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Books for Christmas

Our annual list of holiday gift suggestionsfvorn distinguished readers and writers.

The other is Dead Right, by . He dislikes that to Randolph Churchill, Leland Hayward, and Averell new breed, the “big government conservative.” He gives me Harriman and on to being the real “first lady of the credit for coining the phrase. Thanks a lot. I wish I’d never Democratic party.” heard of it. My idea wasn’t big spenders, but those who’d Having met Mrs. Harriman while in Washington, D.C. rather slow the growth of spending than break their pick in with then-Governor Bill Clinton, I think Ogden has truly search of spending cuts in Social Security, Medicare, etc., captured the real Pamela Harriman, who reveals her that never materialize. Frum argues, from a libertarian argu- thoughts at the time on the man who would eventually ment, for breaking your pick. It’s an interesting argument, reward her with the ambassadorship to France. one conservatives need to hear, then reject. I’ll not miss the opportunity in this space to suggest you I read few novels, but I grabbed a paperback my 12-year- reread William Manchester’s One Brief Shining Moment, a old nephew left behind. It was Killer Angels by Michael recollection of John ’s presidency. Commissioned Shaara. The subject is Gettysburg, and Shaara sides with by the late Jackie Kennedy Onassis, it will be interesting to Longstreet against Lee. Absolutely riveting, the best (though see if Bill Clinton can commission someone to write such a maybe the only) historical novel I’ve read since I went glowing tome after he leaves office. Even the master through those books by Kenneth Roberts as a teenager. Manchester may not be able to pull this one off.

Fred Barnes is a senior editor of the New Republic. L.D. Brown is an Arkansas State Trooper.

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sive rise in the U.S. House of Representatives, his selection as vice president, and finally his assumption of the presidency. Robert P. Casey Cannon reminds us that Ford‘s greatest professional ambition First Things: An Inquiry into the First Principles of Morals was to become House Republican leader; he never sought the and Justice. Hadley Arkes’ clear, provocative, and witty vice presidency much less the presidency. Yet he served in the treatise on moral reasoning. White House honorably and with great distinction and bravely Plain Speaking: An Oral History of Harry S. Truman. led our nation through one of its most turbulent times. Merle Miller’s marvelous portrait of an American original Finally, being a lifelong fly-fisherman, I console myself and a forgotten art. when not actually fly-fishing by reading about it. Although Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era. James M. I’ve plowed through several new titles this year, the classic in McPherson’s epic account of America’s defining moment. the field remains Ray Bergman’s Trout. Originally published Chronicles of Wasted Time: An Autobiography. Malcolm in 1938, Bergman’s book has been reprinted thirteen times. Muggeridge’s brilliant memoir. It’s the most complete text on trout fishing available both for Shane. Jack Schaeffer’s timeless western about a reluctant the experienced angler and the novice. As the 1975 introduc- but deadly gunslinger saving a group of struggling farmers. tory note says, “In Trout, waters will forever run pure and Before the Shooting Begins: Searching for Democracy in sparkling and fish will rise in clear, untrammeled streams.”

America’s Cultural War. James Davison Hunter’s account ~ of the current struggle for the soul of America. Dick Cheney is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute Our Country: The Shaping of America from Roosevelt to and the former secretary of defense. Reagan. Michael Barone’s magisterial rendering of modem American political history.

