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White House Diary
by Jimmy CarterThe edited, annotated diary of Jimmy Carter, former President of the U.S. is filled with insights into his presidency, his relationships with friends and foes, and his lasting impact on issues that still preoccupy America and the world.
The White House Doctor: My Patients Were Presidents—A Memoir
by Connie MarianoA riveting look into the personal lives of our presidents through the eyes of their White House doctor "An interesting, behind-the-scenes glimpse of life at the White House." - Kirkus ReviewsDr. Connie Mariano served 9 years at the White House under Presidents George H.W. Bush, William J. Clinton, and George W. Bush. She participated in world headline-making news events and traveled all over the world. She cared for visiting dignitaries and was charged with caring for all the members of the First Family. From flirting with King Juan Carlos of Spain to spending the night on the Queen of England's yacht, Dr. Mariano glimpsed a glittering and powerful celebrity that few ever see.White House Doctor is a fascinating look into what goes on behind closed doors at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
The White House for Kids: A History of a Home, Office, and National Symbol, with 21 Activities
by Katherine HouseAn intriguing, in-depth look at the most famous home in the United States, this kid-friendly activity book educates young readers on the White House. Blending facts from numerous primary sources with engaging anecdotes--from learning that George Washington never actually slept in the White House and Abraham Lincoln never slept in the Lincoln Bedroom to how Gerald Ford's daughter Susan held her high school prom in the White House--this book provides the complete story of the presidents' home. Details on the many changes, updates, renovations, and redecorations that have occurred over the years are featured as well as a look at the daily lives of the White House's inhabitants, including past presidents and their families along with the enormous staff that makes the White House run smoothly. This rich history is packed with an assortment of cross-curricular activities that allow readers to walk in the footsteps of presidents--they can play key passages of "Hail to the Chief," practice signing a bill into law, make a White House punch, and re-create an aerobic game designed for President Hoover--making it a perfect book for any young mind with an interest in the White House or American history.
White House Ghosts: Presidents and Their Speechwriters
by Robert SchlesingerIn White House Ghosts, veteran Washington reporter Robert Schlesinger opens a fresh and revealing window on the modern presidency from FDR to George W. Bush. This is the first book to examine a crucial and often hidden role played by the men and women who help presidents find the words they hope will define their places in history. Drawing on scores of interviews with White House scribes and on extensive archival research, Schlesinger weaves intimate, amusing, compelling stories that provide surprising insights into the personalities, quirks, egos, ambitions, and humor of these presidents as well as how well or not they understood the bully pulpit. White House Ghoststraces the evolution of the presidential speechwriter's job from Raymond Moley under FDR through such luminaries as Ted Sorensen and Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., under JFK, Jack Valenti and Richard Goodwin under LBJ, William Safire and Pat Buchanan under Nixon, Hendrik Hertzberg and James Fallows under Carter, and Peggy Noonan under Reagan, to the "Troika" of Michael Gerson, John McConnell, and Matthew Scully under George W. Bush. White House Ghoststells the fascinating inside stories behind some of the most iconic presidential phrases: the first inaugural of FDR ("the only thing we have to fear is fear itself ") and JFK ("ask not what your country can do for you -- ask what you can do for your country"), Richard Nixon's "I am not a crook" and Ronald Reagan's "tear down this wall" speeches, Bill Clinton's ending "the era of big government" State of the Union, and George W. Bush's post-9/11 declaration that "whether we bring our enemies to justice or bring justice to our enemies, justice will be done" -- and dozens of other noteworthy speeches. The book also addresses crucial questions surrounding the complex relationship between speechwriter and speechgiver, such as who actually crafted the most memorable phrases, who deserves credit for them, and who has claimed it. Schlesinger tells the story of the modern American presidency through this unique prism -- how our chief executives developed their very different rhetorical styles and how well they grasped the rewards of reaching out to the country. White House Ghostsis dramatic, funny, gripping, surprising, serious -- and always entertaining.
