(Part 2) Best ethnic & national biographies according to redditors
We found 2,473 Reddit comments discussing the best ethnic & national biographies. We ranked the 891 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the products ranked 21-40. You can also go back to the previous section.
> In fact, many former SS see themselves as victims of the Nazi regime who had little option beside follow orders (and maybe request transfer at their own peril). This is the critical problem with systematic, state sponsored murder...in many ways everyone is responsible and therefore legally its almost as if no one is responsible.
I thought exactly this. As a black man, my thoughts on Germans and Germany were and to a large extent still are fear. I'm not sure if I'd ever go simply because I don't know how I'd be perceived. Then I read Destined to Witness, the story of a biracial kid (White Mother, Black Father), growing up in Nazi fucking Germany. Holy shit that book was an eye-opener. What I took from it:
At least during early America when whites owned slaves you wouldn't be killed for deciding not to own them. During WWII, if you were a guard/soldier, I guess you had the option of either not following orders and being killed or participating in genocide. It truly is a fucked up position to be in if you think about it.
There is a lot more censorship than people are aware of. You can't actually discuss censorship on the internet with ease, at all. Reddit was 'co-opted' around 2011, when Aaron Swartz was constrained by the FBI and 'murdered' as his parents have put it.
Here is one simple video showing their support of Hillary Clinton.
However, it is much, much deeper. Eric Schmidt, the ABC CEO I believe (Google's newly formed parent company), is part of an ULTRA elite group called the Bilderbergs.
The Bilderbergs function as an international Senate, and operate under Swiss rules of order (no records, no recording, 100% code of silence). A little different from the 'transparent government' that most preach. All the same, it gets worse.
The Bilderberg Group was founded by Henry Kissinger. This is why Hillary 'mistakenly' praised Kissinger, he is a beloved Bilderberg (though he is despised by most American people). Now here is where it gets a little whacky. JFK was at odds with Kissinger, over his controversial tactics of: Political Assassination, Control of Public Media, and Poisoning population groups to create chaos and disorder. As such, JFK wanted groups like the Bilderberg shut down, along with a host of other 'open but secret' societies that influence and control government. Well as we all know, he was assassinated, and this group was not shut down.
Now what is so special about the Bilderberg Group, and what is their function? Well, for one thing they have the finances to book entire 4 or 5 star luxury hotels for a week at a time, without compensation (members only pay for travel, I think). In addition to renting out the entire hotel (and presumably bringing in their own staff) the Bilderberg also receive special permissions from whichever country they meet to use 'military style' law enforcement, regarding privacy and secrecy of their discussion. A level of enforcement normally reserved for things such as the Olympics, etc.
In addition, their topics (that they post) of discussion are a bit odd, such as US Elections. There are ~150 members, 2 from the US (2 per country, typically), and they, as a group, discuss what should happen in the US Election cycle.
Another topic of discussion was the rise of social media and the 'diversification of power', and thus began their censorship campaigns, and the death of Aaron Swartz (a Jew, who hated the push of false narratives by news media, people powered political activist). Aaron, for example, felt that the 'way out' was to ride around on bikes tossing out pamphlets, because he knew the internet was being censored.
All the same, Eric Schmidt is not only a big supporter of Hillary Clinton's but he is an important member of the Bilderbergs. Other members include the Presidents of a host of foreign nations, and other titans of industry (particularly steel manufacturing, banking, pharmacy, & media). Their role is pretty plain: If you can control industry, then you can control a country, and that through separating people by artificial borders, while working together as an international coalition, the group is able to out leverage Democratically supported governments, like that of the US, Canada, Brazil, or what have you. Eric Schmidt's role is to be one of the leaders in 'Google Censorship', and social media technology to push the agenda.
I hate to think, but Microsoft 10, and the rise of pervasive technology is likely part of the orchestration. Privacy is dead, or nearly, as it applies to computers connected to the internet.
To the deniers :D - Bilderberg - Swiss Holocaust - Torture - Black Death - Future of Jews in Switzerland - More History
Yes, OP definitely has some research to do.
You're referring to Hyenseo Lee - The Girl with Seven Names.
They literally have white glove inspections of every household to ensure there isn't dust collecting on the mandatory Leader pictures.
I don't really have any advice to give you but this may have:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Reason-Jump-Thirteen-Year-Old-Autism/dp/0812994868
They mentioned it on The Daily Show and it has recieved great reviews for dealing with autism.
Here's a video link to the interview. http://youtu.be/IKxiJ-kWve0
Presidents make $400,000 a year and pay no living expenses while serving. So, after tax times 8 years, that's about 2.36 million dollars. He's also got multiple... New York Times... best selling books. So, he's likely earned a few million dollars. No different than any other president in the past 50 years.
if anyone in the thread wants to read about more horrific instances of racism in the justice system and inmates thrown on death row without even being convicted, check out Bryan Stevenson's Just Mercy.
http://www.amazon.com/Immortal-Life-Henrietta-Lacks/dp/1400052173
I've helped contribute to that weight. Also, more than 2 tons of cells have been produced and her family hasn't seen a dime.
Believing in equality, and marching against Trump in a show of solidarity for those values, is the point - "achieving equality" happens through legislation and societal evolution. Kind of like how women had to march for suffrage, but the march didn't "achieve" suffrage. If you honestly don't understand the purpose of protest, I suggest you read "March: Book One", or "Freedom is a Constant Struggle".
For your second question: women are still paid less for the same job a man has (the discrepancy of which is even worse for women of color), women are still vastly outnumbered in positions of power (CEOs, World Leaders, etc.), and when they do find themselves in those positions, like Hillary Clinton, they are derided for everything from the pitch of their voice, to the clothes they wear, to their ability to overcome their "emotions".
And I swear to God, if you try to reply with some "but things are so much better!" line: things were also better for women after they won the vote, but it still took until 1993 for Marital Rape to be considered a crime in the U.S. "Progress" is not a road that just ends, where we all pat each-other on the back and look out at our utopia - because humans will always be imperfect, and there will always be something to improve.
Hopefully, this brings attention to the role that John Lewis played in the civil rights era.
I know of him, but I don't know as much as I should, so I ordered the graphic novel he made called March. Apparently it's very good.
Have you read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks? I quite enjoyed it.
https://smile.amazon.com/March-Trilogy-Slipcase-John-Lewis/dp/1603093958
Hey now. If we're going to be good people...
He was freed by the Equal Justice Initiative, a non-profit that provides free legal services to those who can't afford anything better than a public defender. The founder of EJI, Bryan Stevenson, has a book called Just Mercy, about his fight against the death penalty and against racism in the justice system. Read it, it's fascinating and horrifying, and I can't imagine anyone could walk away from that book and support the death penalty.
Japan did not try to surrender before the nukes dropped. Some third party proxies had gone out for some peace feeling but conditions were confusing for instance.
The Rising Sun talks about this, how even after the first atomic bomb was dropped, the Japanese Cabinet was divided on what conditions the surrender would happen under. The Soviet invasion of Manchuria (some cabinet ministers were hoping for a negotiation led by Stalin) and the second atomic bomb forced the Emperor to no longer stay above fray and he ordered the cabinet to surrender.
Some diehard Japanese war hawks actually attempted a palace coup afterwards but it was quashed. They were also attempting to find the Emperor's surrender broadcast but it was smuggled out by attendants if I remember correctly.
I'm not saying the US was innocent. Many civilians died in firebombings. I'm just saying your info is wrong on this bit.
A good read: Dr Carl Hart: High Price Regarding different drugs and their differences/similarties + an awesome biography of sorts.
By virtue of the fact that I'm on Reddit, you're obviously correct.
I recommend Losing Ground, Affirmative Action Around the World, and The Myth of the Robber Barons for an empirical, historical examination of what has caused poverty to decline in America, and what has caused it to increase.
I would suggest you read the March series by John Lewis for a graphic novel tutorial on the history of the American civil rights movement.
Are you aware that "BHO" had money before he ran for office? The Audacity of Hope made BHO and family lots of money. In addition to that, the constitution guarantees that BHO receives a salary for being the president of the US. It is a job, just like any other, and therefore that money is his to do with what he pleases.
You are correct, the ACA was not what BHO campaigned on, but which side of the aisle helped kill the key provisions, such as single-payer? It's not like he presented and passed the first draft of this bill by himself.
Finally....BHO? What a strange abbreviation. Do you abbreviate all public officials like that?
The Joke, you missed it.
Title: World Order - Kissinger
Summary: (goodreads): Henry Kissinger offers in World Order a deep meditation on the roots of international harmony and global disorder. Drawing on his experience as one of the foremost statesmen of the modern era—advising presidents, traveling the world, observing and shaping the central foreign policy events of recent decades—Kissinger now reveals his analysis of the ultimate challenge for the twenty-first century: how to build a shared international order in a world of divergent historical perspectives, violent conflict, proliferating technology, and ideological extremism.
Purchase Link: https://www.amazon.ca/World-Order-Henry-Kissinger/dp/1594206147
I just read this book a few weeks ago.
https://www.amazon.com/Auschwitz-Doctors-Eyewitness-Miklos-Nyiszli/dp/161145011X
About a doctor in Auschwitz who did autopsies.
read this book
https://www.amazon.com/Auschwitz-Doctors-Eyewitness-Miklos-Nyiszli/dp/161145011X
About a doctor in Auschwitz who did autopsies.
He did. You can count on it. The Girl With Seven Names is a powerful read. And her TED Talk.
You'll probably find this book interesting: Destined to Witness, Growing up Black in Nazi Germany, by Hans J. Massaquoi...
https://www.amazon.com/Destined-Witness-Growing-Black-Germany/dp/0060959614
The blurb: "This is a story of the unexpected.In Destined to Witness, Hans Massaquoi has crafted a beautifully rendered memoir -- an astonishing true tale of how he came of age as a black child in Nazi Germany. The son of a prominent African and a German nurse, Hans remained behind with his mother when Hitler came to power, due to concerns about his fragile health, after his father returned to Liberia. Like other German boys, Hans went to school; like other German boys, he swiftly fell under the Fuhrer's spell. So he was crushed to learn that, as a black child, he was ineligible for the Hitler Youth. His path to a secondary education and an eventual profession was blocked. He now lived in fear that, at any moment, he might hear the Gestapo banging on the door -- or Allied bombs falling on his home. Ironic,, moving, and deeply human, Massaquoi's account of this lonely struggle for survival brims with courage and intelligence."
It was a good read! And should answer most of your questions.
