5 comments about Gonzo: The Life of Hunter S. Thompson.

1. I picked this book up without reading much about it, and without reading what Anita Thompson had to say (wow). Yes...this is another book about Hunter S. Thompson, one of many to be released since his death, and one in a longer line to come. The Jann Wenner connection made it sound 'juicy' from the get-go.
   
   Overall, having read most of the book (you don't have to go front-to-back since it breaks up the life and career of HST into succinct chapters of quotes), I don't get the real feeling it's a hatchet job through and through. Sure, Wenner and HST, after a glorious beginning, had problems, with Wenner trying everything he could to lure the writer back to Rolling Stone. But I found a lot of love and affection for HST coming from most, if not all, of those interviewed. Yes, Wenner is making another buck off HST, and will likely continue to pen something on the man here and there, or at least contribute forwards for years to come. But this is about perspective, and this summary of the writer's life is no more 'definitive' than any other.
   
   The book is divided into periods---'Hell's Angels' or 'Fear and Loathing--Vegas' or 'Height of Gonzo' or whatever. The book is a collection of quotes from many people in the writer's life, including Wenner, of course, as well as neighbors, editors, other celebrities, his family, etc. Each chapter jumps from person to person and they provide a detail, a memory, a thought, etc, like a documentary, going from talking head to talking head with flashbacks and postcards. Yes, Wenner is the biggest talking head, but he has much to say (even if yes, some of it is hatchet work to put Hunter's legend in perspective). After all, following the successful adventures under the Rolling Stone flag, the Gonzo mania drove Hunter away from his earlier dreams of being a serious figure and into a 'role' for the rest of his life and career.
   
   The book flows very well from thought to thought, and it goes way back, and way to the end. Especially insightful are the final two chapters, discussing the last few years of HST's life. While I think short-shrift is made of his later work---the ESPN writing and his collections and interviews---it does provide key insight into his last few years of physical decline. Though his seemingly mind was still sharp (despite the Herculean chemical intake), his body was giving out on him and the resulting pain became too much to bear. These details, though obviously very personal and painful, do provide some welcome context and gravity to the author's suicide in early 2005.
   
   Still recommending it for HST fans. Okay, it doesn't carry the seal of approval of everyone who ever knew him, but it's still people talking about Hunter, and providing some new insight, and should be read skeptically and with other bios and material on the legendary writer. Despite the criticism, it does not come off as a hateful Wenner screed that some have made it out to be. After all, why would Wenner want to totally destroy the man? He's still selling his books...



2. Some reviewers here seem to take exception to Jann Wenner's comments in this oral biography of Gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson. Having been a fan of Hunter for years, I didn't find anything insulting or derogatory in what Wenner had to say. Let's be honest here, someone as wild as Hunter is bound to ruffle a few feathers along the way.
   
   I thought GONZO presented a well-rounded picture of a talented artist who eventually became prisoner to his public persona. Somewhere along the way, the focus shifted off Thompson's writing and came to bare on his chemical-fueled lifestyle. It seems clear reading this that Thompson came to somewhat regret his public image, wishing instead to be known for his writing and not his diet of alcohol and narcotics. It makes for a tragic story and an interesting read. That is, of course, if you're interested in Thompson the man and not Thomopson the public image.



3. For anybody who's read through H.S.T's entire library, for anybody looking for another part of the story, for anybody looking to add to their accumulated knowledge of Dr Gonzo...this book is for you...It's a great, extremely accessible book.
   
   The only people that should stay away from this title are those that are so uptight & tightly wound, that are so concerned with preserving a myth rather than telling a story, that would rather read (or release or publish or allow) the same monotonous versions of the same rehashed stories time & time & time again...
   
   (...monotonous is probably an exaggeration, especially in HST's case...)
   
   I don't understand all this great decrying of this book based on the fact that HST's wife "disapproved".
   
   Who cares?
   
   There's many stories here from the people that knew Hunter Thompson best, & they each have the right to see & tell things as individually as the man they're busy describing....
   
   When they each & all come out & say they were conned & baited & paid off, I'll change my humble opinion.....
   
   Until then, I'll continue reading & laughing & cursing & waiting for releases of the next couple Hunter books to be allowed...or at the very least, morally approved of....



4. Hunter Thompson writes to Jann S. Wenner (Rolling Stone editor in chief and mentor), "...just how hot can you stand it, brother, before your love will crack?" I asked myself the same thing about Wenner as I was sucked into this spellbinding and powerfully edited first person(s) account of the life of HST. I was amazed at the endurance and patience of JSW, and was thankful that that the hand-held nurturing, in part, resulted in the brilliant literary output of Thompson. Having been a 150 countries as a private detective and video producer, I thought I had a pretty exciting life. But my knees were shaking reading about the insane adventures of HST and his inner circle. Highly recommended.



5. I finished the book and am only doing a review in response to all the criticism of Wenner. It seems to me the book is fair. Guess what--Thompson's writing skills did decline and he did suffer the consequences of his excesses, emotional, physical, and pharmaceutical. Thompson himself seems to have agreed. Lay off Wenner he deserves credit for an unblinking and insightful book.

5 comments about The Rage and The Pride.