White House Inc.: How Donald Trump Turned the Presidency into a Business
by Dan AlexanderAn in-depth investigation into Donald Trump&’s business—and how he used America&’s top job to service it.White House, Inc. is a newsmaking exposé that details President Trump&’s efforts to make money off of politics, taking us inside his exclusive clubs, luxury hotels, overseas partnerships, commercial properties, and personal mansions. Alexander tracks hundreds of millions of dollars flowing freely between big businesses and President Trump. He explains, in plain language, how Trump tried to translate power into profit, from the 2016 campaign to the ramp-up to the 2020 campaign. Just because you turn the presidency into a business doesn&’t necessarily mean you turn it into a good business. After Trump won the White House, profits plunged at certain properties, like the Doral golf resort in Miami. But the presidency also opened up new opportunities. Trump&’s commercial and residential property portfolio morphed into a one-of-a-kind marketplace, through which anyone, anywhere, could pay the president of the United States. Hundreds of customers—including foreign governments, big businesses, and individual investors—obliged.The president's disregard for norms sparked a trickle-down ethics crisis with no precedent in modern American history. Trump appointed an inner circle of centimillionaires and billionaires—including Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner, Wilbur Ross, and Carl Icahn—who came with their own conflict-ridden portfolios. Following the president&’s lead, they trampled barriers meant to separate their financial holdings from their government roles.White House, Inc. is a page-turning, hair-raising investigation into Trump and his team, who corrupted the U.S. presidency and managed to avoid accountability. Until now.
The White House Looks South: Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman, Lyndon B. Johnson (Walter Lynwood Fleming Lectures in Southern History)
by William E. LeuchtenburgPerhaps not southerners in the usual sense, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman, and Lyndon B. Johnson each demonstrated a political style and philosophy that helped them influence the South and unite the country in ways that few other presidents have. Combining vivid biography and political insight, William E. Leuchtenburg offers an engaging account of relations between these three presidents and the South while also tracing how the region came to embrace a national perspective without losing its distinctive sense of place.According to Leuchtenburg, each man "had one foot below the Mason-Dixon Line, one foot above." Roosevelt, a New Yorker, spent much of the last twenty-five years of his life in Warm Springs, Georgia, where he built a "Little White House." Truman, a Missourian, grew up in a pro-Confederate town but one that also looked West because of its history as the entrepôt for the Oregon Trail. Johnson, who hailed from the former Confederate state of Texas, was a westerner as much as a southerner.Their intimate associations with the South gave these three presidents an empathy toward and acceptance in the region. In urging southerners to jettison outworn folkways, Roosevelt could speak as a neighbor and adopted son, Truman as a borderstater who had been taught to revere the Lost Cause, and Johnson as a native who had been scorned by Yankees. Leuchtenburg explores in fascinating detail how their unique attachment to "place" helped them to adopt shifting identities, which proved useful in healing rifts between North and South, in altering behavior in regard to race, and in fostering southern economic growth.The White House Looks South is the monumental work of a master historian. At a time when race, class, and gender dominate historical writing, Leuchtenburg argues that place is no less significant. In a period when America is said to be homogenized, he shows that sectional distinctions persist. And in an era when political history is devalued, he demonstrates that government can profoundly affect people's lives and that presidents can be change-makers.
White House Nannies
by Barbara KlineAs president of Washington's premier nanny placement agency, White House Nannies, Inc. , Barbara Kline has spent the last twenty years handpicking and delivering nannies to elected officials, cabinet members, advisers to the President, and the media who report on their every move. In this hilarious account of her life in child care, Kline discloses the mayhem that ensues when these powerful parents find themselves at the mercy of tiny tyrants-and the nannies who offer their only hope of salvation. Offering "an especially insightful insider's perspective," White House Nanniesalso "addresses more serious questions, from what nannies really think of their employers and their young charges to the tricks of hiring a great caregiver for your family" (Childmagazine). In this "very funny, very insightful, and very well-done" (Kirkus Reviews) memoir, Kline casts a keen eye on one of the most complicated of relationships under the sun: that between extremely busy people and their nannies. Following the major events that launch powerful D. C. parents into parenthood (discovering they're pregnant; hiring a fabulous nanny; giving birth; hiring a second nanny in a pinch when the first one is nannynapped), this book goes behind closed doors in our nation's capital to reveal the laughter-and of course, the tears-involved when overworked professionals attempt to raise a child.
