As I've mentioned before, Empire is a popular topic these days in Amerikkka.
At some point I will review some of the seminal books on this important topic. A few that I would highly recommend now are:
Kevin Phillips' American Theocracy.
John Hobson's Imperialism is regarded as a classic on the topic, even though it is now over a century old. If you go to that link, you'll find the entire book archived online, which is great, since it's hard to find, and expensive if you do.
Speaking of centennials. I have it on good word that Multinational Monitor is about to serialize excerpts from the great forgotten classic, Sin and Society by the great sociological historian, Edward Alsworth Ross. (The tip for doing this came from Morton Mintz, the former Washington Post reporter/editor who wrote America, Inc.)
Having read some excerpts, I must say, I am thoroughly entertained by Ross' book. There has to be a name (genre) for this type of essay. Social criticism doesn't quite cut it. It's much more biting, and it's too serious to be satire.
Reminds me of Mencken, Philip Wylie (Generation of Vipers). Closest we have now, I suppose are some bloggers. Don't ask me who.
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that we've helped launch a new web site called CROCODYL (short for "Collaborative Research on Corporations") -- a kind of activist wiki of dirt on your favorite corporate targets. If it grows, that site will be the go-to repository of basic information on any company. Pretty cool.
Saturday, July 28, 2007
These days, fiction rarely gets ahead of reality, but R.J. Hillhouse's Outsourced has stirred up enough controversy that she was also invited to write a related op-ed for the Washington Post.
Hillhouse (who also runs the spy who billed me blog) was interviewed by Democracy Now, where she explained:
"I found that there were things that could only be written about in fiction. It’s amazing for someone who has lived in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe to find that in this country we’re in a similar place. In the repressive regimes, literature has often played the role of bringing things to light that could not otherwise be discussed. And I found that there are some things that are going on in the intelligence community or things that are going on with our government with relationships between corporate and government that it was only safe to discuss under the guise of fiction. So it’s an unusual transformation that a novelist would actually be ahead of media in this. I mean, it is the norm for me to be contacted each week by people from New York Times, Washington Post and others to try to learn about what’s going on in outsourcing. So it’s very strange as a novelist that I actually have moved ahead of that.
And I’ve not only been at the center of controversy in the intelligence community, I’ve also been in the center of controversy in the literary world, because I believe that and I’ve been very public about it, that thriller writers, that novelists, have failed us today. They haven't helped us understand the darker truths of what’s going on in the war on terror, the ambiguities, the changes that have occurred in how we’re fighting the war on terror and what that shows us about ourselves. Unfortunately, thriller writers have failed us. As you know, it’s mainly -- and I’ll call it for what it is -- beach reach that we see, that we don't see literature playing this larger role in society, but rather, the novels become a race of, we have to stop the terrorists from, what would be in a jargon, a, b, or c weapons -- atomic, biological or [chemical] weapons -- and it just -- it underscores the narrative of our time, which is, be afraid, be very afraid, and only a hero who will violate the Geneva Conventions, only a hero who will violate the Constitution will save us. So I tried to do something very different with Outsourced."
Look for a non-fiction book on this topic by Tim Shorrock, who wrote this piece for The Nation and this piece for Salon.
Hillhouse (who also runs the spy who billed me blog) was interviewed by Democracy Now, where she explained:
"I found that there were things that could only be written about in fiction. It’s amazing for someone who has lived in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe to find that in this country we’re in a similar place. In the repressive regimes, literature has often played the role of bringing things to light that could not otherwise be discussed. And I found that there are some things that are going on in the intelligence community or things that are going on with our government with relationships between corporate and government that it was only safe to discuss under the guise of fiction. So it’s an unusual transformation that a novelist would actually be ahead of media in this. I mean, it is the norm for me to be contacted each week by people from New York Times, Washington Post and others to try to learn about what’s going on in outsourcing. So it’s very strange as a novelist that I actually have moved ahead of that.