Robert P. Casey is the governor of Pennsylvania. Arthur Cooper Henry and Clara, by Thomas Mallon. The best novel of 1994. People will be reading it in 2094. Unless gets the bomb. Dick Cheney Catch-22, by Joseph Heller. The funniest novel ever Over the years, my favorite books have been about written by an American, I think it’s the closest we’ve come American history-and in particular, military history. to The Great American Novel. The 50th anniversary of Normandy provided a fitting Cocksure, by Mordecai Richler. The funniest novel ever occasion to review some of the most recent books on World written by a Canadian. Actually, Richler has also written the War 11. One of the best is D-Day: June 6, 1944, by the his- second, third, and fourth funniest novels ever written by a torian Stephen Ambrose. In magnificent detail, Ambrose Canadian. recounts the battles at Omaha and Utah beaches. By focus- A Moveable Feast, by Ernest Hemingway. Hemingway’s ing on the individual troops in the field-from the enlisted most appealing book. It made my generation want to starve men to the generals-Ambrose allows the reader to witness in Paris for art. None of us starved. None of us wrote any- the bravery and strength of our armed forces under the most thing worth a damn. demanding wartime environment. The Nine Tailors, by Dorothy Sayers. The great English Leaping forward a few decades one gets to A1 Santoli’s mystery. Lord Peter Wimsey and Ms. Sayers at the very top Leading the Way. This oral history of the Vietnam War is a of their game. riveting portrait of a generation of troops who proudly A Piece of the Action, by Joseph Nocera. A lucid, impec- served our nation in Southeast Asia and then-upon return- cably researched history of personal finance that is exquis- ing to this country- passed through one of the most diffi- itely reader-friendly. There are as many “characters” in this cult times for our armed forces. Many of my good friends book as in a Dickens novel. and colleagues from the Pentagon-Gens. Colin Powell, Barry McCaffrey, Freddie Franks-remained committed to Arthur Cooper is editor-in-chiefof GQ. the U.S. military and led the way toward restoring the digni- ty and professionalism of our armed forces. To appreciate just what a magnificent force we could field after this period of rebuilding, one can turn to Bob Dole Washington Post reporter Rick Atkinson’s Crusadeione of Aside from wading through the 1,342 pages of the Clinton the best accounts of Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm. health care plan this year, I have recently had the pleasure As well as any reporter I’ve read, Atkinson moves seam- of turning the pages of several good books. I would like to lessly between interagency meetings in Washington and the recommend the following titles: decision-making and actual fighting in the desert. Beyond Peace, by Richard Nixon. President Nixon’s last In a completely different category of books, I’d recom- book was also his best-a compelling analysis of world mend James Cannon’s Time and Chance. Cannon traces affairs, common sense solutions for America’s domestic Gerald Ford’s early political career in Michigan, his impres- problems, and a call for a return to American leadership. +

