The Challenges of Lupus: Insights and Hope

Customer Reviews:

collective essays.......2000-03-08

"Coping With lupus" takes a philosophical approach to the disease. It brings together a collection of essays from different experts. Topics covered include a message of hope, lupus and kids, S.L.E. and genetics,the doctor-patient relationship. The essays are cursory without much depth. And without providing anything really "new".I previously purchased two other books on the subject (one by Phillips and another by Dibner). These addressed the topic more comprehensively.

very educational.......1999-10-18

I have lupus so I found much of the information interesting. ..For those of you looking for more, you might try reading Stolen Moments by author Barbara Jeanne Fisher.. This is a beautiful fiction book, based on the autors on life with lupus, and for sure makes readers aware that life and love are precious and not to be taken for granted. this book was edited by Ms Fisher's lupus specialist, and it is also known as the love story of the 90's. Hats off to both authors.

Book Description

This is the first full-length biography ever written on the life and death of the nineteen-year-old Werner Voss, who was a legend in his own lifetime and the youngest recipient of the Pour le Me'rite, Germany's highest award for bravery in WWI. At the time of his death he was considered by many, friend and foe alike, to be Germany's greatest ace and, had he lived, he would almost certainly have overtaken Manfred von Richthofen's victory total by early spring 1918.

Voss is perhaps best remembered for his outstanding courage, his audacity in the air and the prodigious number of victories he achieved before being killed in one of the most swash-buckling and famous dogfights of the Great War; a fight involving James McCudden and 56 Squadron RFC, the most successful Allied scout squadron.

Yet the life of Voss and the events of that fateful day in September are surrounded by mystery and uncertainty and even now aviation enthusiasts continue to ask questions about him almost on a daily basis.

Barry Diggens was determined to find out the truth and his book unearths and analyses every scrap of information concerning this extraordinary young man. His conclusions are sometimes controversial but his evidence persuasive and this study will be welcomed by, and be of great interest to, the aviation fraternity worldwide.

Includes an excellent photographic section.

Customer Reviews:

Very good reading........2006-11-10

This book not only serves its purpose (examining the life of German ace Werner Voss) but serves as a good introductory book for anyone interested in lear something about World War I dofights and aces, because the author talks about a lot of aces, including Richthofen, Ball, Mannock, Collishaw, Lothar Richthofen, etc.

The photos (all in black and white, of course) are also stunning, with great restoration job upon them.

TEENAGE ACE.......2005-10-26

I GOT THIS BOOK AND I WAS VERY HAPPY WITH IT.FOR THE FIRST TIME ANYWHERE YOU CAN NOW FIND THE REAL STORY OF THE TEENAGE ACE WERNER VOSS.HE WAS THE BETTER PILOT THAN THE RED BARON SOME SAY AND EVEN THE BARON HIMSELF SAID HE WAS THE ONE TO WATCH.THIS BOOK TELLS THE STORY OF A GREAT KID TO HIS LAST BATTLE WITH THE 7 S.E.5A SCOUTS ON THAT SEPTEMBER EVENING.

A Must Read.......2004-02-09

First off, let me say this is a "Must Read" for anyone remotely interested in the aerial campaigns of WW1 and/or the career of Werner Voss. The subtitle of the book: "The Life and Final Combat of the German World War One Ace Werner Voss" neatly describes the organization of the book with 77 pages devoted to his life and wartime career prior to September 23, 1917, while the final 89 recount the climatic dogfight and its aftermath.

I must say that I was a bit disappointed with the depth of coverage dealing with his wartime career. The author explains that much family and archival material was lost during the Second World War and other than an examination of his relationship with von Richthofen, his personal and professional life remains indistinct. What we are left with is a valuable recounting of all the pertinent postings during his service career and thumbnail descriptions of his 48 aerial victories.

In the recounting of Voss' final Dogfight, where he fought nearly single handed against nine British aircraft, the author gives the reader a clear picture of this epic encounter as well doing some first rate detective work examining the numerous controversies surrounding the fight. The appendices which include the after-action reports of the particpants and a fine selection of photographs are a highlight of the book. This will be a valuable addition to every WW1 aviation bookshelf.

Customer Reviews:

A Conduit of Identity.......2000-05-23

"Boundaries and Passages" is one of the better anthropological texts on Arctic peoples to be found, Fienup-Riordan's text engages Yup'ik culture through context of ritual and shared space.