1. 9/11/01,a sore point among many in America and in the world.An unspeakable tragedy,a waste of life,and for what?The modern day eqivalent of Pearl Harbor will be remembered as Roosevelt said then as,"a day that will live in infamy".If you live in New York as I do, witnessed it as I did,chances are you know someone who lost someone that day.My heart goes out to them.But that seems a shallow tribute to those who must go on without loved ones lost that day.Not because of a plan to injure Americans but because of the stupid,ignorant,malcontents that ascribe to radical Islam.A pox on the world,an agenda pushed foward by the Saudis'(our friends),paid for by the petro dollars we give them so we can drive our 8 cylinder monster mobiles.They should be ashamed,they should be dealt with severely.Orianna Falacci has taken that very anger and has written a scathing report, more of an open letter to the world venting her anger most vehemently at the source of this ridiculous waste of life.She is Italian and her love of both America and her native Italy is apparent.She yells and screams at you and in many respects she is right and not afraid to speak her mind which is mostly negative toward the Middle Eastern issue both on a personal and global level.It is at times jumpy and does veer a bit.Her discussion of Italian history shows how it too has fallen under the political auspices stemming from the fear of Islam,the unchecked immigration and the slow deterioration of and destruction of some of the most beloved places as Islamic influx and the power to intimidate now shapes the landscape.Because of the need to ass kiss the imams to maintain peace,sunny Italy has become a muslim stronghold and may one day be renamed Italistan,don't laugh,just watch.Falacci has seen alot of violence and wars,practically grew up on it and her writings send a strong message that she is one who can cut through the crap and deliver ideas,ideas that have made her enemies,and is not afraid to say it despite the outcome.Her ability to write what others think in private but would never admit to publicly,not to rant but to have something to back up your assertions is to be admired in any writer.As Christopher Caldwell wrote in his 'Reflections on the Revolution in Europe' as he charted the muslim movement over time and how because of this, the balance of power is changing rapidly in much of the countries we refer to as European nations.Fallaci is right in her emotive reaction to 9/11 and the European demise.It is too bad she is now dead and her pen is silenced.All survivors of that day should read her,Italian Americans should,patriots should just to realize that the whole world is not against us,we have true friends out there despite what the news tells you. She makes her disdain for the Middle Eastern culture and the individuals who engage in it both men and women quite clear.They value the lands of their forefathers,the desert sands, they can have it,lock, stock and barrel.Stay there, we won't bother you.This book will fuel the fire in your heart.It is time to stop forgiving the bastards, as Falacci would say, and start showing them who they should not be messing with.That they should think twice and twice again if they want to come at us again.Falacci's anger should be the anger that keeps us alert.America must not forget nor should she forgive.'The Rage and the Pride' will help you keep the flame of liberty alive.Thomas Paine would be proud of her.



2. This book seemed like a great idea when I bought it in a moment of $@#. I spent some time reading it and it provided a point of view of the author and thats about it. My review for this book are that if you are looking for this particular subject area, then there are books available which would give you better kick.



3. Bikinis vs. burkahs, bell-towers over minarets: secular humanism vs. retrograde bigotry. Dividing foolish tolerance of intolerance from righteous defence of human rights, Fallaci's attack on Islamic fascism and Muslim extremism post-9/11 reads passionately if inevitably unevenly in her translation from Italian. Her famous journalistic career that brought her into Vietnam, 1968 Mexico, to Arafat and the Dalai Lama, among despots and dictators provides her backdrop for her disgust with how the West capitulates to the "Reverse Crusade." I liked its content; her presentation remained erratic.
   
   She explains in an extended preface how this article expanded into this short book, why she chose to render it into her idiosyncratic English, and how it relates to her adopted American audience. She errs in assuming Yanks put their hands over their heart for "God Bless America" (it's not our national anthem), and her usage does have its antiquated touches: "Read History and you'll see that behind every event of Good and Evil there is a piece of writing, A book, an article, a manifesto, a poem, a song." (23) Still, I can "hear" her in her rhetorical flourishes on the page, as if her own quirky, ineradicable "accent."
   
   The book follows the pattern of Bernard-Henry Lévy's later (2008; also reviewed by me on Amazon US) "Left in Dark Times." Taking the Italian (as he chides the French) surrender in the name of political correctness the professoriate, the chattering classes (she calls them the "cicadas"), the media, the churches, the bureaucrats, and the politicians to task, Fallaci comes from the background of a family whose own anti-fascist, progressive, secular, and leftist values find themselves undermined by a people who refuse to apologize for their culture's destruction of intellectual and scientific and rational patrimony. Even as they insist on mosques as they colonize Western Europe, Muslims forbid churches in the Middle East. They demand unlimited immigration, importation of their customs, and municipal acceptance of their limitations on the freedom of women, of unbelievers, of dissenters.
   
   This infuriates Fallaci; Italy, she elucidates, cannot be compared to pioneer America. Her small country cannot accept so many foreign migrants determined to assert their dubious "rights" to spread drugs, prostitution, discrimination, squalor, and backwardness into the heart of civilized Europe. She has the "guts" that she finds lacking in her Florentine counterparts in office, to call out her enemies and face them heedlessly. As a woman refusing to give in to sexism, crude advances, catcalls, and second-class status, Fallaci seeks the moral high ground, in her advocacy of the universality of decency, equality, and dignity.
   
   She reminds us that the real protagonist of the war the West has taken on is not Bin Laden, or even the backward regimes that sponsor and foment terror. The "Mountain" for 1400 years remains unchanged, "which in spite of the shameful richness of its retrograde masters (kings and princes and sheiks and bankers) still lives in a scandalous poverty, still vegetates in the monstrous darkness of a religion that produces nothing but religion." (30) Illiteracy rates surpass 60% in most Muslim nations; information comes "only through the backward Imams of the cartoon-strips." (And this years before the Danish uproar.) In Kabul, beards can be shaved or grown, burkahs discarded or forced back on-- the military victories of the West, she warns, will not "solve the offensive of Islamic terrorism. On the contrary, they encourage it. They exacerbate it, they multiply it. The worst is still yet to come. Here is the bitter truth. And Truth does not necessarily stay in the middle. Sometimes it stays on one side only." (32)
   
   I was reminded of Robert Ferrigno's alternative-history novels "Tears of the Assassin" and "Sins of the Assassin" (both reviewed by me, written after Fallaci's 2001 book) about a near-future Islamic takeover of much of America: Fallaci predicts that such a movement may not be as dramatic as Ferrigno portrays, but perhaps as insidious. She wonders why Pope John Paul II apologized for the Crusades while no Muslim leaders acknowledged the depredations upon Italy of their Moorish slave trade for so many centuries that terrorized the Mediterranean. She cites (this book lacks footnotes, and often sources are not fully identified) an October '99 Vatican synod between Muslims and Christians where "an eminent Islam scholar addressed the stunned audience declaring with placid effrontery: 'By means of your democracy we shall invade you, by means of our religion we shall dominate you.'" (98)
   
   Such threats often become buried in the mainstream media by "cicadas," eager to promote a more placid view, she argues. I'm not sure if the subsequent "war on terror" can be aligned with her thesis; her book needs to be placed within the immediate aftermath to 9/11, as it appeared but twelve months after the attacks. In that context, it reads years later as an artifact of the immediate rage and the intensity that Fallaci brings to her subject. It lacks the learning of Lévy, it shares his scattered structure as both progressive journalists desperately try to talk sense into their grovelling colleagues, and it fails often to keep attention for a foreign reader unschooled in the intricacies of Italian (as in Lévy's French) political factions and cultural discourses.
   