The White House Plumbers: The Seven Weeks That Led to Watergate and Doomed Nixon's Presidency
by Egil "Bud" Krogh Matthew KroghSOON TO BE A FIVE-PART HBO SERIES, STARRING WOODY HARRELSON AND JUSTIN THEROUXThe true story of The White House Plumbers, a secret unit inside Nixon's White House, and their ill-conceived plans stop the leaking of the Pentagon Papers, and how they led to Watergate and the President's demise.On July 17, 1971, Egil “Bud” Krogh was summoned to a closed-door meeting by his mentor—and a key confidant of the president—John Ehrlichman. Expecting to discuss the most recent drug control program launched in Vietnam, Krogh was shocked when Ehrlichman handed him a file and the responsibility for the Special Investigations Unit, or SIU, later to be notoriously known as “The Plumbers.”The Plumbers’ work, according to Nixon, was critical to national security: they were to investigate the leaks of top secret government documents, including the Pentagon Papers, to the press. Driven by blind loyalty, diligence, and dedication, Krogh, along with his co-director, David Young, set out to handle the job, eventually hiring G. Gordon Liddy and E. Howard Hunt, who would lead the break-in to the office of Dr. Fielding, a psychiatrist treating Daniel Ellsberg, the man they suspected was doing the leaking. Krogh had no idea that his decisions would soon lead to one of the most famous conspiracies in presidential history and the demise of the Nixon administration.The White House Plumbers is Krogh’s account of what really happened behind the closed doors of the Nixon White House, and how a good man can make bad decisions, and the redemptive power of integrity. Including the story of how Krogh served time and later rebuilt his life, The White House Plumbers is gripping, thoughtful, and a cautionary tale of placing loyalty over principle.
The White House Tapes: Eavesdropping on the President
by John PradosTranscripts of tape recordings beginning with Roosevelt.
The White House Transcripts: Submission of Recorded Presidential Conversations to the Committee on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives by President Richard Nixon
by Gerald Gold Richard M. NixonThe 46 private conversations between President Nixon and his closest advisors, a Who's Who and chronology of events surrounding Watergate, and more.
White House Warriors: How The National Security Council Transformed The American Way Of War
by John Gans“The NSC, part star chamber, part gladiator arena, and part Game of Thrones drama is expertly revealed to us in the pages of Gans’ primer on Washington power.” — Kurt Campbell, Chairman of the Asia Group, LLC Since its founding more than seventy years ago, the National Security Council has exerted more influence on the president’s foreign policy decisions—and on the nation’s conflicts abroad—than any other institution or individual. And yet, until the explosive Trump presidency, few Americans could even name a member. “A must-read for anyone interested in how Washington really works” (Ivo H. Daalder), White House Warriors finally reveals how the NSC evolved from a handful of administrative clerks to, as one recent commander-in-chief called them, the president’s “personal band of warriors.” When Congress originally created the National Security Council in 1947, it was intended to better coordinate foreign policy after World War II. Nearly an afterthought, a small administrative staff was established to help keep its papers moving. President Kennedy was, as John Gans documents, the first to make what became known as the NSC staff his own, selectively hiring bright young aides to do his bidding during the disastrous Bay of Pigs operation, the fraught Cuban Missile Crisis, and the deepening Vietnam War. Despite Kennedy’s death and the tragic outcome of some of his decision, the NSC staff endured. President Richard Nixon handed the staff’s reigns solely to Henry Kissinger, who, given his controlling instincts, micromanaged its work on Vietnam. In the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan’s NSC was cast into turmoil by overreaching staff members who, led by Oliver North, nearly brought down a presidency in the Iran-Contra scandal. Later, when President George W. Bush’s administration was bitterly divided by the Iraq War, his NSC staff stepped forward to write a plan for the Surge in Iraq. Juxtaposing extensive archival research with new interviews, Gans demonstrates that knowing the NSC staff’s history and its war stories is the only way to truly understand American foreign policy. As this essential account builds to the swift removals of advisors General Michael Flynn and Steve Bannon in 2017, we see the staff’s influence in President Donald Trump’s still chaotic administration and come to understand the role it might play in its aftermath. A revelatory history written with riveting DC insider detail, White House Warriors traces the path that has led us to an era of American aggression abroad, debilitating fights within the government, and whispers about a deep state conspiring against the public.