And I’ve not only been at the center of controversy in the intelligence community, I’ve also been in the center of controversy in the literary world, because I believe that and I’ve been very public about it, that thriller writers, that novelists, have failed us today. They haven't helped us understand the darker truths of what’s going on in the war on terror, the ambiguities, the changes that have occurred in how we’re fighting the war on terror and what that shows us about ourselves. Unfortunately, thriller writers have failed us. As you know, it’s mainly -- and I’ll call it for what it is -- beach reach that we see, that we don't see literature playing this larger role in society, but rather, the novels become a race of, we have to stop the terrorists from, what would be in a jargon, a, b, or c weapons -- atomic, biological or [chemical] weapons -- and it just -- it underscores the narrative of our time, which is, be afraid, be very afraid, and only a hero who will violate the Geneva Conventions, only a hero who will violate the Constitution will save us. So I tried to do something very different with Outsourced."
Look for a non-fiction book on this topic by Tim Shorrock, who wrote this piece for The Nation and this piece for Salon.
Some great speeches and interviews with activists and investigators:
First, be sure to check out the various presentations at Ralph Nader's recent conference,
Taming the Giant Corporation
Other Activist Presentations:
Lectures from the Democracy Schools:
Thomas Linzey (of CELDF)
Richard Grossman
The Carnegie Institute's (DC) mission is to promote popular education in science. They sponsor a series of lectures each year. Check out the archives (one I recommend is David Goodstein's lecture on the End of the Age of Oil from 4/2006.
If all of this gets too grim, then go to this interview with Bill Hicks
or this speech by "President Bush" for a change of pace.
Also, for intelligent diversion, try Doug Henwood's radio show,
the archives of which are here.
First, be sure to check out the various presentations at Ralph Nader's recent conference,
Taming the Giant Corporation
Other Activist Presentations:
Lectures from the Democracy Schools:
Thomas Linzey (of CELDF)
Richard Grossman
The Carnegie Institute's (DC) mission is to promote popular education in science. They sponsor a series of lectures each year. Check out the archives (one I recommend is David Goodstein's lecture on the End of the Age of Oil from 4/2006.
If all of this gets too grim, then go to this interview with Bill Hicks
or this speech by "President Bush" for a change of pace.
Also, for intelligent diversion, try Doug Henwood's radio show,
the archives of which are here.
Some interesting links that I've come across in the past few months:
This UK site, the Dossier, has a ton of videos, interviews, documentaries, news, etc.
E.g. I just watched this doc on the Iraq oil law.
Oil Phreak: Radical Polytics
History is a Weapon
Guerrilla News Network: links page has tons of interesting stuff
The Armchair Subversive
I've been reading (I admit it, for the first time) The Man in the High Castle. P.K. Dick fans might like this Wikipedia page: Ideas in Science Fiction
Chomsky on audio and video
Mark Crispin Miller's blog
Rikesh tunes.
This UK site, the Dossier, has a ton of videos, interviews, documentaries, news, etc.
E.g. I just watched this doc on the Iraq oil law.
Oil Phreak: Radical Polytics
History is a Weapon
Guerrilla News Network: links page has tons of interesting stuff
The Armchair Subversive
I've been reading (I admit it, for the first time) The Man in the High Castle. P.K. Dick fans might like this Wikipedia page: Ideas in Science Fiction
Chomsky on audio and video
Mark Crispin Miller's blog
Rikesh tunes.
Saturday, January 27, 2007
The Agony of Mammon: The Imperial Global Economy Explains Itself to the Membership in Davos, Switzerland byLewis Lapham (Verso, 75 pages)
The annual World Economic Forum was just held again at an exclusive ski resort in Switzerland. If you've ever wanted a short peek at what these meetings are like, I highly recommend this book, by the Harper's editor who Molly Ivins once called the "most incisive essayist of our time." A mantle that few could challenge him for. The essay is written in a very high-minded style that conveys just the right kind of satiric regard for a gathering of the elite, without distancing you from its participants. As a Boston Brahmin Lapham is a practiced appreciator of the good things in life who sees through all the flash and glitter (without getting too distracted by all the business buzzwigs and pseudosophs) to all the economic buncom that lies beneath, without having to relay a kind of combative resentfullness that a populist like, say Jim Hightower or Michael Moore might resort to at this resort. (Molly Ivins, I'm guessing would have much more tact, even if her rapier wit would eviscerate the plutogogues and castrate the beau sabreurs much later.)
