Yami: The Autobiography

Book Description

This is Yami Lester's story from stockman to stirrer. His is a unique life of challenge, change and humor. From his experiences in the remote Central Australian outback to bomb tests at Maralinga and the Royal Commission in London, Yami's memories are about the making of modern Australian history.

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Yami: The Autobiography of Yami Lester
Yami Lester
Manufacturer: Iad Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Australian | Ethnic & National | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

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New Zealand | Australia & Oceania | History | Subjects | Books

Book Description

NASCAR's hottest young stars are featured in this collection of magazine articles from Circle Track magazine. Driver articles include: - Jimmie Johnson, 2002 rookie and the hottest young driver in NASCAR right now - Kevin Harvick, the Dale Earnhardt Sr. protege - Ryan Newman, another fast 2002 rookie - Matt Kenseth, 2000 Rookie of the Year - Kurt Busch, 2000 runner-up for Rookie of the Year

Book Description

A Critical Cinema 3 continues Scott MacDonald's compilation of personal interviews and public discussions with major contributors to independent filmmaking and film awareness. An informative exchange with Amos Vogel, whose Cinema 16 Society drew American filmgoers into a broader sense of film history, is followed by interviews reflecting a wide range of approaches to filmmaking. Sally Potter discusses her popular feature, Orlando, in relation to the experimental work that preceded it, and Canadian independent John Porter argues compellingly for small-gauge, Super-8mm filmmaking. Ken Jacobs discusses the "Nervous System" apparatus with which he transforms old film footage into new forms of motion picture art; Jordan Belson describes his Vortex Concerts, ancestors of modern laser light shows; and Elias Merhige talks about going beneath the "rational structure of meaning" in Begotten.
A Critical Cinema 3 presents independent cinema as an international and multiethnic phenomenon. MacDonald interviews filmmakers from Sweden, France, Italy, Austria, Armenia, India, the Philippines, and Japan and examines the work of African Americans, European Americans, Asian Americans, and Hispanics. He provides an introductory overview of each interviewee, as well as detailed film/videographies and selected bibliographies. With its predecessors, A Critical Cinema (California, 1988) and A Critical Cinema 2 (California, 1992), this is the most extensive, in-depth exploration of independent cinema available in English.

Customer Reviews:

An essential view on Independent Filmmakers from thall World.......1998-11-10

(Please excuse my bad English: I'm a normally French Writer) As Historian writing a thesis about the Historical meaning of several peoples in the all World, I was very excited by the reading of interviews and documents concerning so much essential filmmakers from US, from EUROPE, from Asia, etc... It's very important for a searcher on movies historical interpretation to find so powerfull texts about directors and other filmmakers - out of the Studio era and influence. I will write more after having read the entire book I received by mail just today. But I confirm just now it's a capital contribution for my future University Thesis. I'm shure You will find here a basical documents anthology. Please tell me what You will think about. Claude-René DE WINTER Belgian Historian

Customer Reviews:

Book that takes you to the heart of the 50s "Beat" scene........1998-03-24

This is a wonderful book filled with images of the beat coffeehouse hangouts in Greenwich village circa 50s and 60s. It is great to actually be able to view a photo of a poetry reading as it took place in one of these bohemian haunts. We are lucky that the author had the foresight to take photos in the smoke-filled coffeehouses and beat pads. I have a coffeehouse and the book is a great reference to utilize when trying to recapture the spirit and styling of the 50s coffeehouse.

"Beat Generation" worthy addition to any Beat collection.......1996-12-31

McDarrah's photograpic work evokes what it must have been like to frequent the bohemian scene of the late '50s and early '60's. Anyone who is greatly interested in the literature of this genre, but too young to have actual remembrances of this era, will find this work fascinating. Many of the photos have never been published before, and thus are a refreshing change from the standard photos of Kerouac, Ginsberg, and crew that have been served up so many times elsewhere. McDarrah, who I believe worked for the Village Voice at that time, has done a fine job in selecting the photos in this collection. My favorites are one of Diane DiPrima, perched on a piano reciting her poetry, and Herbert Huncke visiting Allen Ginsberg and attempting to fix the latter's broken TV. I also enjoyed the many pics of other accomplished, but lesser known figures of the era, and the establishments they frequented, such as the Cedars Bar & Grill

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The New Music 1900-1960
Aaron Copland
Manufacturer: Reprint Services Corp
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Music | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0685148483