Detailed and often more of a documentary than an analysis, this text arms the anthropologist and/or interested reader with the context to form their own evaluations and conclusions.

The Yup'ik world is one formed by passages between the natural, spiritual, and human worlds. These passages are bounded, transgressed, and set right by rituals and practices that unite community...in effect creating Yup'ik identity in context of the outside world.

As well, Fienup-Riordan's text is a modern one, and she is clearly capable of acknowledging the changing spheres of influence that constantly create and recreate Yup'ik culture. Nowhere is the staid analysis of the Yup'ik as a dying culture, as a dead culture, as a static culture. Fienup-Riordan's book is a window into the living culture as well as the historical perspective.

An excellent text!

Book Description

Deforestation is occurring at an alarming rate in many parts of the world, causing destruction of natural habitat and fragmentation of what remains. Nowhere is this problem more pressing than in the Amazon rainforest, which is rapidly vanishing in the face of enormous pressure from humans to exploit it. This book presents the results of the longest-running and most comprehensive study of forest fragmentation ever undertaken, the Biological Dynamics of Forest Fragments Project (BDFFP) in central Amazonia, the only experimental study of tropical forest fragmentation in which baseline data are available before isolation from continuous forest took place.

A joint project of Brazil's National Institute for Research in Amazonia and the U.S. Smithsonian Institution, the BDFFP has investigated the many effects that habitat fragmentation has on plants, invertebrates, and vertebrates. The book provides an overview of the BDFFP, reports on its case studies, looks at forest ecology and tree genetics, and considers what issues are involved in establishing

Lessons from Amazonia: The Ecology and Conservation of a Fragmented Forest
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Lessons from Amazonia: The Ecology and Conservation of a Fragmented Forest
Richard O. Bierregaard
Manufacturer: Yale University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OS4UNQ

Charles Darwin: Voyaging
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Comprehensive and Easy to Read Darwin Bio.

Biogeography

You must have it

Darwin Voyaging by Janet Browne

An Ambitious, Wide-Ranging, & Intelligent Work

Charles Darwin: Voyaging
E. Janet Browne
Manufacturer: Princeton University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0691026068

Book Description

Few lives of great men offer so much interest--and so many mysteries--as the life of Charles Darwin, the greatest figure of nineteenth-century science, whose ideas are still inspiring discoveries and controversies more than a hundred years after his death. Yet only now, with the publication of Voyaging, the first of two volumes that will constitute the definitive biography, do we have a truly vivid and comprehensive picture of Darwin as man and as scientist. Drawing upon much new material, supported by an unmatched acquaintance with both the intellectual setting and the voluminous sources, Janet Browne has at last been able to unravel the central enigma of Darwin's career: how did this amiable young gentleman, born into a prosperous provincial English family, grow into a thinker capable of challenging the most basic principles of religion and science? The dramatic story of Voyaging takes us from agonizing personal challenges to the exhilaration of discovery; we see a young, inquisitive Darwin gradually mature, shaping, refining, and finally setting forth the ideas that would at last fall upon the world like a thunderclap in The Origin of Species.

Customer Reviews:

Comprehensive and Easy to Read Darwin Bio........2007-05-13

I actually first checked this book out from my university's library and liked it so much that I went ahead and bought it for my personal library. Browne explores Darwin's life in the text in an extremely compelling and easily comprehendable manner. While I don't believe Charles Darwin: Voyaging is explicit and detailed enough to negate the need for true Darwin enthusiasts to discover Darwin for themselves through reading his autobiography, collected correspondence, and great scientific works (The Origins of Species, Descent of Man etc...) I do think the text accomplishes what it was meant to do--give those curious about Darwin's life and works the basic overview they need before pursuing the topic in more depth.

Biogeography.......2007-01-30

Exceptional book, if in doubt, buy it. I knew it would be great after reading so many positive reviews, for some years, and was not disappointed. Unlike some overly detailed biographies, every word seems worthwhile here, from that first glorious sentence to the last. Here is the great adventure story of all time, biology-wise. All I can do is add my two cents worth to what is said elsewhere, don't miss this one.

You must have it.......2005-08-16

Un libro estupendo. Erudito ,informado , ameno y riguroso.¿Que mas podemos pedirle a Janet Browne?

