Different views on Rathenau

Remarkably different view of Walther Rathenau from Zweig and Pynchon(GW)?

Powell on draft dodging

"I am angry that so many of the sons of the powerful and we'll placed and so many professional athletes..managed to wrangle slots in Reserve and National Guard units."

-Colin Powell, My American Journey, p. 143-5

The irony, that he served..Bush Jr.

Brzezinski' 'wisdom'

"Islamic revivalist movements are not sweeping the ME and are not likely to be the wave of the future."

to Carter, after Khomeini's triumphant return to Iran in Feb. 1979.

He was the head of NSC. Conservatives and Kissinger, Rockefeller supported the Shah and denounced Carter as leaving the shah in the lurch.

But Carter has voiced support even after the Jaleh Square massacre in Sep. 1978(his administration was known to have committed to...human rights).

The story of US-Israeli relation

Brzezninski:

" Dayan intimidated Carter by threatening to denounce the president to American Jews'"

Same old story from Truman to Obama.

Reagan endorses dictators

"The most important reality facing us today is the shrinking global influence of the West." Hence, USA should cling to dictatorships "which, despite not always behaving precisely as we might like, have nevertheless been our friends."

Reagan in 1977.

Hence his administration was friendly with authoritatian regimes such as South Korea, Pinochet's Chile(who followed the economic policies of Milton Friedman), Apartheid South Africa, Argentina("the dirty war")....quite similar to Margaret Thatcher, in fact.

Heather & MacMillan

Downloaded Tess free from Amazon so am more interested in finishing Mann's The Magic Mountain (which is not free) lol.


Enjoying Peter Heather's Empires and Barbarians: The Fall of Rome and the Birth of Europe. Restarted after a long hiatus, and his argument on the Gothic invasion is pretty exciting; history IS a lot like a detective work; cogent reasoning is a must.
And reading this part really made me long for purchasing loeb edition of Ammianus Marcellinus lol(I do have the Penguin pbk edition, methinks?).


Also enjoying Margaret MacMillan's http://www.amazon.com/Dangerous-Games-History-Library-Chronicles/dp/0812979966/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1408579853&sr=1-4&keywords=margaret+macmillan


It's a short book, but a must for every reader interested in history; she comments on every aspect of writing and reading history, so it's pretty useful.

Amis lecteurs

Amis lecteurs qui ce livre lisez,
Depouillez-vouz de toute affection,
Et le lesant ne vous scandalisez.
Il ne contient mal ni infection.
Vrai est qu'ici peu de perfection
Vous apprendrez, si non en cas de rire:
Autre argument ne peut mon coeur elire.
Voyant le deuil, qui vous mine et consomme,
Mieux est de rire que de larmes ecrire.
Pour ce que rire est le propre de l'homme.


- Francois Rabelias, Gargantua

Started today

Light reading

http://www.amazon.com/Heretics-Heroes-Renaissance-Artists-Reformation-ebook/dp/B00CNQ7G7Y/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1408429286&sr=1-1&keywords=thomas+cahill



More serious reading:

http://www.amazon.com/Empires-Barbarians-Fall-Birth-Europe/dp/0199735603/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1408429171&sr=1-1&keywords=peter+heather+empires+and+barbarians

http://www.amazon.com/Gravitys-Rainbow-Domination-Freedom-Herman-ebook/dp/B00HNQ6M4C/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=undefined&sr=1-1&keywords=rainbow+freedom+gravity

Novel

http://www.amazon.com/Tess-dUrbervilles-Library-Classics-published/dp/B00E29ASXY/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1408429436&sr=1-3&keywords=tess+modern+library

winner of prop 13

Kalman, p. 234:

"Homeowners received less than a quarter of savings, rest went to owners of biz, apartment houses, and commercial property"

Ave Caesar

 "Ave Caesar, nos morituri te salutamus" 

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ave_Imperator,_morituri_te_salutant

St. Jerome says

"If an offense come out of the truth, better is it that the offense come than that the truth be concealed"

quoted by Thomas Hardy, 1891.

It would've been better not to write it

Melius fuerat non scribere.

Hardy on his subtitle to Tess: 'a pure woman'

Compliment or not: toughest industrialists

Eleanor Roosevelt once said that Politburo admires toughness, and in order to negotiate with them in economic matters, she would put the very toughest ones in her mission:

Ernest Weir, Tom Girdler, Alfred Sloan.

Wonder if those 3 felt it as a compliment!

Already bought

The Education of Henry Adams byFranklin library for $5

The Ambassadors by Henry James by Konemann

Normally u don't hesitate buying those editions, but since I've already bought those in another editions..alas.

Novels for August

I keep deferring resuming Proust and Joyce lol, still reading histories and for novels, read Kafka's the Castle and D.H.Lawrence's Chatterley..for the last few months.

Borrowed Mann's the Magic Mountain some time ago yet haven't read much so far, and just borrowed Hardy's Tess of the D'Urbervilles upon borrowing Polanski's movie version. Can I finish the book before resuming watching the movie? Lol(did that mad stint for Vanity Fair, loved the novel)

3 books on the American Right

http://www.amazon.com/Mad-Hell-Crisis-1970s-Populist/dp/1400042623/ref=tmm_hrd_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1408034291&sr=8-2

http://www.amazon.com/Rule-Ruin-Moderation-Destruction-Development-ebook/dp/B005UFCPHG/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1408034416&sr=1-1&keywords=kabaservice

http://www.amazon.com/Right-Star-Rising-Politics-1974-1980-ebook/dp/B003UD7JL2/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1408034490&sr=1-3&keywords=laura+kalman

10th on queue for Perlstein's new book

Read a short review of

The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan

by Rick Perlstein


on the Entertainment magazine, so decided to put the book on hold at the library website:

I am 10th on queue lol, Perlstein must have some faithful readers, should check his earlier outputs(he does seem to focus on the recent American Right).

Discovered S.N. Behrman

Recuperation time after 'the stint' lol.

Started to read the New Yorker compilation of the 1940s(can't renew, someone already put it on hold -_-), and really enjoyed his The suspended drawing room.

Napoleon on religion

"Society cannot exist save with inequality of fortune, and inequality of fortune cannot be supported wiithout religion"

Napoleon in 1800.

Matchbox toycar ads during the Energy Crisis

Started reading Laura Kalman's Right Star Rising: A New Politics, 1974-1980



" We sell more cars than Ford, Chrysler, Chevrolet, and Buick combined"

Hilarious.