This book looks at the history of the "Space Race" between America and the Soviet Union, and asserts that America could have put a satellite into orbit a year before the Russians.

At the end of World War II, America and the Soviets were racing around Germany, gathering up as many German V-2 rocket parts, engineering drawings and scientists as they could find. This was to be done before the zones of control in Germany, agreed at Yalta, came into effect. The German scientists were more interested in rockets and space flight than in rockets and war. Most of the Germans surrendered to the Americans, while some surrendered to the Russians.

After much interrogation and debriefing in Europe, the "American Germans" were quietly brought to America, and ended up at Fort Bliss, near El Paso, Texas. They were intentionally kept away from any classified information, for obvious reasons, and there was little or nothing for them to do. The "Russian Germans" were not faring much better. They, and their families, were forcibly deported to Russia, and ended up on a desolate island over 100 miles from Moscow. They had to be segregated from the local population; as in America, memories fade slowly. For the next 5 years, they did their best, under terrible working conditions, until being deported to the West. There is little indication that the Russians ever used German expertise on their rockets.

Back in America, the Germans were eventually moved to Huntsville, Alabama. It was much more hospitable than Texas, both technically and for their families. They were made American citizens in 1955, so they could access Top Secret information. Throughout the 1950s, there were a number of government commissions tasked with deciding what to do about rockets, specifically the ex-Nazis in their employ. The Stewart Committee had to decide what booster system would be used to get a satellite into orbit, the proven German system, or an American system that needed more work. When Wernher von Braun, the leader of the Germans, learned that the American system was chosen, he went ballistic. Among the official reasons for the decision was to keep the military program (on which the Germans were working) and the civilian programs separate. Among the actual reasons was plain old racism. It would not be good for America’s rocket to be called the "Nazi Rocket."

This book does a wonderful job as a history of the Space Race from the end of World War II to the first American satellite. I am not so sure of this as a conspiracy book (the "conspiracy" part is only in the last chapter), but it is still well worth reading.

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There is a piece about the assassination of John F. Kennedy which does a good job of destroying the Warren Commission findings (as if more destruction is needed). There is a chapter on secret societies and their huge influence in America, including Skull and Bones and the Freemasons.

For anyone who wants to know What Really Happened at Waco in 1993 and just who David Koresh really was, there is a piece in this book that does an excellent job at it.

Being High Times magazine, there is a visit to a young man in the Netherlands who has become something of a marijuana entrepreneur, shipping high quality pot seeds all over the world. There is also a visit to the annual Cannabis Cup competition, held in Amsterdam. Think of it as the Marijuana World Championship.

The most interesting parts of this book look at the history of graffiti in 1970s and 1980s New York City. It started with young people writing their name or "tag" nearly anywhere, then evolved into an art form that attracted big attention from the mainstream art world. The reader will also read about the birth of rap music, when the DJ was king, spinning records in tiny clubs and basements. Later, the MCs, who were to keep the crowd moving, started rhyming, and eventually took over the show. The book also looks at the birth of CBGB’s, the iconic rock club in the East Village. Punk rock of the 1970s gave birth to glitter rock, new wave and all sorts of offshoots. All the important people in 1970s and 1980s New York City are here, including Keith Haring, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Africa Bambaataa, Talking Heads, the Sugarhill Gang and the B-52s. The stories are told mostly from the point of view of the everyday New Yorkers who were part of these "scenes."

No matter what your counterculture interest is, music, art or drugs, it is in this excellent group of articles. I learned a lot from this book, and even "veterans" will, too.

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The book follows Billy, who needs to lose some weight, and his wife, Beth, who wants to start her own business, but they are having problems in the willpower department. The author takes them through the entire process of committing to something, sticking with it and dealing with negative thoughts.

Instead of saying something vague, like "I need to get healthy" on January 1, like most people, then give up after a few weeks, make it more definite and achievable. For instance, try "I will go for an after-dinner walk three times a week" or "I will cut out soda and potato chips." Break a large task into smaller mini-tasks. If you would like to start your own business, then start with "I will write out a business plan." After that, "I will submit my business plan to my local bank for a loan."