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D-Day: June 6, 1994, by Stephen Ambrose. The defini- m tive account of the young soldiers who put their lives on the John H. Fund line to ensure the survival of democracy. In this time of revolutionary political change in America, Truman, by David McCullough. For some reason, I my suggestions for Christmas gift books focus on the loved this fascinating biography about a no-nonsense lessons we can learn from the demise of Communism. I straight-talking senator from the Midwest who became pres- believe Bill Clinton will be to welfare-state liberalism ident. what Mikhail Gorbachev was to the Soviet Union-a Eisenhower, by Stephen Ambrose. President Dwight D. transitional figure who tried to keep a failing system alive Eisenhower, a fellow Kansan, has served as a role model but actually accelerated its collapse. Here are some books throughout my career. Not only was Eisenhower an that help us hasten the collapse of liberalism’s Berlin admirable chief executive, but he also was a great comman- Wall: der of those he led in the Army. To date, this book is my Imperium, by Ryszard Kapuscinski. A Polish foreign favorite source of Ike inspiration, correspondent, Kapuscinski gives a surprisingly witty and The American Red Cross First Aid and Safety Handbook. insightful perspective on the collapse of the Soviet This handy reference book might save the life of someone Empire. As a citizen of a Warsaw Pact nation, he was in your family. allowed far greater access to Communist countries than Bob Dole is the Republican leader in the Senate. any Westerner. Dismantling Utopia: How Information Ended the Soviet Union, by Scott Shane. Shane, a Moscow correspondent for m the Baltimore Sun, tells the fascinating story of how the Malcolm S. Forbes, Jr. Soviet system was undermined by the new information The best but most underpublicized book of 1994 is Bruce technologies and the growing press freedom the Gorbachev Porter’s War and the Rise of the State: The Military regime was prompted to tolerate. Not only was George Foundations of Modem Politics. Beginning with medieval Orwell wrong in 1984, he was spectacularly wrong. Thank Europe, the book chronicles how warfare reshaped the map goodness. and governments of Europe. The chapters on the U.S. are The Private Life of Chairman Mao, by Dr. Li Zhisui. superb. Liberals won’t be happy to learn how important war Mao’s doctor for twenty-two years reveals that the Great was as a catalyst for social reforms, and defense-minded Helmsman was actually just a minor-league Stalin, but with conservatives will choke as they read how a strong military even fewer friends. invariably means a powerful central government. Other Of course, one shouldn’t ignore American politics com- worthy reads include Cal Thomas’s The Things That Matter pletely. Ralph Reed, the executive director of the Christian Most, Frederick W. Marks’s excellent set of essays, Velvet Coalition, provides a fascinating overview of what ails on Iron: The Diplomacy of Theodore Roosevelt, David America and how ordinary citizens are taking their country Halberstam’s October 1964, Bob Woodward’s Agenda, and back in Politically Incorrect: The Emerging Faith Factor in for all its flaws, Peter Schweitzer’s Victory, which properly American Politics (published by Word Publishing, Dallas). credits the Reagan administration’s critical role in winning After reading this book, I concluded that conservatives have the Cold War. The novel of the year is Chris Buckley’s very little to fear from the activities of Christians in politics, Thank You for Smoking, with Michael Crichton’s Disclosure, and they should be thankful to have someone of Reed’s a close second. organizational skills in their comer. The growing consensus that our welfare system has Malcolm S. Forbes, Jr. is president and chief executive oficer and imploded should rekindle interest the best public editor-in-chief of Forbes Magazine. in one of policy books I’ve ever read: The Tragedy of American Compassion, by Marvin Olasky, a fascinating discussion of how early social workers combated poverty until the David Frum Progressive Era. Help was a two-way street. The poor were Demosclerosis by Jonathan Rauch searingly condemns a expected to improve their lot, or in dire cases do something, political system paralyzed by greedy, short-sighted gimme anything, that contributed to society and allowed them to groups. The Ethics of Culture by Professor Samuel keep their dignity. Fleischacker attacks a liberal philosophical tradition stretch- Finally, I recommend a real treat to remind us of how ing back to Kant to argue that ethics must nearly always fascinating British politics can be for an outsider-combin- originate in religious orthodoxy. Finally, conservatives who ing as it does high moral purpose and sordid behavior. Mrs. hope that the next Republican White House will avoid the Thatcher’s Minister: The Private Diaries of Alan Clark. debacles of the last one must commit to memory John These splendid memoirs by Britain’s former minister of Podhoretz’s Hell of a Ride-a brilliant and hilarious por- defense will never be read by an American politician. They trayal of abject political failure. are far too frank and literate.

~ ~ ~ David Frum is author of Dead Right (New Republic Books). John H. Fund is an editorial writer for the Wall Street Journal.

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66 I look forward to receiving each issue of the CONSERVATryE CblRoIIvIcLE. I believe it is one of thefinest magazines available dealing with the important social andpolitical issues of the day. Ifind it very hebful in my work here in the Congress, and I wish every member would read it. 99