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The New Music 1900-1960 Revised
Copland
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company Inc
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000JC9EOW

The New Music 1900-1960 Revised and Enlarged Edition

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The New Music 1900-1960 Revised and Enlarged Edition

Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000FP8RCS

Tthe New Music 1900-1960: Revised and Enlarged Edition

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Tthe New Music 1900-1960: Revised and Enlarged Edition
Aaron Copland
Manufacturer: NORTON
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000H53NLQ

The Modern Age, 1890-1960 (New Oxford History of Music, V. 10)

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The Modern Age, 1890-1960 (New Oxford History of Music, V. 10)

Manufacturer: Oxford Univ Pr (Sd)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Music | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
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The New Oxford History of Music: Volume I: Ancient and Oriental Music (New Oxford History of Music, Vol.1)

ASIN: 0198164572

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THE NEW MUSIC
Aaron Copland
Manufacturer: Norton
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000RWAAWO

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The New Music 1900 1960
Copland
Manufacturer: W W Norton & Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: 0356024970

The New Music: 1900-1960: Revised And Enlarged

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The New Music: 1900-1960: Revised And Enlarged
Aaron Copland
Manufacturer: W.W. Norton & Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000PRX8RK

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Fantastic Book!

If you need to correct your credit, buy this book.

Pull The Curtain Back on The Credit Game!

Buy the best, Forget the rest

What everyone with less than perfect credit should know..

BestCredit: How to Win the Credit Game
Dana Neal
Manufacturer: Paladin Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Popular Economics | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
Credit Ratings & Repair | Personal Finance | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
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Look Inside Business Books | Trip | Specialty Stores | Books
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Your Credit Score: How to Fix, Improve, and Protect the 3-Digit Number that Shapes Your Financial Future (2nd Edition) (Liz Pulliam Weston)

The Insider's Guide to Credit Repair

Talk Your Way Out of Credit Card Debt!: Phone Calls to Banks That Saved More Than $43,000 in Interest Charges and Fees

7 Steps To A 720 Credit Score

The Complete Credit Repair Kit (+CD-ROM) (Complete Credit Repair Kit)

ASIN: 1581605013

Book Description

Dana Neal knows first hand the consequences of bad credit - how a financial setback can leave you unable to buy a house or car, rent an apartment, get insurance or even land a job. But the former collection agency insider also knows that flawless credit is in everyone's reach. In easy-to-understand terms, the author explains how the credit game is played, the roles of the various players, and the ways in which the credit industry stacks the odds against consumers He then presents a straightforward, no-nonsense plan to show you how to win the credit game by getting others to play by your rules!

Customer Reviews:

Fantastic Book!.......2007-09-17

I have read several books dealing with the subject of credit, credit scoring, and credit repair, and I believe BestCredit by Dana Neal to be the most informative book on the subject that I have ever read. The book is ideal for anyone who wishes to know more about the subject of credit. The information will be helpful regardless of whether you have excellent credit or not. If you have average or below average credit scores, this book may be very helpful in providing you with practical advice on how to improve your credit scores. For others who may have unsatisfied financial obligations, the book offers advice on how you might negotiate less than 100% payment of a balance. Additionally, a provision for neutral or even positive reporting of the adverse account may be negotiable with a creditor or collection agency. The techniques may be particularly useful for those who have not yet negotiated and agreed upon a settlement.

If you need to correct your credit, buy this book........2007-09-10

I was amazed to learn how the Credit Reporting Agencies work, and Dana gives you the lowdown on how they go about the business of giving YOU the business. If there is any time to be an educated consumer who has credit problems, it`s now. Dana Neal has written a very understandable, easy to read "manual" on fixing credit reporting mistakes, and how to make the rules work for you. I can`t recommend this book enough, a "must buy" for the "do-it-yourselfer".

Pull The Curtain Back on The Credit Game!.......2007-08-22

As a mortgage broker specializing in helping clients with banged up credit, this book clarified much of what we've learned the hard way, much of what we've suspected, and added volumes to our knowledge base. Simply put, Dana knows the game and spells out the rules consumers need to know to level the playing field. I purchased copies of this book for every loan officer in my office. After acquiring and reading 6 different authors on the subject, I found I could have saved a lot of time and money if I had read BestCredit first. Dana knows his stuff, and is in a class of his own when it comes to mastering the credit game. BestCredit is THE BEST!