Darwin Voyaging by Janet Browne.......2005-05-26

This is one of the best biography books that I have ever read. It is factual and beautifully written

An Ambitious, Wide-Ranging, & Intelligent Work.......2005-04-03

"I am almost convinced (quite contrary to the opinion
I started with) that species are not (it is like confessing
a murder) immutable."--Charles Darwin, in a letter to
Joseph Dalton Hooker, January 1844

In 1859, The Origin of Species dropped like a bombshell
on the world. One of the most radical books of the 19th
century--its full title was On the Origin of the Species
by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of
Favored Races in the Struggle for Life--turned the society
of its day upside down.

"No other thinker," writes Janet Browne, "shook Victorian
England as deeply as Charles Darwin and the theory of
evolution by natural selection. His radical new theory of
nature undermined everything usually believed about
the human race."

In The Origin of Species, Darwin painted a dark picture
of nature red in tooth and claw, the struggle for existence
as a perpetual competition--species against species,
individual against individual--a dark cosmos of change,
alteration, flux, development, and transmutation.

In this dog-eat-dog world, he saw the evolution was
powered by the engine of natural selection--the survival
of the fittest

In Charles Darwin: Voyaging, Volume One of a projected
two-volume biography, Browne has launched an ambitious
work that is wide-ranging, intelligent, and impressive in
its scientific acumen.

The volume is a marvelous tribute to the life and thought
of Charles Darwin (1809-1882), one of the greatest figures
in the history of science.

Browne divides the 21 chapters of this 600-page tome
into three parts:

Part One, "Collector," tells of Darwin's birth in Shrewsbury,
Shropshire, England, a town nestled on the Severn River;
describes his education at Edinburgh University (where
the sight of blood convinced him not to be a medical
doctor) and at Cambridge University (where he studied
to be a country parson); and explains the "Cambridge
network" of professors, scholars, acquaintances, and friends.

Part Two, "Voyaging," chronicles the five-year journey of
the H.M.S. Beagle (Dec. 27, 1831, to Oct. 2, 1836), a
voyage that circumnavigated the world and changed
Darwin's life forever. Browne describes the fiery Capt.
Robert FitzRoy and the remarkable lands explored by
Darwin: Patagonia, Tierra del Fuego, Chile, the Galapagos
Islands, Tahiti, New Zealand, and Australia.

Part Three, "Naturalist," tells of Darwin's marriage to
Emma Wedgwood and their children, of Darwin's becoming
a "man of property" with his purchase of Down house and
18 acres of land situated in Down village in Kent (now
Downe), about 15 or 16 miles from the center of London.

At Down house, Darwin labored for eight years on his
"beloved barnacles," seeking hard facts to bolster his
theory of "transmutation," and then proceeded to the
study of plants and pigeons.

Browne's work ends in 1856, three years before the
publication of The Origin, with Darwin poised to begin
writing his "big book on species," to which he gave the
working title, Natural Selection.

Rich in scientific content and impressive in its writing style,
Charles Darwin: Voyaging is the best biography I have
read in years. Put this book of your must-read list.

Charles Darwin Voyaging. Volume I of a Biography.

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Charles Darwin Voyaging. Volume I of a Biography.
Janet. [DARWIN] BROWNE
Manufacturer: Alfred A. Knopf
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000SIBYKE

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Charles Darwin: Voyaging

Manufacturer: Alfred A. Knopf
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000I10EQG

The Sailing Navy, 1775-1854 (U.)
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The Sailing Navy, 1775-1854 (U.)
Paul H. Silverstone
Manufacturer: Routledge
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Military | History | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0415978726

Book Description

The Sailing Navy, 1775-1854 is the first volume in the 5-volume US Navy Warships encyclopedia set. In a convenient tabular format, important details are listed for each ship, including the often overlooked, lesser-known, and smaller vessels. Each entry provides information on size, date, location of construction, commissioning date and length of service, and the ship's fate. Combat details include campaigns and actions fought, damages sustained, casualties, prizes taken, and ships sunk. Names used before or after naval service are provided.

Unvanquished: A U.S. - U.N. Saga
Average customer rating:

A good read exploring the complexities of the US-UN relation

Valuable to Leaders and Observers of International Politics.

The reality revealed in this book.