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Georgie Anne Geyer Paul Greenberg Amusing Ourselves to Death, by Neil Postman, professor of Democracy in America, by Alexis de Tocqueville. Only communications at New York University, This book is so prophetic when it was written in the 1830s, now it is relevant. good-so original, so necessary to read to understand our See the perfect description of Political Correctness in Volume times-that I simply cannot understand why Postman is not II, Chapter VI, ‘What Sort of Despotism Democratic Nations so wildly famous that his phone is ringing off the wall. He Have to Fear.” Or the description of the true power of American traces for us the way that the human personality has actually women in Volume 11, Chapter XII, “How the Americans changed as we passed from the print age to the television Understand the Equality of the Sexes.” Or the sections on the age. The unfortunate corollary, at least as it seems to me: role in American life of private associations, of lawyers, and so “there’s no going back.” Absolutely brilliant. (And his later relevantly on. Our French visitor came, saw, and perceived. book, Technopoly, is good, too.) Vico ’s Science of Imagination, by Donald Philip Verene. The Impossible Country: A Journey through the Lust Days Hannah Arendt demonstrated the root of fascism, Nazism, of Yugoslavia, by Brian Hall, an excellent political travel and Communism in her Origins of Totalitarianism. The writer living now in Ithaca, New York. If there is one book to trouble, it seems, began with the French Revolution, as read on “Bosnia,” which is becoming the archetypal tragedy Edmund Burke knew it would. Readers of Vico will realize of the post-Cold War syndrome, it should be this one. Hall that all the trouble goes back to the Renaissance, to takes the reader by the hand, introduces him to these tragic Descartes. This is a fine introduction to, and summary of, a worlds-within-worlds with their orchestrated hatreds. heroic mind and his road not taken by the world. The Democratic Imagination: Dialogues on the Work of All the Pretty Horses, by Cormac McCarthy. Beware the Irving Louis Horowitz. This Transaction Publishers book is a sound of these Texican words; they will move you to speak paean to Professor Horowitz, the prestigious professor of your own truth unadorned-which is to ask for trouble. This sociology at Rutgers University-and he well deserves one, long, long ride will exhaust and refresh and bring moments of for he is one of the few true searchers after truth still in the unbearable revelation and recognition that will make the hair academy, a man who portrays things the way they are and not on the back of your neck stand up prickly as a dog’s. And you the way the political correctors insist they be. A group of his will no longer be the same, or you’ll be a lot samer. multitude of friends write about his “other” way of thinking. Franz Rosenzweig: His Life and Thought, by Nahum N. Hollywood vs. America: Popular Culture and the War on Glatzer. The life of this theologian and anti-theologian, poet Traditional Values, by Michael Medved. You can never read and teacher, seeker and finder who died young of Lou this book too many times. It is unique in telling us the dismal Gehrig’s Disease is only a little more inspiring than the sim- story of why Hollywood insiders do truly hate the America they ple, shattering, inundating light of his words. This is a clear, supposedly represent. Most unfortunately but not surprisingly, restrained telling of his life that lets its power come through, nothing has changed since this book was published in 1992. together with a finely chosen selection of his words. Haunts of the Black Masseur: The Swimmer as Hero, by Pirke Avot: The Ethics of the Fathers. This is the Charles Sprawson. If you are a swimmer, or even if you famous, inexhaustible little talmudic treatise on ethics. simply think there is nothing quite so beautiful on God’s Forget the volumes of commentaries; stick to the slim text, earth as rivers, bays, oceans, seas, and even swimming and avoid the more modern translations. Ponder each perek, pools, this book takes you back through history and into the or chapter. The best commentary will be your own. Take a lives of all the great people who loved swimming. You see piece of advice from the book itself Provide thyself with a ultimate romanticist Byron swimming in the Hellespont and teacher andfind a companion for study. the drunken Jack London floating out to sea while roaring death chants at the stars-altogether a perfectly wonderful Paul Greenberg is editorial page editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette whose column is distributed by the Angeles little book. Los Times Syndicate. Georgie Ann Geyer is a columnist syndicated by Universal Press Syndicate and author of the new book Waiting for Winter to End:

An Extraordinary Journey Through Central Asia (BrasseyIs). Christopher Hitchens I thank providence that, because of a mediocre television James Goldsmith series, I was in effect actually paid to reread Middlemarch. How did she know so much? But the life of the reviewer is African Genesis, by Robert Ardrey. seldom peachy, berry, and skittle, and anyway I’m not Ancient Futures, by Helena Norberg-Hodge. so Hermit of Peking: The Hidden Life of Sir Edmund invited to recommend the classics, so let me just defend the Backhouse, by Hugh Trevor-Roper. idea of reading as hedonism against the notion of literature as social science. In fiction I was much taken by The End of the Sir James Goldsmith is a businessman and member of the Hunt, Thomas Flanagan’s rounding of his trilogy about Irish European Parliament. history. (It was to have been titled The Heel of the Hunt, but

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some fool thought that all Americans both use and misunder- Zbigniew Brzezinski in Out of Control, has a more sobering stand Mickey Spillane vernacular.) Joanna Trollope’s The and instructive effect, especially useful to those who are Men and rhe Girls caught me in its snare of humane wit. I thinking about where we should be in the future. also followed Gore Vidal’s advice and took in all of Dawn Although found in the “science fiction” section of most Powell, which is very good on women on men. Salman book stores, Morgan Llwelyn’s fascinating novels about the Rushdie’s collection of stories, East Wesr, is the latest refuta- ancient Celts (I have so far read The Druids and The Bard) tion of Orwell’s deceptive dictum that the imagination, like offer a beguiling mix of history, spirituality, and adventure. In certain wild creatures, will not breed in captivity. In the polit- between all this, I find myself returning to Goethe’s Faust ical column, Noel Malcolm’s Bosnia: A Short History was a about once a year, just to be, reminded that “freedom and life great work of freelance advocacy and a surprising Tory growl belong to that man solely who must reconquer them each day.” against the foul (at least when Serbian) invocation of race, Ojars Kalnins is Latvia’s ambassador to the United States. nation, and empire. The other outstanding political book of the year was also penned by a conservative. H.R. Haldeman’s Diaries make the clearest connection yet between small-time crookery and big-time, serious crime. G. Gordon Liddy Christopher Hitchens writes the “Cultural Elite” column for The Jerome Biblical Commentary. An extraordinary work of Vanity Fair and the “Minority Report” column for the Nation. His scholarship that puts together, at one’s fingertips, all that schol- collection, For the Sake of Argument, is freshly out in paperback. ars of various religions, archaeologists and so on have learned to date about each Book of the Old and New Testaments. The Book of Virtues, compiled by William Bennett. Don’t even try to raise a child without it. Ojars Kalnins Modern Times (revised edition), by Paul Johnson. A suc- William Manchester’s A World Lit Only by Fire is wonder- cinct, thoughtful presentation of where we are and how we ful to read and even better as a reminder that regardless of got here. how difficult, confusing, irrational, and dangerous life Commentary of the First Ten Books of the Roman seems to be today, it has been much worse. While a glimpse Historian Titus Livius, by Niccolb Machiavelli. Still the at the distant past helps put the present into a more comfort- most modem work on politics available to us. able context, recent history, as brilliantly analyzed by Guns, Crime and Freedom, by Wayne LaPierre. This may be the scariest book you

And it’s not about crime, drugs, or AIDS.