Buy the best, Forget the rest.......2007-08-21

I've read a couple of the credit repair guides out there, but none come close to the level of detail and research which Dana Neal exposes in his book. His methods are tried and true and garnered from experience gained through repairing his own credit and working in the collection industry. This is a self-help book that has a plan you can follow. Get your hilighters, file folders, and credit reports ready for a battle with the corporate dead-heads that are trying to keep you paying high interest rates for the rest of your life!

What everyone with less than perfect credit should know.........2007-08-15

I am like many people who have bad credit. After finally realizing I needed to do something to help myself, I found this book. Its not at your normal booksellers (Barnes and Noble & Borders didn't have it), so BUY IT ON AMAZON!! The book is VERY detailed and gives you a step-by-step way to correct your credit--for good! Not just the easy way out, but real ways to understand reading your report (Dana trains you to find the mistakes), credit scoring, sample dispute letters, identity theft, and actual suggestions to negotiate and how to help yourself! There is even a chapter on legal issues surrounding questionable practices regarding FCRA, Do yourself a favor...BUY this book, and check out the website. Its worth the money spent. The author is very organized, and very helpful. He even answered my questions, PERSONALLY! It's the best money you can spend on yourself!

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Genuine

Fine book

beautiful, honest -- the real deal

A Shepherd's Watch: Through the Seasons with One Man and His Dogs
David Kennard
Manufacturer: Thomas Dunne Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books
General | Animals | Biological Sciences | Science | Subjects | Books
Reference | Outdoors & Nature | Subjects | Books
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The Dogs of Windcutter Down: One Shepherd's Struggle for Survival

The Dogs of Windcutter Down

A Useful Dog

Trafficking in Sheep: A Memoir: From Off-Broadway, New York, to Blue Island, Nova Scotia

Eminent Dogs, Dangerous Men: Searching through Scotland for a Border Collie

ASIN: 0312332661
Release Date: 2005-11-29

Book Description

At Borough Farm, on North Devon’s rugged, spectacular coast, David Kennard and his dogs are embarking on a new shepherding year.

Part diary of one man and his remarkable dogs, part Herriot-like homage to the countryside and its characters, A Shepherd’s Watch is that rare thing: a portrait of a real life that is at once authentic and evocative, warm, and compelling. Here, David Kennard presents twelve months with his working sheepdogs, Greg, Swift, Gail, Fern, and Ernie, as they face a never-ending series of challenges: from rescuing ewes stranded on the Atlantic cliffs to running the gauntlet of psychopathic rams and officious farm inspectors, from spring lambing and summertime shearing to fending off the ever-present threats nature has in store for the 850-strong flock. All this, in the midst of a harsh economic climate for farming and a landscape that is among the most picturesque, yet wildly unpredictable, in the British Isles.

David Kennard has been a shepherd since he left school at the age of seventeen. In this, his first book, he draws on half a lifetime’s experience to paint an honest and affectionate, often comic picture of a year in the life of a sheep farm and its very different canine and human personalities. As he follows the changing seasons, observing nature’s inexorable journey through the dark days of winter to the rebirth and renewal of spring, he also offers a gentle meditation on man’s relationship with his environment, and a poignant elegy to a rural way of life.

Customer Reviews:

Genuine.......2007-02-13

A totally wonderful book. Beautifully written and authentic. Don't miss this one!

Fine book.......2007-01-19

This is the best book of this kind I've read since James Herriot. In a way David Kennard is more powerful because instead of serving the farmer he is one and has to survive on what he can do as a farmer. He has a deep appreciation of the land and the environment around him coupled with a strong sense of history. His writing is excellent, the pace good and the stories wonderful. It is wrapped in a package of an eventful year in the life of his farm. If you enjoy reading about nature, man and his interaction with animals, you'll enjoy this book.

beautiful, honest -- the real deal.......2007-01-11

David Kennard keeps more than 800 ewes who produce some 1,200 lambs each year on his scenic, windswept farm on the North Devon coast. This is the story of a year in the life of his flock, his farm, his young family, and the five border collies he trains and relies on in his work. Given his background, it's no surprise that he knows sheep and shepherding through and through, and this knowledge, together with his understanding and love of his dogs, radiates throughout the book. In addition, he is a keen observer of nature, and writes with remarkable beauty, grace and humor. Anyone who is drawn to the age-old, elemental life of a shepherd -- a vanishing way of life of simplicity, hardship and profound satisfaction -- is sure to love this book.