White House Wild Child: How Alice Roosevelt Broke All the Rules and Won the Heart of America
by Shelley Fraser MickleThe fascinating historical biography of America&’s most memorable first daughter, Alice Roosevelt, whose free spirit and status made her the Princess Diana and Jackie O of the early 20th century.Perfect for readers of female-centric biographies like The Daughters of Yalta and for fans of the glitzy drama of The Gilded Age and The Crown.&“I can do one of two things, I can be President of the United States or I can control Alice. I cannot possibly do both.&”—Theodore RooseveltDuring Theodore Roosevelt&’s presidency—from 1901 to 1909, when Mark Twain called him the most popular man in America—his daughter Alice Roosevelt mesmerized the world with her antics and beauty.Alice was known for carrying a gun, a copy of the Constitution, and a green snake in her purse. When her father told her she couldn&’t smoke under his roof, she climbed to the top of the White House and smoked on the roof. She became the most famous woman in America—and even the world—predating Princess Diana and Jackie Kennedy as an object of public obsession.As her celebrity grew, she continued to buck tradition, push against social norms, and pull political sway behind the curtain of privilege and access. She was known for her acerbic wit and outspoken tendencies which hypnotized both the social and political world.Brilliantly researched and powerfully told, Shelley Fraser Mickle places the reader in the time and place of Alice and asks what would it have been like to be a strong-willed powerful woman of that day. Drawn from primary and secondary sources, Alice&’s life comes into focus in this historical celebration of an extraordinary woman ahead of her time."With wit and fresh insight, Shelley Fraser Mickle brings vividly to life one of the most colorful figures of the 20th Century--the most glamorous, rebellious and contentious woman in the United States, and for a time the most famous." –Jonathan Alter, former editor for Newsweek, author of His Very Best: Jimmy Carter, a Life "What a tale!. . .The history of the Roosevelts has been predominantly about men, now it's Alice's turn."—Diana Williams, WABC news anchor
White House Years: The First Volume Of His Classic Memoirs
by Henry KissingerNew York Times Bestseller and National Book Award Winner: Henry Kissinger’s memoirs of summit meetings and secret negotiations from 1969–1973.One of the most important books to come out of the Nixon Administration, White House Years covers Henry Kissinger’s first four years as Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs.Among the momentous events recounted in this first volume of Kissinger’s timeless memoirs are his secret negotiations with the North Vietnamese in Paris to end the Vietnam War, the Jordan crisis of 1970, the India-Pakistan war of 1971, his back-channel and face-to-face negotiations with Soviet leaders to limit the nuclear arms race, his secret journey to China, and the historic summit meetings in Moscow and Beijing in 1972. He covers major controversies of the period, including events in Laos and Cambodia, his “peace is at hand” press conference and the breakdown of talks with the North Vietnamese that led to the Christmas bombing in 1972. Throughout, Kissinger presents candid portraits of world leaders, including Richard Nixon, Anwar Sadat, Golda Meir, Jordan’s King Hussein, Leonid Brezhnev, Chairman Mao and Chou En-lai, Willy Brandt, Charles de Gaulle, and many others. White House Years is Henry Kissinger’s invaluable and lasting contribution to the history of this crucial time.A New York TimesBest Book of the Year
White Identity Politics (Cambridge Studies in Public Opinion and Political Psychology)
by Ashley JardinaAmidst discontent over America's growing diversity, many white Americans now view the political world through the lens of a racial identity. Whiteness was once thought to be invisible because of whites' dominant position and ability to claim the mainstream, but today a large portion of whites actively identify with their racial group and support policies and candidates that they view as protecting whites' power and status. In White Identity Politics, Ashley Jardina offers a landmark analysis of emerging patterns of white identity and collective political behavior, drawing on sweeping data. Where past research on whites' racial attitudes emphasized out-group hostility, Jardina brings into focus the significance of in-group identity and favoritism. White Identity Politics shows that disaffected whites are not just found among the working class; they make up a broad proportion of the American public - with profound implications for political behavior and the future of racial conflict in America.