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Essential to an understanding of the meaning of the Second Calculus. What made the difference were three math teach- Amendment and how it undergirds all our freedoms and ers, Jaime Escalante, Ben Jimenez, and Angelo obligations under the United States Constitution. Villavicencio, who set high expectations, taught math the Public Education: An Autopsy, by Myron Lieberman. The way coaches teach football, and, fighting the designed-for- biggest problem facing the future of this country is the failure failure public school system all the way, inspired sullen of the public education system. This book offers a scholarly teenagers with the ganas-desire-to learn and succeed. and critical analysis, with suggestions as to what to do about it. Truman, by David McCullough. When Policy Review Tower of Secrets, by Victor Sheymov. True story of the profiled seven Western leaders who did the most to win the conversion and brilliantly executed (and highly dangerous) Cold War, we featured Harry Truman, along with Ronald defection of the most important member of the KGB ever to Reagan, Winston Churchill, Pope John Paul 11, Konrad come over to the side of freedom. Adenauer, George Meany, and Whittaker Chambers. Truman, who had the moral courage to save millions of G. Gordon Liddy is a nationally syndicated radio talk show host as lives by dropping the atom bomb, and who built the Cold well as writer, lecturer, actor, and businessman. War alliance against Soviet Communism, was the last Democratic president who knew how to handle foreign poli- cy. McCullough’s biography masterfully tells the story not Thomas Mallon only of Truman’s political career, but also of an education Three old ones: and upbringing in small town Missouri that was right out of Letters of John Keats. “We read fine things but never Bill Bennett’s Book of Virtues. feel them to the full until we have gone the same steps as Modem Times, by Paul Johnson. This tour de siEcle by the Author.” With these letters a reader can take Keats’s one of England’s preeminent journalists is still the finest great, gutsy journey with him. The only dead immortal single volume political history of Planet Earth in the twenti- writer one would truly like to have met. eth century, a period in which “The power of the State to do Vanity Fair. Not Tina’s or Graydon’s, but Thackeray’s. evil expanded with awesome speed” while “its power to do The best English novel. Ever. good grew slowly and ambiguously.” Memories of a Catholic Girlhood, by Mary McCarthy. Cold Sassy Tree, by Olive Ann Bums. One of the best The most deeply felt book by a woman who defined style as American novels of the past decade, this is an endearing “lucidity, perspicuousness,” and who had it in every word, story of a young man growing up and a grandfather growing including “and” and “the.” young in rural turn-of-the-century Georgia. Fourteen-year- Three new ones: old Will Tweedy is a marvelous boyhood hero in the tradi- The Bird Artist, by Howard Norman. Creepy, spare, and some- tion of Tom Sawyer, a mischievous rebel who steadily times slightly ridiculous, this novel about murder and redemp- grows in maturity as the teachings of experience and his tion in 1911 Newfoundland certainly “has something,” as they elders reinforce his natural kindness and moral principles. say, even if, in this case, it’s hard to say just what. Adam Meyerson is vice president for educational affairs at the Mrs. Thatcher’s Minister, by Alan Clark. Everything , and editor of Policy Review. Haldeman Diaries are not: egotistical, judgmental, hilari- ous. Clark is no more capable of self-censorship than Boswell or Pepys, and he makes “the Lady” seem, finally, a good deal more terrifying than “P.” Case Closed, by Gerald Posner. The author rides a leaf- Andrew Neil blower across the grassy knoll, scattering every kook, The Economist on America: 150 Years of Intelligent British aureur, and quick-buck artist who ever addled the nation’s Commentary on America by the World’s Most Influential brains over the Kennedy assassination. Common sense has News Magazine. Written and edited by Sir Alastair Burnet, rarely been so exhilarating. who edited the Economist for ten years, then went on to become Britain’s Walter Cronkite. Thomas Mallon’s most recent book is Henry and Clara (Ticknor & Rethinking AIDS: The Tragic Cost of Premature Fields). Consensus, by Robert Root-Bernstein. The most authorita- tive debunking of the many American myths about AIDS peddled by an unquestioning media in the pockets of the Adam Meyerson AIDS Establishment. The author painstakingly explains why Escalante: The Best Teacher in America, by Jay Mathews. there is no heterosexual AIDS epidemic and never will be; Read this book before signing on to Charles Murray’s argu- and why to be HIV positive is far from being the death sen- ment that IQ is the best determinant of academic and eco- tence conventional wisdom would have us believe- nomic achievement. Intelligence tests would never have because HIV does not cause AIDS. predicted that Garfield High School in working-class, The Oxbridge Conspiracy, by Walter Ellis. A provoca- Mexican-American East Los Angeles would become one of tive analysis of how graduates of Oxford and Cambridge the nation’s ten top high schools for Advanced Placement have kept their stranglehold on the British Establishment

