C - ♥ Dark Invasion: 1915: Germany's Secret War and the Hunt for the First Terrorist Cell in America

032314
Library Book

By Howard Blum

Essay   "Protecting the homeland the first time around"

So it becomes evident that there is to be war and the German Ambassador to America is given instruction on how to run a network of spies, a task which he finds most un gentlemany.
Like Stimson:
This from Wikipedia:
In 1929, the State Department withdrew its share of the funding, the Army declined to bear the entire load, and the Black Chamber closed down. In his much later memoirs, then new Secretary of State Henry L. Stimson said that: "Gentlemen do not read each other's mail." His views on the worth of cryptanalysis had changed by the time he became Secretary of War during World War II, before and during which he, and the entire US command structure, relied heavily on decrypted enemy communications.

The feeling at the time was that "Gentlemen do not read other gentlemen's mail."

72 At the outbreak of WWI "over 8 million people...[in America] had been born in Germany or had a German parent.

Hail fellow well met" is a somewhat archaic English idiom used when referring to a person whose behavior is hearty, friendly and congenial. The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) gives a 1589 quotation for this phrase as a friendly greeting. The OED also gives quotations for the related phrase "hail fellow", a greeting that apparently dates to medieval times. "Well met" appears to have been added to the phrase in the 16th century to intensify its friendliness. This additional term seems to derive from the concept of "good to meet you", and also from the meaning of "meet" as something literally the right size for a given situation.

130 The Strowger's switch that revolutionized phone switching also made it easier to eavsdrop and when the rich realized they were being targeted, they got their paid leglislators to pass a law. It was now . illegal to tap phones in NYC. But our hero here of this story just ignored that fact and tapped them anyway. Its a nod to Snowden and the fact that this was going on as early as 1915.

176 And then a german chemist came up with a fire starting device and showed it to Von Rintelen. The device invented by Walter Scheele would reak havoc on allied shipping. The new Scheele  cigars were the latest in Germany's  undeclared war on New York.

228 Hey look out Jordan Belfort cause here's another man calling himself the wolf of Wall Street circa 1915 and his name David Lamar.

225 lol. After the failure of his fake unions to shut down shipping Von Rittelen decides to get Mexico to attack America. He feels if this happens ( and get this) America will be  so busy with the Mexicans that we will need all of.our munitions ourselves.  Oooohh the Mexican threat huh. Smart man but not too bright.

229 Von Rittelen makes a deal with the deposed  Huerta to attack America and almost pulls it off except the secret meeting was taped. Heurta was arrested at the border and then immediately perished in US custody of yellow jaundice some say poisoning.

266 and now what?? A German transvestite carrying anthrax cultures among others. This is getting weirder by the minute.

268 thats right we tend to forget how valuable horses were to the war effort. One for the war horse.

So the transvestite german was going to poison the horses. Was that granpa.Simpson? He did wear a dress for awhile in the 40's.

293 I never knew the White House was bombed during WWI.

302 JP Morgan shot in the stomach? In his own house? Was that in the book? Was that in Chernow?

329 A fake summons home and then captured? You cant make this stuff up. Von Rittelen gets his.

330 Lusitania sunk!

350 Dilger tries his hand at germs.

359 Hoboken is referred to as little Bremen due to the "two major German steamship lines"  that called it home. Again angry Germans trapped in port like anvry bees with nothing to do but start trouble and foment rebellion. But I guess it was worth it in the end because all of those luxury liners went under the gavel at wars end.

Ya know all this verm warfare business was going on in America just before the outbreak of the deadliest flu virus ever known to man  which would surface in of all places America in 1917 at Ft Riley Kansas. Were we not working on germs too and was that at Ft Riley?

410 so get this. Germ warfare dude Dr Dilger leaves America when the jig is up and winds up in? Yep Spain. And just in time to catch the spanish flu and die. "The Dr who propagated germs had become their victim." Wow!

412 And finally, on Sunday July 30th 1916 at 12:24 am Black Tom exploded. This is actually the only sabotage mission that I had ever heard of prior to reading this book. Its no wonder that years later in the second World War (to end all wars lol) the New Yorkers were so panicky about seeing Germans  everywhere on the streets.