White Lies: Nine Ways to Expose and Resist the Racial Systems That Divide Us
by Daniel HillWhite Lies is a thoughtful, practical guide for confronting and dismantling White supremacy and promoting racial justice in healthy, effective ways.White supremacy presents one of the greatest threats to the soul of our nation and the kingdom of God--but we can do something about it. Drawn from more than twenty years of working in cross-cultural communities and learning from some of the greatest leaders of color, pastor and racial justice advocate Daniel Hill offers clarity on what White supremacy is and how it is much more than extremist groups spewing hatred, but lamentably is an ideology that infiltrates us all.As more and more White Christians are awakening to the pervasive bias for white culture, ideas, and actions that shape every aspect of society, many are eager to fight for racial justice. But what steps can be taken to make good, lasting change? How can White Christians get involved without causing more harm?In this practical and illuminating guide, Hill provides nine practices rooted in Scripture that will position you to be an active supporter of inclusion, equality, and racial justice. With stories, studies, and examples from his own journey, Hill will show you:How to get free of the impact of White supremacy individually and recognize that it works systemicallyHow to talk about race in an intelligent and respectful wayHow to recognize which strategies are helpful and which are harmfulWhat you can do to make a difference every day, after protests and major eventsWe cannot experience wholistic justice without confronting and dismantling White supremacy. But as we follow Jesus--the one who is supreme over all things--into overturning false power systems, we will become better advocates of the liberating and unconditional love that God extends to us all.
White Lives Matter Most: And Other "Little" White Lies
by Matt Meyer Sonia SanchezModern-day movements to end racism in the U.S. seem sadly doomed to fail. If a more sober analysis of U.S. history is not considered, our efforts will lead to continued fragmentation—or worse. The essays in this book reveal the successful strategies and methods of multigenerational coalitions used in recent campaigns to free Puerto Rican and Black Panther political prisoners, confront neo-Nazis in Charlottesville, and many more. Meyer’s reflections on the need for intensified solidarity, consciousness, and accountability among white folks provide a provocative and urgent challenge. These essays—some coauthored by Black Lives Matter and Ferguson Truth Telling leaders Natalie Jeffers and David Ragland, Puerto Rican professor Ana López, Muslim interfaith activist Sahar Alsahlani, and Afro-Asian cultural icon Fred Ho—offer up-to-the-minute insights.
White Lotus
by John HerseyNot too far from now, in a world very like our own, the oppressors have changed places with the oppressed. After their defeat in the Yellow War, the white people of America are thrust into a brutally altered reality. They are hunted like wild beasts and drive like cattle, transported in reeking ships and sold to their conquerors as field hands and house slaves. Robbed of their old names and their old language, treated with a mixture of cruelty and condescension by their Chinese masters, whites take on new identities and new strategies of survival. Some, like Nose, plunge into dissipation. Others, like Top Man, become imitation Yellows. And some, like White Lotus, rebel. In this mesmerizing book John Hersey creates an alternate history that casts a harsh radiance on our own. It has some of the stateliness of Exodus, along with the power of oral narratives of slavery. It has heroes and victims—and villains who turn out to be victims of another color. At once a masterpiece of storytelling and a complex novel of ideas, White Lotuscompels us to reexamine our notions of race and racism, freedom and oppression.
White Lotus Rebels and South China Pirates
by Wensheng WangThe reign of Emperor Jiaqing (1796-1820 CE) has long occupied an awkward position in studies of China's last dynasty, the Qing (1644-1911 CE). Conveniently marking a watershed between the prosperous eighteenth century and the tragic post-Opium War era, this quarter century has nevertheless been glossed over as an unremarkable interlude separating two well-studied epochs of great transformation. White Lotus Rebels and South China Pirates presents a major reassessment of this misunderstood period by examining how the emperors, bureaucrats, and foreigners responded to the two crises that shaped the transition from the Qianlong to the Jiaqing reign. Wensheng Wang argues that the dramatic combination of internal uprising and transnational piracy, rather than being a hallmark of inexorable dynastic decline, propelled the Manchu court to reorganize itself through a series of modifications in policymaking and bureaucratic structure. The resulting Jiaqing reforms initiated a process of state retreat that pulled the Qing Empire out of a cycle of aggressive overextension and resistance, and back onto a more sustainable track of development. Although this pragmatic striving for political sustainability was unable to save the dynasty from ultimate collapse, it represented a durable and constructive approach to the compounding problems facing the late Qing regime and helped sustain it for another century. As one of the most comprehensive accounts of the Jiaqing reign, White Lotus Rebels and South China Pirates provides a fresh understanding of this significant turning point in China's long imperial history.