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and because of the anti-business snobbery these’universities James Bovard. A modern-day Common Sense, painfully impart how this has contributed to Britain’s decline. As detailing the extent to which our economic and individual Ellis concludes, “Britain under Oxbridge is a failed experi- liberties are being eroded away by an arrogant and uncon- ment.” strained Leviathan. As this book becomes more widely The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in read, Americans are very likely to rise up in anger, mak- American Life, by Richard J. Herrnstein and Charles ing the current political turmoil seem but a tempest in a Murray. Murray, the author of Losing Ground, which revo- teapot. lutionized the debate about welfare, turns to the even more Science Under Siege: Balancing Technology and the controversial matters of genes and intelligence, arguing that Environment, by Michael Fumento. A book that might be those who don’t succeed in the American meritocracy fail subtitled, “Lies, Damned Lies, and the EPA” dealing with largely because they are not bright enough. This book is the horrendous misuse of science and statistics by environ- likely to dominate intelligent discourse this winter: read it if mentalists over the last two decades. Fumento, CEI’s 1994 you want to participate in the debate. Warren Brookes fellow, is perhaps the only journalist in Thieves’ World The Threat of the New Global Network the world able to write about epidemiology without mak- of Organized Crime, by Claire Sterling. A frightening study ing a fool of himself. (Another important book is of the rise of the post-Communist Russian Mafia, the Eco-Scam: The False Prophets of Ecological Apocalypse, fastest-growing, most violent organized-crime group in the by Ronald Bailey, who was CEI’s 1993 Warren Brookes world, whose tentacles are spreading west in a way that fellow .) makes it almost as big of a threat as Marxism, especially The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien. A trilogy that since, as Sterling shows, the Russian Mob is linking up with does more than almost any work I know (save perhaps the other organized crime groups to form a global network. Bible) to make the case as to why each of us must struggle The Agenda: Inside the Clinton White House, by Bob against the Evil Empires here and abroad, even though there Woodward. At times it is far too “inside the Beltway” and are no permanent victories (or defeats) in this eternal battle. some of its sourcing is suspect. But it still manages to paint a convincing, authoritative picture of a rudderless adminis- Fred L. Smith, Jr. is president of the Competitive Enterprise Institute. tration devoid of values or strategy. Andrew Neil is editor of the Sunday Times of London and execu- tive editor of Fox Television’s “Full Disclosure. ’’ Herbert Stein Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations: I’m not showing off; my book discussion group made me do it. Returned to after all these years. Smith reminds us of his analytic power, lit- Fred L. Smith, Jr. erary skill, and erudition. More surprising, he shows a prag- matic attitude towards the role of government in the econo- As a policy wonk, my recommended reading list, not sur- my. The University of Chicago Press has a fine edition with prisingly, is wonkish. Still, among all those dusty, boring type large enough for aging eyes. books that make up this body of writing, there are a few Robert Skidelsky, John Maynard Keynes: The Economist gems that make it all worthwhile: as Savior, 1920-1937 Keynes had more influence and led a Searching for Safety, by Aaron Wildavsky. Read this more colorful life than any other economist of this century. book and learn why poorer is sicker and wealthier is health- Now he has the most comprehensive and perceptive biogra- ier. A wonderful story teller and brilliant thinker, phy ever written of an economist. His character does not Wildavsky in these rabbinical tutorials on modem foolish- come through as admirable and his economics may be ques- ness does much to explain the ongoing inquisition against tionable. But he was a total genius at making his ideas and technological and economic growth. prescriptions the standard thinking and policy for a genera- Essays on Economics and Economists, by Ronald Coase. tion after his death. This may be a warning to some and a This is the latest collection of essays by one of the few lesson to others. Nobel Prize economists whose work is actually relevant to George P. Shultz, Turmoil and Triumph: My Years as the real world. Coase’s style is delightful, saving his fiercest Secretary of State: This is an eye-opening account of what it jabs for “blackboard economics” and the central planner’s means to be a model secretary of state-trying to develop mentality. strategy, negotiating with foreign counterparts, coping with A Rebirth Values, by Frederick Turner. A series of of a constant firehose of information from every comer of the essays by an under-read author who dares suggest that world, contending with the White House and the mankind can actually be a positive force in an evolving Department of Defense, and managing a large bureaucracy. earth. The essay, “Towards a New Bioethics,” extolling I don’t know of any other picture of government in action at man as gardener rather than despoiler, is a much-needed its best that can match it. antidote to the Blame-Mankind Firsters who dominate the green agenda. Herbert Stein is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty, by Institute. a

