For political junkies, politicians, and policy makers on the right or left who will discover that there is more substance to...
Thoughtful and balanced portraits of five lively and influential conservatives, emphasizing their intellectual roots and the parts they have played in the increasing sway of conservative policies and politics in the US since before the Reagan presidency.
The gang of five are journalist and pundit Bill Kristol (editor and publisher of The Weekly Standard), the Christian Coalition's Ralph Reed (now a political consultant), former Indiana congressman David McIntosh (now running for governor of Indiana), lawyer Clint Bolick (whose clients are the urban poor), and anti-tax activist Grover Norquist (who keeps trying to herd all the conservative factions into the same corral). Easton (Reagan's Ruling Class, not reviewed) chose these five because they represent a range of thought across the conservative spectrum. All baby boomers, they also have in common brains, education (two Ph.D.'s among them), and a dedication to overthrowing what they see as entrenched liberals in government and the media. Idealistic and dedicated, fueled by revolutionary energy that matched their youthful counterparts on the left during the 1970s, they "brought to the Right an unprecedented level of political and media sophistication." Easton, eschewing amateur psychological analysis, examines each of their backgrounds with the emphasis on their college experiences (ranging from the cool and elitist Kristol at Harvard to the then-raucous, hard-drinking and arrogant Reed at the University of Georgia). She tracks the five to Washington in the wake of the Reagan victories and recounts the battles over Supreme Court nominees Robert Bork (a loser) and Clarence Thomas (a winner, in spite of Anita Hill), the blowback from the Oklahoma City bombing, and the effort to impeach Bill Clinton. That ultimately failed because, Easton suggests, Clinton's opponents misjudged Americans' support for personal virtue. Whatever missteps these five made—and they were many—they and others like them are poised to continue the "war without blood" to establish their conservative principles as the measure of power in American politics.
For political junkies, politicians, and policy makers on the right or left who will discover that there is more substance to the conservative movement than Charlton Heston and abortion-clinic bombers.Pub Date: Aug. 8, 2000
ISBN: 0-684-83899-0
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2000
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorkerstaff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
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