   The second half of Fallaci's exhortation slides into long perorations against her foes. This again is intentional, as her preface indicates. I found her tone reeled about; its lack of coherence perhaps may have been minimized if it was delivered as a series of separate articles rather than compressed into a single text lacking chapters or divisions as it's given to us here. It fits, again, her own personality I suppose, and nowadays might have been blogged serially. But as a narrative, it's idiosyncratic to say the least. Her admissions to being a careful and slow writer appear to be at odds with the intensity that she admits fueled its composition.
   
   For all its awkwardness, her passion and energy may reward some readers even as its denunciations, periginations, and execrations may continue to gain her-- albeit after her death from cancer five years after this book appeared-- lots of rotten tomatoes. She bravely faces her tormenters, and while her stubborn defiance may enrage the gentler liberals, she takes a liberated stance that shows courage, however misguided in her rhetorical excess that likely goads her opponents to more hatred and more intolerance. This is the strategic risk she seems eager to encourage. It's up to you to regard this as insensitive or principled, bold or foolhardy. At least we have freedom of the press to do so, unlike many Middle Eastern polities.
   
   The Taliban's horrible demolishing of the Bamiyan Buddhas "was pronounced on the 26th of February 2001 (not 1001)." (118) The squares of Italian cities, full of medieval and Renaissance splendor, are desecrated by Somalians in tents, urinating against church walls, drowning out bells with boombox recordings of calls to prayer. The contrast of Third World squalor amidst First World patrimony she conjures up powerfully. She does not shirk the hypocrisy of the West who expects the East to do its dirty work, and she does stress too the manipulation of the desperate immigrants by both the Muslim and Western politicians. Most of all, her feminism informs her pride, as it stokes her rage, against those who dare to mock her, paw her, and insult her for her right to walk among them as a modern woman. She expects to be treated with respect, and reacts accordingly when she is denied that politeness from those who enter her native land to assert their "right" to stay there, to live off the largess of Italian charity, and within their new home or tent to denigrate her.
   
   She's best when evoking the machine-gunning of three women presumably executed by the Taliban for going to the hairdresser. This episode was recorded by a journalist, and the scene was followed by the announcement of the brutality by the local Minister of Foreign Affairs as approved by the Taliban. One woman, in her death agony, as her last gesture lifts up her burkah to expose a bare leg to her murderer.



4. Oriana Fallaci was a controversial Italian journalist, author, cultural commentator and polemicist up until her death from breast cancer in 2006; a native of Tuscany, she had witnessed her father tortured by Mussolini's black-shirts and had fought in the resistance whilst barely more than a child. As an adult, she traveled extensively in the middle-east and was highly regarded for her reportage of various conflicts and world events, as well as numerous interviews with the likes of the Dalai Lama, Yasser Arafat and Ayatollah Khomeini. Her disgust with what she saw as the corruption of Italian ideals eventually led her to refute her status as a public figure and seek exile in New York.
   
   It is the attacks of September 11th on New York city that were to act as the crucible from which 'The Rage And The Pride' was to be forged. Written in the two weeks after the attack, apparently in a period which saw her forego sleep and food, Fallaci's `sermon' (her words) is an excoriating, bilious attack on the ideals of fundamentalist Islam and its insidious infiltration into European life at the hands of politicians, intellectuals and commentators more obsessed with political correctness and their own careers than the protection of their electorate's freedoms and civil rights. Fallaci dubs these politicians, intellectuals and commentators, `Cicadas' and is completely unrepentant in her hatred and disdain for them. However, her absolute hatred is reserved for the adepts of Islam who, she argues, are attempting to engineer a global caliphate by altering the demographic make-up of Europe and the West through mass, state-supported immigration. At least, statistically, demographic projections would seem to bear out her theory - within the next twenty to fifty years, due to an aging indigenous population, low indigenous birth rates, and a fertile immigrant population, countries like Spain, Italy and France stand a very good chance of having a majority Muslim population. However, Fallaci's book is by no means a dispassionate analysis of the situation. If you're looking for that, you'd be better off reading a book like While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within. Be under no illusions, this is not journalism, this is the passionate polemic of a dying, angry woman (Fallaci was well aware that her breast cancer was probably terminal at the time of the book's writing) who has witnessed the spread of fundamentalist Islam throughout the middle-east, and who is disgusted at what she sees as the betrayals of the western ideals of tolerance, feminism, art, love and culture, written in the kind of unapologetic, blunt invective that will have the politically correct apologists running for shelter and crying racism - an erroneous accusation at best, because, as Fallaci points out herself, `Islam is not a race, it is an ideology'.
   
   This is an important book, possibly one of the most important books of the early 21st century, because it is unafraid to externalise the thoughts that many in the West are too afraid or consider too unpalatable to be faced. Fallaci herself considered the book to be a 'scream of anger' designed to awaken the world and considered it's message to be so important and so personal that, rather than risk it's message being lost or softened by the translation of a third party, she translated the book from Italian to English herself - thus retaining the unique cadences of her Tuscan upbringing. This does make the book more uniquely personal. As one who is familiar with the delicious quirks, nuances and cadences of the Tuscan female attempting to speak English, I could quite clearly "hear" her voice whilst reading it.
   
   I urge you to read it. It is very short - I myself read it in one two hour sitting - and beautifully written.
   
   You may not agree with all of Fallaci's opinions, her politics, her choice of words or her polemic, but this is a book that needs to be read due to the questions that it provokes and because it was written by an extremely brave woman who was both sufficiently experienced and uniquely placed to raise them.



5. Fallaci here is not telling the world anything that it does not know...she is just reminding them. All the many abuses waged against the Western world by Islamic culture are collected and retold in this small volume, since we in the ever-tolerant West are always apt to forget them. She reminds us that it is not a question of how to coexist, but a stark reminder that coexistence is impossible. Their very religion/culture teaches that to coexist with the "infidel" is a sin.
   
   Fallaci's "sermon" is heartening because it can, and does in several spots, give the America reader something that he desperately needs--a morale boost from a foreign source. We get so used to hearing the world cat call us and to watching them burn our flags, that sometimes we forget why we bother to help anyone. Fallaci reminds us that there are some out there (even in Europe) who not only respect America but love it "like a husband", as Fallaci writes.

2 comments about Andy Rooney: 60 Years of Wisdom and Wit.

1. I gave this book to my husband for Christmas. He just loved it and is sharing it with many friends. If you like Andy on 60 minutes you will relate to many of his experences. He says this book was the best present I have given him in many years.



2. Good Andy Rooney book if you have not had the opportunity to read his previous compilations. Even though there is little new material in this book it is valuable in that many of Rooney's original books are no longer readily available.
   