When it comes to willpower in general, first and foremost, you must be totally committed to "it," whatever it is. If it doesn’t produce a fire in your belly, then why bother? Get ready for a difficult journey. Be as specific and concrete as you can about your goal, and how you plan to get there. Learn to deal with the self-doubt and negative thoughts that will inevitably occur. Willpower is like a muscle; the more you use it, the stronger it will be for next time.

Don’t let the stick figure illustrations get in the way of enjoying an excellent book. It is very easy to read, and is full of information on how to clean out mental clutter and get anyone moving toward their personal and business goals. This one is very highly recommended.

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In the 1700s, many Irish came to America by way of the British Army. Whatever the reason for signing up, extreme poverty in Ireland, or the lure of adventure on foreign shores, after fighting in the French and Indian War, many Irish stayed in the unnamed land between New York and New Hampshire. After the Revolutionary War and into the 1800s, desertion was rife among British Army units in Canada. The lure of rampant land speculation south of the border was pretty powerful. If the Irish did not come to Vermont via the British Army, they came because relatives or family members were already established in Vermont.

With the coming of Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s, the immigration trickle to Vermont turned into a flood. These new starved and half-dead immigrants, who came because they had no choice, were generally able to find work doing what they did back home. Laying railroad tracks or factory work, for instance, was backbreaking work for very little pay, but, it was work. During the Civil War, Vermont quarries were the main source for all those monuments and headstones. After the Civil War, in which Vermont Irish played their part, Yankee farmers were seized with a desire to head West, and find better farmland than Vermont’s hilly, hardscrabble farms. The Irish were only too happy to buy up those farms; back in Ireland, land ownership was an impossibility for most people.

Ethnic and religious tensions among the various groups living in Vermont were never far below the surface. In the early days, living in a certain town meant that attendance at the local church was mandatory, regardless of the religion. In most towns, there was an Irish Catholic church, and a French-Canadian Catholic church; worshipping together was simply not an option. Sober, hardworking Irish Presbyterians, who came to Vermont under more favorable circumstances, called themselves "Scots-Irish" in order to distinguish them from the "shiftless, alcoholic" Catholic Famine Irish immigrants. Through the 1900s, the Catholic groups grew closer together, but, if anything, Irish Catholics and Protestants grew farther apart. Their children went to separate schools, and they belonged to separate business organizations.

Here is a beautifully-written book that is recommended for anyone interested in new England history or the history of the Irish in America. It gets two thumbs-up.

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Auja, a young oak tree, finds a unique being within its branches. Fur is not your average caterpillar. It is a kind of group-mind being consisting of over 240 separate entities, not seen in Southcrop Forest for the past thousand years. Auja persuades a reluctant Fur to undertake a harrowing journey.

The trees of Southcrop Forest have made an earth-shattering discovery for their kind. Fur is to carry that treasure to a mysterious place called Riverside Farm. It involves crossing the Oak River to the Deep Sky forests. The trees talk to Fur through a form of telepathy, and help Fur as much as possible.

At one point, Fur is attacked by birds and bugs who use caterpillars as hosts for their eggs. Fur survives, but loses a number of its members. Trying to cross a human road, more members of Fur are flattened by car tires. Fur also encounters patches of crawler plague, a disease that is absolutely fatal to caterpillars. Fur is under a huge time constraint of its own. Being a caterpillar, the compulsion is growing to find an appropriate spot, spin a cocoon, turn into a moth and fly to the sun.

Almost at its goal, the few members of Fur who have survived the journey are caught by a human child, and left in an airtight jar in the hot sun. Fur is eventually released, and has lost even more of itself. Along the way, Fur learns about ecology, the threat from mankind and about its own existence.

Perhaps it is time to consider starting a new genre of fiction, "stories written from a non-human perspective." This is a first-rate story that will get the reader looking at their local forest or stand of trees in a whole new way.

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Your local bank puts together a financial security pooling 10,000 debts (mortgages, credit card debt, car loans, etc.). That is a collateralized debt obligation, or CDO. An investor would get a portion of the interest owed by those 10,000 borrowers. There is always a risk that some borrowers will default on their loans, supposedly reduced by bundling together so many loans. The amount of interest an investor gets is based on the amount of risk they are willing to accept.

