This book explores the planning for both Iraq wars, in 1991 and 2003, by one of the few people in a senior Washington position for both conflicts.

The 1991 Gulf War does a very good job of fitting the definition of a "just war" or a "necessary war." The cost of letting Saddam Hussein keep Kuwait, and its oil, and thereby strongly influence the entire Middle East oil supply, was too high. The objectives of the war, to get Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait, were focused and clear-cut. Colin Powell, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, believed in using overwhelming force. If you have to go to war, make absolutely sure you have enough troops to do the job; about 500,000 troops were assembled. The war had huge international support, even from several Arab countries. It was consistent with accepted international norms concerning self-defense. As a senior member of the National Security Council, the author saw it all, first-hand.

For the 2003 invasion, the author was a senior adviser to Secretary of State Powell. Haass felt that sanctions and inspections were not given enough of a chance to work; invasion was not a last resort. It had much less legal and international support than Gulf War I; this was basically a unilateral affair. There was only one Security Council resolution for support, after America concluded that it was not going to get support for a second. The first Gulf War used half a million troops in a country like Kuwait; how would a much larger place like Iraq need only a third as many troops? Because of financial contributions from other member countries, Gulf War I cost America almost nothing; the tab for Gulf War II has passed $1 trillion; with little chance of America getting financial support from anyone. No matter how good an idea it may have seemed, to its supporters, the execution has to be as good (which it wasn’t), or maybe it was not such a good idea in the beginning.

Here is a very interesting look at two important events in recent American history. Written by an insider, it does a fine job of showing two different answers to the question "How does America go to war?" It is very much worth reading.

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In the 1950s, Jonas Salk developed a vaccine against polio, then ravaging America. It involved inoculating children with dead polio viruses, so their bodies would build up immunity. Just before the mass inoculation was to begin, a technician injected the vaccine into some monkeys. The supposedly dead viruses were not exactly dead, so thousands of children contracted polio. The safer Sabin vaccine was quickly developed, and rushed into production.

The bigger problem for the Salk vaccine was that it was impregnated with cancer-causing monkey viruses (imagine the panic if that became known). Consider today’s epidemic of soft tissue cancers. A secret program was rushed into existence to look for some sort of vaccine. Such a program involved lots of mice (thousands), and someone to do the day-to-day observing of the mice, someone like David Ferrie (later to be well-known in JFK assassination circles). A defrocked priest and former airline pilot, he was a long-time CIA asset. Also needed in such a project was a cancer expert to do the actual mutating of the viruses.

Mary Sherman was a world-renowned cancer researcher with a list of qualifications as long as your arm. It is unknown why she would get involved with a right-wing fanatic like David Ferrie. In 1964, her burned and naked body was found in her apartment. The press tried very hard to make it look like a lesbian burglar sex killing, even though there was no sign of forced entry. The bizarre thing is that her entire right arm and the right-hand part of her torso were gone, like they had been disintegrated. The small fire that was set on her bed, to cover up the crime, was nowhere near hot enough to do it.

Mutating viruses required huge amounts of power, on the order of several million volts. A linear particle accelerator was powerful enough, but they require very heavy-duty wiring. The author found evidence of such wiring at the US Public Health Service Hospital in New Orleans. The author theorizes that, one day, Sherman touched the wrong button, or there was sabotage, causing all that energy to ravage her body. It was quickly decided to bring her back to her apartment, stab her in the exact right place in her heart (she may have still been alive at that moment), and cover up her death. This whole arrangement also required a courier to travel from Sherman to Ferrie and back again. His name was Lee Harvey Oswald. He was killed after the JFK death to silence him; having him on a witness stand would have publicized things that powerful people did not want publicized.

This is a wonderful piece of writing. It is a huge eye-opener, and will make the reader look at cancer in a whole new way. It is extremely highly recommended.

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A campaign should concentrate their attention on two types of voters: persuadables, or swing voters, and mobilizables, supporters who need to be motivated to go to the polls. If a campaign can peel off the occasional GOP voter or two, that’s great, but do not spend a lot of time or money on it. A campaign needs to find, and address, people’s self interests: physical needs, need for structure, intellectual stimulation, control over your life, etc.