   Having collected and read Andy Rooney's books and columns for 30 years I quickly recognized many of the essays in this volume. Essentially it is a snapshot of Rooney's 60-plus year broadcast career. For anyone who thinks that Andrew A. Rooney just got lucky, this book proves the adage that hard work and luck walk hand in hand. A budding journalist when he was reluctantly enlisted into the Army, Rooney learned his craft the hard way. After leaving the Army he continued his wartime partnership with seasoned reporter Bud Hutton and completed a one year stint at MGM in Hollywood as a writer. Soon afterward he joined CBS as a television writer. Eventually Rooney found himself writing for television and newspapers, as well as appearing in weekly segments on 60 MINUTES.
   
   My only regret is that this book could do with an additional couple hundred pages. Andy Rooney has written so many down to earth essays -- and read quite a few of them on 60 MINUTES and on books on cassette -- that his book leaves the reader wishing for more.

5 comments about I Can't Believe I'm Sitting Next to a Republican: A Survival Guide for Conservatives Marooned Among the Angry, Smug, and Terminally Self-Righteous.

1. This book was more of a commiseration for our plight rather than a discussion of tactics. I was hoping for an answer of how to shoot down the smug while keeping friends & colleagues.
   
   As it stood, it was a good "oh, boy have I been THERE" book to read.



2. To give you an idea about how serious of a conservative I am, my bookmark was a copy of "Imprimis" (Hillsdale College's free newsletter featuring excerpts from speeches by conservatives). I picked this book up sight unseen figuring it would be organized like one of those "Guide for Dummies" books.
   
   The book is intended to be a "survival guide" for Conservatives that are out of place - the conservative college professor, social worker, or in my case, the conservative active and involved member of a teacher's union. As I said, I thought it might be a hoot, especially if it were organized like one of those "Dummies" books, imagining categories like "What to do if you are a college student and your professor is quoting Al Gore like he's the latest prophet from on high..." Perhaps if the Politically Incorrect Guide folks would have published this one and focused it more I'd have enjoyed it more.
   
   Instead, it is sort of Ann Coulter "lite". Ann goes after name brand Liberals (Gore, the Kennedys, and so on) with awful (and true) stories of flawed liberal reasoning and horrible hypocrisy. Harry Stein mostly talks about his neighbors and people he used to work with using the same style.
   
   Parts of the book work like a charm, especially the chapters on Hollywood, the book publishing industry, public schools and universities. Others are just sort of creepy, like the one in which Stein's wife tape records her friends and the one with the conservative talk show host harassing the liberal in a pet store.
   
   Final thought: mixed bag, good for the hardcore conservative with a funny bone on your gift list.



3. I wish some of the liberals who spout off about republicans or Conservatives could learn to appreciate the differences in our society without name calling. This is what Harry Stein is all about! I enjoyed the points he makes about tolerance or lack thereof in our society for other points of view. A good read with a lot of humor.



4. A lively, fun discussion of liberals and their sentiments is presented in a tour of liberals and right-wingers and the interactions between them in "I Can't Believe I'm Sitting Next to a Republican". Here's a whimsical yet pointed view of what it means to be a conservative in a blue state and more, offering a conservative's guide to live, friendship and living in a liberal environment. A fine pick for any general collection.



5. Harry Stein's one of my favorite writers; his satirical wit when discussing the perplexing motives of the predominantly liberal residents in his suburban New York City home-town are hilarious & of course, quite accurate. Although I'm more of a centrist, his depictions of the liberals inhabiting this slice of the Big Apple, have me constantly nodding my head in agreement.
   
   The book's cover is classic; a reminder of those cheesy B flicks from the '50s depiciting the horror the poor young lady experiences from the attack of the Republican zombies; coming to a theater near you. That would make a great poster.
   
   If you think the pendulum has swung too far to the left in Obama Nation, and have a terrific sense of humor, you'll love Stein's latest cult classic.

5 comments about Losing My Religion: How I Lost My Faith Reporting on Religion in America-and Found Unexpected Peace.

1. I must say this was a nice breath of fresh air. I have read several books on people losing their faith, at times some seem quite hateful or cruel, intentional or not. This book however shows that you don't have to bash the other side to prove your point. It is a great account of a journey this journalist took on his way to incredulity. Pleasant, easy, quick read...well worth the time.



2. Anyone interested in unconventional paths of spiritual formation should read this book and may find it rewarding.



3. I enjoyed reading the narrative of someone's experience that was similar to mine. It was more extreme than mine, which made it more interesting, while still being something to which I could relate well. The style is straightforward, an account. The first part reads like something that could be described as "Finding My Religion", because that's exactly what it was. Having gone through it, I loved reading about it from someone else's perspective.
   
   If you lopped off this section "Finding My Religion", without the further life-changing experiences the author had, it would read like any of the thousands of christian conversion stories, and I think few christians would dare to read beyond anything with which they already agree, for fear and being threatened by the possibility of new ideas and changing one's mind. But, for the author, as for others, life and ideas and thinking kept on going - and kept on changing, whether anyone wanted it to or not! "Life Happens" - and it did. Lobdell points out near the end of the book that life - a rich, full life - is happening.
   
   The interesting part of Lobdell's narrative is that his background in news reporting makes this part narrative and part news exposé. It is unique, because of his dream job writing news columns, the ghastly details of which metamorphosed into news exposé. So you read of both the author's life, and the horrifying news of abuse (when it was actually allowed to become news instead of being covered up) that became part of his life.
   
   I recommend it.



4. Losing My Religion by William Lobdell is a clearly written and provocative memoir by a former Los Angeles Times religion reporter--an award winning one, I might add.
   Lobdell's story intrigues religious minded readers because he entered a serious Christian walk as an adult through a Protestant "born-again" path and later in 2001 with his wife committed to Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults (who elect to be Catholics). It intrigues atheists because in the end Lobdell finds peace in his personal philosophy as a kind of atheist without losing his moral base. On the verge of his initiation as a Catholic, Lobdell's skepticism got the better of him--I use "better" without irony. The author comes across as someone who honestly approached his conversions yet to be honest with his conscience had to finally admit that he no longer believed in God or God's religions. How he got there and found peace is the drama of the book subtitled "How I Lost My Faith Reporting on Religion in America--and Found Unexpected Peace."
   