416 The rest is as they say history. Black Tom caused us to finally wake up and with tbe added bonus of unrestricted submarine warfare and then the Zimmerman telegram (uh oh the Mexican threat again lol) we were to enter the war and make the world safe for democracy.

I enjoyed this book. I read it in two days. It was sort.of a grabber and as the facts unfurled I had to keep verifying thinking all along hey that cant be right. Or hey that never happened.

I deem it not a waste of ten precious hours of my life.

HBO From the Earth To the Moon

023114
Library DVD and companion book

The first disk was great. Covered the Mercury and Gemini programs and right up to Apollo One.

C - The Tanning of America: How Hip-Hop Created a Culture That Rewrote the Rules of theNew Economy

032014
Kindle ebook

I was witness to it all. The book opens up with Rapper's Delight. I remember hearing this song anf thinking what the hell? But it had a way of staying. Movies like Beat Street showed us suburbanites how the other half was living and I was enthralled.

I remember walking down a street in Sanfancisco listening to someone playing walk this way and then bedlam. There were rap voices intruding on Aerosmith.  I loved it. I remember thinking Run DMC was super cool and Steven Tyler was super lame.

Dude its called a thesaurus. If you say unapologetic  one more time I'm going to scream.

71% I really like how all throughout this book we are remimded of the sheep mentality of the so called educated consumer of today. Its all ome big "UNAPOLOGETIC" sell off. Its look im wearing this now go buy it. Oh yes sir right away sir. Unbeleivable, but sadly true. The kids have very little say in what is termed cool. Its all a money making exercise. Trendy fashion for the most base of reasons.

80% August 1973 1520 Sedgewick Ave the birth of hip hop.

The Future of the Mind: The Scientific Quest to Understand, Enhance, and Empower the Mind

032014
Audiobook

Interresting beginning to this book with a full tour of the lafest in brain imaging. Nice description of a PET scanner and how it works.

I love this part where he tells us about an operation that was once used to controll seizures. They would separate the two halves of the brain by severing the corpus callosum. Pts seemed to function normally post surgery but subtleties were revealed. Like the left half of the brain is the rational side and is the boss. The rigbt side is where all the fun and adventure happens. They found out that the fun right side of the brain or the Id is actually.prisoner to the overbearing left side the super ego. And that when the connection between them is severed they actually become two different entities.

♥ Flappers: Six Women of a Dangerous Generation Judith Mackrell

03/19/14
Library book

This book tells the story of the flapper and the roaring 20's througb the eyes of these six women:

Josephine Baker -  Her style beauty and voice made her the epitome of the jazz aga.
Nancy Cunard - poet and heiress
Tamara de Lempicka - Pish-Russian artist
Zelda Fitzgerald - wife to F Scott
Lady Diana Cooper  - Daughter of the 8th Duke of Rutland
Tallulah Bankhead - actress

These will womens' stories will provide the framework of life as it wa s in the Jazz age.

5  A London editor commented on the right for women to vote I this era with,"dismissing them as...feckless...frivolous scantily-clad jazzing flappers (to whom) a dance or a new hat or a man... is more important than the fate of nations.'"

6 1922 Victor Marguerittte's La Garconne creats a scadal with tales of lesbianism. Later Garconne would be the new name for the flappers.

Women  were working. Disposable income spurred the ad men to target them with feminine products they just couldn't do without. It was all 'dyed hair, bee-stung lips, and Charleston frocks."

Some speculated that is was the massive world war that had so scrambled  values and morals and  created the flapper. Whatever it was it happened. These ladies found themselves coming of age after the war in a world where men were noticeably absent. Such was the devastation that the war reaked on the males of the species. What the war didnt take the flu did.

15 The little girl was out of the yard and out of her ever-loving mind. Mabel Potter Daggett also thougbt it was the War. She wrote, "August 4 1914 the door to.the dolls.house opened." This phenomenon would always be. Later Sara Evans would sing about "Suds In A Bucket," but its all the same.
 
                                     Diana

"I'll eat a banana with Lady Diana
The aristocracy's working at Guys."

20 the Gibson Girl was giving way to the Flapper. The  corsette came off but now a new problem "slenderizing"
to fit the new style which was much less forgiving. The Victorian age gave way to the Edwardian age. Cigarette was marketed to women as a way to diet. A period ad said,"reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet." That ad did very well for the company.

