I finally wrote my first review on Amazon.com, of Dan Abbott’s Revolutionary Strategies in Early Christianity – I read it about four years ago, wrote a review and never posted it. I came across the book again on my Kindle recently, reread it, and wrote the review. Sorry for the lateness of the review Dan!
Books
19
May 08
Fifth Generation Warfare sighted in the wild!
Check out this interview on bloggingheads with the author of The Family, which is a book about a loose network of self dealing Christians in high placed.
From the interview (I haven’t read the book yet) it seems to match all of the definitions of 5GW (loose as they may be), and it’s been around since the 30s as well.
Thoughts from my fellow war nerds, which is to say Soob and Slog?
14
Feb 08
Marching Toward Hell
Michael Scheuer’s new book Marching Toward Hell, America and Islam After Iraq came in the mail today, I’ve read the first 20 pages or so, it looks to be a very good read. The man is the Merle Haggard of foreign policy.
10
Jun 07
The weirdest thing I read last week
From Jim Thompson’s novel, Pop. 1280 after the protagonist almost get hanged by an angry mob for rape
I figure sometimes that maybe that’s why we don’t make as much progress as other parts of the nation. People lose so much time from their jobs in lynching other people, and they spend so much money on rope and kerosene and getting likkered up in advance, and other essentials, that there ain’t an awful lot of money or man-hours left for practical purposes.
28
May 07
Line of the moment
I came across this podcast of Steven Landsburg, author of More Sex Is Safer Sex: The Unconventional Wisdom of Economics and found it quite entertaining. I thoroughly enjoyed his earlier works, especially The Armchair Economist (much better than Freakonomics). In the excerpt it has this bit:
…If your common sense tells you otherwise, remember that common sense also tells you the earth is flat.
28
May 07
The Grifters
I just finished The Grifters by Jim Thompson, one of the best hard-boiled crime dramas I’ve ever read. Told entirely in the first person, it’s the dark and evil story of crooks, marks and no innocence whatsoever. Notable in it’s absence is any objective description (well, there’s almost none). Almost no “it was raining”, “the night was cloudy”, etc. Lots of impressions, feelings and lies, but no independent reality.
Highly recommended.
1
Feb 06
Tuesday rapid fire
- The story and original lyrics to Bonaparte’s Retreat.
- A very good bio-article on Micky Spillaine.
- A new conspiracy site!
- You’ve got your pain ray in my sonic blaster!