A Shepherd's Watch: Through the Seasons With One Man and His Dogs

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A Shepherd's Watch: Through the Seasons With One Man and His Dogs
David Kennard
Manufacturer: Thomas Dunne Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OTIM9I

Book Description

Readers of the bestselling novel, "The Killer Angels," or viewers of Ted Turner's movie "Gettysburg" and PBS's "The Civil War" have become familiar with Chamberlain and Alexander, two men who made their mark on history. This dual biography of the two officers-one Union and one Confederate-describes a number of Civil War battles, from Bull Run to Appomattox. The climax of each man's career, just as in the war itself, however, came at Gettysburg, where Chamberlain held Little Round Top and Alexander, commanding Lee's artillery, desperately tried to pave the way for Pickett's charge. Fast-paced, full of the feel and texture of battle, this book is also very much a personal story of the two men. Maine's Chamberlain was a 19th-century archetype: a romantic fighting the first of the world's modern wars while straining to interpret the carnage through the idiom of the knightly joust. Alexander, of the Georgia planter class, viewed war with a clear, cold eye, casting a long glance forward to our own more technical century. Their lives subsequent to the war are emblematic of the American society that emerged from the cathartic conflict between North and South. The original hardcover was published without illustrations or maps. These have been added for the new paperback edition.

Customer Reviews:

The NOT-EXACTLY Parallel Lives of Chamberlain and Alexander.......2000-11-06

Michael Golay is a master story-teller. Thus he instantly enthralls his audience by inter-weaving the lives of one of America's greatest heroes: Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, and an American traitor: Edward Porter Alexander, into one, seamless story. Golay takes dry, dead history and makes it live, so that the seemingly formidable task of reading 345 pages passes quickly and enjoyably.

This is a great book to read if you are looking for a little fun, or if you wish to share information with a friend or family member unfamiliar with the details of America's 19th century, intramural tragedy.

However, a double biography is an artificial construct, at best. Golay's choice to tie together the lives of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain and Edward Porter Alexander emphasizes just how artificial that structure can be.

Chamberlain was a genuine American hero: a civilian academic, past the age when he would have been expected to serve, he rushed to his country's defense at the beginning of the Civil War. Serving brilliantly, at great personal cost, Chamberlain is creditted by many with turning the Battle of Gettysburg, contributing significantly during the Battle of Five Forks, and beginning the process of national healing with his chivalrous gesture at the Surrender Triangle of Appomattox Court House.

Alexander, on the other hand, was a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point, and a regular Army officer. Like all regular Army officers, he had sworn "to protect and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic." In order to participate in the insurrection, he violated his sacred oath: he lied. The nation expected better of the man, and should have had its expectations fulfilled.

In an age when values are, again, viewed as important, we must clearly state that, ultimately, despite the shared battles, hardships, and adventures, the lives of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain and Edward Porter Alexander were not parallel. Chamberlain's life is to be emulated, and Alexander's rejected.

This book works. It is simply flawed by its structure.

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To Gettysburg and Beyond: The Parallel Lives of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain and Edward Porter Alexander
Michael Golay
Manufacturer: Crown
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000OK9FO8

Book Description

Did the United States "win" the Cold War? In its self-congratulatory euphoria, argues Thomas McCormick in this new edition of his highly acclaimed study, America neglected a twenty-year process of political and economic devolution--the real threat to global peace and prosperity. Revised andupdated through 1993, it describes how the end of the Cold War affected the United States's global role as well as suggesting what possibilities lie ahead for a restructured world-system.

Customer Reviews:

Not for the closed-minded.......2006-01-05

This is a well-research, well-argued and still-relevant book. As other reviewers have noted, the author adopts an explicit neo-Marxist (or World-systems) perspective. Based on this, two reviewers have summarily dismissed the author's argument as "clap trap" or "mumbo-jumbo." Yet, not surprisingly, they offer nothing of substance to support their views. They do not show exactly how and why the author's position is wrong. It's an ad hominem attack par exellence. The author, by contrast, provides plenty of support, backed by a coherent framework of analysis. Not everyone will agree, of course, but that is the nature of the academic enterprise. Still, it is undeniable that economic interests--and specifically, the interests of the most powerful economic actors--underlie much of what the United States has done in the world. The "domino theory" provides a perfect example. Consider what President Eisenhower had to say on this subject (in 1954):

"You have a row of dominoes set up, you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is the certainty that it will go over very quickly. So you could have a beginning of a disintegration that would have the most profound influences.