22 Maude Allan"s Salome caused a sensation among Britains women. A London editor accused hed of promoting lesbianism and "spreading the cult of the ciltoris."

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh0F84bsYnbQlwMdjEmFzqdPgugcAG_9dVT0HVVe9wq-7hse8ihhkdr3RYud3vWZLwd3Wlwi3MZuoDN2ogHZPlfIKHKonQ8Ct7TELHaLAgHLBz5zBWyajM-DZEtgviFtTvlpVNrnNYjd4k/s640/scan0006.jpg

Heres Lady Diana Manners herself posing nude for her brother. Nothing weird about that huh?

Well it would be a picture of her but the link thing doesn't work in blogger.

25 London was coming alive to little Lady Di. There the post-impressionist artist, little Siggie Freud was dreaming of his mother and then...a brand new type of night club. The Cave of the Golden Calf.  Jazz and Blues and ragtime had come to the continent. They were doing the Turkey Trot and The Grizzly Bear while sipping on a Pink Lady.

32 Her life changed wifh the assination of Archduke Ferdinand. She volunteered to be a nurse at Guys Hospital with the VAD service.

48 As war ravaged London editor Billings went after Maude Allans Cult in the papers and Diana reports overhearing Lord Albemarle saying "I've never heard of this Greek chap clitoris they are all taking about."

                                        Nancy

This is the grand daughter of that Cunard yes the shipping Cunard. Now we here about this poor little filthy rich girl's life and times.

                                       Tamara

Tamara de Lempicka (Łempicka) (16 May 1898 – 18 March 1980), born Maria Górska in Warsaw, Poland,[1] was a Polish Art Deco painter and "the first woman artist to be a glamour star".[2]

It is her painting "Self Portrait in the Green Bugatti" that adorns the cover

102 Alice B Toklas was Gertrude Steins "wife"?

                                        Tallulah

120 Spiritualism was big busines in America in the 1920's

122 She says Tallulah was "cock -a-hoop" when she "first saw herself on the screen." Really?

I saw ms Bankhead on an old Lucy show.

123 She finds herself at the Algonquin hotel and bumping into famous celebrities like the the Barrymoores: John Ethel and Lionel. The resturaunt the will later host the famous round table.

127 Estelle Winwood woke her up in the middle of the night to borrow her douche bag and poor lil Tallulah did not know what that was. Great set up for a married lady though,"my douche bag is passed out on the couch if you can wake him up you can borrow him though" This stuff writes itself.

128 We speak of the arrival of the "Dutch Cap." I assume its not a hat. And why Dutch? Mr Shorto assures us that mocking the Dutch as so is an ages old stereotype that was first established in the pamphlet wars between England and Holland in the 1500's. And I see Russell still hs true with tbe Dutch Cap.

Tallulah says her father warned her about men and booze but forgot to warn her about women and cocaine. This is the 1920's!

130 Early film was called "the flickers." I guess before "talkies" the sound of the projector itself was prominent.

133 Lil Tallulah was finding he voice and establishing the persona she would assume. When she mispoke about a play she had done to a writer he splashed it on the front page. He maxe this innocent mistake seem like a purposeful and cynical comment which is was not. But the tone stuck and now she was to be the funny cynical quip girl and so she ran with that.

"Im as pure as the driven slush"

135 Good foreshadowing Judith. We find here Eugenia, Tallulah's older sister is "running wild" in New York and "adulterously tangled up in the marriage of" F. Scott and Zelda.

139 Jan 6, 1923 Tallulah heads to London for her appointment with destiny.

                                        Zelda

This from Wikipedia:

Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald (July 24, 1900 – March 10, 1948), born Zelda Sayre in Montgomery, Alabama, was an American novelist and the wife of writer F. Scott Fitzgerald. She was an icon of the 1920s—dubbed by her husband "the first American Flapper." After the success of his first novel, This Side of Paradise (1920), the Fitzgeralds became celebrities.

Much like her friend Tallulah Bankhead, she also came from Alabama and rose to new heights In the roaring 20's.