But don't deduce from all this wordplay that Lapham himself resorts to sesquipedalianism to make his point. He's too fluid and certain in his observations to have to resort to that. It's a fine read, and now that it's a few years old, quite cheap if you look it up on ABE books.
(As for me, well you can probably tell that I've also been dipping into David Grambs' wonderful book, Dimboxes, Epopts, and Other Quidams: Words to Describe Life's Indescribable People to find some of those wonderful words.)
The annual World Economic Forum was just held again at an exclusive ski resort in Switzerland. If you've ever wanted a short peek at what these meetings are like, I highly recommend this book, by the Harper's editor who Molly Ivins once called the "most incisive essayist of our time." A mantle that few could challenge him for. The essay is written in a very high-minded style that conveys just the right kind of satiric regard for a gathering of the elite, without distancing you from its participants. As a Boston Brahmin Lapham is a practiced appreciator of the good things in life who sees through all the flash and glitter (without getting too distracted by all the business buzzwigs and pseudosophs) to all the economic buncom that lies beneath, without having to relay a kind of combative resentfullness that a populist like, say Jim Hightower or Michael Moore might resort to at this resort. (Molly Ivins, I'm guessing would have much more tact, even if her rapier wit would eviscerate the plutogogues and castrate the beau sabreurs much later.)
But don't deduce from all this wordplay that Lapham himself resorts to sesquipedalianism to make his point. He's too fluid and certain in his observations to have to resort to that. It's a fine read, and now that it's a few years old, quite cheap if you look it up on ABE books.
(As for me, well you can probably tell that I've also been dipping into David Grambs' wonderful book, Dimboxes, Epopts, and Other Quidams: Words to Describe Life's Indescribable People to find some of those wonderful words.)
Sunday, January 21, 2007
Just re-read The Great Gatsby for the first time in -- what, 25 years? Obious conclusion: The great American tragedy is the vain attempt to attain the unreachable, a theme that is so deeply rooted in many of the great American novels (e.g. Moby Dick, On the Road?), as much as the tragic aspirations toward Empire (another story) are in our history.
At the risk of launching into a disposition that might be cribbed from Cliff Notes (I confess that back when I first read the book, my sloppy reading habits led me to consult those yellow and black pamphlets far too often for my own good, once even getting me into trouble with Mrs. Todd, our Freshman English teacher, who confronted me after class to ask who wrote my paper on -- what was it, A Tale of Two Cities? -- too ebarrassed to admit I'd used the Cliff notes, I said my brother had helped me), now the novel seems less a novel than a long short story (a la Chekov) with a lot of florid writing wrapping that essential, very simple motif, expertly woven together in the plot, the characters, just about everything (the novel ending as summer ends, the violence peaking on the hottest day of summer). Gatsby asserting to Nick Carraway that he could turn the clock back five years (i.e. to before Daisy's marriage to Tom), Tom's vain (in the real sense) need to hang onto his athletic prowess in affair after affair, even Myrtle's desperate attempt to stop the car that ran her over under the imposing gaze of Dr. Eckleburg's all-knowing gaze. Lord what fools these mortals be. The impossibility of escaping from the Valley of Ashes. The unattainable green light on the edge of the pier across the Sound. (Money as elusive happiness?) The book lends itself to easy speculation. No wonder it's on all the high school reading lists.
At the risk of launching into a disposition that might be cribbed from Cliff Notes (I confess that back when I first read the book, my sloppy reading habits led me to consult those yellow and black pamphlets far too often for my own good, once even getting me into trouble with Mrs. Todd, our Freshman English teacher, who confronted me after class to ask who wrote my paper on -- what was it, A Tale of Two Cities? -- too ebarrassed to admit I'd used the Cliff notes, I said my brother had helped me), now the novel seems less a novel than a long short story (a la Chekov) with a lot of florid writing wrapping that essential, very simple motif, expertly woven together in the plot, the characters, just about everything (the novel ending as summer ends, the violence peaking on the hottest day of summer). Gatsby asserting to Nick Carraway that he could turn the clock back five years (i.e. to before Daisy's marriage to Tom), Tom's vain (in the real sense) need to hang onto his athletic prowess in affair after affair, even Myrtle's desperate attempt to stop the car that ran her over under the imposing gaze of Dr. Eckleburg's all-knowing gaze. Lord what fools these mortals be. The impossibility of escaping from the Valley of Ashes. The unattainable green light on the edge of the pier across the Sound. (Money as elusive happiness?) The book lends itself to easy speculation. No wonder it's on all the high school reading lists.