Now, with respect to the first one, two of the items from this particular area that the world uses are tin and tungsten. They are very important. There are others, of course, the rubber plantations and so on. Then with respect to more people passing under this domination, Asia, after all, has already lost some 450 million of its peoples to the Communist dictatorship, and we simply can't afford greater losses.

But when we come to the possible sequence of events, the loss of Indochina, of Burma, of Thailand, of the Peninsula, and Indonesia following, now you begin to talk about areas that not only multiply the disadvantages that you would suffer through loss of materials, sources of materials, but now you are talking really about millions and millions and millions of people.

Finally, the geographical position achieved thereby does many things. It turns the so-called island defensive chain of Japan, Formosa, of the Philippines and to the southward; it moves in to threaten Australia and New Zealand.

It takes away, in its economic aspects, that region that Japan must have as a trading area or Japan, in turn, will have only one place in the world to go-that is, toward the Communist areas in order to live. So, the possible consequences of the loss are just incalculable to the free world."

Needless to say, the domino theory informed American foreign policy in a profound way during the entire cold war. And it is clear from the quote above that American political leaders framed the domino principle in primarily economic terms. In the most simple sense, this is one of the key points that McCormick makes in his book.

Any reader with an open mind, any reader who wants to achieve a better, more comprehensive understanding of US foreign policy, therefore, will have something to learn from this book. And, again, even if you don't buy the entire argument, this does not mean that it is clap trap or mumbo jumbo.

Wallerstein is just the framework... well fleshed out histor.......2004-10-15

As noted by other reviewers, this book is framed around a Wallersteinian model of core and periphery. However, that is no reason to deride its excellent content. I have read numereous other great volumes on American Foreign Policy (it was my undergraduate specialization); however, this book does a nice job of putting together the intricacies of America's forey into a bigger world.

The only criticsm I can offer is that it is a sweeping look at 50 years of colorful history, and thus leaves ot some details important to serious scholars of USFP. However, if you are unknowledgeable about the subject and want to know how the current war in Iraq fits into the US overarching scheme for a liberal capitalist world give this book a spin. I couldn't put it down.

More ideology than history.......2002-11-15

The author makes use of ideologically motivated platitudes throughout the book, such as "it was never the destruction of Nazi Germany per se that was the American war aim; it was the prevention of any one power from dominating Europe and limiting American access to it." (p. 37) The thousands of Americans who gave their lives in WWII would probably beg to differ. A bunch of neo-Marxist Wallersteinian mumbo-jumbo. Its a shame so many impressionable minds are forced by their professors to read this junk.

Outstanding, provocative overview of US foreign policy.......1999-11-06

This is one of the best books available tracing the political and economic history of U.S. foreign policy since the end of World War II. I use it on a regular basis in my American Foreign Policy course and students enjoy McCormick's clarity and provocative insights,as he does a masterful job in linking economic and political power in the shaping of U.S. foreign policy.

Marxist Clap-trap.......1999-10-25

This book is nothing but often-discounted left-wing theories. I have to read it for an International Relations course; don't read it unless you have to.

America's Half-Century: United States Foreign Policy in the Cold War and After (The American Moment)

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An Honest History of US Foreign Relations

America's Half-Century: United States Foreign Policy in the Cold War and After (The American Moment)
Thomas J. McCormick
Manufacturer: The Johns Hopkins University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

ASIN: 0801838762

Customer Reviews:

An Honest History of US Foreign Relations.......2001-04-14

Readers not fully abreast of contemporary debates in the study of U.S. history may be somewhat shocked by the central theme of Thomas J. McCormick's America's Half-Century. According to McCormick the Cold War was not something foisted on a reluctant American leadership by Soviet belligerence and intransigence. Rather, the Cold War was itself part of a larger "hegemonic project" -- a projection of U.S. power whose goals were nothing short of world domination. Most of the great and terrible milestones of Cold War history find their origin, McCormick tells us, in the logic of this U.S. pursuit of world hegemony or in the reactions of other peoples to that hegemonic quest.