Read American Shaolin before you join the temple. It's a quick read about the quirks and realities of training at the current Shaolin temple in modern China.
People really need to understand this more. It is not like the people of DPRK are all hoping to get out and live "normal" lives. To them, they are normal and everyone else is strange. They have spent every day of their lives living one way and to just magically change it will not work. There is also quite a bit of prejudice towards NK folks from Chinese and South Koreans. They would not be too welcomed into society due to the gap in among other things, education.
A really good and easy read on life inside (and outside) of North Korea is The Girl With Seven Names. It follows a more middle class woman as she essentially accidentally escapes North Korea to see what life is like on the other side and then realizes she cannot go back due to the consequences for her and her family if she does. It is interesting since she was living a good life there as much as you can outside of Pyongyang and had no idea what the truth about her country was until she left.
Indeed. This one is mostly outright lies, but still...
http://www.amazon.com/The-Audacity-Hope-Thoughts-Reclaiming/dp/0307455874
Another good book that discusses this is Marjorie Shostak's book Nisa: The Life and Words of a !Kung Woman. In it Nisa describes a sexual openness. Since everyone in the family sleeps together they are exposed to sex at a young age and obviously want to learn more about it and to do this start exploring their own bodies and the bodies of their peers at a young age. It seemed as though although the adults tried to stop this, the attempts at stopping them were half-hearted as it was seen as something that all children do and must do in order to learn.
http://www.amazon.com/Infidel-Ayaan-Hirsi-Ali/dp/0743289684
So you're saying the state can't refuse service, but everyone else can.
Please please please read some history. Start with March, which is a comic book, and an easy read.
Auschwitz: A Doctor's Eyewitness Account https://www.amazon.com/dp/161145011X/ref=cm_sw_r_sms_api_fLYxxb9YMJCRX
The best and worst book I have ever read. It will answer all of your questions. This guy was Dr. Mengeles right hand man. Though he only did it to survive.
I don't rely on "paleo" evidence to determine appropriate human diets, but I do like reading it. I think the best application for it is learning about the environment that our basic systems evolved within. But the maximum you can conclude from the best paleo evidence is that whatever diet was consumed was sufficient for reproductive success under the conditions that existed at the time. The milieu of human evolution involved: a specific environment and climate (African savannah); a spectrum of foods eaten; a certain amount of exercise (lots, constantly); frequent parasitic infection and physical wounds that had to be survived; whatever microbiome we had then; food scarcity; complex cultural factors; and selection pressure to have many children and see them into adulthood, but not to live a long time.
Whatever we can conclude about diet applies only to that environment. If some of the variables change, uncertainty is introduced. A trait or strategy that was beneficial could become the opposite, or could be completely irrelevant. Thus, I prefer to look to human populations from the last 100 years. Not only do they live in an environment much more similar to mine, but we can actually gather accurate data on their dietary patterns and their health outcomes.
That said, I like this book for thoughts on dietary animal products and macronutrient ratios: The Paleoanthropology and Archaeology of Big-Game Hunting
A short paper as a reminder that all "just so stories" should be questioned, because even the most basic "paleo" hypothesis, the thrifty genotype, is contested: Evolutionary Perspectives on the Obesity Epidemic
This one is fascinating for social factors: Egalitarian Behavior and Reverse Dominance Hierarchy
And this one is just a great ethnology, especially for considering gender roles and what makes us happy: Nisa: The Life and Words of a !Kung Woman
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0674004329
I read this book about a tribe in Botswana. It's one of the more inhospitable places on the planet, yet the researchers found that they worked short hours. Their study inspired this paper http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_affluent_society which is a cornerstone of modern thought on foraging tribes.
If you haven't, please go read John Lewis's book series March. it's an incredible read, and has some information you wouldn't normally find in a conventional American history book.
> but not children's books because she is at an adult reading level.
It is great that she is precocious, but she is still a little girl. There are things you won't understand until after puberty and, besides, who doesn't like a good story?
Have her read A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L'Engle. It should be perfect for her and she will love it.
Also get her a copy of Kon Tiki by Thor Heyerdahl. One of the best adventure books ever written. It's a touch slow in the beginning, but once they get to sea you can't put the book down.
If you want to give her something a little bit on the mature adult side, The Universal Traveler is an extremely unique and interesting book. It is mature and adult in terms of abstract concepts. No sex or violence. Nothing offensive whatsoever. Not sure if it would interest her, but it's a terrific method for channeling creativity and working through processes. And much more. She might get more out of it at 14 or 15, but there is something useful inside for everyone. One of my favorite books.
I can't see it being a problem. Here's a Goodreads collection of cannibalism books if you need comps. Some appear to be YA.
For research purposes, I would recommend chapters in Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers (non-fiction). Contrary to popular belief, The Sex Lives of Cannibals doesn't contain cannibalism. It is hilarious South Pacific travel writing though.
Anyone interested in Vanuatu, I highly recommend reading Getting Stoned With Savages: A Trip Through the Islands of Fiji and Vanuatu by J. Maarten Troost
Here's a recommended book: Just Mercy
Read the book " The reason I Jump" and maybe look around at http://flappinessis.com/
Your husband needs to think differently. I say this with kindness.
Your child does this because he needs to, and because it makes him feel better. He needs it.
Yeah, let's keep these guys on a pedestal pretending they're so spiritual they don't care about money. Read American Shaolin: Flying Kicks, Buddhist Monks, and the Legend of Iron Crotch: An Odyssey in the New China. The author, Matthew Polly, trained at a Shaolin Temple in China in the early 1990s - and was charged a pretty hefty fee. Tourism and exhibitions were a huge part of what the temple did on a daily basis. The young guys who Polly was training with all wanted to become kung fu movie stars or immigrate to the US and start their own schools to escape the poverty and deprivation they were living in.
There is also an irrefutable proof of why their arts are unsuited to MMA. Even if you accept the idea that Shaolin monks are too spiritual to fight, if their arts were effective in that context someone would undertake to study them to get an advantage in MMA, one of the fastest growing sports in the world. Just to put this into context, UFC light-heavyweight champ Jon Jones began training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu at Gracie Barra maybe 1.5 years ago - as a white belt. Here's a guy who has submitted Rampage Jackson, Lyoto Machida, and Vitor Belfort, but still feels like he can improve his game taking BJJ classes. Who out there is training Shaolin Kung Fu?
It was Tuesday the 9th, which would likely be Henry Kissinger's 'World Order'.
http://www.amazon.ca/World-Order-Henry-Kissinger/dp/1594206147
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/hillary-clinton-reviews-henry-kissingers-world-order/2014/09/04/b280c654-31ea-11e4-8f02-03c644b2d7d0_story.html
While not war related, March has a lot of historical context. It details the civil rights movement told through the perspective of Civil Rights leader John Lewis. Great comic, highly recommend.
Ooh! I used to love reading new things that teachers left out for us when we finished tests early or whatever. I don't know what kind of reading you typically arrange, but can I suggest bringing some comics? Even when the subjects aren't distinctly for teens, the medium can be a good way to introduce new topics and characters that they typically wouldn't pick up (kind of like your "ooh, Teen Vogue -- just kidding, it's also political news" plan).
Off the top of my head, I can recommend March, which is about John Lewis and the civil rights movement; Ms. Marvel, who is a young Muslim American superhero; American Born Chinese, which is a really well done coming-of-age story. Just something to consider if you ever want new things to bring in for teens.
The men on the Kon Tiki drank turtle blood IIRC. I do know the author said there was plenty of fish and plankton to be eaten simply by skimming the water with mesh pantyhose.
But seriously, this book is really good.
The only reason this is a dilemma to some people is because of the myth that the Japanese wouldn't have surrendered. They were on the brink of doing just that, trying to negotiate through Russia, when it all went down. Read Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, 1936-1945 for more.
I think that's John Lewis, not Elijah Cummings - https://www.amazon.com/March-Trilogy-Slipcase-John-Lewis/dp/1603093958/ref=mp_s_a_1_2?keywords=Elijah+Cummings&qid=1571322512&sr=8-2
Check out this book by Miklos Nyiszli. He was a Hungarian Jew taken to Auschwitz and made to work for Joseph Mengele. His work was a major source in my undergrad capstone research and details many duties of the Sonderkommando. It's an excellent read!
www.amazon.com/Auschwitz-A-Doctors-Eyewitness-Account/dp/161145011X/ref=la_B001K8O94Y_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1342001947&sr=1-1
Auschwitz: A Doctor's Eyewitness Account has been one of my favorite memoirs about Auschwitz. The doctor is spared in order to help Mengele.
I know your comment was sarcastic, but there is a really interesting book about a little black kid who grew up during the WWII under Hitler . It's a truly fascinating perspective.
http://www.amazon.com/Audacity-Hope-Thoughts-Reclaiming-American/dp/0307455874/ref=la_B001H6OA8E_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1451867248&sr=1-3
Nisa: Life and Words of an !Kung Woman.
These two ethnographies are easy/pleasant reads, frequently used in undergraduate courses:
Ethnographies written almost solely for the purpose of introducing hunter-gatherer societies to college freshmen/sophomores include ...
These teaching ethnographies have been around for decades, so while they don't reflect current scholarship, it should be possible to pick them all up for a couple of bucks each, and I think you'd get a lot out of browsing them that's lost in comparative work.
I recently finished The Sex Lives of Cannibals by J. Maarten Troost. I found it to be an immensely fun read. It's a travelogue that gives great perspectives on the history Western influence on South Pacific nations and the sociology of modern island nations.
Demult. Iti recomand o carte.
you mean this book didn't cover everything?
You need to read up on your history a little better. I recommend this book, but this is a really good book on Leyte itself.
If you had to pick one campaign that probably did the most damage to the Japanese it was the submarine campaign against their merchant shipping. But when you realize that the Japanese Empire had attacked both Alaska and Australia and everything in between, one campaign wasn't going to do it. There were numerous important fights and saying it all came down to Nimitz's central campaign (Nimitz was in Hawaii the whole time, how come Spruance and Halsey never get the credit?) is overly simplifying things to a ridiculous degree.
Dividing the Pacific into two theaters actually prevented the Japanese from regaining the initiative and some of the most significant battles were fought in the South Pacific theater. Coral Sea, Guadalcanal, Hollandia? Remember that the oil and rubber and metals the Japanese needed were all in the South Pacific.
