My favorite new-year pastime, the Buffalo Beast‘s annual “Most Loathsome” list, is now up. It’s a little more brief (and tame) this year, but still a funny read.
Some highlights:
Posts tagged `politics`
-
Confessions of an Economic Hitman - Publisher: Plume
- Year: 2004/2005
- Pages: 303
I don’t recall at what point I became aware of John Perkin’s tell-all exposé on the seedy underworld of global politics, but while the idea was intriguing, it sounded a bit too exaggerated for my tastes, and I left it well enough alone. Finally, I could not resist the temptation to read this tome by Perkins, who is referred to as a “frothing conspiracy theorist” (more on this later) but praised by a multitude of readers.
-
Where Men Win Glory: The Odyssey of Pat Tillman - Publisher: Doubleday
- Year: 2009
- Pages: 416
There was a time—ever so briefly—when Pat Tillman dominated the news cycle. Actually, there were two times: one, when the football semi-star joined the military and become a posterboy for patriotism and self-sacrifice, and another when he died via friendly fire, becoming yet another It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad Mad World story in a long string of nonsensical happenings on the other side of the world.
-
The Science of Fear - Publisher: Dutton Adult
- Year: 2008
- Pages: 352
I hadn’t predicted, when I picked up Daniel Gardner’s The Science of Fear and Richard Mullen’s Physics For Future Presidents, that there would be so much overlap between the two. I suppose, ultimately, it was inevitably: Mullen’s book, by title and design, covered those areas of science which are the most politically and socially relevant. As is so often the case with complicated issues with big numbers, these situations have the ability to frighten people who can’t keep a level head: consider, if you will, the fear, antipathy, and abject horror that most people have for nuclear energy after the events of Three Mile Island and —even worse in the sense that it actually caused deaths—Chernobyl.
Enter The Science of Fear, Daniel Gardner’s (a Canadian journalist) to both explain and debunk the fear that tends to grip most people when it comes to vaguely menacing concepts.
-
Idiot America - Publisher: Doubleday
- Year: 2009
- Pages: 304
Charles Pierce is a frequent guest on NPR‘s “Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!” though I didn’t know this until after I read this book (go figure).
Despite the inflammatory title, Idiot America isn’t a criticism of the country, but rather a condemnation of the way in which idiocy or nescience has become something to be proud of; it’s a sort of extension of Thomas Frank’s question of authenticity. And it troubles Charles Pierce to no end.