Boutros-Ghali bites back

The truth is coming out

Unvanquished: A U.S. - U.N. Saga
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Pilgrimage For Peace: A Secretary General's Memoir

The Best Intentions: Kofi Annan and the UN in the Era of American World Power

Act Of Creation: The Founding of the United Nations : A Story of Superpowers, Secret Agents, Wartime Allies and Enemies, and Their Quest for a Peaceful World

In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security And Human Rights for All - Report of the Secretary-general: Towards Development, Security And Human Rights for All

Kofi Annan: A Man of Peace in a World of War

ASIN: 0812992040
Release Date: 1999-06-01

Amazon.com

Boutros Boutros-Ghali offers a frank chronicle of his five years as secretary-general of the United Nations. Although Unvanquished describes ambitious activities in the Middle East, the Balkans, Central America, and elsewhere, its title is clearly a pun (capitalize those first two letters and look at it again), and this is a bitter memoir of hardball diplomacy. The central story line features Boutros-Ghali's confrontations with the United States, with a special focus on how the Clinton administration prevented him from serving a second term as secretary-general--a "rejection of democracy," he calls it, because the United States was the only member of the Security Council to vote against him. The serious trouble began as a result of election-year politics in the United States: "the White House apparently felt a growing need to compete with the GOP over which party was more anti-United Nations." Yet it seems clear that trouble was brewing for much longer. Consider how Boutros-Ghali describes his early impression of Madeleine Albright, who was the U.S. representative to the United Nations before she became secretary of state: "I was puzzled, however, by what seemed her desire to strike attitudes rather than address substantive issues.... She seemed to assume that her mere assertion of a U.S. policy should be sufficient to achieve the support of other nations." Boutros-Ghali is fiercely unapologetic, and his narrative is feisty and engaging. --John J. Miller

Book Description

For years the United States has treated the United Nations as an extension of its own foreign policy, while other member states--especially smaller, less influential countries--have looked to the United Nations to represent their collective interests. This conflict escalated in the fall of 1996, when the United States unilaterally decided to deny Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali a second term.
        In this book Boutros-Ghali argues that U.S. policy toward the United Nations threatens the fragile fabric of the international organization. By selectively consulting the Security Council, the United States has frequently condemned the United Nations to the status of scapegoat in international affairs, notably during peacekeeping missions in Bosnia, Somalia, and Rwanda. Meanwhile, the United Nations's financial crisis persists as the United States fails to pay its bills while seeking to further increase its already considerable influence within the organization.
        In October 1995 President Clinton lavishly praised Boutros-Ghali for his "outstanding leadership," and thanked him for his "vision." Yet, a mere four months later, the Clinton administration decided that Boutros-Ghali would have to go. What happened in that short time to convince the United States that the secretary-general was now a liability? United States domestic electoral politics were decisive: While campaigning for the primaries, Bob Dole was scoring heavily by repeatedly ridiculing Boutros-Ghali. To neutralize Dole's challenge, Clinton denied the controversial secretary-general a second term, vetoing his reelection in the Security Council despite unanimous support from its other members.
        Boutros-Ghali reveals the dramatic conflict and the personalities involved and considers the future of the United Nations in light of American domination.

From the Hardcover edition.

Customer Reviews:

A good read exploring the complexities of the US-UN relation.......2003-03-15

An excellent book which the focuses mainly on the US - UN relationship. In fact the author exposes some of the main issues related to UN reform and how political the workings are for a Secretary General to implement reforms; even the reforms adopted by the security council.

In addition the book demonstrates how critical and powerful a role US plays in the working of the UN (even without having payed the UN dues at the time). To quote Jamie Rubin "The UN can only do what the US Lets it do".

However I was a little dissapointed that the author did not bring out how the UN works in terms of how the resolutions are proposed, voted, adopted and implemented. Also all the focus is on the US-UN relationship and all other member relations are viewed through this prism. Also I felt the author was preoccupied with explaining the reader how he was deprived of the second term in the office.

The author has singled out Madeline Albright for some special treatment in the book. This personality of Madeline Albright is very different from what the US media has portrayed her. She comes across as very insecure and cunning (For example: what Joseph Verner Reed says he heard her say " I will make Boutros think I am his friend; then I will break his legs").

Another thing I want to mention here is in relation to what US keeps saying about how ineffectual the UN is in regards to imposing restrictions on Iraq. But what I realize from the book is that we often forget that US, its allies and its enemies are all part of the UN and the UN can only be as effective as its member states want it to be!