Thursday, November 02, 2006
One of the rules of reading that Daniel Pennac describes in Better Than Life is the "right to not finish a book." Which I was relieved to be reminded of after chucking a bunch of books mid-read, including Cryptonomicon, which I was about half-way through before something else caught my eye and a friend whose judgement of SciFi I consider much better than mine said didn't get much better. (I actually enjoyed the book very much, but maybe it was my quasi-ADD, fueled by piles of other alternatives that distracted me. Borges said that he imagined paradise as a kind of library. But when you constantly get distracted like that, it can also be a kind of hell if your not careful.)
As Pennac suggests, "We have a choice. We can conclude that it's all our fault, that we're a few bricks shy of a load, that deep down we're basically stupid. Or we can appeal to the very controversial notion of taste and begin to explore what our tastes are. ... It has the advantage of offering the rare pleasure of rereading and understanding why we don't like a certain book."
Thus, I refuse to feel guilty for not getting very far into Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things. It's fine and all that she won the Booker prize. And I concede to the (mostly women) who have told me it's brilliant. You can tell on the first page how precise her diction can be and eye for detail. But still, after a few pages, it wore thin. I don't feel that way about her essays on politics, however. They remind me of Orwell. Quite clear, driven by moral passion.
Orwell is one of those writers that any writer should read and reread. In fact, I picked up a short collection of his essays and read about half the collection (before putting the book down -- the benefit of that is you don't feel like you've missed anything). Including his great essay on Dickens, which was enough to remind me that there's no point in collecting any of Dickens' novels -- because I won't read them. Orwell's essay, although an appreciation of Dickens, also convinced me that I wouldn't get much out of them -- except, perhaps, for The Gilded Age. But why read that when I haven't started Kevin Phillips' Wealth and Democracy?
As Pennac suggests, "We have a choice. We can conclude that it's all our fault, that we're a few bricks shy of a load, that deep down we're basically stupid. Or we can appeal to the very controversial notion of taste and begin to explore what our tastes are. ... It has the advantage of offering the rare pleasure of rereading and understanding why we don't like a certain book."
Thus, I refuse to feel guilty for not getting very far into Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things. It's fine and all that she won the Booker prize. And I concede to the (mostly women) who have told me it's brilliant. You can tell on the first page how precise her diction can be and eye for detail. But still, after a few pages, it wore thin. I don't feel that way about her essays on politics, however. They remind me of Orwell. Quite clear, driven by moral passion.
Orwell is one of those writers that any writer should read and reread. In fact, I picked up a short collection of his essays and read about half the collection (before putting the book down -- the benefit of that is you don't feel like you've missed anything). Including his great essay on Dickens, which was enough to remind me that there's no point in collecting any of Dickens' novels -- because I won't read them. Orwell's essay, although an appreciation of Dickens, also convinced me that I wouldn't get much out of them -- except, perhaps, for The Gilded Age. But why read that when I haven't started Kevin Phillips' Wealth and Democracy?
Alas, a while since I've checked in.
Earlier this year, I reread Ulysses for a trip to Dublin, and dabbled in the Wake. But the best surprise was stumbling into some other famous (and infamous) Irish writers who I had not read before, including Flann O'Brien, whose Dalkey Archive was pretty amusing. Another book, The Book of Myles remains unread: a collection of his newspaper columns, which are quite well known.
Travelers to Ireland should eschew the highbrow for books like the hilarious McCarthy's Bar by Pete McCarthy, which my brother Nate passed along from an Irish drinking buddy who took us out to some of Dublin's swankier spots where the foreign flaneurs are likely to run into Molly the mouseburgers and other demivierges.
"The world is packed with good women. To know them is a middle-class education."