Of course, the bank has sold that security, or pieces of it, to other banks, municipalities, pension funds; anyone it could seduce with promises of high profits, with little or no risk. The security had been given a high rating by one of the major credit rating agencies, in exchange for huge fees, when such a rating was totally unjustified. Large numbers of borrowers start defaulting on their loans, because the local economy is in big trouble, and the bank is on the hook to pay off the security based on all that debt (not to mention being on the hook for the original debts). Unfortunately, the bank does not know the size of their obligation, because there is no public listing of derivative prices. They can’t sell the security at any price, because the other banks are also in trouble.

Move that bank to Wall Street, and multiply the problem by trillions of dollars per day, and you get some idea of the size of the problem. Those who still worship the free market say that government intervention is the cause of all this. All that credit card debt, and all those homebuyers who defaulted on their mortgages, knowing that they could not afford them, are what drove the economy into the ditch, not Wall Street. Simply cut taxes on the rich, reduce or eliminate government regulations on business, and the market will take care of itself. Nonsense, the author says.

He advocates greater transparency in derivatives, including a publicly accessible list of prices, and keeping them on an institution’s regular books, not "off the books." He also calls for salary limits, and a consumer watchdog agency with teeth.

Finally, someone explains how the economy almost collapsed (in plain English). This is an excellent and eye-opening book that is very much worth reading.

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The author places much of the blame on a high rate of net migration (not just illegal immigrants) and a high fertility rate among some groups. There are many groups who benefit by high population growth, and like things just the way they are. Among them are builders and developers, farmers, the hospitality industry, food processors and middle class Americans. Supposedly, these would all collapse if it wasn’t for cheap foreign labor unwilling to demand a decent wage and decent working conditions out of fear of being deported. Why are middle class Americans included as part of the problem? How many people hire someone to mow their lawn or take care of their pool, instead of doing it themselves?

What would happen if all 10 million (or so) illegal immigrants in America suddenly left? First of all, the world would not come to an end. Young people who spend their days on cellphones or playing computer games would get a taste of some honest hard work. Native-born Americans would be able to demand better wages and working conditions from farmers and builders who presently pay illegal immigrants as little as possible. Less money would be needed for infrastructure (like schools and road repair).

America’s addiction to population growth also has many victims. For those just out of prison, the best way to stay out is with a job, even a menial one. Every illegal alien dishwasher, for example, means one more parolee who doesn’t have a chance to better himself. What about illegal aliens who are killed or maimed on the job? Students are affected because rampant population growth forces school districts to build more schools or cram more and more students into each school.

What is to be done? First of all, decide for yourself, how many people is enough? How big should America get? If a politician talks about "smart growth" or easing immigration rules, don’t be afraid to call them on it. If a magazine or newspaper seems to have a pro-growth bias, cancel your subscription, and tell them why. If you need to hire employees, even just someone to mow your lawn, make sure they can converse in English. If you find that you have unknowingly hired an illegal alien, fire them, but do it legally. Donate to groups involved in population, fertility or net migration.

This is a very interesting book that will really get the reader thinking in a different way. It’s worth reading.

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According to the author (and new medical research), the cause of arthritis is due to infection, either viral or bacterial. The first place to look for a cause, especially if you have had a root canal. It is very hard to clean all of the bacteria out of a diseased tooth, so if the root canal was done improperly, it is very possible that some of that bad bacteria will enter your bloodstream through a cut or scrape in your mouth. The bacteria will travel to someplace "safe," where there is little blood nearby, like a bone joint. That is why the usual drugs have little, or no, effect, as the bacteria eats away at your cartilage.

So what is the answer? Coconut oil. Teeth are very porous, full of tiny tubules, where the bacteria can hide. Brushing and flossing won’t clean out those tubules, but coconut oil will. The book goes into detail about why coconut oil is so healthy. Take a teaspoon or two, and swish it around your mouth for several minutes. Don’t gargle, and don’t swallow (spit it out when you are done). You don’t want to draw all those toxins out of your mouth, and deposit them in your stomach. Coconut oil can be also used in cooking, and taken internally as a dietary supplement. Do it everyday, and, after a couple of weeks, even the most extreme cases will show improvement.

Is that the whole story? No. After cleaning out your system, change your diet by a lot. Everybody says that, but consider this: After going to all that trouble, and eating all that coconut oil, to clean the arthritis infection out of your body, do you really want to let it back in with an unhealthy diet? Think about taking a combination of glucosamine and chondroitin to rebuild those damaged joints. Exercise will help limber up your joints, so get moving. If the pain has limited your mobility, start with something you can do (even simply standing and bouncing on one of those mini-trampolines). If you are overweight, lose some of it. Every pound lost decreases the stress on your joints.

