paragraph. Other family members or friends are just there to prop up what Pfohl is writing about himself. There is no bigger picture here, only the spotlight he seeks.
For instance, when he writes about not being able to get into Canada because of “forgetting” to check in with his parole officer, he completely leaves out that he and other wrestlers were involved in a dispute on the plane that caused law enforcement to be summoned.
And once family members of friends have completed their “role” in his story, they are never heard from again. His father, siblings, children, fellow wrestlers he worked with are left to the ether. We never know what happened to them and I think it’s because they don’t matter to him, personally.
I’d like to think I’m wrong and that maybe it’s just crappy writing, but…
What REALLY stuck out to me when I finished was this; once Elizabeth Hulette has died from an overdose in his company and he exclaims to a police officer, “Elizabeth’s dead??” he never mentions her again. He doesn’t attend her funeral or memorial service, if there was one, and never expresses how her death affected him. I know, I know, he was in jail and probably couldn’t attend a funeral or memorial, but to never even mention her?? Again, it seemed she was just a “walk on” character in his story about him, him, HIM.
I don’t know the man personally. He may be an absolutely wonderful human being. If he is, the book does not reflect that.
So, if you want to read about his childhood and how he got into wrestling, there may be something here for you. But the rest of it is just wasted space and time.
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Happy Birthday Bill Gaines
Today would have been the 103rd birthday of William Maxwell “Bill” Gaines, publisher of that great literary periodical known as MAD Magazine. Gaines sadly passed away on June 3, 1992 at the age of 70.
It just so happens that one of the three books I am currently reading is “Unconditionally MAD – The First Unauthorized History of MAD Magazine – Part 1” and I am enjoying reading about the history and behind-the-scenes information regarding this humor magazine of my youth…and maybe into young adulthood.
I think I read my first issue of MAD Magazine when I was around 10 or 11 years old and it held my attention for several years as I progressed into the teenage years and twenties…maybe even my thirties. It didn’t take me long to recognize on sight the artwork of Mort Drucker, Dave Berg and others. I loved the satires they did of popular movies, TV shows, books and cultural zeitgeist of the times.
Here’s to Bill Gaines. Happy Birthday to the guy who started it all.
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Tagged Bill Gaines, MAD Magazine, William Maxwell “Bill” Gaines, William Maxwell Gaines
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