To be sure, America's foreign policy elite did not so baldly think or speak in terms of world domination. Their self-described goals were peace and prosperity, but peace and prosperity achieved through the economic integration of the greater part of the world on the terms and in the manner that U.S. policy-makers prescribed. Third World nations, in particular, resisted this economic integration. Their role, as McCormick outlines it, was to be the same as the role they had played in the old colonial division of labor -- suppliers of food, fuel and raw materials for the capitalist core nations.

"Hewers of wood, carriers of water," this role assigned Third World nations was an indispensable underpinning to the U.S.- designed system as a whole. Especially in the early post-war years, Europe's and Japan's ability to sustain trade relations with the U.S. was dependent upon their ability to access the resources and markets of Third World nations. Shut off access to those resources and markets and Europe and Japan -- the US's main trading partners -- would fall; if Europe and Japan fell, capitalism could not be sustained in the U.S. This, McCormick tells us, was how U.S. policy makers understood the three-way relation between the U.S., Europe and Japan, and the Third World. An original draft to the Truman Doctrine speech put it boldly: "If, by default, we permit free enterprise to disappear in other countries of the world, the very existence of democracy will be gravely threatened." Hence, as McCormick describes it, the critical role of Third World nations in sustaining the European and Japanese economies.

Consequently, what drove U.S. policy in relation to Vietnam, for example, was not fear of communism, but fear of nationalist revolution in South East Asia. South East Asia -- Indochina, Indonesia, the Philippines, the Malay Peninsula, all in varying degrees of upheaval following the Second World War -- were to be Japan's principal market and source of raw materials in the U.S. designed world order. Both Secretaries of State Acheson and Dulles, McCormick tells us, rejected as irrelevant discussions of whether Ho Chi Minh was an "Asian Tito," or a Russian or Chinese dupe. The whole thrust of Ho's program "was to withdraw his nation ... from the [U.S.-designed] world-system and its international division of labor." The problem, in short, was not communism, but Vietnam's rejection of the colonial division of labor. This was unacceptable and the U.S., during Truman's administration, took its first steps towards disaster in Vietnam.

The decision around Fidel Castro and Cuba's revolution was made on a similar basis. McCormick rightly waves aside a popular discussion of whether Fidel was always a Marxist-Leninist or whether U.S. actions drove him to communism. What was important, according to McCormick, was that Castro and his July 26 Movement were determined to carry out a real land reform in Cuba, diversify Cuba's economy and alter Cuba's economic dependence on the United States. In short, "the Cuban enterprise flew in the face of American prescriptions for the proper place of the periphery in the world order." Under any conditions this would have been unacceptable to the United States, but Cuba's challenge to the U.S.-ordered world was enhanced by Cuba's proximity to the U.S. How would other Third World nations perceive a "world policeman" incapable of dealing with "crime" on his "own block"? It was this challenge that accounts for the Bay of Pigs and the October Missile Crisis, and, I would add, the U.S.'s ongoing hostility towards Cuba.

McCormick's book is a serious book. Unlike many authors who shy away from hard conclusions concerning US foreign policy or who make fetishes of the personal foibles of this or that president, McCormick highlights those policies that have remained remarkably constant through the administrations of ten presidents and fifty years time. He dissects those policies, discerns their principles and underlying logic and courageously argues an unpopular viewpoint. On this count alone, and in these times in particular, such books deserve a wide audience.

For all this, however, America's Half-Century is not a great book. To have been a great book, McCormick needed to have put far more of himself into it. While, for example, from the standpoint of U.S. policy makers, the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was imminently logical as a mechanism for intimidating the Soviet Union and impressing Europe, McCormick in his presentation, needed to have gone beyond the mere logical elaboration of U.S. motives. A great book would have given us the human consequences of this history: the horror on the ground for countless human beings -- men, women, children in their paper-walled schoolhouses -- incinerated, unbearably burnt and poisoned, not out of any military necessity but in order to send a message to the rest of the world; and more still, McCormick would have exposed the darkness in the hearts of the cynical men who ordered the atomic bombings. The history of the last fifty years, in short, and the responsibility that this nation bears for that history, is deeply tragic. And such tragic history, to be understood, needs to be felt. Unfortunately, McCormick does not make the effort required for this.

Nonetheless, America's Half-Century is a good book, an honest book, a book that can serve as stimulus to greater study and self-reflection. Such books are rare.

