The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood

The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood is a book that I have chosen after much soul searching.  Several friends encouraged me to watch the mini-series and I resisted for a long time.  I have now watched that series.  I understand that the book is different (as a book can rarely be captured in a cinematic format) and I have finally gotten up the gumption to read it.

Started: 7/27/2019
Completed: 7/30/2019
Recommendation: Not Recommended
Recommended By: Lots of my friends

Words for which I sought help:

prurience -- an encouraging or excessive interest in sexual matters

susurration -- a rustling sound

waif -- a homeless and helpless person, esp. a neglected or abandoned child

Review:

I like learning new things.  This book has many new things to say, but sometimes it is the simple things that catch my eye quickly.  In the book there is a discussion on the source of the phrase "mayday."  As the discussion began, I slipped inside my own head and imagined a Jerry Seinfeld style rant:

Why do they call it "mayday" when you need help?  Is May such a hopeless month, what with the flowers and everything?  Did someone start with "marchday" and decide that March was too ambiguous--in like a lamb, out like a lion?  No, we couldn't use March, March doesn't give a sense  of urgency.  Not like May.  May demands attention!  There are flowers popping up everywhere after the April showers.  And flowers just scream help.  "I need to make seeds," "No pick me over here!"  Now, "mayday," that is a cry for help.

The book taught me, however, that "mayday" is derived from the French, m'aidez.  I love it when stuff like that happens when I am just sitting and reading a book.  It's like my brain just got a nice piece of candy.

Having said all of these good things about the book, it is worth knowing that this book is very different from the Hulu television show.  I found the book confusing and only through references common between the book and the show was I able to piece together the broader nature of the society.  The epilogue helped also.  I think that if I had read this book without the show, I would have stopped part way through.  One can only tolerate so much horror.

The Best Land Under Heaven, Michael Wallis

The Best Land Under Heaven:  The Donner party in the age of manifest destiny by Michael Wallis is an audio book that I picked up at some point new.  I cannot remember why.

Started: 7/10/2019

Completed: 7/29/2019

Recommendation: Recommended with care and caution

Recommended By:  Nobody

Review:

It was surprising to me that Lincoln had known a member of the Donner Party.  It was almost equally shocking to me that Lincoln and Stephen Douglas had been in the same military command during the Black Hawk War.  Finally, you can imagine my surprise when I found that one of the Donner Party (James Reed) had gotten his start in Galena, Ill. which was a location for one of Grant's homes in his retirement.

I was also surprised to find out that relatives of Daniel Boone had been among the party.  It really does feel like the United States was a big place with few people in it.

This is a historical perspective.  It is not a memoir of one of the members, nor is it simply a retelling of previous descriptions.  This is an effort to put the entire event within historical context, to describe events in as even handed a manner as possible, and to also provide a compelling narrative.  The writing is not fantastic, but there is enough there to keep my attention and the subject matter has enough myth around it that it was nice to dispel some of the exaggerations.

The horror these people faced, the courage with which they faced it, and the heroism of those who provided relief feels like it belongs to another time.  Such an odd combination of carefully thought out mistakes, underestimation, and will power is hard to imagine.

I recommend this book with care as it is true and horrible.  I recommend this book with caution as it leaves behind nightmares.

Circe, Madeline Miller

Circe by Madeline Miller seemed to show up everywhere I looked.  I saw it on the NYT best seller list and in many lists of "best books" for a season or a year.

Started: 7/23/2019

Completed: 7/27/2019

Recommendation: Recommended

Recommended By: Everyone

Words for which I sought help:

etiolated -- Having lost vigor or substance; feeble

Review

A nice easy read and a retelling of several myths (at least Jason and the Argonauts and the Odyssey) from the perspective of Circe.  Circe is a goddess with little or no power who turns to magic and becomes a witch.  The story flows well and the prose is engaging.  I particularly recognized the descriptions of Circe's baby as they reminded me so much of my youngest.

The Line Becomes a River, Francisco Cantu

The Line Becomes a River:  Dispatches from the border by Francisco Cantu was a book that came to my attention from an NPR story about the top 10 books of 2018.  I know it is the story of a former border patrol officer.  I know it provides a visceral understanding of why building a wall is a bad idea.