These days, it is tempting to base a campaign around new media, like blogs, Facebook and Twitter. Do not, for any reason, abandon old-fashioned Get Out the Vote methods, like phone banks, calling people several times during the campaign, and knocking on doors. People like to be asked for their vote.

All the effort in the world will be worthless if the candidate is boring or wishy-washy on the issues. People like to feel that the candidate is on their side, that they aren’t afraid to stick to their values, that they have vision and integrity, and that the candidate respects the voters. Next in importance after having a good candidate is having good organizers and a field operation that can cover the whole area (town, district, state).

It’s tempting to think that the election of President Obama, and the current unpopularity of the national Republican Party, makes this book not necessary or obsolete. Nothing could be farther from the truth. It’s easy, in relative terms, to win one election, whether on the local, state or national level. The hard part is to continue the day-to-day work to get voters to realize that Progressivism can become the dominant American political philosophy. Besides, the Republicans will not stay unpopular forever. They will be back, perhaps in 2010, perhaps in 2012, and Progressives cannot wait for them to return before they start fighting for the future of America. They should be doing everything possible to change the playing field, now.

This book is an excellent place to start. It is full of information for people planning any sort of political campaign, and is extremely highly recommended.

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Humanity is nearly wiped out by a large asteroid that strikes the moon, and breaks it into many pieces, sending the pieces toward Earth. If the initial earthquakes and tidal waves don’t kill people by the millions, the later nuclear winter does.

Thousands of years later, eastern North America (where this is set) has reverted to a medieval level. Harris is the son of Aidyn, King of Pennland. Aidyn doesn’t know (or seem to care) about conditions in his kingdom, and won’t let Harris get on a horse to find out. Aidyn spends all day in his office, doing whatever monarchs do, and Lucida, his mother, rarely comes out of her rooms. Harris is very bored.

As a teenager, Harris is sent to the neighboring kingdom of Carolinas, to learn how to be a ruler. After several years of fighting battles, and recovering from a severe sword injury, Harris gathers an army and is determined to reclaim his kingdom.

Town by town, and district by district, Harris finds utter devastation. Most places are nearly deserted, because everyone has been enslaved, or killed, by a barbarian/rebel leader named Kain. Harris and the army spend time in each place, helping to rebuild. He shows the people that he is for real, instead of merely ordering them to obey them. Even then, some people are very reluctant to accept him as king. When he gets home, he finds more utter devastation. Aidyn is dead, poisoned by Lucida, who has descended into full-blown insanity. The castle itself is beyond filthy and disgusting. It is as if a combination of an invading barbarian horde, and the ultimate in wild and drunken parties, happened several months ago, and no one has bothered to clean up. Will Harris be able to remove Kain, the cause of all this, once and for all?

This one is really good. It’s very easy to read, and the author does a good job with the story and characters. First in a series, this is worth checking out.

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The Fountainhead takes place in the 1920s and 1930s, and is about Howard Roark, a modernist architect in a society that prefers buildings that look like Gothic cathedrals or Greek temples. He is expelled from college, gets fired from one job and loses commissions because of his absolute refusal to compromise his principles. After, unwillingly, working in a quarry, because he was forced out of the architecture field, Roark designs a revolutionary apartment house in New York City. As part of a socialist plot to neutralize Roark, his revolutionary design for a religious temple is criticized as sacrilege, so Roark is branded an enemy of religion and a public enemy. Commissioned to design a government housing project, Roark’s design is changed without his knowledge or consent. Does Roark let it go ahead, or not?

In Atlas Shrugged, America is being pushed toward socialism by politicians and intellectuals; also, America’s greatest minds are literally disappearing. Where are they going?

In an isolated part of the Colorado Rockies, Dagny Taggart, railroad owner, finds America’s missing smart people. They are on strike against a moral code which says that moral goodness is found in sacrificing one’s self for others, not in finding personal happiness. Taggart also meets John Galt, inventor of an ultra-efficient motor, and leader of the strike. The state kidnaps Galt, and tortures him, in order to force him to become economic dictator of America, and to fix America’s precarious economy. Does Galt give in, or stay true to his principles?

For anyone who has read either of Rand’s books, and still don’t understand them, this is the book. For anyone who wants to know more about Objectivism, this is the book. For anyone who simply wants to know more about a famous person of the 20th Century, this is the book. It is a gem.