                                     Josephine

This from the Official Josephine Baker site:

Josephine Baker sashayed onto a Paris stage during the 1920s with a comic, yet sensual appeal that took Europe by storm. Famous for barely-there dresses and no-holds-barred dance routines, her exotic beauty generated nicknames "Black Venus," "Black Pearl" and "Creole Goddess." Admirers bestowed a plethora of gifts, including diamonds and cars, and she received approximately 1,500 marriage proposals. She maintained energetic performances and a celebrity status for 50 years until her death in 1975. Unfortunately, racism prevented her talents from being wholly accepted in the United States until 1973.

Holy Mackrell! What a great and informative book. This book gets a heart in the title because it has it all. I actually felt like a real time  traveler. A book should transport one and inspire one to find out more. This book did that and more. Kudos.

♥ Plutocrats: The Rise of the New Global Super-Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else Chrystia Freeland

231614
Ebook

ESSAY 2011 The China Syndrome economists—David Autor, David Dorn, and Gordon Hanson

"The Marshall effect, the Rosen effect, and the Martin effect are all about the ways in which superstars are able to be better paid for the value they create—thanks to richer clients (Marshall), more clients (Rosen), and better terms of trade with their financial backers (Martin). The multiplier effect that Saint Matthew observed is what makes all these drivers of superstardom so powerful: the superstar phenomenon feeds on itself"

"On January 11, 1991, Jeffrey Katzenberg, then CEO of Walt Disney Studios, sent a memo to his thirteen top executives titled “The World Is Changing: Some Thoughts on Our Business.” Despite its bland title, the twenty-eight-page note was instantly leaked to the press, probably by Katzenberg himself, and it swiftly became the most read prose in Hollywood. “We are entering a period of great danger and ever greater uncertainty,” the memorandum began. The change Katzenberg was worried about? The rise of superstars."

Clayton Christensen, the Harvard Business School professor whose book The Innovator’s Dilemma is the corporate bible on disruptive change, has found that established companies almost always fail when their industries are confronted with disruptive new technologies

66% Yes they are planning a new Galt's Gulch its called Dubai. They have built a playground for the super rich for them to flee to once they have exhausted the resources of this country. We are not invited.

68%   heres the difference or the evolution of Dems:

"The life choices of Democratic first families tell a similar story. Amy Carter, who came of age in the White House, took part in anti-apartheid protests at the South African embassy in 1985 (for which she was arrested). She met her husband at an Atlanta bookstore where he was a manager and she was a part-time employee. Chelsea Clinton, the next Democratic daughter, has worked at a hedge fund and as a management consultant. Her husband, a fellow legacy Democrat, worked at Goldman Sachs before they married and went on to set up his own hedge fund."

Books:

Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer--and Turned Its Back on the Middle Class Paperback
by Jacob S. Hacker  (Author), Paul Pierson  (Author)

The Winner-Take-All Society: Why the Few at the Top Get So Much More Than the Rest of Us Paperback
by Robert H. Frank  (Author), Philip J. Cook (Author)

Winner Takes All: Steve Wynn, Kirk Kerkorian, Gary Loveman, and the Race to Own Las Vegas Paperback
by Christina Binkley

69.8% "When Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson went to Congress last fall arguing that the world as we knew it would end if Congress did not approve the $700 billion bailout, he was serious and speaking in good faith. And to an extent he was right: His world—the world he lived and worked in—would have ended had there not been a bailout,” Zingales argues. “But Henry Paulson’s world is not the world most Americans live in—or even the world in which our economy as a whole exists.”"
To think of that fool literally down on his knees begging to save his buddies just sickens me.

Good book. Always good to check in with other half and see how well they are doing.They pretty much have it sewed up. Congratulations.

Of a Fire on the Moon Norman Mailer

I31414
Library book

34 "The horror of the 20th Century was the size of each new event, and the paucity of its reverberation. "
Wow! Great line Norman.

43 After seeing how smooth Armstrong was for the cameras, Mailer comments on the selling of the program with,"a new species of commercial.was being evolved. NASA was vending space. Armstrong was working directly for his corporate mill." I guess we'll read all about this when we get to Marketing The Moon.

BOOK Marketing the Moon: The Selling of the Apollo Lunar Program
David Meerman Scott, Richard Jurek

44 mailer on Frank Mcgee from NBC tv. He calls him "the very ring-tailed hawk of waspitude" LMAO!