Also I think you have Roosevelt confused with Truman. MacArthur and Roosevelt, by all accounts, had a decent relationship, strained at times, but certainly guided by a mutual respect. Roosevelt, by all accounts, never considered dismissing MacArthur, who was a diva, but also an incredibly brilliant general who managed to conquer more territory with fewer losses than any military commander in history short of Genghis Kahn. Remember that only a few months after Leyte, Roosevelt placed MacArthur as theater commander over the entire Pacific. Roosevelt didn't lack balls and he certainly didn't lack the political power.
And the Philippines was certainly necessary to the defeat of Japan because it was US territory. The US needed fighter bases and the decision came down to the Philippines or Formosa. As strong resistance was expected on Formosa, Roosevelt, Nimitz and MacArthur all agreed at their Hawaiian conference to make the Philippines the next strategic goal. Of course the battle was necessary because the Japanese showed up with two huge fleets including Ozawa's and Kurita's forces. Our goal was to put those ships on the bottom of the ocean and you kind of need a battle to do that.
> I don't think he ( /u/bg1256 ) was referring to the actual crime a person ends up pleading guilty to or is convicted of. I read it as a reference to a person who is willing to deliberately kill someone with premeditation and malice aforethought ... what should always be first degree murder as the initial charge. Granted that charge may be reduced later.
I agree with you, but in practice we cannot ever sentence someone to life in prison without working their case through the limitations and inherent biases of the criminal justice system.
> As it happens, Adnan was convicted of first degree murder in spite of seemingly having a good support structure and a decent attorney
We'll never agree on this case, barring some game-changing revelation, so I'm not going to comment here.
Edit: I will just comment that, my opinions concerning murderers have changed to some extent on reading this book. There is some wrongful conviction stuff there, but I found the stuff on the actually guilty to be more impactful.
I just heard back about the exciting job I interviewed for a few months ago. I didn't get it, but found out it was a close race and a splinter skill was the difference between multiple people getting it.
I've been reading more recently: Just Mercy, which I highly reccomend; Twelve-by-Twelve; Tribe; A Renegade History of the US; and At Risk Youth.
I know I still need to compile and post about the Social Skills course I took last month, and I will, I've just been busy with school, work, and life.
Have you read The Reason I Jump by Naoki Higashida and, if so, do you feel that it acurately portrays childhood as an autistic person?
What do you find most challenging in interacting with "normal" or very low spectrum people? What can we do to help make these interactions easier for people like you?
If she was just diagnosed, I'm thinking it's probably more likely that she's high-functioning since you probably would've noticed earlier on if she was low-functioning. And the fact that she doesn't resist affection is a really wonderful sign! My brother wasn't very affectionate when he was her age but he did have some of those same behaviours - not responding to commands, self-focused etc. The word Autism itself comes from 'auto', so naturally a huge component of Autism is a focus on oneself rather than others which makes for more difficulties in social situations. Like I said, our situations are very different because my brother is 3 years older than me but going back to my 5 year old mindset, how I managed to communicate with my brother was through his common interest which is music. He'd play piano and I'd sit with him, we'd talk about our favourite artists etc. Since your sister is still pretty young, it might be difficult to establish a common interest right now but my advice would be interest yourself in whatever she finds interesting, getting her to talk about what she's doing, what she likes. And I hope that as she gets older, she's put in 'typical' child environments so that she doesn't miss out. I'm really happy to say that my brother had a lot of support when he was younger and now he's 23 and extremely well-adjusted and living in his own apartment and has a job that he loves. I wish I could offer you some reference books or something but all of the ones that I read were for younger siblings of Autistic children. If you're interested though here are a few that helped me:
Freaks, Geeks & Asperger Syndrome <-- it's about Aspergers but a lot of the characteristics are similar and more importantly, it provides a lot of information for siblings
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime <-- fictional but takes place completely inside the mind of an Autistic person! And it's an amazing read!
The Reason I Jump
> The reason money is so important is because they do need people's votes.
And that is why both parties ultimately work for the same people. The rich. Because they need their money.
> He got in because tons of idiots wanted to have a beer with him.
It's actually quite a bit more sophisticated and sinister than that. Politicians get people to vote for them by creating in the minds of their target audience something like a personal connection - an identification. Bush excelled at doing this with the Republican base. Obama excels at doing it with the Democratic base. That is the purpose that things like books, websites named "myBarackObama.org", and the marketing campaigns fulfill.
So in the same way that Conservatives looked at Bush, and thought he was a good guy, down to earth, homey, unpretentious in that aw-shucks way middle America likes so much (basically all those things that presses that demographics' subconscious buttons) Liberals looked at Obama, at his life-story narrative, his cool, calm, rational demeanor, abundantly apparent intelligence and eloquence, and that just pressed all their buttons the right way. And this is why despite all the evidence to the contrary, they persist in thinking he somehow means well, is trying to do good, is trying to help the little people, etc. etc. Even though in reality he's just like Bush. Just a guy who wanted to get his ass into office, and to get there he cut deals w/ the establishment and basically sold out, and now that he's in office he's basically doing what the powerful, the rich, the interest groups that really call the shots in the country, want done.
> You mean cutting taxes on the rich while initiating a massive ground war
Both of which Obama continued. The Iraq withdrawal btw was plans drawn up during BushCo.
> undermining dictators through NATO actions with no boots on the ground
Aka starting yet another War for Oil. The US simply doesn't care about dictators, as long as they're "our bastards." Only if they have something we want, or are completely uncooperative in our scheme to militarily dominate and control their part of the world, do we demonize them and seek to regime change them.
So in fact, the proper way to assess Obama is that he continued all of Bush's wars, tried to complete the task of finishing the conquest and pacifying them, and even started new ones of his own.
> raising taxes on the upper class
He's just posturing for re-election purposes. He's not serious about it.
http://www.ianwelsh.net/tax-increases-on-the-rich/
>And where are you getting this cocaine stuff?
Dreams From My Father, By Barack Obama.
"I had learned not to care. I blew a few smoke rings, remembering those years. Pot had helped, and booze; maybe a little blow when you could afford it."
Apparently this was talked about so much that you didn't even know he admitted to cocaine use in his memoir...but let's keep talking about how big of a deal Romney's prank should be.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zrp-v2tHaDo
ETA: https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1400082773/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1479704078&amp;sr=8-1&amp;pi=AC_SX236_SY340_QL65&amp;keywords=obama+dreams+from+my+father
Right now, I don't see a viable alternative. I'd say I fall into a small void between the Liberals and Conservatives, but if the election was called tomorrow, I'd be voting Conservative.
There are a number of issues with the CPC, which I've enumerated previously. But currently they best represent me.
It's got John Lewis in is sit-in comeback tour!
Seriously though, read March. It's harrowing and inspiring and the art is pretty solid.
In the UK, John Lewis is a major department store chain.
In the US, John Lewis is a Civil Rights icon who marched with MLK and was arrested over 40 times for peaceful protests. He also authored a NYT bestselling graphic novel and as a Congressman led the recent House sit-ins.
Both are cool. But I like our John Lewis better.
I think part of it is that is a copy (that seems to be one) printed by Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum. I'd think that if you're going to the Auschwitz Memorial/Museum and picking up a copy, not a lot of people are going to sell them?
This translation is easier to get a hold of.
My intuition tells me you are either a troll, or someone who is ignorant on the subject of drugs in modern society. I recommended the book "High Price" by pharmacologist Dr. Carl Hart.
*link: http://www.amazon.com/High-Price-Neuroscientists-Self-Discovery-Challenges-ebook/dp/B009NF75MY
The Girl with Seven Names. Just read it entirely. It's a truly incredible story that really humanizes the North Korean people and their struggles.
I typically don't read. However my girlfriend gave me The Girl With Seven Names to read while we were traveling for vacation and it was absolutely enthralling.
I can't recommend it enough. It's an autobiography but the author's life is more akin to a riveting adventure movie. If you're interested the author gave one of the most viewed Ted Talks that is a super short version of her book.
I've heard only very little about this but, I heard that being black in Nazi Germany wasn't that big of a deal. A fellow wrote a book about being a black child in Germany there: http://www.amazon.com/Destined-Witness-Growing-Black-Germany/dp/0060959614
https://www.amazon.com/Destined-Witness-Growing-Black-Germany/dp/0060959614
Here you go, bud
I would highly recommend the book! It's absolutely amazing. Additionally, if you dig it, check out Fatu Hiva, in which Thor Heyerdahl comes up with the inspiration for the Kon-Tiki expedition.
Which book is it, this one? http://www.amazon.com/Kon-Tiki-Across-Pacific-Thor-Heyerdahl/dp/0671726528
Nisa is very memorable.
Ultimately, it all boils down to the existence of god(s). If they can show that one exists, fine; if not; there's your answer.
As far as developing a deeper understanding of Islam itself, for a start try Ayaan Hirsi Ali's book "Infidel"... http://www.amazon.com/Infidel-Ayaan-Hirsi-Ali/dp/0743289684
There's always the web... http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/
Good luck...
I am surprised that no one has mentioned the book Infidel, by Ayaan Hirsi Ali. It may only be one person's account, but it really affected my views on Islam, especially the treatment of women.
http://www.amazon.com/Infidel-Ayaan-Hirsi-Ali/dp/0743289684
In lieu of actually going to those places, I found two books which describe Kiribati and Vanuatu from a Western perspective. If you're interested in the area please read The Sex Lives Of Cannibals, and Getting Stoned With Savages. Although I prefer the latter, they're both great books and give an interesting perspective on the region.
How about on the sea?
Pirates! by Celia Rees is historical fiction about two girls who run away from a sugar plantation to be privateers.
In the nonfiction department, The Sex Lives of Cannibals and Getting Stoned with Savages by J. Maarten Troost are humorous travelogues about expat beach living in Kiribati, Fiji and Vanuatu.
Damnit.. it's completely vile, and I'm loathe to admit it, but when it comes to internationally iconic songs [La Macarena]() should be on or near the top of the list.
Seriously, cassette tapes of that piece of shit actually made it to Kiribati in around 2003. For years that song by itself was the entire music scene of that tiny island nation. Most of those people didn't even have a radio, but they could sing along to that song if it was played.
I refuse to link it out of protest.
Edit: Source: The Sex Lives of Cannibals
Unfortunately I can't seem to find that, however it did lead me to The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire. Does anyone know if this is a good book on the topic?
I don't have a complete answer, but there was one very notable example of an american stuck in Japan at the outbreak of war: Iva Toguri, better known as "Tokyo Rose."
Poor woman was visiting family in Japan when war broke out. After refusing to renounce her American citizenship, she was essentially forced to perform as a proganda broadcaster. Throughout the war, she refused to read any script that she considered anti-american, and after the war, the DoJ declared her radio work "innocuous." Nevertheless, she was tried for treason and served several years in prison after the war.
Source: Rising Sun: the Decline and fall of the Japanese empire.
> such as as copyright
I was sympathetic up to this point, but now I'm mentally pigeonholing this as upper-middle-class whining. However, I continue to recommend Just Mercy to the attention of anyone else who wanders in to the thread (I hear that The New Jim Crow is also well worth reading, but I have not gotten around to that one yet.)
It's been this way for years. There are entire books written on the subject, as well as TED talks.
https://www.amazon.com/Just-Mercy-Story-Justice-Redemption/dp/081298496X
https://www.ted.com/talks/bryan_stevenson_we_need_to_talk_about_an_injustice
It was included as a statistic in Bryan Stevenson's book Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption which I had to read last semester. It really gets into black culture and the rise of police in their neighborhood.
I just finished Why I jump. The author is a non-verbal autistic boy and he does a good job explaining some of the behaviors associated with autism and what his inner state is like. It's also really short, only took me around two hours, and written in a very clear Q&A format.
http://www.amazon.ca/The-Immortal-Life-Henrietta-Lacks/dp/1400052173
Great book about her life. Emphatic recommendation.
Yeah, it's much bigger than circumcision:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Immortal-Life-Henrietta-Lacks/dp/1400052173
Immortal cells already exist, i.e. HeLa cells.
> One biologist, Leigh Van Valen, has written that Lacks' cancer cells have evolved into a self-replicating, single-cell life-form and has proposed HeLa cells be given the new species name of Helacyton gartleri. The cells are a genetic chimera of human papillomavirus 18 (HPV18) and human cervical cells and now have a distinct, stable, non-human chromosome number. His 1991 suggestion has not been followed, nor, indeed, been widely noted. With near unanimity, evolutionary scientists and biologists hold that a chimeric human cell line is not a distinct species, and that tumorigenesis is not an evolutionary process.
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks - Rebecca Skloot
I loved Dreams from My Father and [The Color of Water] (http://www.amazon.com/Color-Water-Tribute-Mother-Anniverary/dp/159448192X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1417378244&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=the+color+of+water), and they're relatively recent.
There are reasons some books become classics though - you should check out [Voices in the Mirror] (http://www.amazon.com/Voices-Mirror-Autobiography-Gordon-Parks/dp/0385266987/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1417378538&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=gordon+parks+autobiography), [Black Boy] (http://www.amazon.com/Black-Boy-Record-Childhood-Youth/dp/0061130249/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1417378427&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=black+boy), [Invisible Man] (http://www.amazon.com/Invisible-Man-Ralph-Ellison/dp/0679732764/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1417378361&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=invisible+man), and [Black Like Me] (http://www.amazon.com/Black-Like-John-Howard-Griffin/dp/0451234219/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1417378875&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=black+like+me) for instance
And here is a link to his autobiography, that he personally wrote, in which he personally lays out the fact that he's not black.
https://www.amazon.com/Dreams-My-Father-Story-Inheritance/dp/1400082773/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1503411518&amp;sr=8-7&amp;keywords=Obama
Have you ever read American Shaolin, and if so, what were your thoughts on it? Did it influence your decision to make the trip?
One of the bits I liked was when a rival school challenged the kids school to a contest between their best students. The master sent the American to fight, not because he was the best (he wasn't). He just wanted to make the point that his style/school was so good that even a foreigner would win.
> I don't like the term NWO either.
George Bush Sr. does.
So does Henry Kissinger.
For me, it's really just wanting to be able to change the world and impose what I believe to be logically sound on others. My love of politics stems from my love of history.
In the words of Dennis Van Roekel, "For anyone who cares about the direction of the country, engagement in the political process should be a lifetime commitment." In other words, you should ALWAYS vote. Many people never take any action because they believe their voice is so minuscule that it will not matter.
Here are some books I'd recommend if you really are wanting to start up.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Righteous-Mind-Politics-Religion/dp/0307455777
http://www.amazon.com/World-Order-Henry-Kissinger/dp/1594206147
> ο Bullman επικεντρώνεται σε πολιτικές [...] πρόοδος είχε γίνει επί Δημοκρατικού Κόμματος
Αυτό είναι και το πρόβλημα όμως. Η ρητορική έχει σημασία. Γιατί ο κόσμος - ειδικά όταν μιλάμε για λαϊκιστικό όχλο - παρασύρεται και χειραγωγείτε. Όταν ο σοσιαλδημοκράτης ανοίγει συμβολικά όπως λες το πράσινο φως στο Μεσόγειο αυτό δείχνει και προθέσεις και κατεύθυνση. Ο Γάλλος πολίτης θα σου πει "αυτή είναι η κατεύθυνση που θες; Ακόμα και να τους περιορίσεις πρακτικά μου ηθικά μου λες να ανοίξουμε την πόρτα; Εγώ την θέλω κλειστή. Le Pen."
> Παρόλα αυτά, στην πολιτική παίζει πάντα ρόλο το φαίνεσθαι, και δέχομαι ότι μερικές δηλώσεις τορπιλίζουν τον πολιτικό διάλογο.
Ακριβώς αυτό.
> Δεν σημαίνει ότι δεν πατάνε πάνω σε υπαρκτά προβλήματα, όμως το ότι είναι αυτοί που είναι στην καλύτερη θέση να εκμεταλλευτούν την κατάσταση πολιτικά
Οπότε η λύση ποια είναι; Λύνουμε τα προβλήματα και έτσι στερούμε το πάτημα στη Ρωσία. Χωρίς αυτά τα προβλήματα τι θα σου πει η Ρωσία; "Η ΕΕ είναι του Σατανά"; Όταν η ΕΕ αρχίσει να αντιμετωπίζει αυτά τα προβλήματα οι ίδιοι οι Ευρωπαίοι - ακόμα και οι ακροδεξιοί - θα την δουν ως όχημα. Γιατί θα απαντά στα ερωτήματα τους. Θα συμβάλει θετικά στις ζωές τους. Δεν θα τους κουνάει το δάχτυλο όπως κάνει τώρα και θα τους λέει "τα προβλήματα σας δεν υπάρχουν. Ελάτε να συζητήσουμε για τον κατώτατο μισθό". Ξέρεις που τον έχουν γραμμένο τον κατώτατο μισθό για παράδειγμα οι Σουηδοί όταν οι κόρες τους κυκλοφορούν έξω και ταυτόχρονα υπάρχει και αυτό το στατιστικό.
> ο Τραμπ θα έπρεπε να είχε φύγει χθες, αποτελεί υπαρξιακή απειλή για την αμερικανική ηγεμονία. Δεν πρόκειται τόσο περί υστερίας όσο περί βάσιμου πανικού
Το Αμερικανικό σύστημα είναι έτσι δομημένο ώστε ο Πρόεδρος να μην μπορεί να ξεφύγει ηγεμονικά. Για παράδειγμα ο Πρόεδρος της Γαλλίας έχει πολύ περισσότερες εξουσίες στη χώρα τους απ' ότι ο Αμερικανός Πρόεδρος στις ΗΠΑ. Αν κάνεις τον διαχωρισμό μεταξύ του φαίνεσθαι και του είναι όπως είπες πριν θα δεις ότι ο Trump κάνει πράγματα συμβατικά με αυτά που έκαναν Πρόεδροι πριν από αυτών. Αλλά όπως είπα και εγώ πριν η ρητορική μετράει. Και δυστυχώς η ρητορική του είναι κατώτερη των περιστάσεων. Θα φύγει και αυτός όταν έρθει η σειρά του. Και χαίρομαι που οι Δημοκρατικοί επιτέλους κατεβάζουν και μερικά σοβαρά πρόσωπα το 2020 όπως ο Buttigied. Αλλά μέχρι να φύγει ο Trump δεν χρειάζεται να τρελαθούμε.
> Οι ΗΠΑ έχουν διαφοροποιηθεί σημαντικά από τους ευρωπαίους τους εταίρους, στο εμπόριο και στην ελευθερία εμπορίου
Οι Ευρωπαίοι έχουν ελεύθερο εμπόριο στο εσωτερικό της ΕΕ αλλά σε παγκόσμιο επίπεδο καταφεύγουν σε προστατευτικές πρακτικές. Όπως κάθε χώρα άλλωστε στο ένα ή στο άλλο επίπεδο. Και οι ΗΠΑ έχουν και μια δικαιολογία παραπάνω για τον προστατευτισμό και αυτήν είναι η γεωπολιτική διαμάχη με την Κίνα. Η εξαιρετική σειρά ντοκιμαντέρ Frontline που βγάζει το PBS νομίζω πρόσφατα έκανε ένα επεισόδιο γι' αυτό αν ενδιαφέρεσαι.
> έναν ηγέτη ο οποίος ουκ ολίγες φορές έχει αμφισβητήσει την σημασία του ΝΑΤΟ
Ο Νορβηγός γενικός γραμματέας του ΝΑΤΟ έχει ευχαριστήσει πολλές φορές των Trump για τον τρόπο με τον οποίο χειρίζεται το ΝΑΤΟ. Κυρίως γιατί ενισχύει το ΝΑΤΟ στην Ευρώπη καθώς και τις δαπάνες πολλών χωρών που απλά καβαλούσαν το κύμα χωρίς να πληρώνουν. Φαίνεσθαι και είναι που λέγαμε.
> πλέον αμφισβητούν συμφωνίες που οι ίδιοι διαπραγματεύτηκαν και συνυπέγραψαν, συμφωνίες οι οποίες είναι υπέρ ευρωπαϊκών συμφερόντων, συμφωνίες σαν την Συνθήκη του Παρισιού για την Κλιματική Αλλαγή σε πιο "ανύποπτο" επίπεδο, και σαν αυτήν του Ιράν τώρα.
Η Συνθήκη του Παρισίου όντως κακό να φύγει. Η Συμφωνία στο Ιράν καλά έκανε και έφυγε. Σε παραπέμπω σε αυτό το βιβλίο του Henry Kissinger. Έχει ένα κεφάλαιο για το Ιράν που δείχνει ότι είναι ένα καθεστώς που όχι απλά δεν τηρεί τις συμφωνίες αλλά είναι θρησκευτικά φανατισμένο και ταγμένο στην καταστροφή των απίστων.
> Πλέον οι ΗΠΑ αποχωρούν από συμφωνίες ελεύθερου εμπορίου και αμφισβητούν θεσμούς σαν τον ΠΟΕ, και βασικά στοιχεία του multilateralism.
Οι ΗΠΑ ποτέ δεν ήταν multilateral. Προσπερνάν ακόμα και τον ΟΗΕ αν χρειαστεί για να δράσουν όπως νομίζουν (βλέπε Κόσοβο). Καμία ηγεμονική χώρα δεν είναι ποτέ multilateral.
> Ξεκαθαρίζω ότι είμαι, και εγώ, ευρωπαϊστής και ατλαντιστής: όμως το Περόν μοντέλο δεν είναι βιωσιμο(εδώ αν καταλαβαίνω καλά συμφωνούμε σχεδόν όλοι) και οι δράσεις των ΗΠΑ δεν φαίνονται να είναι βοηθητικές για μια θετική επίλυση του προβλήματος αυτού.
Και εγώ Ευρωπαϊστής. Και εγώ Ατλαντιστής. Και συμφωνώ ότι το παρών μοντέλο δε δουλεύει. Αλλά εγώ πιστεύω η πηγή του κακού είναι στην Ευρώπη και όχι στις δράσεις των ΗΠΑ. Οι ΗΠΑ κάνουν ότι πάντα έκαναν.
March is a badass trilogy of graphic novels about John Lewis struggle for human rights. https://www.amazon.com/March-Book-One-John-Lewis/dp/1603093001/ref=nodl_#productDescription_secondary_view_div_1537048099015
How about March?
You should really follow the example of one of my personal favorite neuroscientists, Dr. Carl Hart, who has dedicated his life to eliminating many of the myths regarding drugs so we can better formulate rational policy that treats the mental health issues (substance abuse).
I recommend his memoir, High Price: A Neuroscientist's Journey of Self-Discovery That Challenges Everything You Know About Drugs and Society, in addition to his Google talk and his Reason TV talk which both go over many of the main points of his book and general research into neuropharmacology insofar as debunking myths about the propensity to addiction with these drugs and the need for universal decriminalization and formulation of separate tracks for substance abusers and casual users (most of the using population).
I think that was a paraphrase, but the quotes they do attribute to Thune are really in line with that philosophy. This is, BTW, contrary to what I understand is the best guidance from the medical community and from drug researchers.
I suppose this is a time to mention that Dr. Carl Hart's book High Price was pretty fucking life changing for me.
Obviously, to those that have read it, much of it is still about African American society and Dr. Hart trying to find his place within it as well as outside of it as he was growing up, but the way he speaks about it is still pretty universal. Most importantly though, and the part of the book that was very eye-opening for me was his writings on drugs, addiction in general and our policies on those topics.
His Ted talk is fucking amazing.
I have a keen interest in the Koreas so I've read many books. You should check out yeonmi park - in order to live and Hyeonso Lee - The girl with seven names
I can't believe no one has mentioned this.
There is is a very famous black German, who unfortunately recently died named:
Hans-Jüren Massaquoi, he grew up in Nazi Germany and even wanted to join the HJ Hitlerjugend and the Wehrmacht later on, he was rejected.
This is him:
Hans J. Massaquoi
And this is his book:
Destined To Witness
I can really recommend it with all my heart, if you're into history and maybe a different view on life and that time. It's highly addictive and one of the best books I have read.
>rural Germany didn't have blacks or asians back then
DO I have a book for you. I read this a couple years ago. It's about a black kid who was in Nazi Youth. (click the link to see a fascinating photo) His dad was an African businessman who worked with Germany on metals and other natural resources. This boy died in Los Angeles a few years ago and an article was printed in the LA Times which made me aware and prompted me to check the book out of the library. Great book.
Growing Up Black in Nazi Germany - Amazon.com
It's more historical than what you may be looking for, but Nixon in China is a really interesting look at what is, probably, Nixon's greatest achievement as president.
Also Obama's The Audacity of Hope is great, but not as well-regarded as his previous work Dreams from my Father.
> Chutzpah is a bad thing to have
In America, 'Audacity' is a positive trait. For good or bad.
Yep. People who put their face on the cover of their book with some awe inspiring title are douchebags... oh, nevermind
Not sure your budget...these might help:
http://amzn.com/B003YMNFHQ
http://amzn.com/B0029LHWFO
http://amzn.com/037583527X
http://amzn.com/0307455874
I apologize for taking so long to respond, I have 3 very young children which makes a long and thoughtful response sometimes impossible for many reasons, I'm sure you can understand.
I think we can both agree, this discussion may have reached it's limits through an internet discussion, as the topic has widened and lost focus. As to the failure that is the Great Society's War on Poverty, broadly we can view it in the same failure as the governments War on Terror, Drugs, illiteracy, hunger, or any other Strawmen it can conjure, in that it ends up causing more of the very thing it purports to end. Specifically relating to poverty however is quite complex, where over time we re-define terms and statistics, economic conditions fluctuate, and not to mention outside unintended consequences such as increased babies born out of wed lock, single parent families, etc,.... In short, it would take a book to prove to you my case, and I am not willing to do it. Luckily, others have. But in short I'll paraphrase Tom Woods who puts it plainly "The poverty rate in the United States fell from 95 percent in 1900 to around 12-14 percent in the late 1960s – a period in which government antipoverty measures were fairly trivial. By the late 1960s, when Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty programs began receiving substantial funding, the poverty rate stagnated. By 1994 it was about the same as it had been in the late 1960s, even though the federal government was by that time spending four times as much per capita as it had under LBJ." In 2009 the AP reported poverty as having the single largest year increase in the rate since the govt began keeping records in '59. Now, like I said, economic conditions conflate the issue, but the fact remains, and it doesn't show the efforts of the govt war on poverty to be a resounding success now does it?
I'll politely bow out at this point, if only because at some point these discussions become pointless as we Redditors love to argue and yet rarely budge on our positions. I'll will say that it is my opinion that it's precisely your worldview being the majority that we have such a disparity between the top 2% and the rest of us. The government has been trying to socially engineer this country and regulate and control the market for many many decades now, and all we've gotten is bigger government and bigger corporations. I'm for freedom and trying something different for a change, and it shouldn't be that scary.
Edit: Meant to say that I wish we could discuss this further over a beer or six, cheers!
Two points. One, a moral premise; the other, an empirical observation.
It follows from these two points that the welfare state is immoral. If you want to deny this conclusion, you have to deny one of the premises (the first being a moral principle, the second being an empirical matter.) But both of the premises seem fairly plausible to me.
> History does not show that free enterprise outstrips the government. History shows that people with power take advantage of those without.
In fact without free enterprise there could be no socialistic government. The government creates nothing at all, it can only take the productive capacity of individuals to fund its projects. Capitalism has provided more wealth and a higher standard of living for more people in the world than any other economic system.
The people in power that you speak of who take advantage of those without are those in government. It is less obvious, but no less true in america, but it is more obvious when you look at dictatorships around the world. The US is continually moving in that direction, it is your government you need to be most wary of.
> The property is not taken by force.
It is absolutely taken by force. You can't assume that I agree to what you call a social contract. Individuals make individual decisions, you can't say we all agree to give up our property simply because you feel most people do or should. The only reason that most people give tax money to the government is exactly because you will land up in prison if you don't.
> We're a society, and pretending like we're not and that we shouldn't pitch in to help other members of our society is backwards.
Thinking that the only or best way to help our friends and neighbours is through giving money to the government is backwards. http://www.amazon.com/Losing-Ground-American-1950-1980-Anniversary/dp/0465042333
I am stunned that you claim the only way that America got to where it is was through social assistance. My good god, that is as backwards as you can get. The only reason there is any capacity to provide welfare is because of productive individuals who earn wealth in your country. Welfare is not a tool for economic growth.
> Without public education, not everyone would be able to get a minimum level of education.
Private coalitions, charity schools, faith based schools and voluntary tutoring and home schooling are all alternatives to a public education. You can't pretend a public school education is free. It is not free, it is more expensive than it is worth and it is a forced version of charity... not freely given and unaccountable in its outcomes. If you think it is a good system that is worth keeping then you're not looking at it with a mind that asks about what could be better.
I don't think it's as simple as that, but reforming welfare laws to what they were pre-LBJ would be a good start. Charles Murrary's Losing Ground is a good introduction into what disincentives became entrenched during the "Great Society."
Amazon Book Link: https://www.amazon.com/Kon-Tiki-Across-Pacific-Thor-Heyerdahl/dp/0671726528/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1519669788&amp;sr=1-1-fkmr0&amp;keywords=kon-tiki%3A+across+the+pacific+by+rift
Amazon Movie Link: https://www.amazon.com/Kon-Tiki-P%C3%A5l-Sverre-Hagen/dp/B00EBGUPMC/ref=sr_1_cc_1?s=aps&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1519670255&amp;sr=1-1-catcorr&amp;keywords=Kon-Tiki+movie
Godforsaken Sea - About the Vendee globe race of '96-97
Close to the wind - The same race as above, but from the perspective of Pete Goss
Kon Tiki - Slightly different subject, but similiar period and feeling to the two you mentioned.
There's a great book about Heyerdahl's crossing, written by Thor himself. It's AWESOME. I read it when I was about 10, and have have wanted to make a raft like that one ever since.
Heyerdahls book Kon-Tiki used to be required reading in the Canadian education system. Not sure if it still is or not. If not, that's too bad, it's a great read for everyone.
http://www.amazon.ca/Kon-Tiki-Thor-Heyerdahl/dp/0671726528
Nisa (http://www.amazon.com/Nisa-Life-Words-Kung-Woman/dp/0674004329) is a biography of an African woman who grows up in a hunter gatherer society, but whose world becomes intertwined with the modern world as an adult.
In Nisa: The Life and Words of a !Kung Woman anthropologist Marjorie Shostak describes that it is common for !Kung marred men and women to "take lovers" and have extramarital sex, albiet clandisnedly.
I read the book for a cultural anthropology class and was able to geturn the book afterwards for a full refund, so I no longer have it to cite page numbers, but I recall that there's an entire chapter on the subject.
Infidel, by Ayaan Hirsi Ali.
I have been trying for a week to come up with a way to respond to this with, but I have completely failed, because I'm not sure how some (not I said "some", not "all") women freely choosing to wear full-face veils in Western countries is comprable to genital mutilation and disfiguring violence. I understand that they all come from the same culture, but that doesn't mean that they all necessarily go together. Male genital mutilation (circumcision) and eating Kosher are both part of my cultural heritage and I do neither of those things, yet still feel connected to the culture in other ways.
I suppose we'll have to agree to disagree. You seem to care very passionately about this issue, and I really admire that. If you really do care about these issues, I hope you don't mind my recommending some books for you to read: Unveiling the Truth: Why 32 Muslim Women Wear the Full-Face Veil in France, and The Politics of the Veil are good ones. I also suggest both Infidel and Murder in Amsterdam, and perhaps those two first since they're opposites. Depending on which one you end up agreeing with, the other two may not be worth reading to you, although I'd still urge you to read opinions that differ with yours, if only to help you strengthen your arguments.
Might I suggest an addition?
If you're interested in what Kiribati is like, this, is a great travel novel written by an american who went to live there
Chuck Thompson, i.e. To Hellholes and Back and J Maarten Troost, i.e. The Sex Lives of Cannibals. Hilarious stuff, really good for passing time on planes.
J. Maarten Troost's "travel" books:
The Sex Lives of Cannibals
Getting Stoned with Savages
and Lost on Planet China
I highly recommend this book! It's hilarious and will tell you some great stuff about Vanuatu.
Fantastic book about this, and one of the reasons Vanuatu is on my bucket list.
http://www.amazon.com/Getting-Stoned-Savages-Through-Islands/dp/0767921992
Two books on this: I'm currently going through the opening chapters of This book but it's one of those histories that assume you know something about the overall culture at the time, and IMO isn't very well written Toland, the author, tries very hard to be nonjudgemental, and this I think weakens his narrative, particularly on the events that catapulted Japan into committing to Manchuria. He describes very well some of the attempted coups and assassinations, along with a bit of the ideology, but he doesn't really get at the 'why' of these, beyond what the muntineers themselves said. Paul Johnson had several chapters on the rise of militarism in Japan in his book Modern Times which was much more accessible because he isn't afraid to state his overall opinion of the forces that were contributing to the ultimate path Japan took.
In my opinion, the best book you can read about the Pacific War from the Japanese perspective is John Toland's Rising Sun. It is marvelous.
There are, in fact, many, many facts to support my position. Just because class (which happens to be closely tied to race) also plays into the equation doesn't mean that racism isn't at the heart of the problem. Educate yourself, my friend:
https://www.amazon.com/New-Jim-Crow-Incarceration-Colorblindness/dp/1595586431
https://www.amazon.com/Ghettoside-True-Story-Murder-America-ebook/dp/B0062OCN4E
https://www.amazon.com/Just-Mercy-Story-Justice-Redemption/dp/081298496X
Also to add, since I'm no expert in this field, I would suggest further reading on this topic including:
It was so hard to choose just one! But The Reason I Jump is really interesting to me as Autism has had a huge impact on my life.
Thanks for the contest!
I've nothing for ADHD, would autism interest you? The Reason I Jump is fantastic, really touching.
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks?
http://www.amazon.ca/Immortal-Life-Henrietta-Lacks/dp/1400052173
Not sure if this is totally relevant, but I just found it and am looking forward to reading it:
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks:
From a single, abbreviated life grew a seemingly immortal line of cells that made some of the most crucial innovations in modern science possible. And from that same life, and those cells, Rebecca Skloot has fashioned in The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks a fascinating and moving story of medicine and family, of how life is sustained in laboratories and in memory. Henrietta Lacks was a mother of five in Baltimore, a poor African American migrant from the tobacco farms of Virginia, who died from a cruelly aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her knowledge or consent, as was the custom then, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology: human cells that could survive--even thrive--in the lab. Known as HeLa cells, their stunning potency gave scientists a building block for countless breakthroughs, beginning with the cure for polio. Meanwhile, Henrietta's family continued to live in poverty and frequently poor health, and their discovery decades later of her unknowing contribution--and her cells' strange survival--left them full of pride, anger, and suspicion. For a decade, Skloot doggedly but compassionately gathered the threads of these stories, slowly gaining the trust of the family while helping them learn the truth about Henrietta, and with their aid she tells a rich and haunting story that asks the questions, Who owns our bodies? And who carries our memories?
It's really hard for me to pick an all-time favorite but the two best non-fiction books I read in 2010 were The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks and Big Girls Don't Cry .
https://www.amazon.com/Dreams-My-Father-Story-Inheritance/dp/1400082773/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1479518293&amp;sr=8-4&amp;keywords=obama
Oh man, I could recommend so many.
Kung Fu and Taoism:
The Making of a Butterfly is one of my favorite books. It is about a white kid who starts learning Kung Fu out of a Chinese master's basement back in the 70s, well before Kung Fu was popularized in the West.
Chronicles of Tao by Deng Ming Dao is excellent, a narrative perspective of how Taoism intertwines with the life of a Kung Fu practitioner.
American Shaolin by Matthew Polly is an entertaining and illuminating story that disseminates a lot of the mysticism surrounding the Shaolin Temple.
The Crocodile and the Crane is a fun fictional book that is basically about Tai Chi saving the world from a zombie apocalypse.
My next goal is to tackle The Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
Of course, I highly recommend the Tao Te Ching and the Art of War as well.
Buddhism: I highly recommend anything Thich Nhat Hanh. Anger and Peace is Every Step are two of my favorites.
Karate and Japanese Arts:
Moving Toward Stillness by Dave Lowry is one of my favorite books, taken from his columns in Black Belt Magazine over the years. A really excellent study on Japanese arts and philosophy.
Miyamoto Musashi: His Life and Writings by Kenji Tokitsu is wonderful. It includes the Book of Five Rings as well as some of Musashi's other works, including many of his paintings.
The 47 Ronin, by John Allyn, a dramatization of the Genroku Ako Incident, is still quite poignant in 2016.
I read a memoir called American Shaolin of exactly that; worthwhile read.
/u/Toptomcat nailed it. Wholeheartedly agree in reference to Bubishi, not very practical but interesting nonetheless. I loved Draeger's CAFA and Unante is comprehensive thesis on the historical origins and lineages of the Okinawan fighting arts. These titles might not be for everyone but I am a history buff in addition to a martial artist so I enjoyed them.
Couple of others:
A few off-topic but related titles:
Yep, you sure can. Read this book to learn all about it. American Shaolin: Flying Kicks, Buddhist Monks, and the Legend of Iron Crotch: An Odyssey in the New China by Matthew Polly.
If it's at all like American Shaolin it will involve a hefty tuition.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1936488868?pc_redir=1408890437&amp;robot_redir=1
http://www.amazon.ca/World-Order-Henry-Kissinger/dp/1594206147
The book in question is most likely one of those two, set to be released this Tuesday.
I agree that the people aren't always right, but it kind of breaks the social contract. The nazi example is a bit extreme as I feel that anything that causes that much damage to citizens is just, beyond.
Yeah maybe why I'm not attracted to cultural pride is due to my culture being on the ascent. I live in the US and there are some black guys who like to wear kente cloth and ankhs, in a show of cultural pride, and some white guys who get these Norse and Celtic tattoos.
But in the 1950s, neither group did this. Black pride was about being a clean cut professional in the NAACP, reading WEB DuBois, white pride was about being an upstanding suburbanite, a pillar of the community. I think people become jingoistic flag-wavers when they feel threatened. I think true pride comes from within the individual and from helping people, including people in the outgroup. But that's just me.
Moreover, nationalism is weird. It comes from the Westphalian nation-state system based on the balance of power concept of world order. It's weird for me to talk about national distinction when I'm from the central part of a country that has always existed, called middle earth, and speak a dialect called common, and my ethnicity is just distinguished by what we aren't, not what we are.
Being Chinese is more like Romanitas, or the credo of American exceptionalism, than it is about being one of the tribe. Blood and soil applies more to regional identities like being Teochew or Hakka. First of all, theoretically you, a white or a black man, can become Chinese. Second, anyone whose father's father's father is Chinese is 100% Chinese whether he has dark brown skin, blue eyes, kinky hair.
Nationalism is also a very new construct. Europeans used to call their civilization Christendom, like some very religious Muslims probably view the Islamic world the same way. By Romanitas as a cognate for Chinese identity, I am kind of talking about what cohered civilized Europe before it became Christendom. I'm really not a historian and am not really sure of this.
Hope it helps.
http://greprepclub.com/forum/free-gre-practice-tests-506.html?fl=menu
Was told to read this http://www.amazon.com/World-Order-Henry-Kissinger/dp/1594206147
and I don't know if this is worth the money
https://gre.magoosh.com/?utm_source=elitesem&amp;utm_medium=paidsearch&amp;utm_campaign=gre_prospecting&amp;utm_term=59745
There is a trilogy of graphic novels about him (he's actually one of the authors) that I would highly recommend to everyone. Here's the first book if anyone is interested.
There's a graphic novel about Rep John Lewis and his time as a civil rights marcher with Dr. King in the 1960s. I went to Washington with a delegation of teachers this summer and got to meet him. He's amazing.
John Lewis wrote an award winning graphic novel titled "March" that explains a lot about civil rights history in the sixties. https://www.amazon.com/March-Trilogy-Slipcase-John-Lewis/dp/1603093958
https://www.amazon.com/Auschwitz-Doctors-Eyewitness-Miklos-Nyiszli/dp/161145011X
An account of a jew who was spared of extermination because he performed surgeries on other jews caught in the Nazi's human experiments
I suggest reading Auschwitz: A Doctor's Eyewitness Account. It is a very chilling account of a Jewish pathologist working for the SS in the camps. I recently finished it before seeing these pictures, and they hit a nerve.
At one point he describes boiling the flesh off some corpses to obtain skeletons for research, and some prisoners actually started to eat some of the meat because they were so hungry. Sad stuff.
A good book to read on the subject of Auschwitz is,
http://www.amazon.com/Auschwitz-A-Doctors-Eyewitness-Account/dp/161145011X
Be prepared to cry a lot. It's awful and hard to read about it. Also, they did kill a lot of people on arrival.
There actually were a few. Not huge numbers, but the book Auschwitz: A Doctor's Eyewitness Account was written by a guy who did autopsies for Mengele.
Obviously your overall point is indeed correct, in that of course the state doesn't give a shit about the cause of death in people deliberately killed by the state, but some records do exist. Naturally, they've been faked by the reptilian Jewish overlords.
Carl Hart's book High Price discusses the effect of the criminal justice system and the drug laws on black people. Perhaps it would give you some ideas.
Hey, have you read Carl Hart's book High Price, and if so what do you think about it?
Wow - that's fascinating. You're the first person I've met who has had experience with both SGI and Scientology - we've noted the similarities here on this subreddit. This one, "Parallels between SGI and Scientology", is a fine place to start if you don't have time to dig through the previous list.