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America and France are the only members of a new, and extremely exclusive, nuclear stewardship club. They now have the technical, and computer, capability to be able to simulate nuclear explosions in the laboratory. This means that they are now able to develop new nuclear weapons without having to ignite them. As far as the public is being told, nuclear stewardship means being able to test and simulate the aging process of nuclear arms.

Jonathan Aitken was a British Member of Parliament who spent most of the 1980’s as a "fixer" for Saudi Arabia, buying cars, boats, expensive properties, and blonde prostitutes, for Saudi use. Any attempt at a political career was stymied by Margaret Thatcher, who personally hated him. Aitken was also involved in several very secret arms deals sending arms to Iraq and Iran. After Thatcher was deposed, Aitken was invited to join the Cabinet, but was dis-invited for breaking the ethical rules. A very public libel trial ended with Aitken going to jail for perjury. A person would have thought that Aitken’s friends, in Saudi Arabia and in British Intelligence, would have helped him with his legal troubles, but they preferred to let him twist in the wind.

The Netherlands actually disbanded their foreign intelligence service in the 1990’s; a book about it became a best seller. Georgi Markov was a Bulgarian dissident who was killed in London by a poison pellet fried from an umbrella. A well-known German politician supposedly committed suicide in a Geneva hotel room. The interesting part is that his German province played a vital role in secret arms traffic between Israel and Iran that Tel Aviv would prefer not make it to the front pages.

I very much enjoyed reading this book. I also have a college degree in politics, and am something a lifelong foreign politics "junkie." The only possible downside is that this book requires more than a layman’s knowledge of international relations. For those with such knowledge, here is a highly recommended book.

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The author was a twenty-something alcoholic high school dropout; overall, a pretty dislikable person. One night, driving around in his pickup, he picks up a hitchhiker. Fueled by large amounts of beer and cocaine, they rob a couple of businessmen coming out of a Colorado restaurant. They are arrested later that night, which begins a decade-long journey through the criminal justice system.

After several years in prison, he is sent to a halfway house. While living with his son and second wife, he commits several armed robberies. In prison for the second time, the author begins to realize that his life does not have to be a downward spiral. He reads every book he can find on success, from authors like Napoleon Hill, Wayne Dyer and Stephen Covey, and begins to take it to heart. While out for the second time, he gets involved in shady telemarketing, and finds that he is really good at it. For a time, he runs his own "boiler room," until the authorities catch up with him. A central part of his new philosophy is to take responsibility for his actions, which means a third trip to prison on federal fraud charges.

The biggest reason for wanting to change his life is to not be an emotionally distant father to his son, like his father was to him. In prison, he gets his GED, a Bachelor’s degree in Law, and then an MBA. To show how much he has changed, he saves a guard’s life (not a path to popularity in prison). Out of prison again, he gets a sales job for a heating company, and is really good at it. After a couple of layoffs, perhaps for being "too good" or "too ambitious," he and Wife #3 start their own heating company, which becomes very successful.

Long does a fine job of showing how anyone can change their life. No one is beyond help. The first steps are to want to change, and then to visualize yourself as a changed person.

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Think of a resume as equivalent to a business card. It’s required; the book exactly how to write it. For those whose work history is spotty or non-existent, register with a temporary employment agency. Going on a variety of jobs will help to narrow down the type of jobs that you do (or do not) want, they will provide experience to put on a resume, and the paycheck does not hurt. Volunteering is another way to get experience to put on a resume. Target your resume for different types of positions. A resume that highlights your experience as a landscape gardener will be of little help in applying for a security guard position.

Treat your job search as a full-time job. Carefully read the on-line or newspaper ads. If it says, for instance, "no phone calls" or "apply in person," then follow it. If your qualifications don’t exactly match the requirements, apply and go for an interview, anyway. The more job interview experience you can get, the better off you will be. You need to be out there every day, filling out applications and leaving off resumes.

The book goes through the job interview process, including a list of questions the interviewer will ask. Practice the answers to these questions ahead of time, so that you will sound confident and "with it," instead of hesitating and unsure of yourself.

At some point, the question will be asked: Have you ever been convicted of a felony? Do not lie, because the truth will eventually be discovered, but there is no need to include every detail. If that part of your life is, honestly, never to return, find a way to say so. The book gives some suggested responses.