-- Oscar Wilde
Earlier this year, I reread Ulysses for a trip to Dublin, and dabbled in the Wake. But the best surprise was stumbling into some other famous (and infamous) Irish writers who I had not read before, including Flann O'Brien, whose Dalkey Archive was pretty amusing. Another book, The Book of Myles remains unread: a collection of his newspaper columns, which are quite well known.
Travelers to Ireland should eschew the highbrow for books like the hilarious McCarthy's Bar by Pete McCarthy, which my brother Nate passed along from an Irish drinking buddy who took us out to some of Dublin's swankier spots where the foreign flaneurs are likely to run into Molly the mouseburgers and other demivierges.
"The world is packed with good women. To know them is a middle-class education."
-- Oscar Wilde
Tuesday, September 12, 2006
Berkeley has an interesting online program called Conversations with History, where you can watch interviews with top historians, like this one with Oliver Roy.
Matt Simmons is one of the most respected among the "peak oil" theorists. You can see a presentation he made at Harvard in early 2006 here.
Monday, September 11, 2006
My favorite latest reads are the Dalkey Archive by Flann O'Brien, an Irish writer who I honestly hadn't heard much about until I got to Dublin, where he was apparently a local here, perhaps more so even than Joyce.
Another great read is Kevin Phillips' masterful American Theocracy.
Cosmoetica is a compendium of essays. Some good book reviews including this one on Dhalgren.
Do you like literary feuds, salacious gossip about plagiarism, and seeing those bogus poetry contests attacked? Then you might like FOETRY.
Another great read is Kevin Phillips' masterful American Theocracy.
Cosmoetica is a compendium of essays. Some good book reviews including this one on Dhalgren.
Do you like literary feuds, salacious gossip about plagiarism, and seeing those bogus poetry contests attacked? Then you might like FOETRY.
Sunday, June 25, 2006
I just returned from a great trip to Dublin for Bloomsday. I went with family, which worked out great, esp. as a close friend of the family has ties (family and friends) in Ireland that opened many doors. E.g. he arranged a dinner at the University Kildare club (where he also arranged for us to stay) with Senator David Norris, who is an expert on Joyce. (Wrote introduction to Joyce). I asked him how many people in the world have read the Wake with full understanding, and he said, "none...Joyce himself probably forgot all that he put in there."
We visited Sandy Cove (the "omphalos" -- i.e. circular castle that appears in opening scenes of Ulysses, peering over the "snotgreen sea"), the James Joyce museum, and Howth Castle, among other places. Also got a tour of the Dail ("doyle") -- the equiv. to our House of Representatives.
Also saw a good recitation/explanation of Flann O'Brien's famous work, At Swim--Two Birds.
And visited most of the major bookstores in Dublin proper.
Also read ReJoyce by Anthony Burgess, one of the best explorations of the man and his work that you can find.
After I got home I started reading Finnegan's Wake. It occurs to me that I could begin adding to my Joycean poem, "The Ill Id" (El Noise) -- using his technique (w/o as much brilliant layering and use of polyglottamy -- of dreamlanguage. Which is where the poem left off. With me asleep in a hammock slung under the el. Pot to Potawattomee? Yes, I say Yes.
We visited Sandy Cove (the "omphalos" -- i.e. circular castle that appears in opening scenes of Ulysses, peering over the "snotgreen sea"), the James Joyce museum, and Howth Castle, among other places. Also got a tour of the Dail ("doyle") -- the equiv. to our House of Representatives.
Also saw a good recitation/explanation of Flann O'Brien's famous work, At Swim--Two Birds.
And visited most of the major bookstores in Dublin proper.
Also read ReJoyce by Anthony Burgess, one of the best explorations of the man and his work that you can find.
After I got home I started reading Finnegan's Wake. It occurs to me that I could begin adding to my Joycean poem, "The Ill Id" (El Noise) -- using his technique (w/o as much brilliant layering and use of polyglottamy -- of dreamlanguage. Which is where the poem left off. With me asleep in a hammock slung under the el. Pot to Potawattomee? Yes, I say Yes.
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
The Assassins' Gate: America in Iraq
by George Packer (FSG, 2005)
I have to admit, I started reading this book with a great deal of skepticism, given the effusive praise from Christopher Hitchens in a plug on the back. Others also told me that Packer is a "liberal hawk" who originally supported the war. But if so, he's come a long way.