Valuable to Leaders and Observers of International Politics........2000-07-09

Politics is generally way beyond the scope of my field of interest. I did, however, buy the book and I did enjoy it.

For someone of very little political background as myself, I found the book very easy to read and even gripping in parts. (you must bear in mind that gripping me by the happenings in Somalia is a superior achievement of a very able author.)

Mr. Ghali's writing style is awesome. He makes the complex simple and does so with such grace that reading the book becomes a recreational activity rather than a study of contemporary political events.

The book reveals a lot of the "happenings" in the international political scene and points at many "obstacles" that the UN has encountered and describes why he was not re-elected for a "generally given" second term.

The book is divided into 8 chapters. Each describes a particular event or string of events that happen during a defined period of time from 1991 till 1996.

An enjoyable book. Dr. Ghali takes you by the hand on a tour around the world as the UN saw it in those 5 years.

Essentail reading for Statesmen. Enjoyable reading for others.

The reality revealed in this book........1999-08-19

Boutros Boutros Ghali is very courageous and expericence man. In this world if you don"t follow you are out of the way and this is the new policy of world only super-power. Are we going to be hostage of one naation?

Boutros-Ghali bites back.......1999-06-07

As compelling as a good novel, BB-G's memoir of his service as UN Secretary-General skilfully blends an account of some of the more disastrous episodes of our time -- Iraq, Rwanda, Bosnia -- with one of the more outrageous US assaults on the will of the international community -- its rejection of BB-G's own re-election to a second term as UN chief. What's truly scary is to compare the intense apathy which the US brought to many foreign catastrophes (in the Rwandan case, a kind of criminal disregard as the genocide raged) with the zealousness and fanaticism of Madeleine Albright's campaign against B-G. The passages in which B-G relates Albright's attempt to buy him off with a title -- the hilarious 'Secretary-General Emeritus', as if to acknowledge the vanity of former academics -- are especially compelling. You'll quake with terror as even Barbara Walters is brought into service as an instrument of US diplomacy (or non-diplomacy, as B-G would probably put it).

Of course, this book needs to be read carefully. B-G has every reason to be bitter about the treatment he received, and his own lifelong service as a diplomat and privileged list of friends (Ted Turner, George Soros and even Kissinger apparently among them) make it clear that he's hardly an innocent in all this. His persistent emphasis on 'democratization' also clashes uncomfortably with his prior service of Anwar Sadat and Hosni Mubarak, the latter still rigging Egyptian elections during BB-G's term at the UN. However, even these caveats cannot diminish the simple, brutal force of B-G's argument -- that the US frequently acts unilaterally, selfishly and destructively to undermine a genuinely multilateral and effective response to international crises.

Of course, this is an imperfect world made up of many players, some far more reprehensible than the likes of Clinton and Albright; but, through B-G's strained prose, we get a real sense of the particular criminality and dereliction of the current US administration, of a gulf between rhetoric and actions which stretches from New York to Sarajevo, from Washington to Kigali.

The truth is coming out.......1999-05-25

Finally a book that is not afraid to talk about the most poisonous snake of them all: Madeline K. Albright. Favourite line: Labeling Washington an imperial power, Boutros-Ghali said the United States ``sees little need for diplomacy; power is enough. Only the weak rely on diplomacy...the Roman Empire had no need for diplomacy. Nor does the United States.''

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Unvanquished A U.S.-U.N. Saga
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000J0ZER0

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Unvanquished: a U.S.-u.N. Saga
Boutros Boutros-ghali
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000N774RW