This book does a fine job at making the job search process as painless as possible. It is not just good for those just out of prison, but also for those whose work history is less than stellar.

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Dada was a young man who could not complete the simplest of tasks. Today, he might be called "slow" or "learning disabled," one person called him an idiot savant (each Sunday at church, Dada shows off his amazing singing voice). Prince, his father, is at his wit’s end. One day, in his early twenties, Dada has a very strange dream. When he wakes up, his disability is gone. He is convinced that his purpose on Earth is to spread peace and brotherhood. He decides to take the name Brother Walk.

He also has the power to heal the sick, so Brother Walk’s fame spreads like wildfire. His followers build the Balm Yard, which becomes his church and residence. Attendance at Albion’s First Baptist Church plummets to only a handful, which leads Albion’s leading citizens to consider ways to get rid of Brother Walk, once and for all.

Brother Walk has the ability to see directly into a person’s soul, and tell them exactly what is bothering them. With the women, that usually leads to ending up in bed with him. If a person is having financial problems, and is about to lose their farm, Brother Walk gives them the money to pay the bill. The only stipulation is that they must sign over the deed of their land to Brother Walk. In later years, Brother Walk has a dream which he interprets as a command to circumcize everyone in the village, starting with a young woman named Ruth, who Brother Walk tells that they are getting married. He does not ask Ruth, he tells her that they are getting married.

This is quite a story of humanity, temptation and modern religion combined with old religious practices. It’s about a place alien to most people, and it is very much worth checking out.

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These are desperate times for the Southerners. The men are haggard, exhausted collections of skin and bones. Starvation is an everyday concern; when there is food, which is rare, it is usually moldy and inedible. More men are lost to disease and desertion than to northern artillery. Deserters are usually shot on sight. The war’s outcome is a foregone conclusion; it’s only a matter of time.

Alongside small pockets of humanity, Whit and Francis see the horror of war, up close and personal. The first Union soldier that Francis kills in hand-to-hand combat is only a teenager, who forgives Francis as he dies. Both Francis and Whit are injured, so they experience a field hospital. It’s a place where the main medical activity seems to be amputating of limbs, and the only available anesthetic is whiskey. Whit loses one of his eyes, and the eye socket has to be cleaned out, to prevent the onset of gangrene. Both men are at Appomattox Court House to witness the official end of the war. On their way back home, both men are distressed to learn that the killing does not end just because the war is over.

As much as possible, this is a historically accurate novel, and it shows. It was written by someone who really knows his way around the finer points of the War Between The States. By all means, read the official histories of the Civil War. To get the point of view of the average soldier, the reader could do a lot worse than start right here.

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Beckerman discovered a lot of interesting things in his travels. Betty Friedan, founder of the National Organization for Women, compared American housewives to "the millions who walked to their own death in the concentration camps." Those on the Right blame homosexuality for the destruction of American society, but just over half of Americans think of homosexuality as an acceptable life-style. Texas A&M University requires that all faculty members "celebrate and promote" homosexuality.

"It would be a much better country if women did not vote. That is simply a fact."--Ann Coulter. The American Institute for Philanthropy has ranked MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) as one of the most corrupt and least effective charities in the country. In 2006, the California Supreme Court allowed authorities to break into citizens’ homes anytime--without a warrant--to check their blood alcohol levels. A legislator in Missouri compared biology teachers to terrorists, for teaching evolution. Environmental activists have demanded control over citizens’ home thermostats, threatened to spy on those who do not recycle and suggested that governments should intelligently reduce human populations to one-sixth their present number.

In 2006, the Bush Administration joined with Iran to ban a gay-rights group from addressing the United Nations. In 2004, Canada officially banned criticism of homosexuality, which is now punishable by up to five years in prison. Also in 2006, the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled that forcing drug suspects to consume laxatives, in order to find drugs in their digestive tracts, is not an "unreasonable search." In the 1990’s, a Republican member of Congress proposed mandating the death penalty for all drug dealers. When his son was convicted of growing thirty marijuana plants, he received community service, not a lethal injection. Neither side has a monopoly on hatred of free speech.

This is the sort of book that will be thrown across the room by True Believers on both sides (sometimes those are the best kind of books). For everyone else, it is an excellent, and eye opening, look at the state of politics in America. It is very much worth reading.