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Lens Democracv by Thomas MaIlon J

or a century and a half the politi- politician on the mere chance that some- the days before zoom lenses) of capturing cian and the camera have been thing might happen. In 1910, William the crowds around him. Finvolved in a power struggle, Warnecke succeeded in capturing New Probably the best political pho- changes in technology shifting the York Mayor William J. Gaynor an tographs come out of election cam- advantage between one side and the instant after he had been shot; the blood paigns, when the candidates are desper- other. In the beginning, like anyone else pours down from his head and a young ate with self-importance and the voters who posed for Mathew Brady or man rushes wide-eyed to his aid. are jazzed by courtship. Riding through Alexander Gardner, statesmen had to The curators of “American Politicians: Elwood, Indiana, in August 1940, stand still and, even less character- Photographs from 1843 to 1993,”l which Wendell Willkie-surrounded by roar- istically, shut up for a moment or two. runs at New York‘s Museum of Modern ing faithful tipping their hats, and police Early presidential facial expressions run Art through January 3, have tried to keep motorcycles churning up dust-seems to impatience and bafflement, as their a balance between general historical sig- so mad with excitement that he can’t wearers struggle not to move: Martin nificance and important developments in have noticed how he’s just ridden past Van Buren leans on a book and John this particular genre of picture-taking. A the undertaker’s parlor. Six years later, Quincy Adams folds his hands, to steady viewer will find little of Franklin Congressman Joseph Martin is pho- them, one suspects, in his lap. General Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan, however tographed through the office window of Grant actually stands with his head much the camera loved each of these the Massachusetts paper he published, clamped between the tines of what looks titans, and a surprising amount of William as he listens to election returns over the like a giant tuning fork. Lincoln, unsur- McKinley, a dull-looking man whose telephone. So stunned does Martin seem prisingly, manages to defy convention photographers did an interesting job (in (he’s on his way to becoming Speaker even as he honors it. of the House), and so in charac- Photographed by Gardner in the ter everyone else around him, last months of his life, he adopts that a viewer wonders just how the conventional three-quarters spontaneous Allan Grant’s pic- profile staring into space, but his ture really was. A L$e photo of lips portray amusement over his John Kennedy from the same son, Tad, standing a foot or two year shows the congressional away. hopeful sitting beneath his own After the Civil War, the cam- poster, which looks as if it’s era’s increasing speed and porta- been designed to tout a film bility allowed the politician to instead of a candidacy. force it away from portraiture and When dealing with politicians, into witnessing the historical art photography is generally about moment. But even in 1862, as appealing as state-sponsored Gardner was shooting Lincoln painting. Edward Steichen’s and McClellan in a tent at Theodore Roosevelt, from 1908, Antietam, the two subjects look- is gauzily heroic, and the 1955 ing animated and intense, a map Nixon that Philippe Halsman or newspaper (it’s difficult to tell) caught for his pointless “jumping” discarded at the President’s feet, series does have a certain vice- and a Confederate flag folded up presidential irony to it (as well as on the dry ground. Soon the cam- era could even travel along with a An accompanying book, with the same title, carries a text by Susan Thomas Mallon’s latest book is Kismaric and is distributed by the novel Henry and Clara Harry N. Abrams, New York (208 (Ticknor & Fields). pp., $39.95).

48 The American Spectator December 1994 LICENSED TO UNZ.ORG ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED