Tag: history

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#BookReview: Members Club by Piet Hoebeke

Factual Overview Of The Penis. This book, written by a Belgian urologist, has a bit of everything when it comes to factual information about the penis. We’ve got history. We’ve got biomechanics. We’ve got anatomy. We’ve got medical recommendations for a wide range of topics related to the penis from basic hygiene to STDs and when to seek further consultation. If you’ve ever wanted to know really most anything about the penis, this is the book you should probably look to if you don’t already have some degree of academic knowledge of it. Seemingly comprehensive, though the version I read (nearly 5 months before actual publication) didn’t have much of a bibliography at all – just about 5% of this text, vs closer to 25% of an average nonfiction text. Still, Dr. Hoebeke mostly relies on his own decades of experience and appears generally authoritative – at least in a general sense – even without the extensive bibliography (which may yet be added between the date I write this review in early July 2020 and the date of publication in early November 2020). Very much recommended.

This review of Members Club by Piet Hoebeke was originally written on July 8, 2020.

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#BookReview: Last Mission To Tokyo by Michel Paradis

Slightly Misleading Title, Solid History. If you’re looking for a history of the actual Doolittle Raid… this isn’t it. Instead, this focuses on the 1946 war crimes trial of the Japanese officials implicated in murdering four of the Raiders after their capture in China following the raid in 1942 and subsequent conviction in a kangaroo court. But for what it is, this is truly a remarkable story that brings to life a part of history I personally had never so much as heard about. Paradis notes in the afterword that upon researching what was originally supposed to be a more straightforward legal analysis, he realized that he needed to change the focus to be a historical narrative fit for a wider audience, and in that new goal this reader can confirm that he did particularly well. Yes, Paradis is a miliary lawyer historian by trade, and this particular background comes through quite blatantly in the text, but it is never so full of jargon from any of those parts of his background as to be incomprehensible to the wider audience only cursorily aware of those subjects. Very much recommended.

This review of Last Mission To Tokyo by Michel Paradis was originally written on July 5, 2020.

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#BookReview: Political Junkies by Claire Bond Potter

Solid Discussion Of Sometimes Obscure History. Full disclosure up front: As a former political blogger who was an organizer of one of the Tea Party events (before the professionals got involved) and as both a Party Official (for the Libertarian Party, at both local and State levels) and Candidate (for City Council in a town encompassing an area just four square miles), I actively participated in some of the history Potter discusses here. Though quite a bit of it was before I was born – she begins her discussion in the 1950s, before even my parents were born, and I would come along during Ronald Reagan’s first term as US President but not become truly politically active until November 5, 2008.

But even as someone with the aforementioned background, even as someone who once had a very high level of behind the scenes access within at least State level politics of at least one State, this truly seems like a comprehensive and accurate history of how we got to where we now find ourselves as Americans relating to politics through media. Potter has done a remarkable job of showing how various movements and moments played on and into each other, building on and around prior and contemporary techniques to go from a dude in his garage just trying to present news the Big 3 weren’t to the modern era of ubiquitous cameras and Deep Fake technology. Though actual Deep Fake tech is one area Potter doesn’t *truly* get into, likely as it hasn’t been shown to be actually active in political circles in the US. Yet. Truly an excellent work, and anyone who is interested in why we are as fractured as we are as a populace would do well to read this to at least know how we got here from an alternative media side. If you’re discussing regulation of social media or complaining about the vitriol far too many online discussions turn to, read here to find out how we got to this point – and a couple of passing ideas on how we can do a little better. Very much recommended.

This review of Political Junkies by Claire Bond Potter was originally written on July 4, 2020.

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#BookReview: Prisoners Of Geography by Tim Marshall

Interesting Concepts. Marshall presents an interesting case of geopolitics from a geographical perspective, and while quite a bit of it makes perfect sense, there are also times where he presents an idea as perfectly obvious… when it actually isn’t/ wasn’t. For example, he claims that once America gained access to the Pacific Ocean in the 19th century via the Oregon Territory, it was destined to become a great world power simply because it had direct access to both of the world’s great oceans. If it was so perfectly obvious, why did it take another century or so – for this barely century old nation at the time – to achieve such supremacy? But the cases Marshall does make, he makes many interesting points on that even I had never considered, and I consider myself a fairly learned and analytical person. He also does so with great humor, which makes what could have been a much drier, more academic treatise into a much more enjoyable read. So read this thing. It has some good ideas and you’ll be entertained. Just don’t believe every word it says, and keep a critical eye on all things at all times. Recommended.

This review of Prisoners of Geography by Tim Marshall was originally written on June 29, 2020.

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Featured New Release of the Week: Feeding The People by Rebecca Earle

This week we’re looking at a remarkably well researched novel history. This week, we’re looking at Feeding the People by Rebecca Earle.

This is one of the more novel histories I’ve ever read, whose central point is looking at the Andean Potato as at least a sign, if not a driver at times, of world history through the last several centuries since it was brought to Europe and popularized there post-Columbus. Structurally, it divides its chapters between various ages – Enlightenment, Scientific, Globalization, etc – and examines how potatoes were playing a role in world history during those ages. And it makes some very interesting cases that I personally had never considered, but which largely make sense.

Truly the most remarkable thing about the book though is just how well documented it is – literally 42% of the edition I read was bibliography and index. Considering that more normal documentation rates for even books I generally consider to be well documented are closer to 25-30%, this is exceptional indeed.

For its completeness, its documentation, and yes, its novelty, this is absolutely a very much recommended book.

As always, the Goodreads/ Amazon review:
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Featured New Release of the Week: The Sum of the People by Andrew Whitby

This week we’re looking at a history of the origins and current uses of the census – at the very time the United States Census officially begins. This week, we’re looking at The Sum of Us The People by Andrew Whitby.

I don’t exactly hide the fact that despite reading quite a few books, at heart I’m a numbers and computing guy. And few things get more numeric than efforts to count literally billions of people around the world in the span of just a year or two – the very subject of this book, and efforts that officially began a couple of months ago when this post (and the book it is about) are published. (I sit here writing this post on New Year’s Day 2020, having made this book the first book I read in the year the Census begins in the US.)

And y’all, Whitby does a seemingly excellent job of taking a complex and complicated subject like the modern realities of counting people – particularly when such counts can lead to shifts in power – and boiling it down so that anyone, even those without the mathematical foundations Whitby and I share a portion of, can understand what is happening, why, and why both are important. He states early on that a primary goal is writing a book that can be understood by most anyone, and to me it seems he has done an exemplary job of this.

I might nitpick about his discussions of the beginnings of computing and even the mathematics of statistics as its own field of study (among others), but neither does my own cursory knowledge of those areas allow me to outright refute them. So while I tend to think that he *may* have overstated his case in believing that these things came about due to a need to count people, I cannot be positive of this and his arguments are well documented and worthy of critical examination. (And here, he has provided nearly 25% of this text in notes and bibliography – generally a sign of a very thoroughly researched and presented discussion, in my experience.)

Truly a fascinating book, and one anyone remotely interested in the how or why of a census should read. Very much recommended.

As always, the Amazon/ Goodreads review:
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#BookReview: Did Jesus Rise From The Dead by William Lane Craig

Solid Introduction To The Arguments. This short and easy to read book is a solid introduction to the various arguments on the issue at hand. The only way it is lacking is in that many of these arguments probably need a lot more discussion of their various points and counterpoints and nuances, but that doesn’t seem to be the intent of this particular book. Instead, this book seems more geared to those that are looking for the basics, and is written in exactly that tone – scholarly, yet more of a “fireside chat” and not the hyper dry prose normally reserved for works aimed at fellow academics and particularly those in the same field. Very much recommended.

This review of Did Jesus Rise From the Dead by William Lane Craig was originally written on December 29, 2019.

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#BookReview: Twain’s Feast by Andrew Beahrs

Twain Would Be Proud. This lighthearted yet fascinating look at the life of Mark Twain through the Feast he laid out in one of his books – but never actually ate himself – is a breathtaking. From describing the prairie hens as Twain would have known them (more multitudinous than even the famed bison) to San Francisco as Twain knew it to his beloved Mighty Mississippi. The combination of tales of food and food history with the history and writing of perhaps the world’s first true mega-celebrity is a delight to read, particularly as today is itself Thanksgiving Day 2018.

This review of Twain’s Feast by Andrew Beahrs was originally published on November 22, 2018.

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#BookReview: One Nation Under God by Kevin Kruse

Intriguing But Incomplete. The central premise of this book is that “Under God” and “In God We Trust” were created by a cabal of corporate and religious interests opposed to the New Deal in the 1930s, and indeed the roughly 30 year period from the mid 1930s through the mid 1960s is where the bulk of the text concentrates. For example, the 30 year period from 1980 – 2010 is encompassed only in the epilogue, the 2nd shortest of the chapters of this book, and the period before the mid 1930s is barely mentioned at all. And therein lies where the book is incomplete. It should have built the case that pre-New Deal, religious references were scant in American politics. I believe that case can be made, based on my own knowledge of the history, but I’d like to see the efforts of a more trained historian on the matter. Instead, Kruse zeroes in on the New Deal opponents. But within the framework that he creates, he actually does do a solid job of showing how their efforts led to the increased religiosity of the Eisenhower Administration and from there directly to the Culture Wars as we know them now – though Kruse never uses the term “Culture Wars”. Even with my own better than average knowledge of the relevant events, I learned quite a bit here and had at least a few attitudes shifted. Highly recommended reading for anyone actually interested in the subject from any side of the issue.

This review of One Nation Under God by Kevin Kruse was originally published on October 14, 2018.

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#BookReview: NeuroTribes by Steve Silberman

Mostly History with a dash of future. I am Autistic, and this look at the history of my people was more fascinating and horrifying than even I already knew. In this book, Silberman shows several people from history that were fairly clearly Autistic, progressing from early accounts to newest and from there into the histories of the two men that “co-discovered” Autism in the 20th century. The vast bulk of the book is spent inside the 20th century, with only the last chapter or two in the 21st, but even then it truly is fascinating and horrifying. Absolutely recommended for all, particularly those with Autistics in their lives.

This review of NeuroTribes by Steve Silberman was originally published on October 5, 2018.