   As a child Lobdell attended Episcopal Church services with his family. Like so many young adults in America he lapsed from his rather "boring" family religion as soon as he could, in his case at age 17. After a failed marriage and some loose living the author impregnated a new girl friend who was a nominal Catholic. She kept the child. A month after the birth of their daughter Bill and Greer married in a secular service in Las Vegas. Greer figures prominently in the story as the couple remained together throughout the author's rough religious passages. Lobdell's adult inroad to Christianity occurred around 1990 when he joined the evangelical Mariners Church. Two years later a friend took him to a Presbyterian men's retreat for an intense weekend of self-examination, confession, renewal and conversion. There the author experienced a closed environment where lack of enough sleep, emotional Bible readings, pious songs, charismatic prayer and group pressure brought on what he felt was an authentic born-again experience. He had a vision that seemed to confirm his deeper connection to Jesus. During this period he found a job as the religion writer for an Orange County, California news service. He attributed his new prosperity to prayers answered by God.
   
   His entry into Catholicism paralleled assignments he had to report on sexual abuse by clergy in the Catholic Church. While maintaining his faith Lobdell nevertheless felt disgust with the Church leaders after listening to many victims tell their stories of abuse. Though most of the horrible molestation events and crimes occurred years and decades before, time had not healed the wounds of the victims. Adding to their pain was a Church hierarchy that systematically suppressed, minimized and covered up the abuses. The Church, for the longest time, was more inclined to forgive and restore the deviant clergy than to believe and assist the victims. Lobdell was also upset with the media that often used "far too neutral" terms like "molestation" and sexual abuse." He accuses the Church of being "Orwellian" in its vague use of "boundary violation" and "inappropriate conduct" to describe "child rape" and "sodomy." News editors might change or neutralize his more graphic descriptions that accurately portrayed the allegations.
   
   Lobdell cites studies showing that people in pews among Catholics, Protestants and Mormons are no better or worse than average Buddhists or atheists. He found this dismaying as he was expecting to find, on average, better behavior among fellow churchgoers. Eventually he "felt angry with God for making faith such a guessing game." Lobdell was referring to the myriad versions of the Christian faith that continue to splinter and argue with one another. He mentions that this lack of unity is "often described as the faith's largest scandal." As he paid more attention to scientific studies and statistics he grew more skeptical about leaning on faith to excuse the more bizarre claims in religions. For example, Lobdell wrote of DNA research about migrating peoples that proved beyond reasonable doubt that the Book of Mormon story of Semites coming to America before Columbus was false. By invitation he attended a conference with Mormons where a church leader attacked him for merely reporting the facts. Mormon scholars like all faith apologists continue to scramble to reconcile odd and fantastic scriptures with disconfirming evidence.
   
   Lobdell writes that his biggest challenge was death (247). Would he end up in hell because he rejected God? Should he take Paschal's Wager just in case God was real? A resolution came when he and his wife attended Letting Go of God, a one-woman, autobiographical play by comedienne Julia Sweeney who portrays her walk into disbelief. Sweeney, a cradle Catholic like Lobdell's wife Greer, captured and resolved Lobdell's dilemma with "humor, insight, sensitivity and reason" and so much so that the play gave our author "goose bumps." He found good news in the play for his transformation. Howard Stern, the embarrassingly honest shock-jock became Lobdell's role model for expressing his story as directly as possible. He came to the conclusion that Occam's razor trumps Pascal's wager or the idea that it is better to bet on God just in case God exists. Lobdell had to be true to his conscience. God became an unnecessary factor to explain his existence, his morals and his life in general so he let "Him" go. He felt relieved to finally accept his thin slice of life in this universe and to do the best with it in the time he has. When he came out publicly in a 3,800 word news feature about how his doubts led to his conversion to atheism, he was surprised by the response. A Catholic priest, for example, wrote, "Welcome to the edge. There are lots of us here." Lobdell titled Chapter Eighteen "Welcome to the Edge."
   
   That "edge" can be an anxious place where people feel as if they are among the lunatic fringe or the cutting edge for believing or not believing. It is a two edged sword. For many of us, like the priest quoted above, faith in God relies on a slim intuition at the borders of our testable reality. I know it does for me because I am one of those Catholics who live on this edge. Buddhists might say that walking the "right" way is a razor's edge to sustain the Eight Fold Path. The security of a simplistic pseudo-certainty is not what the author wanted in faith or finds outside of faith. He never states that he is certain, rather he feels more at peace. Lobdell understands completely that the Gospel he sought to follow teaches that sustained faith requires grace but the same Gospel also teaches that not all are called by the Father to follow Jesus. His conscience finally won out as there was no clear evidence that God called him. All his religious experiences could be explained as social influences and psychological misperceptions. He would no longer fake his faith or hang on to the promise of some future grace. Nor would he endorse the best selling evangelists of the neo-atheist movement: Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Sam Harris. "I know only what is true for me," he says. Where this author will be philosophically as he ages (he was 48 at the time of publication) I wonder. He is not an absolutist. In other words, his newfound atheism is personal, not dogmatic.
   
   So, to a Catholic, what does it matter if an intelligent churchgoer finds good evidence to leave the Church? There is nothing new here that has not shaken the faith of believers since ancient times. Prophets and seers have often appeared as nutcases to unbelievers that met them or read their revelations. Religious ideas rarely meet scientific criteria for falsifiable evidence. Our ideas of God do not. Historically religions exhibit every human foible common to any established political force. Why would anyone remain Catholic faced with the same evidence as the author? In my case with a long career as a cult deprogrammer or exit counselor I have had to grapple with hundreds of fantastic mindsets and religious claims that not only borrow from the old religions but often reveal new and unique variations of religious ideology with every one totally believed by rather intelligent people. In my work I have become well aware of Roman Catholic history and the criticisms.
   
   Mircea Eliade (1907-1986) called his forays into the history of religious ideas an "Ordeal by Labyrinth" in a 1982 autobiographical book by that title (Ordeal by Labyrinth: Conversations with Claude-Henri Rocquet). Eliade, for all his eloquence in establishing a scientific approach to world religions, avoided revealing his private faith in his writings. The labyrinth represented the potentially confusing array of ideas that might drive some men crazy or tempt others to "go native" by a conversion experience while studying a religion or cult. Eliade, who has been called a radical modernist, quietly participated in Orthodox Catholicism. Eliade's personal "center" was his insistence that something he called the sacred was just as necessary to the human experience as physical reality. I am not sure that William Lobdell abandoned this same sacred center. After letting his book settle in my head for a week, I am inclined to place Lobdell (and his quoted priest on the "edge") in the context of one of T. S. Eliot's cats. In his Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats Eliot (1939) writes that cats have three names: A common name like Victor or Bill Bailey, a unique name like Munkustrap or Jellylorum, and a private name that a cat will never confess. By analogy, we name our particular group (e.g., Society of Friends or Quaker) while sustaining a personal identity within that group (Asian-American Quaker human rights activist). Ultimately we might sit quietly (as Quakers are wont to do) never uttering our deepest, inscrutable thoughts about our relationship with the sacred or being. The Eliot cat's deepest name indicates that we are speechless to express (and should be content not to express) the ultimate mystery that is us yet we somehow know is us above and beyond whatever faith we name outwardly as our own or reject not as our own.
   