Started: 7/19/2019

Completed: 7/24/2019

Recommendation: Recommended

Recommended By:  Nobody

Review:

This is a first hand account of a border patrol agent who was haunted by his job.  The horror of the deaths he witnessed, the difficulties that people experienced in the desert, and the abuse of individuals by coyotes all played upon his mind and crept into his dreams.  He became a border patrol agent to help people, to discourage border crossings and "non-designated" sites, and to care for those who needed the help of our great nation.  Over time, he could no longer participate in a system that was dehumanizing, demoralizing, and abusive.  After leaving the border patrol, he met a person who was later deported and the author tried to help the man return to his family.  The reality he experienced all around was the horror of family separation; the desperate need for deported people to return to their families; and the mortal concerns of deportees who contemplated bringing their American children to Mexico.  I will never think of the same way.

The Assault on Intelligence, Michael Hayden

The Assault on Intelligence:  American national security in an age of lies by Michael V. Hayden has a title that drew me.  Trying to understand why it makes sense to take issue with the entire intelligence apparatus makes no sense to me, so I turned to an expert for insight.

Started:  7/7/2019

Completed: 7/14/2019

Recommendation: Mild Recommendation

Recommended By:  Nobody

Words for which I sought help:

naif -- a naive or ingenuous person

Review:

Director Hayden is very conservative.  He is not a fan of Trump.  He is focused on facts.  He is perplexed by Trump.  "Did [Trump] simply reject the premise that objective reality existed or mattered?"  Trump is incomprehensible to Director Hayden because Trump is so untethered from the truth which forms Hayden's bedrock.

Regarding Trump's assertions that the Intelligence community had it wrong after the community started providing candidate briefings, Director Hayden argued that "[r]ejecting a fact based intelligence assessment--not because of compelling contradictory data, but because it was inconsistent with a preexisting worldview or because it was politically inconvenient--is the stuff of ideological authoritarianism, not pragmatic democracy."

Trump's behavior was baffling to those in the intelligence committee who were trying to brief him.  "The veteran briefer ruminated with me over whether or not the president made a distinction in his own mind between true and untrue."

I was completely floored to learn that George W. Bush was a voracious reader.  Director Hayden said so and I did a little quick research and was stunned to learn that in a 4 year period he had read 95 books.  Not picture books either, but serious biographies and even Camus' The Outsider.  It is understandable when you think about Bush graduating with a History degree from Harvard and a Business degree from Yale, but it is so hard to reconcile with the man who was publicly president ("the deciderer").  I remain stunned.  It took me so far aback, that I am still flummoxed as to handle this new information.

This book was a hard read to me as many of the asides provided by Director Hayden assumed that his exceedingly conservative positions were obviously correct and his comments about the Obama administration could find no positivism.  Meanwhile he largely side-stepped the concept of going into Iraq on bad intelligence except for when he was quoting Trump.  I'm no fan of the CIA or FBI, but I recognize their value and importance to the USA.  I also recognize that they can abuse their position--though, hopefully, the era of McCarthy style abuse will not arise again in those agencies.

I recommend this book because it helps me understand how a conservative wants to divorce himself from Trump and how he distinguishes himself from those who support Trump.  I imagine that people such as Director Hayden will opt not to vote for President rather than select a non-conservative for office.  I will be curious to see if he announces his position on this issue in the 2020 election (assuming Trump is still in office at that time).

The Female Persuasion, Meg Wolitzer

The Female Persuasion by Meg Wolitzer was recommended by an article in The Atlantic.  In terms of classification this would probably be put as a feminist novel.  My understanding, however, is that this is simply a well written book with a good story.

Started: 6/24/2019

Completed: 7/10/2019

Recommendation: Mild Recommendation

Recommended By:  The Atlantic

Review:

This was a well conceived book.  I did not like the ending and that has had an impact on my thinking of the whole book.

The end felt rushed.  It felt like there was so much more to be explored, but a bow was needed so it was applied.  There is no doubt that the book focuses on overcoming adversity from many different perspectives and with several different personality types.  Maybe it is the need to make a feel good book, but it always seems that the characters do, indeed, overcome the adversity with which they are faced no matter what the character flaws highlighted.  That feels contrived.  Thus the book avoids being too much of a drama, but it falls apart for me because no one is actually overwhelmed by the dire circumstances in which each character appears.

Personally, this book offered some insights into feminist thinking, but, really, it isn't all that different from the thinking I had been doing.  It emphasized to me, however, that these thoughts need to be considered and more often at the forefront of my mind.

The Retreat of Western Liberalism, Edward Luce

The Retreat of Western Liberalism by Edward Luce is a book that I saw reviewed in the New York Times and found the review compelling.  It is hard to pass by a book written by an editor of the Financial Times who is saying that we have to pay attention to the risks to our democracy.