The White Mandarin
by Dan ShermanA CIA double agent holds the fate of China—and the world—in his hands in this gripping spy thriller from the author of The Man Who Loved Mata Hari. John Polly enters Shanghai in 1948 on a muggy, velvet evening, just in time for the Communist takeover of China. It marks only his fourth month in America&’s newly formed Central Intelligence Agency. Over the next two decades, Polly will become The White Mandarin, a double agent buried so deep within the inner circle of the People&’s Republic as to shape the futures of both that nation and his own. Dan Sherman&’s intricate, superbly crafted spy thriller follows Polly as he walks a dangerous tightrope of intrigue and suspense. As China rebuilds itself, Polly attempts to start a family in the intersection between the American intelligence system and the Asian drug trade. Can Polly keep his wife and daughter safe? Can he keep track of the shifting stories and changing allegiances in the CIA? Will his emotion get in the way of his mission? Only pages into this stunning novel, readers will easily understand why Sherman has earned comparison to the great John le Carré and Graham Greene. It is both a story of very personal love and loss, and an insightful history of China between the rise of Chairman Mao and the 1972 visit by President Nixon. Anyone looking to understand the China of yesterday and today—its power, its flaws, its beauty—need look no further than The White Mandarin.
The White Mandarin
by Dan ShermanA CIA double agent holds the fate of China—and the world—in his hands in this gripping spy thriller from the author of The Man Who Loved Mata Hari. John Polly enters Shanghai in 1948 on a muggy, velvet evening, just in time for the Communist takeover of China. It marks only his fourth month in America&’s newly formed Central Intelligence Agency. Over the next two decades, Polly will become The White Mandarin, a double agent buried so deep within the inner circle of the People&’s Republic as to shape the futures of both that nation and his own. Dan Sherman&’s intricate, superbly crafted spy thriller follows Polly as he walks a dangerous tightrope of intrigue and suspense. As China rebuilds itself, Polly attempts to start a family in the intersection between the American intelligence system and the Asian drug trade. Can Polly keep his wife and daughter safe? Can he keep track of the shifting stories and changing allegiances in the CIA? Will his emotion get in the way of his mission? Only pages into this stunning novel, readers will easily understand why Sherman has earned comparison to the great John le Carré and Graham Greene. It is both a story of very personal love and loss, and an insightful history of China between the rise of Chairman Mao and the 1972 visit by President Nixon. Anyone looking to understand the China of yesterday and today—its power, its flaws, its beauty—need look no further than The White Mandarin.
The White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good
by William EasterlyFrom one of the world's best-known development economists-an excoriating attack on the tragic hubris of the West's efforts to improve the lot of the so-called developing world In his previous book, The Elusive Quest for Growth, William Easterly criticized the utter ineffectiveness of Western organizations to mitigate global poverty, and he was promptly fired by his then-employer, the World Bank. The White Man's Burden is his widely anticipated counterpunch-a brilliant and blistering indictment of the West's economic policies for the world's poor. Sometimes angry, sometimes irreverent, but always clear-eyed and rigorous, Easterly argues that we in the West need to face our own history of ineptitude and draw the proper conclusions, especially at a time when the question of our ability to transplant Western institutions has become one of the most pressing issues we face.
