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david-baptiste

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david-baptiste’s favorite books

View with a Grain of Sand by Wisława Szymborska

The Hidden Masterpiece by Honoré de Balzac

Selected Poetry and Prose by Stéphane Mallarmé

The Crowd/Extraordinary Popular Delusions & the Madness of Cr... by Charles Mackay

Unsung Heroes Of Rock 'n' Roll by Nick Tosches

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david-baptiste’s Bookshelves

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david-baptiste is Currently Reading

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Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army

by Jeremy Scahill

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david-baptiste said: " Jeremy Schahill i've seen read/talk a number of times here in his hometown, Milwaukee--a superb investigative reporter--this book really blew the lid off the formerly secretive world not only of Blackwater, but the entire spectrum of connectiosn that Jeremy Schahill i've seen read/talk a number of times here in his hometown, Milwaukee--a superb investigative reporter--this book really blew the lid off the formerly secretive world not only of Blackwater, but the entire spectrum of connectiosn that its founder, Erik Prince, is involved with--secret organizations as well as public--of right wing religious political funding, think tanks, organizing and lobbying efforts--a mixture of right wing Fundamentalist Christian (Protestant) groups, Catholic organizations of the right (Prince is a convert to Catholicism from his family's traditional Dutch Calvinist background) and secular Jewish neocons--a "theocon" gathering wielding huge power within all branches of the US Govt first under GW Bush and continuing under the current administration, which has gone on handing out huge contracts to Prince's various paramilitary & mercenary groups--Prince/Blackwater, like Cheney & Haliburton--among the first to get heavily involved in the security which is deemed de rigeur for the conditions under which "disaster capitalism" is increasingly practiced (see also re this Naomi Klein's masterpiece, THE SHOCK DOCTRINE; Klein & Scahill are both frequent contributors to The Nation)--a fascinating & harrowing read--Scahill goes deep into Prince's family background, with its long time involvement in politics, entrepreneurship (or entrah-pren-ewer" as Dubya wd say)--providing a historical context for the decades long planning, lobbying, funding that have gone into building up the powerhouse movement of right wing conservatism's goal of taking over the entire range of power structures within the USA--i'd give this book four and a half stars if i cd figure out how to make the half star others seem to be able to manage--the book's opening description of the appearance of four mutilated American "civilians" (soon exposed as "contractors, that innocuous word for mercenaries--hired by Blackwater--and the investigation that followed instituted by the family of one of the dead men--)-- hung from bridge in Fallujah--triggers this exploration of what led up to this world wide broadcast set of images--to all that has happened up to the time of the book's appearance--Scahill's work has continued being top level--he can often be found not only in the pages/online of The nation but is often seen giving updates on the horror show on Democracy Now! public access television news-- ...more "

Nov 16, 2010 10:33AM · see review

david-baptiste rated a book really liked it

Manual of Piety: Die Hauspostille

by Bertolt Brecht

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Nov 10, 2010 07:57PM

david-baptiste rated a book it was amazing

The Wings of the Dove

by Henry James

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Nov 10, 2010 07:56PM

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“A weed is a plant out of place.”
― Jim Thompson, The Killer Inside Me

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Critical Marxist Reading Group — 52 members — last activity Dec 19, 2010 07:49PM
For workers, proletariats, comrades, et al interested in sharing canonical and less known works of marxist ideological bents and those imbued with mar ...more

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¡ POETRY ! — 22610 members — last activity Nov 19, 2025 04:25PM
No pretensions: just poetry. Stop by, recommend books, offer up poems (excerpted), tempt us, taunt us, tell us what to read and where to go (to read No pretensions: just poetry. Stop by, recommend books, offer up poems (excerpted), tempt us, taunt us, tell us what to read and where to go (to read it!) Goodreads honors wordsmiths: poets and poetry promoted and prompted here. ~~~ "Poetry is the synthesis of hyacinths and biscuits." -- Carl Sandburg “God has a brown voice, as soft and full as beer.” —Anne Sexton On Clouds – “…what primitive tastes the ancients must have had if their poets were inspired by those absurd, untidy clumps of mist, idiotically jostling one another about…” —Yevgeny Zamyatin “If the poet wants to be a poet, the poet must force the poet to revise. If the poet doesn’t wish to revise, let the poet abandon poetry and take up stamp-collecting or real estate.” —Donald Hall “Poetry is a rich, full-bodied whistle, cracked ice crunching in pails, the night that numbs the leaf, the duel of two nightingales, the sweet pea that has run wild, Creation’s tears in shoulder blades.” —Boris Pasternak “Wanted: a needle swift enough to sew this poem into a blanket.” —Charles Simic “Language is a cracked kettle on which we beat out tunes for bears to dance to, while all the time we long to move the stars to pity.” —Gustave Flaubert “Poetry is not an expression of the party line. It’s that time of night, lying in bed, thinking what you really think, making the private world public, that’s what the poet does.” —Allen Ginsberg. ~~~~~ Amy King, Moderator Amy King is the recipient of the 2015 Winner of the WNBA Award (Women’s National Book Association). Her latest collection, The Missing Museum, is a winner of the 2015 Tarpaulin Sky Book Prize. She serves on the executive board of VIDA: Women in Literary Arts and is co-editing with Heidi Lynn Staples the anthology, Big Energy Poets of the Anthropocene: When Ecopoets Think Climate Change. She is also co-editing the anthology, Bettering American Poetry 2015, and is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at SUNY Nassau Community College. ...more