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In New York City, garbage (including horse manure) was piled high on city sidewalks. In the rain, those garbage piles turned into slime beds. Western towns were dirty, with horses creating fly-infested cesspools around the hitching posts. People risked their lives attempting to cross major streets like Broadway, because there were no traffic laws. In the winter, horse-drawn snowplows did not do much more than move the snow a few feet. Keeping the streets semi-clear for horse-drawn trolleys was most important. Frequently, the snowplows became stuck in the snow, making a bad traffic problem that much worse.

Milk was diluted with water, and everyone knew it. To improve the color of milk taken from diseased cows, dairymen frequently added chalk, molasses or plaster of Paris. Butter was often rancid, and contained bleach, calcium, hog fat or mashed potatoes. Adulteration of food was commonplace; loaves of bread frequently contained ash from the baker’s oven and grit from his machinery.

Alcoholic children were not uncommon, as a result of many trips to the local bar to fill a pitcher of "beer for father." Most medical schools were run by people more interested in tuition fees than standards, thereby graduating many who knew nothing about medicine. Hospitals, with non-existent standards of hygiene, were basically deathtraps.

This book also explores the reality behind housing (tenements), work (child labor and sweatshops) and education (corporal punishment and very unqualified teachers). For anyone who thinks that those days were like the American equivalent of a Jane Austen novel, read this book. It’s really interesting.

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The first requirement for admission to the scientific "priesthood" is the possession of an advanced college degree. But, that by itself does not equal intelligence. There are plenty of people out there who may not have the appropriate credentials, but are smarter than those who do.

There are some sciences which are easier for outsiders to undertake than others. It is much easier to become an amateur astronomer, for instance, than an amateur nuclear physicist. Newspaper and TV reporters may honestly care about reporting science the right way, but time and space constraints may require them to dumb down the science too far, and lose the essence of the story.

A central topic in this book is science literacy, which is not helped by schools turning science into rote memorization of formulas and Absolute Truths (which will probably change within a generation). Scientists have a very hard time getting rid of Scientific Model X, even in the face of new data which shows that Scientific Model Y does a much better job of explaining things. They would rather put patch after patch on Model X, until it’s nothing but patches.

A favorite game for scientists is to pick out scientific inaccuracies on TV and in the movies. The author has no problem suspending his disbelief when it comes to hand-held lasers or faster-than-light travel. It’s different when a spaceship, for instance, travels to Ursa Major. It is not a specific place. Ursa Major is a group of stars spread out over many, many light years that happen to form a picture when seen from Earth. Travel to some other star, and the stars that make up Ursa Major will form a totally different picture. A person can no more stand on a specific planet and say "This is Ursa Major" than they can stand on a specific spot and say "This is the Atlantic Ocean."

This book is easy to read, so it is recommended for those who think of themselves as science-free. For those in the science world, perhaps this book will encourage some of you to ease up on the "entrance requirements" for the rest of us.

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Michelle has used a particular P.O. Box number for several years, always dutifully paying her Post Office bill. Things have recently gotten away from her and she forgot to pay her bill. Upon finding her box locked, she asked if she could re-rent that particular number. Even after speaking to a supervisor, the answer was No. The Chicago Post Office uses a computer program that assigns numbers in order; it’s no longer possible to rent a specific P.O. box.

After getting her B.A. in English, Michelle wants very much to be a high school English teacher. After getting nowhere with sending out resumes and attending job fairs, she becomes a substitute teacher, and recounts some of her experiences. Some days, she feels like she is actually reaching the students, some day she wonders why she even bothers, and some days she runs, head-first, into the Byzantine bureaucracy that is the Chicago public school system. Included is a mini-zine "The Substitute Journals," that goes into more detail.

Michelle has always had "difficulties" with her weight. During her unpleasant adolescence, eating healthy was far down on the list of things to think about. After watching a documentary on obesity, she throws out all the artificial chemicals in her kitchen, learns to really cook, and takes up running.

She spends much of the issue talking about being in love with two men at the same time. Daniel is going to school in Montreal. While remaining emotionally committed to each other, they agree to see other people. Michelle meets Scott; they seem to be an excellent fit. As the months go on, her feelings for Scott grow, while her relationship with Daniel gets increasingly tense.

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