Boy, "happy" is the cult hook of choice, isn't it?
Did you already tell me how long you'd been out? Yeah, it can take a while. I have to tell you, reading others' getting-out experiences and interacting with them has helped me so much. No, I wasn't wrong! Others noticed the same things I did, and their explanations helped me put words to my feelings and reactions and that odd sense of discomfort one can't quite put one's finger on. That's one of my goals here, is to provide the evidence, from as many different angles as possible, that you and the others like you were NOT wrong. You were exploited, and THAT's wrong! Everyone who joined did so because they were idealistic and/or suffering and so all that lofty blahblah about "happiness" and "world peace" really resonated with them. A shame the reality had nothing to do with the advertising, huh?
I really feel for you, going through this difficult untangling process while caring for 4 children on your own. This is you O_O
We walked out of SGI with nothing but the spiritual clothes on our backs - there was no support network, no meetings to help us, no services to facilitate our transition back to "normal", and if your experience was anything like the norm, you weren't able to continue any of the friendships you had inside SGI. "Us vs. them" means that if someone leaves, she becomes "them", not "us", and must be avoided. Besides, what would you talk about? One of the ways people process transitions is by talking about them, and what SGI members wants to listen to THAT???
On your observations re: your friend's 40-year practice. Still looking for the actual proof, are we? Welcome to the reality of the SGI. Nobody is doing better than their peers who don't chant. If they were, we'd be able to SEE it, because it's supposed to be "ACTUAL proof", not "IMAGINARY proof". Where are the leaders of industry and society and politics Ikeda promised us would arise from SGI ranks? There's been plenty of time - if it were going to happen, we'd be seeing it.
A book to add to your list for when you find yourself with an empty nest is Dr. Gabor Maté's "In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts". You'll no doubt recognize the Buddhist imagery. That's a link to the .pdf that's available online - sometimes those links don't work, so if you want to read it FOR FREE, just type in "in the realm of hungry ghosts pdf" and your search engine should take you right to it. As you might guess, it's about addicts and addiction and the related neurological research. We're discovering that the brain chemistry that predisposes people to chemical addiction is set during the 3rd trimester of pregnancy based on the hormones coursing through the pregnant woman's blood. As Dr. Maté put it, "Their brains never had a chance." In fact, that's the title of Chapter 17!
So your friend is self-medicating. It's quite possible that he's self-medicating with cocaine because he has undiagnosed ADD - Dr. Maté works with homeless addicts in Toronto, and he found that a great many of the cocaine addicts had undiagnosed ADD/ADHD:
>Cocaine is his other habit apart from narcotics, and like many others, he unwittingly began to use this chemical as self-medication for his undiagnosed and untreated attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
...
>It took a Ritalin prescription to help Remy unburden his mind. He has severe Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Never diagnosed before, he was dumbfounded when I told him about the lifelong patterns of physical restlessness, mental disorganization and impulse-regulation deficiencies that characterize the condition. “That’s me all over,” he kept repeating, hitting his forehead with his palm again and again. “How did you know that much about me? That’s been me since I was ankle high to a flea!”
...
>Now thirty-five, Remy has been an addict since his teenage years. His first drug of choice was cocaine. The heroin habit he acquired in prison is managed successfully with methadone, but he’s rarely been off cocaine since his discharge. After I diagnosed his ADHD, he agreed to stay away from it—at least temporarily, so we could give him a trial of methylphenidate, better known by the trade name Ritalin.
>He was astonished the first day he took this medication. “I’m calm,” he reported. “My mind isn’t going off like a machine gun. I’m thinking instead of just spinning. It’s not fucking going sixty different miles an hour, in twenty different directions. I’m going, ‘Hang on, I’ve gotta do one thing at a time here. Just let’s slow down here.”
I wish that signaled a "happily ever after" for Remy, but it didn't. Still, it provided a glimmer of hope and suggests a possible medical approach for other cocaine users to at least look into.
A high proportion of these individuals with these undiagnosed neurochemical deficiencies in their brains also smoke a lot. Cigarettes are a stimulant as well; they serve a function similar to Ritalin, only not as well. More self-medicating. Yeah, the tobacco, the cocaine, those are addictive in and of themselves, but they're addictive to the people whose brain chemistry is a match for the neurochemical compounds in the tobacco or the cocaine. I tried both in college the first time, never saw the appeal. You know, MOST people are exposed to opiates, yet few become addicted:
>Heroin is considered to be a highly addictive drug—and it is, but
only for a small minority of people, as the following example illustrates.
>It’s well known that many American soldiers serving in the Vietnam War in the late 1960s and early 1970s were regular users. Along with heroin, most of these soldier addicts also used barbiturates or amphetamines or both. According to a study published in the Archives of General Psychiatry in 1975, 20 per cent of the returning enlisted men met the criteria for the diagnosis of addiction while they were in Southeast Asia, whereas before they were shipped overseas fewer than 1 per cent had been opiate addicts. The researchers were astonished to find that “after Vietnam, use of particular drugs and combinations of drugs decreased to near or even below preservice levels.” The remission rate was 95 per cent, “unheard of among narcotics addicts treated in the U.S.”
Isn't that funny? That's also the remission rate from SGI!! Ima gonna put up a topic about that - thanks!!
>“The high rates of narcotic use and addiction there were truly unlike anything prior in the American experience,” the researchers
concluded. “Equally dramatic was the surprisingly high remission rate after return to the United States.” These results suggested that the addiction did not arise from the heroin itself but from the needs of the men who used the drug. Otherwise, most of them would have remained addicts.
>As with opiates so, too, with the other commonly abused drugs. Most people who try them, even repeatedly, will not become addicted. According to a U.S. national survey, the highest rate of dependence after any use is for tobacco: 32 per cent of people who used nicotine even once went on to long-term habitual use. For alcohol, marijuana and cocaine the rate is about 15 per cent and for heroin the rate is 23 per cent. Taken together, American and Canadian population surveys indicate that merely having used cocaine a number of times is associated with an addiction risk of less than 10 per cent. This doesn’t prove, of course, that nicotine is “more” addictive than, say, cocaine. We cannot know, since tobacco—unlike cocaine—is legally available, commercially promoted and remains, more or less, a socially tolerated object of addiction. What such statistics do show is that whatever a drug’s physical effects and powers, they cannot be the sole cause of addiction.
Most people recovering from surgery or physical trauma are given opiates of some sort or another for the pain, but only a tiny, miniscule percentage ever become addicted.
So while your summary of your friend's situation clearly strikes me differently than it strikes you (I find the studies of addiction fascinating, as in Dr. Carl Hart's "High Price" (might also be available online in a .pdf, but I recommend "In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts" first!) - plus Dr. Hart is smmmmmokin' hot, kind of a cross between Bob Marley and Lennie Kravitz), I think that REAL "actual proof" would have been for your friend to get the medical diagnosis and intervention he needs in order to get onto some safer regular medication, if regular medication is what he actually needs. Like the way a certain type of diabetic needs insulin. Because I agree - there's no actual proof anywhere in sight here. And isn't that a tragedy?
Here is the mobile version of your link
> She didn't. "A stranger from abroad" did.
The stranger was Dick Stolp, whom she met him in Laos, which is also where the bribery happend. you're clueless and you've added nothing of value to this conversation in your rambling incoherent responses, how about you just stop posting?
edit: links to educate yourself
https://www.amazon.com/Girl-Seven-Names-Korean-Defectors-ebook/dp/B00JD3ZL9U
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Hyeon-seo
i encourage anyone interested by this to read some biographies of north korean defectors.. https://www.amazon.com/Girl-Seven-Names-Korean-Defectors-ebook/dp/B00JD3ZL9U is a good one..
LOL...
Thanks for taking the bait... and sorry for the delay.
It does sound highly unlikely.
Things usually are much more complex then people tend to believe and familiarity with anything older then 10 years is regrettably poor - if I may be allowed to whine for a moment. Believe me, you are in very ‘good’ company. Most Germans don’t know it either.
I responded from memory and will admit that allowing the impression to form, ‘blacks in the hitleryouth’ could have been a serious option was likely to be misleading in a double sense as it does not really address the point. I needed some cheep satisfaction due to my frustration with your post.
My only excuse is your foreseeable reaction leading to this ‘exposures’. So there you have it... LOL.
I remembered incorrectly however, that the man in question (Hans Massaquoi) ‘only’ made it into the “Deutsche Jungvolk”, a Nazi youth-organization for everyone rather then the actual “Hitlerjugend” (hitleryouth), which was a Nazi-youth organization and more exclusive as well as prestigious.
While I happily apologize for not checking on the correctness of my memory, I cannot apologize for allowing you to be misled temporarily, also because it is irrelevant for the point I was trying to make, which was: one can be ‘member’ of more then one of those ‘tribes’ with bizarrely conflicting interests, so bad, the resulting cognitive dissonance should be (and invariably eventually is) intolerable.
I was making this point because of what impressed me about your post as vastly overgeneralized and divorced from reality.
Here some links:
http://www.amazon.com/Destined-Witness-Growing-Black-Germany/dp/0060959614
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/9848505/Hans-Massaquoi.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Massaquoi
http://lernen-aus-der-geschichte.de/Lernen-und-Lehren/content/8247
While I was attempting to illustrate the same point with that second example, one can be much less excused to not know about Moslims serving the German Extermination-machinery for several reasons:
a) Black people in Germany at the time where a rarity. Estimates are around 20,000 (out of about 65,000,000). Therefore, most people remain unaware.
b) Although I’m not sure how many ‘homegrown’ Muslims existed in Germany at the time, some significant recruitment's were done within the European (probably also Arabian) Muslim communities and several ten-thousands served in various units within the SS.
See:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/13th_Waffen_Mountain_Division_of_the_SS_Handschar_%281st_Croatian%29
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/21st_Waffen_Mountain_Division_of_the_SS_Skanderbeg_%281st_Albanian%29
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waffen-SS_foreign_volunteers_and_conscripts
This is of course very inconvenient to remember - and the existence of the more active worshipers of the nazi delusions with the Muslim community at the time is usually denied and even more so the
This list is by no means complete and it seems that it was rather successfully exploiting historical differences and animosities. Hitlers machinery had a steady hunger for the gullible willing to do to the dirty work as knowledgeable locals and in a wider sense as tool of the final goal of exterminating what the deluded minds hallucinated to be the root of all evil: Jews and Slavs.