   "When you notice a cat in profound meditation,
   The reason I tell you is always the same:
   His mind is engaged in a rapt contemplation
   Of the thought, of the thought, of he thought of his name
   His ineffable effable
   Effanineffable
   Deep and inscrutable singular Name."
   
   Though Eliot most likely remained an Anglo-Catholic from 1927 until he died in 1965, we can only wonder what he really believed. And I wonder what Bill Lobdell will confess (to his self) twenty or thirty years from now.



5. Journalist William Lobdell takes readers on a very personal journey with him. He describes becoming a born-again evangelical Christian in his 20s to later nearly accepting his wife's faith, Catholicsm, and eventually to having no faith during his years in Los Angeles reporting on religion in America. He makes a good point about finding it difficult to be religious when one cannot tell the difference between a religious person and an atheist. His firsthand account of the Catholic Church's billion-dollar payout to those abused by priests is both frightening and eye-opening. His book serves as a good reminder of Jesus' words at Matthew 7:21-23 in which Jesus pointedly states that not everyone calling himself a Christian really is a Christian.

4 comments about Ancient Gonzo Wisdom: Interviews with Hunter S. Thompson.

1. Your pleasure or displeasure in this book will depend entirely on your liking for and tolerance of the late Hunter S. Thompson.
   
   I happen to have enjoyed most of Thompson's writings but considered him just another ill-mannered, self-absorbed and self-referential celebrity of the dawning of the age of celebrity. The times favored Thompson with his let it all hang out style: open drunkenness and drugs, outrageous commentary. But he had keen powers of observation and turned in craftsman like sentences and had a devilish wit. He was also opinioned and, in my opinion, dead wrong.
   
   In any event, for those who are interested - and the interested are the only ones who will appreciate some of these interviews - Thompson's widow has collected and edited 48 interviews of Hunter S. Thompson spanning the years 1967 through 2005. Like Andy Warhohl, Thompson kept the publicity machine whirring for a long time, fueling it with an endless succession of weird episodes.
   
   Some of the interviews are hilarious with self-revering interviews who are - in their own mind's eye - great public intellectuals approaching the Great One. Needless to say, these interviews are trite: "Do you still live life at a fast pitch?" "Due to your hedonistic misbehavior, do you find it hard to discipline yourself to write?"
   
   Other interviews have more depth.
   
   Does this collection add only to the wealth of Thompson's estate? Or does it add to our understanding of Thompson?
   
   I think the latter, but only in the sense that Hunter S. Thompson understood better than most that publicity was good and that publicity about being the "bad boy" was even better. Do we gain insight into the mind and character of Hunter S. Thompson? I don't really think so.
   
   But this collection of interviews to a someone like myself who is a mild fan of Thompson Is still interesting and an enjoyable read.
   
   Jerry



2. Thompson's shining Gonzo Intellect is displayed here with humor and insight. Thompson was a seer, a visionary, an immovable force of which our culture will have to contend with for decades to come. His interviews read like his prose - evidence that what you read in print was the Good Doctor himself without pretense, without a mask. The earth's axis has shifted since his departure and we are all at a loss with his absence.



3. Always interesting and often funny, Hunter Thompson rations answers to helpless interviewer's and public forum's questions giving insight to his writing, lifestyle, philosophies and opinions from the 70's till just before his passing in 2005. A wealth of nutritional info and sages for our times included as well.



4. About 85 pages from the end, wishing it had been kept to about 300 pages, or at the very least, the ED. would've not repeated so any identical questions, responses, off handed remarks...programmed questions & memorized, sometimes expanded responses...typos, & why define for us in every interview who Ken Kesey was? A. Ginsberg? D. Halberstam? P. Buchanan? B. & H. Clinton? Nixon (!)? Der Fuhrer!!! Honestly? Every interview, everybody has to be introduced, title's mentioned in interviews have to be expanded below...I just don't get it. Any one w/ any idea who this man was knows who these other people are & if not, if they are interested in learning more, let them do the research. What would've taken 5 seconds to google has now slowed down the pace of this book to a handicapped crawl...
   
   Three stars is probably one too many, but can't hold the format of the book against the power of the words.....
   
   Actually...I think I can. This is a two star book.
   
   If only these interviews would've been edited by those that worked w/ him throughout his life & when he was in control of what went out & what didn't, we'd all be better off for it.
   
   In the long run, H.S.T.'s writing has & will always stood alone & uncompromised & there's no reason to think that will or should change now, no matter who gets their hands on the rights to his literature.
   
   And I was so damned excited to get this book...

5 comments about Honeymoon in Tehran: Two Years of Love and Danger in Iran.

1. 
   This book tells the story of Ahmadinejad's first election and how the first years of his administration affected the daily lives of people and, specifically, this reporter.
   
   Azadeh Moaveni takes you through the naiveté of reform minded voters who justified their sitting out the 2005 election since no one represented positive change. Little did they know that at the last minute a hard liner could be entered in stealth and would change the country and take away what little freedoms they had.
   
   She shows how the situation deteriorated. To this point, small freedoms had crept into the Islamic Republic. When Ahmadinejad opened soccer games to women it was hoped the trend would continue, but this was followed a widespread crackdown on woman's attire. Satellite dishes are first removed by somewhat polite police, later, they are just smashed on roofs with little warning. Moaveni's professional situation deteriorates as well. The intimidating government minder becomes downright lethal.
   
   Amid all this, Moaveni falls in love and becomes pregnant. She can't get health information since sites found in Googling "Women" (as well other body parts) are blocked. Every aspect of childbirth is fraught with stress down to selection of the child's name. The marriage ceremony and celebration have concerns. In Iran, wedding planners have added responsibilities. They may have to pay the police to so your friends and relatives can be together (men and women) to celebrate. Add music or wine to your party, and you have more complications.
   
   I didn't read Lipstick Jihad: A Memoir of Growing up Iranian in America and American in Iran due to the all to cute title and almost passed this one up as well. This is not Chick Lit. It is a very serious work and I highly recommend it.