58 he estimates a million people came to clog the roads around Cape Caaveral. The in July and the following month kids would gather in a farmers field  in upstate New York.

60 Mailer says there was a big auto- camping trend going on in American at the time.

61 I love his description of the common people that came to the launch. His description has a sort of Woodstock feel to it. And how many would be born nine months after an event like this. Its like early redneck tailgating.

70 "Tell me Dd Von Braun whats to keep it (the Saturn  V ) from hitting  London." Supposedly asked of Von Braun at the press conference.

71 Dr Debus, Von Braun's counferpart said of Wehrner,"Just give him the Nazi salute and he'll yell Heil Hitler!"

109 Between launch and landing on the moon; Chappaquiddick.

188 Boy this is really some tone of this book. Only Mailer can write about going go the moon with no jingoism.  Apollo 8 was the one were they circled the moon and Frank Borman read lines fron Genesis on Cristmas Eve.

191 Here comes Apollo 11 out of the  VAB. A 363 ft 6 million pound rocket riding on a 13 million pound turtle that creeps along at top speed (1 mile an hour) toward the launch pad. "Over half a million gallons of fuel will be burned in the first two and a half minutes." Its really more like a "controlled explosion." And if the astronauts survive these first two and a half minutes their chances of survival go up precipitously.

♥ Dragnet Nation: A Quest for Privacy, Security, and Freedom in a World of Relentless Surveillance By Julia Angwin

Ni031114
Library book

Looking forward to getting into this book. I loved her "Stealing MySpace" and the topic is all too relevant today. We live in a world of complete surveillance.  If the NSA isn't watching you can bet many others are. Advertisers and otber aggregators vacuum up countless amoi ts of data about us and then mine it and package it and sell it to the Corporations to better make us do what they want of us namely consume.

Since Edward Snowden people have been more aware that someone is looking over their shoulder. But it did t start with Snowden and it wont end there. Today it takes a really.concerted efcorf to go online and remain anonymous.  And the programs you have to use to do that, ie TOR actually trigger the a response. If I use certain programs to maintain anonymity that makes the NSA wonder what I'm hiding and they focus on me specifically.  This according to P W Singer in his book Cybersecurity and Cyberwar. Seems like online surveillance is like that old hound dog humping your leg; best to just let him finish.

Talk about cameras everywhere, today at the gym im watching the news about a gas explosion in NYC. The news chopper was obsessed and constantly.following a drone flying over the site and presumably filming everything. The drone became the story. It was as if the chopper guy was saying to hell with the gas explosion, tbis is whats really happening.  Maybe the news chopper pilot felt he was reading the writing on the wall for his irrelevance. For surely the day will come when drones will be everywhere filming everything.

24 I like how she tells us here that two unrelated events  created a new industry.  911 caused the Feds to  throw large sums of money up for anyone with security in their name to claim just as the dot com bubble burst and the dotcoms were looking c or new sources of new revenue. Hence the birth of the Surveillance-industrial complex was born.

45 Studies show streetlights are just as effective as cameras in reducing crime rates.

BOOK The transparent society : will technology force us to choose between privacy and freedom?
Brin, David

BOOK  Enemies within : inside the NYPD's secret spying unit and the most dangerous terror plot since 9/11
Apuzzo, Matt

BOOK Big Data: A Revolution That Will Transform How We Live, Work, and Think
Viktor Mayer-Schönberger

BOOK The Digital Age Eric Schmidt

BOOK  One Nation Under Debt: Hamilton, Jefferson, and the History of What We Owe
Robert E. Wright

BOOK One Nation, Under Surveillance -- Privacy From the Watchful Eye
Boston T. Party, Kenneth WF

FOM bitcoins and duckduckgo

BOOK Debt: The First 5,000 Years
David Graeber

173 So Daniel Haye is the cookie monster. He invented them in 1995.

203 Hey Julia you know your picture is on the dust jacket of this book right?

ESSAY Garnett Hardin Tragedy of the Commons

BOOK State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration

Well that was scary. Yes Julia we live in a constantly monitored world. If you think about if too much it can drive you crazy. I really cant believe what the author went through to surc the web anonymously.  I really can't see myself doing all that even though it does bother me that companies make mo ey on my data. I like her analogy of the organic food movement. How when that first started it was very harx to do and the food was expensive and not that appealing.  But as the demand grew so did the utility. So maybe thats where we are at in online privacy. Seems bogus and "we better adopt some cool.rjles real soon or we'll just be bogus too."