The White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good
by William EasterlyAn informed and excoriating attack on the tragic waste, futility, and hubris of the West's efforts to date to improve the lot of the so-called developing world, with constructive suggestions on how to move forward. William Easterly's The White Man's Burden is about what its author calls the twin tragedies of global poverty. The first, of course, is that so many are seemingly fated to live horribly stunted, miserable lives and die such early deaths. The second is that after fifty years and more than $2.3 trillion in aid from the West to address the first tragedy, it has shockingly little to show for it. We'll never solve the first tragedy, Easterly argues, unless we figure out the second. The ironies are many: We preach a gospel of freedom and individual accountability, yet we intrude in the inner workings of other countries through bloated aid bureaucracies like the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank that are accountable to no one for the effects of their prescriptions. We take credit for the economic success stories of the last fifty years, like South Korea and Taiwan, when in fact we deserve very little. However, we reject all accountability for pouring more than half a trillion dollars into Africa and other regions and trying one "big new idea" after another, to no avail. Most of the places in which we've meddled are in fact no better off or are even worse off than they were before. Could it be that we don't know as much as we think we do about the magic spells that will open the door to the road to wealth? Absolutely, William Easterly thunders in this angry, irreverent, and important book. He contrasts two approaches: (1) the ineffective planners' approach to development-never able to marshal enough knowledge or motivation to get the overambitious plans implemented to attain the plan's arbitrary targets and (2) a more constructive searchers' approach-always on the lookout for piecemeal improvements to poor peoples' well-being, with a system to get more aid resources to those who find things that work. Once we shift power and money from planners to searchers, there's much we can do that's focused and pragmatic to improve the lot of millions, such as public health, sanitation, education, roads, and nutrition initiatives. We need to face our own history of ineptitude and learn our lessons, especially at a time when the question of our ability to "build democracy," to transplant the institutions of our civil society into foreign soil so that they take root, has become one of the most pressing we face.
White Masks
by Elias KhouryWhy was the corpse of Khalil Ahmad Jaber found in a mound of rubbish? Why did he disappear weeks before his horrific death? And who was he? A journalist begins to piece the truth together by speaking with his widow, a local engineer, a nightwatchman, the garbage man who discovered him, the doctor who performed the autopsy, and a young militiaman. Their stories underline the horrors of Lebanon's bloody civil war and its ravaging effects on the psyches of the survivors. With empathy and candour, Elias Khoury reveals the havoc the war wreaked on Beirut and its inhabitants, as well as their dogged resilience.
White Men Challenging Racism: 35 Personal Stories
by Cooper Thompson Emmett Schaefer Harry BrodWhite Men Challenging Racism is a collection of first-person narratives chronicling the compelling experiences of thirty-five white men whose efforts to combat racism and fight for social justice are central to their lives. Based on interviews conducted by Cooper Thompson, Emmett Schaefer, and Harry Brod, these engaging oral histories tell the stories of the men's antiracist work. While these men discuss their accomplishments with pride, they also talk about their mistakes and regrets, their shortcomings and strategic blunders. A foreword by James W. Loewen, author of Lies My Teacher Told Me, provides historical context, describing antiracist efforts undertaken by white men in America during past centuries. Ranging in age from twenty-six to eighty-six, the men whose stories are presented here include some of the elder statesmen of antiracism work as well as members of the newest generation of activists. They come from across the United States--from Denver, Nashville, and San Jose; rural North Carolina, Detroit, and Seattle. Some are straight; some are gay. A few--such as historian Herbert Aptheker, singer/songwriter Si Kahn, Stetson Kennedy (a Klan infiltrator in the 1940s), and Richard Lapchick (active in organizing the sports community against apartheid)--are relatively well known; most are not. Among them are academics, ministers, police officers, firefighters, teachers, journalists, union leaders, and full-time community organizers. They work with Latinos and African-, Asian-, and Native-Americans. Many ground their work in spiritual commitments. Their inspiring personal narratives--whether about researching right-wing groups, organizing Central American immigrants, or serving as pastor of an interracial congregation--connect these men with one another and with their allies in the fight against racism in the United States. All authors' royalties go directly to fund antiracist work. To read excerpts from the book, please visit http://www. whitemenchallengingracism. com/
White Migrations: Gender, Whiteness and Privilege in Transnational Migration (Migration, Diasporas and Citizenship Series)
by Catrin LundströmFrom a multi-sited ethnography with Swedish migrant women in the United States, Singapore and Spain, the book explores gender vulnerabilities and racial and class privilege in contemporary feminized migration, filling a gap in literature on race and migration.