http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/books/la-ca-john-farrell-20110626,0,4503692.story
The Los Angeles Times Review of “Clarence Darrow: Attorney for the Damned”
Filed under Books, Entertainment/Culture, History, Media
Watch Jack on Morning Joe, discussing Clarence Darrow with Jon Meacham and the gang
Filed under Books, Entertainment/Culture, Media
Politico: John Edwards Could Learn From Clarence Darrow
Filed under Books, Entertainment/Culture, History, Media
E Book Remorse
By John Aloysius Farrell
I’ve quite enjoyed the first two e-books I purchased. I read them on my iPhone on the subway.
I like them so much that I wish I had bought them as hardbacks.
The First was “Empire of the Summer Moon,” the story of Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History, as author S. C. Gwynne puts it. A terrific book, in the mold of “Son of the Morning Star” by Evan Connell or “Lonesome Dove” by Larry McMurtry.
Next up was “The Big Short,” by Michael Lewis, another absurdly talented writer, about the great crash of 2007-08 and the small group of iconoclasts and misfits that saw it coming and made gazillions going short. It is more than just the best book that I’ve read about the crash. It is one of the best books written about modern-day America, and American values. I hope Lewis got some movie money, and that Hollywood is not spending it all on “Too Big to Fail.”
As good as these books were, and as rich was the experience in reading them, there is definitely someting missing when you finish an e book, and you don’t get to give it an affectionate rub, sigh with regret that you’ve come to the end, and place it fondly in just the right place on your book shelf.
Books become friends. E books just shadows.
Filed under Uncategorized
Joe the Plumber, War Correspondent Extraordinaire
By Bree Hocking
War is hell, as they say, and Joe the Plumber, in an ongoing campaign to earn his place as the most famous idiot in history, has just come forward with a solution for dealing with this irksome little fact. Ban war coverage.
Joe, who until his adoption by the McCain campaign’s after-school outreach effort was known as Samuel Wurzelbacher, recently touched down in the Middle East to begin a 10-day stint covering the conflict in Gaza for a conservative web site. He’s only been there a day, but what a day he’s had. According to CNN, Wurzelbacher, an unlicensed plumber-cum-foreign correspondent (who needs government re-training programs?), had this to say about media coverage and what he sees as its anti-Israel bias:
“I think media should be abolished from, you know, reporting. …if you’re gonna sit there and say, ‘well, look at this atrocity,’ well you don’t know the whole story behind it half the time, so I think the media should have no business in it.” Continue reading
Filed under Media, National Security, Politics
Teixeira, Sabathia, Burnett and the Yankees’ Shatner Moment
The Shat
By Robert Schlesinger
I have a theory about William Shatner: 10-15 years ago, he had an epiphany. Either he could go on being an unintentionally farcical B-actor or he could embrace it and by doing so transcend it. He could go from being Shatner and instead accept his clownsish reputation and become … Shatner.
The Priceline commercials followed and then Denny Crain in the late, great “Boston Legal.” James Tiberius Kirk was a great leader and Denny Crain a clownish figure, but as a friend of mine observed to me tonight, Captain Kirk never won an Emmy.
With today’s signing of the elite first baseman Mark Teixeira, the New York Yankees had their Shatner moment.
Filed under Entertainment/Culture, Money, Sports