You’re thinking: Not Another Miracle Cure, right? If the best the medical profession can do is to hand you a bottle of painkillers and tell you to live with the pain, or schedule you for a joint replacement operation, what have you got to lose? This method is easy and drug-free. This book is full of success stories, and is extremely highly recommended.

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Nature changes throughout the seasons with cycles of birth and death. Trees grow leaves, lose them and grow more leaves. People are part of nature, so women should understand that their bodies are changing as they age. Learn to embrace your maturity and life experience. Much as you may wish it to be otherwise, you can’t be twenty-five years old forever.

Just as your body is changing, so too are your friendships. People enter your life, and people leave your life. Not everyone is intended to be a lifelong companion. Learn to treasure those friendships for however long they are part of your life.

Think about creating a kind of support network of other women that you can laugh, and cry, with. When life gets difficult, as it will now and then, maybe one of them can help you to navigate the emotional rapids. Perhaps you can be the one to help someone else through a tough period. For instance, if you are going through a divorce, you may not be able to do anything about the end of the marriage, but you can do something about your attitude. Are you going to, figuratively, lay down and die, or are you going to pick yourself up, and move on with your life? No doubt, he has already moved on.

Positive role models can be found in the most unique places. Find one, and learn how to be one yourself. You don’t have to do anything extraordinary, sometimes just being a kind and decent person is enough to qualify you as a role model. Don’t give up on your desire to learn new things, or to realize when your life is moving in a new and different direction. You never know what could be just around the corner.

The Tao (The Way) is all about living in harmony with nature, about "going with the flow." This book does a very good job of pointing out the things women need to accept and the that they can change. It is recommended for women of all ages.

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He was born in 1922 in the Lower East Side of New York. His father, Eddie, worked a number of jobs, but could never escape poverty. From an early age, Zinn realized that the assertion that anyone could become successful with hard work, and that poor people were lazy, was nonsense. Zinn was a voracious reader, devouring writers like Charles Dickens, Jack London and Upton Sinclair.

In early 1940, he experienced his moment of radicalization. After seeing what predatory capitalism had done to America, causing a depression which made millions homeless, many people thought that communism was a humane alternative. Zinn was never a member of the Communist Party, but he marched in a peaceful demonstration that was suddenly, and violently, broken up by the police. Zinn was knocked unconscious by a policeman’s baton. When he woke up, he realized that the police serve those in power, not protect the public. All that stuff about freedom of speech, and the right to peacefully assemble, could be ignored by the powerful at any time.

As a bombardier in World War II, he participated in a bombing raid on a French town called Royan, just before the end of the war. It was on the French coast, when the war was inside Germany, so it was of no military value. Several thousand German troops were there, waiting for the end of the war. Over one thousand planes dropped tons and tons of napalm on the town, and for what?

After the war, he got his education through the GI Bill, and his first full-time teaching job was at Spelman College, an all-black women’s college in Atlanta. This was right in the middle of the early segregation struggle. For several years, Zinn was involved in the push for civil rights, until he was fired by Spelman College, even though he had tenure. He eventually landed at Boston University, where he became one of the school’s most popular teachers. He continued to write, and get involved in opposition to the Vietnam War. Through out his teaching career, Zinn was not impressed with the quality of history textbooks. None gave the story of the common people, so, in 1980, A People’s History of the United States came into existence. It has sold over 2 million copies, and is still in print.

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Even the best day care centers are little better than germ factories. If one child is sick, which happens frequently, it is nearly guaranteed that all of the other children, and the day care provider, will also get sick. There is also a large increase in aggressive and violent behavior among 3 and 4-year-olds. Pro-day care groups, who the author calls separationists, think that this is a good thing. Getting sick now means they will get fewer illnesses as they grow up, and being an aggressive bully means that they will grow up to be the sort of person not afraid to fight for what they want. (Really?)

A major reason for the epidemic in childhood obesity is the lack of parental involvement. There are no adults around to keep an eye on children as they play in the backyard, or the local playground, so children are told to stay inside and lock the door. Children also go right for the junk food, skipping the fruit, because there are no adults around to teach them otherwise.