Book Description

The eloquent voice of Rick Bass has been raised often in celebration and defense of America's surviving wilderness and the big wild animals that live there, in acclaimed books such as Wild to the Heart, The Ninemile Wolves, and The Lost Grizzlies. Now, in Caribou Rising, he journeys from his beloved Yaak Valley in Montana to Alaska, to witness firsthand one of the sole remaining landscapes on Earth where the wild is entirely untrammeled--America's Serengeti, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. It is a place where great caribou herds gather, calve, and migrate as they did in the Pleistocene, and where the ancient bond between animals and human hunters still informs daily life.
Bass's avid desire to meet this landscape and its native people, the Gwich- in, had several sources. A hunter himself since his Mississippi childhood, he now pursues game with a primal passion coupled with an environmentalist's conscience, providing nearly all the meat his family consumes. He hoped to kill one caribou and bring home its meat. But the deeper intent of that act was to enter, even briefly, the experience of the Gwich- in, who have been following, relying on, and praying to the caribou for 10,000 years, in a relationship parallel to that of the Plains tribes and the buffalo. The more urgent impulse for his journey was that the Refuge, along with the caribou and the Gwich- in, faces ruin if the oil industry and its minions in government get their way. Rather than fight for it in the abstract, Bass wanted to find out for himself--and share with readers--what we really stand to lose if the Arctic Refuge is opened to drilling.
Bass's Arctic sojourn brings surprises and unexpected rewards. The caribou's late arrival gives him some downtime in remote Arctic Village, the Gwich- in's home at the base of the Brooks Range. Waiting to travel upriver, Bass walks the land, talks to villagers about their lives, and interviews their leaders. Through him we meet Sarah James, a matriarch wise in the ways of Beltway politics; Trimble Gilbert, an Episcopal priest who kills a caribou for a village-wide barbecue while Bass is in town; and the mysterious Jimi, designated the village's chief hunter. Bass ponders the profound differences between this culture and ours: "the gunmetal hardness of their lives," their casual acceptance of physical risk, and their visceral knowledge that none can exist outside the community. And he reflects on the timeless dance of human, caribou, and land in this place.
While a great many Americans are concerned about assaults on the Arctic National wildlife Refuge, not all are aware that a culture is at risk along with the 129,000 caribou of the Porcupine herd--so, as Bass observes, "the caribou. . . will either save the the Gwich- in one last time, or not." Those who read his extraordinary testament to the place, its animals, and its people will understand the interconnectedness of the three and will have all the more reason to make a stand with conviction.
"It is here that we are being challenged," Bass writes, "with the responsibility of imagination and of discipline, attributes we as a country once had in spades. . . . It is not the caribou, nor the Gwich- in, who are being given one more chance. It is we who are being given one more chance."

Customer Reviews:

good for the goose, but . . . .......2006-04-08

Save the caribou ... so the Gwich-'In can slaughter them! Eating red meat is bad for you ... unless you're Gwich-'In -- in which case, it's good for you!

love and courage in Arctic Alaska.......2004-12-30

The fate of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge has weighed heavy with me for some time now. One of my first reactions to the disaster of November 2 was to buy and read Subhankar Banerjee's "Seasons of Life and Land," a true masterpiece, including not only his own magnificent photographs of ANWR, but also helpful and fascinating commentaries by a number of environmentalists and scientists and other thoughtful visitors to the region. Rick Bass's "Caribou Rising" is a perfect companion to Banerjee's book. At base it is a travel memoir, in which Bass shares the experience of his visit to the Gwich'in community of Arctic Village, his impressions of the residents, and especially his joining some Gwich'in hunters on an expedition in search of their sacred, life-sustaining caribou. "Nature writing" in general is not a genre that impresses me much; but Bass's account of this up-river journey in a questionable boat with his finely drawn hosts is truly fascinating. (Bass is frankly a hunter and a carnivore. Those are issues that tend to divide environmentalists. Hopefully we may look beyond them for now to the very important values that we share.) Interwoven in this memoir are two major strands. First is that of the folly of the Bush/Cheney project to drill for oil in the coastal area of ANWR, the breeding ground of the Porcupine caribou herd, and the ignorance, arrogance and selfishness of that project's supporters. Bass, writing before October 2, argues eloquently that whatever this project might gain for us is despicably little, while what it will destroy is inestimably great. Even more important, though, is his other great theme, the integrity and well-being of the Gwich'in people, and the preservation of their culture. Since the Pleistocene they have been the people of the caribou. So dependent are they on the hunt of the caribou for everything important in their lives, that it seems true to agree that they and the caribou are one. Already as a result of global warming, the caribou population is under great stress. The intrusion of Dick Cheney's friends into the breeding ground in ANWR seems likely to make the caribou's persistence in this region highly doubtful. And if the caribou disappear, so does the ancient love and life of the Gwich'in. It is terrificly inspiring to read Bass's words on all the Gwich'in are doing to defend themselves, the caribou and the land, at home in Alaska, in Washington, and around the world. This story is not over; and it touches every one of us.

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