Average customer rating:

an interesting read with a slightly "pop" tone

Powerful treatment of fisheries management failure

Right on the Nail

Well researched. Harris pulls no punches.

Lament for an Ocean: The Collapse of the Atlantic Cod Fishery
Michael Harris
Manufacturer: McClelland & Stewart
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Production & Operations | Management & Leadership | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
Fish & Sharks | Animals | Biological Sciences | Science | Subjects | Books
General | Natural Resources | Nature & Ecology | Science | Subjects | Books
Reference | Outdoors & Nature | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

When Smoke Ran Like Water: Tales of Environmental Deception and the Battle Against Pollution

The Uses of Ecology: Lake Washington and Beyond (Jessie and John Danz Lectures)

ASIN: 0771039581
Release Date: 1998-04-11

Book Description

The northern cod have been almost wiped out. Once the most plentiful fish on the Grand Banks off the coast of Newfoundland, the cod is now on the brink of extinction, and tens of thousands of people in Atlantic Canada have been left without work by a 1992 moratorium on fishing the stock. Today, the Pacific salmon stocks are in similar trouble – victims of the same blind, stupid greed.

Angry, accusatory fingers have been pointed at various possible culprits for the collapse of the cod – at the Spanish and Portuguese, who for hundreds of years sent ever-bigger fleets to the Grand Banks; at the factory-freezer trawlers, which “vacuumed” the ocean floor for the prized fish; at those inshore fishermen who circumvented the rules governing the fishery; at the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans, which is responsible for managing the fishery; at the harp seal, the cod’s competitor for food, whose numbers have exploded in recent years; even at Nature, for lowering the temperature of the ocean.

In Lament for an Ocean, the award-winning true-crime writer Michael Harris investigates the real causes of the most wanton destruction of a natural resource in North American history since the buffalo were wiped off the face of the prairies. The story he carefully unfolds is the sorry tale of how, despite the repeated and urgent warnings of ocean scientists, the northern cod was ruthlessly exploited.

Customer Reviews:

an interesting read with a slightly "pop" tone.......2000-10-02

This is certainly a book to make one wonder at the relationship between scientists, politicians, and government administrators. Harris presents the story with a (to this Southerner) refreshing Canadian focus, and he reminds us of both the difficulties and the advantages that the Confederation faces in managing natural resources. My only quibble is with the author's periodic descent into hyperbole & the somewhat sloppy repetition of phrases and analogies -occasionally within the same paragraph. The horrifying facts of the case speak eloquently for themselves and don't really need a journalistic "push" to raise the reader's ire. Apart from that this book would be a good read for anyone concerned with natural resource exploitation and the complexities of international envirnmental policies.

Powerful treatment of fisheries management failure.......1999-04-12

This book held my interest throughout and carefully depicts the events that led to one of the biggest failures of fisheries management ever. The book shows how failure to protect the biological resource resulted in tremendous economic and social loss in eastern Canada. While the book is somewhat repetitious, it should be of interest to those involved in fisheries management and those who care about protecting the resources of our oceans. The chapter on the Alaska-Canada salmon wars would be disputed by many Alaskan scientists, but the analogy that people forgot about the fish still rings true.

Right on the Nail.......1999-01-21

I found Lament of an Ocean to be a wonderfully informative read. I approached the book out of necessity for a project, and was overjoyed by it's clarity, depth of detail and clever presentation on the Fishery crisis in the North Atlantic. I feel Harris's book brought me up to speed (and beyond) on the subject, in a manner that I found to be pleasantly unbiased.

Well researched. Harris pulls no punches........1998-10-13

As befits a man whose books have caused four royal commissions of inquiry,Michael Harris has chronicled the rise and fall of the Alantic Cod fishery with painstaking,sometimes painful, accuracy. There are no hero's here, only different degrees of guilty politicians, fishermen, and Department of Fisheries officials. The facts are laid out plainly, in order of appearance, and the readers draw their own conclusions with no editorializing or urging from the author. This is an informative book rather than an entertaining one, and will be the defining work on the subject.

Lament for an Ocean: The Collapse of the Atlantic Cod Fishery A True Crime Story

Average customer rating:

Lament for an Ocean: The Collapse of the Atlantic Cod Fishery A True Crime Story

Manufacturer: McClelland & Stewart Ltd
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000HIIMAA

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