2. I was intrigued to be introduced to a place that, realistically, most US media presents in a fearful viewpoint. The author does illustrate with many examples that, as with all cultures, people are very much alike, trying to get ahead in the world making a better life for themselves and their families. But it almost comes across as viewing this behavior as selfish, that Iranians are indifferent to eroding freedoms, yet the author leaves the country for that very reason.
   
   Most of the book is quite easy to read and entertaining, but the viewpoint is exclusively from the privileged upper middle class, almost to the point of bragging when digressing into the details of her wedding. And while the author is a writer for Time, she brushes aside in a couple sentences that speaking to a few people in Tehran purports to represent the views of the entire nation- at least the title of the book does not deceive this fact. At times, the reading gets laborious such as when pages are devoted to the nuances of finding an obstetrician, and yet the process was little different than would be encountered in other developed countries. It was hard to understand the point, and I found myself skipping paragraphs at a time.
   
   In addition, much of the text deals with the author's ambivalence to Islam, again little of which has to do with Iran and simply her own spiritual journey. Interesting perhaps to some, and though she tries to link it with the religious aspects of an Islamic nation as a whole, the connection is weak.
   
   The book as a whole does succeed in opening the door on a nation that most of us scarcely know, but unfortunately the reader must wade through too much mostly unrelated writing to reach it.



3. You have to respect someone who risks her life to report accurately and honestly in Iran. There were very real dangers that Moaveni consistently faced. So dangerous in fact, that when she heard of a friend's arrest, she was too scared to speak out on her behalf.
   Yet, the entire book was essentially a dialectical debate about whether to stay in or leave Iran. The arguments for and against were repeated with minor variations for hundreds of pages. By now we all know how oppressive life is for women in Iran. That's a given.
   I was very frustrated by the constant reminder that most of Iran is made up of more secular people, or even religious Muslims who felt hostility towards the very small percentage of militant Muslims in the country. What is a small percentage? Is it 1%? Wouldn't knowing that there are 500,000 militant Muslims in a country frighten anyone? And how much of a smaller percentage than 1% can we get? In other words, her description of reality didn't give you enough useful information, despite numerous repetitions of facts. Wouldn't it be more useful, for instance, to state that there are an estimated 2,000 militant Muslims in Iran than saying that the militant Muslims made up a very small percentage of Iranians?
   I found Moaveni's pro-Palestinian stance upsetting and unbalanced. And I would have like to have learned that after leaving Iran, she did what she could have to help her friend who was unjustly imprisoned. This was never addressed after she spoke about how guilty not doing anything made her feel.



4. Born to Iranian emigrants in the United States, journalist Azedah Moaveni starts living the life on which she merely used to report as she marries and attempts to put down roots in the country of her bloodline, which is her TIME magazine beat. Ms. Moaveni tells her story, which spans two years that include the birth of her son, in HONEYMOON IN TEHRAN.
   
   Azedah Moaveni's decision to make Iran home coincides with the election of hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. If one can experience culture shock in a country she knows well, that's what happens to HONEYMOON IN TEHRAN's author as rules restricting personal freedom take effect with Iranian authorities removing satellite television dishes, imposing Islamic dress code, and limiting names families can choose for newborns.
   
   HONEYMOON IN TEHRAN reminds us of how westernized many Iranians are despite their country's preponderance of religious conservatives. Vanity results in nose jobs being one of Iran's most popular surgeries. Pregnant women find their doctors pushing unnecessary c-sections because of their higher profit margin. Weddings cause families to spend beyond their means so they can keep up with the Joneses.
   
   An Iranian government official whom Azedah Moaveni identifies only as "Mr. X" stands between the journalist and her press credentials. Recurring meetings with him she details in HONEYMOON IN TEHRAN prove her sword of Damocles. By the end of her second year residing in Iran, Ms. Moaveni faces greater threats from the Iranian government because of her reporting. She must choose between standing her ground or fleeing for the sake of her husband and their toddler son.
   
   Azedah Moaveni's engaging prose keeps the HONEYMOON IN TEHRAN pages turning. Read HONEYMOON IN TEHRAN.



5. although the author finds the governmental intrusion an irritant, more often she sounds like she is making excuses and justifications not so much for the government but for the people's support for it and for their attitudes. she describes facts reflecting small mindedness, bigotry, sexism, zealotry and fanaticism but tries to jusify them as though she hopes the reader will somehow understand. there is no excusing or understanding a community which perverts religion to subjugate women and suppresses free thinking and expression. casting the entire society as innocent bystanders who are at the mercy of the government is a mischaracterization. likewise, struggling to differentiate between "arabs" and persians sounds as though one is superior to the other or that the distinction is material. the country, which is made up of its population, uses religion as a weapon. complaining that religion is causing iranian rights to be infringed upon without mentioning that the same religion is also the basis and foundation for rampant international terrorism is self serving. the author herself claims liberality and open mindedness but takes swipes at israel, judges "arabs" and struggles to create some non-existent difference between muslims based upon their country of origin. overall, uninformative and unsatisfying.

5 comments about Big Russ and Me: Father and Son: Lessons of Life.

1. until I read this book. I did enjoy the book, reading about his childhood and his father. I also found his Catholic upbringing very interesting to read about. He was very devout in his religion. I loved hearing about the Nuns and Priests that taught him.
   
   I wish that he would have written more about his mother and three sisters. They were barely mentioned in the book. I would like to know how he got along with his sisters, the kind of influence his mother was on him, etc., but none of that was talked about. When his parents were divorced it was mentioned but glossed over very quickly which I found odd.
   
   Toward the end of the book when the chapters turned to politics it was all about him, and only a mention here or there of his father. He had grown up and moved out by that point, so I'm sure his father wasn't as central a figure in his life as he had been, but still, this book was supposed to be about him and his father, not just himself.
   
   The book wasn't sequential at all, which I found very confusing. One minute he's telling a story from his childhood and the next he's going to college. It was hard to keep track of how old he was or what was going on because there was no timeline.
   
   Overall an okay book. Not gripping and not one that I had a hard time putting down.



2. I am very disappointed in the quality of this CD. The second time we listened to this book it had noisy flaws on the CD's and could not listen to the story.



3. my book arrived promptly and in great shape. i would buy from this seller again.



4. Big Russ and Me was a gift to my husband for Father's Day. He loved it and insisted I read it when he was finished. Frankly, I felt I had already read it as he kept reading different parts of it to me. It made us both yearn for a simpler life. His respect for authority was taught to him by his father and had a profound affect on his life. A fast read you'll never regret.