Started: 7/4/2019

Completed: 7/7/2019

Recommendation: Highly Recommended

Recommended By: The New York Times

Review:

It is important to recognize that this book was published just as Trump came into power.  It anticipates many of his actual moves and it is also misses some of his difficulties.  Regardless, this is an excellent book that spells out the nature and design of the threat to to liberal democracy.

For starters, there is a little bit of hypocrisy.  "For all the emphasis we place on our multicultural cities, they epitomize our oligarchic reality.  In the US, the more liberal a city's politics, the higher the rate of inequality."  Now, this may seem to make no sense, but my wife pointed out that living with people of different means, different cultures, and different races (like what happens in a city) is what leads to a liberal point of view.  Compound that with how wealth is focused in a city (as described by Luce) and this odd dichotomy becomes a little more understandable (though still a tad shocking).

Trying to understand Trump's election in terms of Jackson or any other leader brought to the fore by the mob, Luce points out that "Plato believed that democracy was the rule of the mob....In his view, the mob could not distinguish between knowledge and opinion."  Whether Plato was right or not, Trump has made a conscious effort to mislead with cries of "fake news" and unremitting, relentless lies.  If the mob cannot distinguish between knowledge and opinion, Trumpism further confuses the issue by eliminating facts.

Luce argues that war with China is likely due to the Thucydides trap. "What struck Keynes's contemporaries as plain only in hindsight stands in full view before us today.  Historians call it the Thucydides trap....How does an established power react to the rise of a potential challenger?...A 2012 Harvard study...found that in eleven [of fifteen] cases since 1500...the trap had culminated in war."  Luce puts the timing for this as 2020 and says the start will be around the islands that China has built and fortified in the South China Sea.  This analysis does not require a crystal ball and is an excellent hot spot to identify.

So, why isn't the US likely to just lift itself out of this mess by virtue of "the American Spirit?"  "Almost 60 per cent of the US labor force are now paid hourly wages rather than annual incomes.  The median hourly wage is $15.61...Most of America's truck drivers are now independent contractors.  They are known as sharecroppers on wheels."  The risk in the economy has been shifted from companies to individuals while the rewards remain with the companies.  This means that the population as a whole is at risk with little ability to withstand the realization of that risk.

"Champions of [Universal Basic Income] depict it as a magic wand for the complex problems we face.  I fear it would help bring about a kind of Hunger Games, in which the poor are kept afloat while sating themselves on dog-eat-dog reality entertainment.  UBI is also silent on the future of work."  This book predates the Green New Deal as proposed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and I have a feeling that Luce would have a lot to say about her proposal which makes a serious effort to address the future of work.

"Education should not just be about getting a job.  It must equip us to be full members of society."  I think this is a dream.  I agree with Luce, but it simply does not seem to be happening and the colleges and universities of the US are complicit.

"There is no precise measure of the health of liberal democracy.  But we can be sure that America will not become great again under Trump.  There will be a lethal mood of betrayal and frustration when he fails.  Who knows where that could lead."

Saving Capitalism, Robert Reich

Saving Capitalism:  For the many, not the few by Robert B. Reich a former Secretary of Labor and current Berkeley Economics Professor talks about capitalism.  I decided to read this book based on a review in the New York Times.

Started:  6/20/2019

Completed: 7/4/2019

Recommendation: Recommended

Recommended By: New York Times

Review:

"In truth, income and wealth increasingly depend on who has the power to set the rules of the game."

Secretary Reich builds a compelling argument that the rules of the game are biased in favor of the rich.  He does this along two primary paths--a hidden offset for Wall Street and manipulation of the concepts behind "free market."  Reich, as usual, sets the ground that there is no such thing as a free market.  The question is in whose favor the market is regulated.  Obvious examples like copyright and patents rig the market in favor of companies over consumers.  Anti-monopoly statutes rig the market in favor of the consumer.  However one approaches the current "free market" it is not a free market and should not be one.  The question is how and to what degree the market should be regulated.

In the end, there is just too much power held by the rich right now.  The market bends far too much in their favor.  Clearly, some of this needs to be resolved within market regulations.  What I find enticing, however, is Secretary Reich's call back to Thomas Paine, who, in Common Sense, called for a universal basic income.

"However it is accomplished, the rules must be adapted toward creating a more inclusive economy."

This is a good book and it spells out the serious issues Capitalism faces in the United States.  It was written before Trump's tax law that further pushed money to the rich.