Insofar Muslim were plausible ally's and the then Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Amin al-Husseini [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohammad_Amin_al-Husayni] consequently tried to form a more lasting coalition with Hitler. However, not only did the ‘Grandest leader of all times’ in Germany start having more and more troubles on a much grander scale, he also did not like the whole thing so much in the end and the number of volunteers where just not exciting enough.
After the war the ‘favor’ was returned thousandfold by the King of Egypt and later Nassar. (For starters: http://www.expatica.com/nl/news/news_focus/Nile-Nazis_-Egypt-haven-for-German-war-criminals-_49361.html (much more can be told about the involvement of German war criminals in the Egyptian post war weapons production.))
This should suffice as attempt to illustrate that reality is usually much more complex then: “Here in Europe [...]”.
However, for the point I was trying to make that one can be ‘member’ of ‘tribes’ with conflicting ideas, this is all irrelevant.
Cheers, L
Every time one of these pictures is posted I have to recommend the book Aku Aku by Thor Heyerdahl. It's an amazing and true story/history of the people and culture on Easter Island, how they likely got there originally and how they made these fantastic statues. Ties in with his book Kon Tiki about how Pacific Islanders likely migrated. Good stuff, and an easy, great read for the curious.
PART TWO OF TWO
(HOW DID MERMELSTEIN'S FATHER DIE? COUNT THREE WAYS)
(MERMELSTEIN CARRIED BODIES FROM THE GAS CHAMBER TO THE CREMATORIA?)
During Mermelstein's time in Auschwitz (May 21 - July 1, 1944), his account differed
(MERMELSTEIN WENT SWIMMING IN BLOOD?)
(MERMELSTEIN'S SISTERS WERE STILL ALIVE AFTER HE ALLEGED THEY WERE GASSED)
Mermelstein alleged his sisters had died in May 1944 and personally saw them being taken to the gas chamber but IHR found a German document dated October 12, 1944, or five months after their supposed deaths, listing 500 Jewish females being transported to Altenburg. Their names were Edith Mermelstein and Magda Mermelstein, the very same names of his sisters though their date of birth was not exactly as Mermelstein gave in his book.
(GASSINGS WERE A NEW STORY)
IHR proprosed that Mermelstein created the story about the gassing of his mother and sisters only after learning of IHR's reward since there was no mention prior to 1980 and in fact the first ever mention was in his letters attacking IHR in the summer of 1980.
His book in 1979, statement to Auschwitz State Museum in 1967, sworn affidavit at the German Consulate in Los Angeles in 1969... none mention anything about witnessing any gassing. Prior to 1979 all detailed press accounts about his industrious activity as a lecturer, exhibitor of artifacts and museum proprietor never mention the story of the gassing of his mother and sisters.
(THE SECOND TRIAL)
The trial judge was Stephen Lachs, Jewish, the first avowed gay judge in California history and a member of American Civil Liberties Union. Despite Mermelstein's attorneys trying to appeal to the judge's Jewish backgrounds, Judge Lachs was a conscientious and impartial judge.
Von Eches caved in at the last minute fearing ruin and paid $100,000 to Mermelstein along with an apology stating that Jews had been gassed at Auschwitz and millions more had perished in Auschwitz and other camps at the hands of the Germans.
Hulsy's 49 pre-trial motions helped withstand and counter Mermelstein's case by his three lawyers (Lawrence Heller, Peter Bersin and Jeff Mausner)
(PUBLIC FIGURE)
Mermelstein refused to consider himself as a public figure. Mark Lane was able to lead him into making damaging admissions one by one that he was a:
When asked how many lectures he has given on Auschwitz before 1985, Mermelstein said as many as "the fingers on my hands". Lane shows a typed list signed by Mermelstein of over 30 lectures given in 18 months in 1981-1982. Mermelstein then tried to be crafty and say he might have lectured more than once at the same place.
After a break for lunch, O'Keefe recalled a deposition from 1985 where Mermelstein stated he gave an average of 20 lectures a year on Auschwitz since 1967 (i.e. 20 lectures multiplied by 18 years is some 360 lectures given). When presented with this, Mermelstein blurted "I mean the fingers of my hand and feet!" Bersin conceded that Mermelstein's status was that of a public figure.
(MERMELSTEIN'S SUIT IS DISMISSED)
Several days later, Judge Lachs, reviewing Mermelstein's characterization of IHR's 1985 settlement (on a New York City radio broadcast) claiming that IHR had signed the 1981 judicial notice of gassing at Auschwitz, declared it could be interpreted as defamatory and that IHR had probable cause to sue Mermelstein in 1986. Judge Lachs ruled in favor of IHR and dismissed Mermelstein's malicious prosecution complaint on September 19, 1991.
Mermelstein voluntarily dismissed his libel and conspiracy complaints soon afterwards, his appeal of the ruling was unanimously rejected by the California Court of Appeal (Nott, Gates, Fukuto) on October 28, 1992, putting an end to the 11 year legal battle.
You certainly didn't look very hard for studies demonstrating the perverse incentives of welfare. The themes of incentivizes and disincentives are very common in the social science surrounding this area. For instance, if we want to talk specifically about the AFDC program—which no longer exists, but this question asks about how welfare has affected black communities since the 1960s, so it is most definitely relevant—here are a few studies for your reading pleasure:
>The roles of the entitlements of the AFDC program and marital prospects in the fertility and marriage choices of young women are assessed in the context of a model incorporating heritable endowment heterogeneity, assortative mating, concern for child quality, and potential parental and public support alternatives. Estimates based on data describing the fertility and marital experience up to age 23 of the eight birth cohorts of women in the NLSY provide evidence that higher AFDC benefit levels and lower marital prospects induce young women to choose to have a child outside of marriage.
>We study the relationship between welfare benefits and the time to first marriage and time to next birth among initially unwed mothers. We use twin births to generate random within-state variation in benefits, effectively controlling for unobservables that may confound the relationship between welfare payments and behavior. Higher base welfare benefits (1) lead unwed white mothers to forestall their eventual marriage and (2) lead unwed black mothers to hasten their next birth. The magnitudes of the effects are fairly modest. Moreover, we find no evidence that the marginal benefit paid at the birth of an additional child—the focus of the family cap debate—affects fertility.
>For some time now, the out-of-wedlock birthrate has been increasing rapidly in the United States. This has prompted several states to propose (and in some cases, enact) legislation to deny access to higher AFDC benefits for families in which the mother gives birth while receiving AFDC. The authors investigate whether AFDC benefit levels are systematically related to the family-size decisions of never-married women. Using a bivariate probit model with state and time fixed effects, applied to Current Population Survey data for the years 1980–1988, it is found that the basic benefit level for a family of two (one adult and one child) and the incremental benefit for a second child positively affects the family size decisions of black and Hispanic women, but not of white women. The effects are concentrated among high school dropouts (no effects are found for high school graduates). The authors conclude that rather than to uniformly deny benefits to all AFDC women that bear children, a better targeted policy might be to alter the AFDC benefit structure in such a way as to encourage single mothers to complete high school. However, being a high school dropout might be a proxy for some other underlying characteristic of the woman, and encouraging women to complete high school who otherwise would not might have no effect whatsoever on nonmarital births.
Look, I'm not saying this issue isn't controversial. You'll find studies pointing both ways, and much of the data is unclear or doesn't produce statistically significant results in either direction. What I'm really trying to say is that you cannot completely deny that welfare produces perverse incentives. The AFDC was criticized for years because many thought it encouraged unwed motherhood. Have you read Charles Murray's Losing Ground? It's a brilliant read, and many more of these studies are studied to prove the thesis that welfare causes dependency.
These are not wild theories, and they cannot be dismissed as racist or overly simplified or overly generalizing. The AFDC received widespread criticism. Check out its wikipedia page.. In fact, it was this kind of criticism and the data supporting the possibility of this dysgenic effect that eventually lead to the welfare reform of the 1990s, as AFDC became TANF.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1400082773
I havent read it so I dont know if it is good, but I do know it is about a psychopath.
>Before reddit shits all over me for saying that, there are numerous peer-reviewed studies that prove welfare reforms have increased the decline in marriage; a simple google search will show you that.
Now show liberals research—by social scientist Charles Murray who first reached that conclusion 13 years earlier in his 1980 book Losing Ground: American Social Policy, 1950-1980—that the Great Society welfare programs increased illegitimacy (now 70%) in black communities, increasing crime, dependency, and broken homes.
They probably won't like him, since he's a libertarian, works for the American Enterprise Institute and has published other research which makes liberals uncomfortable, notably on the heritability of intelligence.
Which facts are you questioning? Everything that I wrote is pretty well documented. You can read about all of it in Obama's autobiography if you have any doubts.
Europe is able to have such a massive welfare state because we pay for their defense budgets. And destructive "fuck you, I'll do what I want" individualism is a result of the state. [Society is emergent, people cooperate to reach common goals without government and through the market] (http://www.amazon.com/Quest-Community-Background-Essential-Conservative/dp/1935191500/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1377371743&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=the+quest+for+community). [After the welfare state was expanded in the 60's, people could engage in destructive behavior that most people disproved of (out of wedlock pregnancy, divorce, promiscousnous, addiction) because that behavior was subsidized by the government] (http://www.amazon.com/Losing-Ground-American-1950-1980-Anniversary/dp/0465042333/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1377371787&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=losing+ground). Libertarians are the greatest friends of poor minorities. Even after desegregation, [the war on drugs] (http://www.amazon.com/The-New-Crow-Incarceration-Colorblindness/dp/1595586431), [occupational licensing laws] (http://www.amazon.com/State-Against-Blacks-Walter-Williams/dp/0070703787/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1377371682&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=state+against+blacks), and the lack of school choice are institutional barriers that have kept minorities poor. [Public institutions have always been erected to take care of the poor, whether there is government involvement or not] (http://www.amazon.com/Mutual-Aid-Welfare-State-Fraternal/dp/0807848417/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1377371988&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=david+beito).
I do not care that he spokes crack.
Did you know that most people that smoke crack are in fact high functioning individuals, like professors, doctors, lawyers etc and not some street hood? [link] (http://www.amazon.com/High-Price-Neuroscientists-Self-Discovery-ebook/dp/B009NF75MY/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&amp;ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1383254857&amp;sr=1-1&amp;keywords=high+price)
I am a libertarian. What he does with his own body is his own fucking business. I do not care whom people have sex with, whom they marry, what the smoke or eat, what they read, or anything they do with themselves. But liberals are not like that. They want you to conform to their own way of life. They are anti-freedom.