5. You can clearly hear Tim Russert's voice as you read this book. There were so many connections that I could make to his family, growing up, and the problems and decisions he encountered. I didn't want the book to end. I bought this copy for my son-in-law who is an avid reader. I know he will have great connections to his dad. Recently, he became the father of a son as well. I know he will think about all the life lessons that he will want to pass on to his son.

1 comments about Tim Russert, We Heartily Knew Ye: Wonderful Stories from Friends Celebrating a Great Life.

1. This is a collection of stories - eulogies - written by Tim Russert's friends. Rich Wolfe is the author, but really he is the editor. Or just the one who asked people to write the stories and put them together. If you loved Tim Russert like I did, and want to know more about him, you will enjoy this book. If you want to be a great journalist and learn more about one of the greatest, you might benefit from this book. It is better than a lot of books that get thrown together quickly after someone dies.
   There are so many authors in this book - people who knew him in high school, college - some of them are good writers and some don't have a very polished style. They use unusual sentence construction and some of the sentences are not complete sentences. It is like the authors were talking into a tape recorder and then someone typed up what they said, maybe cleaning it up a little, but leaving in some of the words and phrases that are not used in good writing.
   Wolfe admits that there is repetition in the book, and there is - two or more people shared the same experience with Tim and wrote about it. That's not so bad. The book seems pretty honest about Tim. One of Tim's friends from college described how Tim cheated on a final exam and how he stole meals from the dining hall when he was living off campus. Yet on page 170 it quotes Tim saying in a John Carroll University publication, "You can read all the books...you can know all the facts...but the emphasis on ethics and values are what matter with an education." Those stories lowered my opinion of Tim Russert and his college. But you have to give credit to the book for being honest about it. These stories were included to highlight Tim's social skills - he was able to talk the janitor into opening the professor's office for him, he was able to get the dining hall staff to let him have meals that were not paid for.
   If you already read Big Russ, you will recognize some of the material, but there is a lot of new material too. Woodstock and his trip to Washington D.C. after Woodstock are fun stories. There is not much in the book about Tim's wife. There's more about his father and his son.
   Several things come across in these stories. Tim was enormously intelligent and energetic. He had terrific social skills. He was genuinely kind and generous with his friends and also with strangers.
   When he first joined Meet the Press, I never watched it because I was always in church when it was on. Then I found out how good it was, and started taping it and watching it after church. Now, I still watch MTP, but it isn't half as good as it was, and you can't trust David Gregory to tell the truth.
   I'll tell you a secret - the last story in the book is the best.

5 comments about Front Row at the White House : My Life and Times.

1. Helen Thomas is beautiful in every way. Her writing ability is incredible, her life in the front row at the White House was brilliant. Her honesty, brilliance and passion is to be valued and respected by everybody. An amazing read, you won't share this book even with your best friend, just in case you never get it back. It's a book that you can read over and over again and still learn more. Thanks Helen, hopefully people are inspired to follow their dreams as you have done. Thanks Amazon, I couldn't get it here in Australia, you came through for me again.



2. I respect Helen Thomas for her fearlessness, tenacity, and the fact that she broke so much ground as a woman in the WH Press Corp. However, as other reviewers have noted, this book didn't have the bite of her questions at a press conference.
   
   I'm glad I read this book - parts were very interesting. Her insights into individual Presidents and First Ladies, the way they viewed the press, and the insidious transition from communications to spin and handling. She also takes the press to task for buying into this.
   
   The book is kinda wonky, and if you aren't a press junky, it wouldn't mean much. I didn't know there was so much to know about Air Force One - and even after reading it, was numb.
   
   Reading this book made me think that I had Helen Thomas at a loooong Saturday afternoon brunch, and she had begun holding forth. Fascinating premise. But after a while, you'd want a break - take a walk, see if they brought out more shrimp, maybe check the Blackberry. After a while (or maybe 30 pages), it would be irresistable to go back and see what she was saying now. You'd be rivited for a while, then your eyes would start to glaze over, and it's time to see if they have FINALLY brought out more shrimp. After everyone has had three glasses of wine, you're in a mellower mood to listen, and she's in a crazier mood to talk, so it all works out just fine.



3. I never noticed Thomas much until I saw her bit on Steven Colbert's famous slap in Bush's face at the White House Pres Corps dinner. I started reading more about her and listened to her on many different shows. I respect her a great deal, so was very interested in this book.
   
   Much of it is about her. Too much really. There is also way too much name dropping as well as anecdotes about her and her cronnies that were frankly rather boring. She aslo is rather contradictory. She prides herself on her journalistic integrity but doesn't understand why someone like Lady Bird would have been furious over her leaks about her daughters. She makes a big deal of her front row seat and on the many compliments and accolades that the various presidents bestowed on her. Such things got in the way of what really was an excellent look at the administrations that she worked with.
   
   However, it was in her chapters on Marha Mitchell, and the first ladies, that really make this book a gem. The former esp - we were always told by the administration that she was insane. She wasn't - she was speaking the truth about watergate, and no one wanted to listen. And for the most part does a good job outlining each administration's successes and faults.
   
   However, She was also far from being unbiased. Kennedy was the only democratic president who she had good things to say about. To hear her talk, Clinton's lies were much worse than Watergate or Contragate. She pretty much gave Nixon and Reagan a free pass, but spent pages ranting about Clinton. I don't expect someone working so long to not have opinions but for heavens sake try to put things into perspective.
   
   Since this book was written just at the end of Clinton's term, and since I know that her opinion of Bush Jr is less than stellar, I'd be interested in reading her more current book which talks about his administration. I wonder if she now sees Clinton with perhaps less myopic eyes?



4. I liked doing business with them. The book came in very good packaging. I plan on doing more business with them in the future. Keep up the good work!!!



5. If you've ever wondered about the woman who for years asked the first question at presidential news conferences and also ended each one, then this memoir will be entertaining. Thomas had a long career and got to know every president since JFK pretty well, or so you'd think from this book which is chock full of interesting anecdotes and opinions. It is a bit repetitious and would have benefited mightily from tighter editing. One wonders if the publisher was a little too reverential to use the red pencil. Somewhere along the line, UPI, her employer, lost a lot of its power and impact, due to business turmoil. Still, Thomas soldiered on. She doesn't say much about UPI in the memoir, probably because she's still working, though for Hearst. If you follow the journalism biz, you'll want to read this one.