Symptoms of conditions like Attention Deficit Disorder include fidgeting, losing things, interrupting, squirming and ignoring adults. These seem to be very close to normal childhood and adolescent behavior. No doubt, there are some children with an actual disability who are really helped by drugs like Prozac and Ritalin. For everyone else, is there some disease or mutation sweeping America causing the "wiring" in millions of adolescent brains to be faulty, requiring such psychotropic drugs?

The teen pregnancy rate in America is going down, which is a good thing, but the rate of sexually transmitted disease is way up. The use of contraceptives does not always equal safe sex. Where do they do "it"? At home, or their partner’s home, because their parents aren’t around.

What is to be done? Every adult must look at their own situation. Many parents work full time out of total necessity. For the others, can you be one of the adults to keep an eye on children allowing them to actually play outside? Can you coach an after-school sport or be a tutor? Can you simply be an adult figure for a child, like a Big Brother or Big Sister?

This is a gem of a book that should be read, and talked about, by parents across America. It is highly recommended.

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In New York, while attempting to steal a certain piece of paper from Welper, Maddaleen makes the acquaintance of John Lanier, who is willing to help in exchange for a piece of the action. Both men are members of an extremely exclusive club called the Forty Club. Its members are all crooks and thieves, and it has many very stringent rules. The breaking of any of the rules obligates all the other members to kill the rule-breaker. Maddaleen breaks several of the rules.

The scene shifts to the family homestead, just off the Carolina coast. The men from the Forty Club set up on one of the nearby islands, looking for the gold. John, Maddaleen and Dirck (who was never really dead, just very ashamed of himself) also start gold hunting. By the way, there is much more to Lanier than just being a smart crook. Eventually, the "good guys" strike gold first, bringing it up by the ton. This leads Welper and a couple of the others to double-cross the rest of their Forty Club compatriots. Fueled by liberal amounts of moonshine, encourage them to attack the "good guys," steal the gold, and kill everyone, especially Lanier. In the ensuing confusion and bloodshed, Welper and his new colleagues will take the gold, and head to parts unknown. Can Lanier, Dirck, Maddaleen, plus about a dozen servants, hold off crazed, drunken crooks? Does Lanier have an ace up his sleeve?

Here is a really good thriller/adventure story. There is no sex, and almost no violence, so the author relies on very fine writing that will keep the reader interested. If you can find a copy, it is very much worth reading.

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Trevor is living in a dark and dreary town called Superbia, along with many other children. Think of an orphanage from Victorian England. They are not allowed to say words like "parents" or "home." If they do, the boogeymen who run Superbia (and who kidnapped the children from their beds), will send them away for behavior modification, or send them to the Pantry, to be fattened up and eaten by the boogeymen. Becoming a meal for the boogeymen is the eventual fate of all the children.

After a very vivid dream about his parents, Trevor asks about going home, and is sent away for behavior modification. Around this time, he meets Maggie, a fellow orphan who also has memories of life before Superbia. She tells Trevor that she is part of a secret society whose aim is to help all the children who want to return home to actually do it. He also meets Epictetus, a one-eyed slave who is a leader in the "underground," and Zephyr, a very unique talking mouse. Trevor also learns about Trothward, a very nice place outside Superbia. He also learns about the long-term war going on between the Guild, who runs Trothward, and Lucian, the leader of the boogeymen. This leads Trevor to one adventure, and narrow escape, after another, while he is traversing many dank and dreary passageways beneath Superbia.

This is a young adult book that was made to be read aloud to older children, say between 10-13 years old. It may be a little too much for younger children. There are a number of dark and spooky bits in this story, and, being first in a series, there is not a "happily ever after" ending. The author does an excellent job with this tale from beginning to end, and it is very much worth the time.

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A small remnant of humanity has made its way to a planet called Nano, run by an Irish property developer named Hunter Hillman. He feels that the humans need a god to worship. The Norse God Thor is one of the applicants. A being named Wowbagger travels around the galaxy handing out insults on various planets. What follows is a titanic battle involving Wowbagger, Thor and a cheese-based deity.

For die-hard fans of the series, concerned that no one could do it like Adams, relax. Colfer is a veteran author who knows what he is doing, and it shows here. For those new to the series, read one or two of the early books first, and then read this. It’s really worth reading.

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