Packer's views on the war are not Hitchens'. Moreover, he takes on the ideological hybris of the neocons in a manner that is quite nuanced, fair, and critical. For that reason, it is more than a deep, first-hand account of the on-the-ground reality gleaned from numerous visits to Iraq (where he describes an increasingly dangerous atmosphere), but more interesting as a sweeping analysis laden with probing encounters with key neocon thinkers, including Perle, Paul Berman, Robert Kagan, and various Iraqi exiles.
The result is a solid description of how delusionary the leading advocates of the war are.
While comparisons with the Vietnam War are fraught with obstacles, if I were to suggest a book to compare this one to, it might be The Best and the Brightest, except that Packer lacks Halberstam's probing descriptions of the inner workings of key players -- e.g. the Office of Special Plans and Cheney's cabal. Nevertheless, he makes up for that with searing and deeply probing examinations of key ideologues, young CPA bureaucrats detached from the reality outside the Green Zone and occupation authories and soldiers who can't afford the luxury of that distance.
A friend of mine suggested he didn't see much point in the description Packer includes of his visit to the father of a dead soldier, out in Iowa, but I think it works well against the abstractions of the neocons, which he puts at the center of a searching examination of the big question: WHY? It is therefore easy to understand how the father would not arrive at the same criticism of the war that we are left with, since that would mean his son's death was meaningless.
And yet, the sad thing is that very well may be the case.
Packer is also simply a damned fine writer, which makes even those parts that you don't seem to learn much that is new (esp. after reading a few other books on Iraq) still rewarding.
So, if you want to read just one book, consider this one. (Esp. since it's not quite as dated as Christian Parenti's The Freedom, which was a solid piece of reportage on the early occupation.) I haven't yet read Anthony Shadid's book (which is supposed to be a good explanation of the war from the perspective of the Iraqi people), Baghdad Burning, or David Enders' book, Baghdad Bulletin. But if they are all good, I think it would be for different reasons.
by George Packer (FSG, 2005)
I have to admit, I started reading this book with a great deal of skepticism, given the effusive praise from Christopher Hitchens in a plug on the back. Others also told me that Packer is a "liberal hawk" who originally supported the war. But if so, he's come a long way.
Packer's views on the war are not Hitchens'. Moreover, he takes on the ideological hybris of the neocons in a manner that is quite nuanced, fair, and critical. For that reason, it is more than a deep, first-hand account of the on-the-ground reality gleaned from numerous visits to Iraq (where he describes an increasingly dangerous atmosphere), but more interesting as a sweeping analysis laden with probing encounters with key neocon thinkers, including Perle, Paul Berman, Robert Kagan, and various Iraqi exiles.
The result is a solid description of how delusionary the leading advocates of the war are.
While comparisons with the Vietnam War are fraught with obstacles, if I were to suggest a book to compare this one to, it might be The Best and the Brightest, except that Packer lacks Halberstam's probing descriptions of the inner workings of key players -- e.g. the Office of Special Plans and Cheney's cabal. Nevertheless, he makes up for that with searing and deeply probing examinations of key ideologues, young CPA bureaucrats detached from the reality outside the Green Zone and occupation authories and soldiers who can't afford the luxury of that distance.
A friend of mine suggested he didn't see much point in the description Packer includes of his visit to the father of a dead soldier, out in Iowa, but I think it works well against the abstractions of the neocons, which he puts at the center of a searching examination of the big question: WHY? It is therefore easy to understand how the father would not arrive at the same criticism of the war that we are left with, since that would mean his son's death was meaningless.
And yet, the sad thing is that very well may be the case.
Packer is also simply a damned fine writer, which makes even those parts that you don't seem to learn much that is new (esp. after reading a few other books on Iraq) still rewarding.
So, if you want to read just one book, consider this one. (Esp. since it's not quite as dated as Christian Parenti's The Freedom, which was a solid piece of reportage on the early occupation.) I haven't yet read Anthony Shadid's book (which is supposed to be a good explanation of the war from the perspective of the Iraqi people), Baghdad Burning, or David Enders' book, Baghdad Bulletin. But if they are all good, I think it would be for different reasons.
Monday, November 28, 2005
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