Space James A. Michener

Ehh. It was alright I guess. Too much blah blah blah for my taste but I enjoyed the real parts.

Cybersecurity and Cyberwar: What Everyone Needs to know by Peter W. Singer, Allan Friedman

031114
Library book

Part one
How It All Works

Whats all this "cyberstuff" anyway

The great Cyber Wall of China

The new cyber arms race

See if you have william gibsons neuromancer on ebook (first mention of the term Cyberspace)

In 1972, Ray Tomlinson of BBN wrote the first "killer app" of the internet: Email (also the @ symbol)

In 1989,Al Gore invented (actually sped up privatization of ) the Internet.

1990 Berners-Lee invents HTTP and the URL and the World Wide Web.

1993 the Mosiac Web browser which would go on to become Netscape Navigator and be mercilessly crushed by the evil one from Redmond. I have fond memories from the internet of this time. Singer says porn drove the early internet (as it drives all new media). Our computer sat in the corner of the living  room pretty much untouched by me until we connected it to the internet and I found out there were nekked ladies on there.  From that moment on I was sold. I was present for it all; from the birth of Yahoo, AOL and sticky portals to the blaring days of tacky banner ads and the Browser Wars. The internet in its infancy was a great place to be.

FOM Alessandor Acquisti and guessing SSN#'s. Easy to guess if you know birthdate and birth city.

On the Internet nobody knows you're a dog. 1993 New Yorker Peter Steiner.

We strive to maintain the classic CIA of Cybersecurity: Confidentiality,  Integrity, and Availability.

The feared "cyber pearl harbor" or "cyber 911" is more a question of when more than if. And we got the ball rolling and set a precedent with Stuxnet. Cyber chickens roosting anyone?

Book David Khan The Codebreakers

Pg 66 prt two Why It Matters

72 I missed this one; 2008 Cornficker virus exploited Mi rosoft Wimdows and made botnets. This was the "holy grail" of botnets some 7 million strong. To this day they still dont know the "who or the how" of that one.

77 The 1989 WANKER virus left Midnight Oli lyrics on NASA computers. "You talk of peace for all and then prepare.for.war"

79 Angry "script kiddies" wil "dox" you.

80 Always we mention computers and the Arab Spring. But I prefer what Evgeny Morozov has to say on this subject in "To Save Everything Click Here." And also in "The Net Delusion."

MOVIE- see V  For Vendetta

84 Here's a ready made book story. A hacktivist group messes with a Mexican drug cartel The Mexicans kidnap one of the ha kefs and the group must use all of its best skills to thwart ,(I hardly ever use the word thwart really) the bad guys and save their friend. And they meet money mules at night cashing in fake ATM cards as part of a "black hat" organization.

You and me going "phishing" in the dark.

87 "typosquating" yes hate those guys.

91 Idea for new tv show Law and Order Computer Victims Unit.

91 "clutching a computer cassette." Really PW? A computer cassette? What was he hacking on a Tandy TRS - 80?

102 Mind your "Geo-tags" Your photos tell where you are.

108 Edwin Snowden will tell you if you use TOR (The Onion Router) thats a paddlin. The NSA like that nosy friend who just has to know, will monitor you. You can download a while browser with TOR built in. Annonymity at last. But if you do the NSA will be watching you.

Check out books by David Rothkopf.

139 "95 percent of the soffware used in China is pirated."

Hey Bill you must be proud; A billion Chinese on Windows. How many copies ya sell? One, the bastards.

151 David has the advantage. The Insurgents used a 25 dollar program called Skygrabber, which college kids use to pull down the satellite feeds of streamed movies to outsmart our billion dollar drone recon system. They watched the drones watching themselves.

155 Marine four star GeneralJames Cartwright who lead the American cyber initiative turned out to be the one who leaked Stuxnet to the press.  His theory is if they dont know whats there then they wont be afraid.

159 America opened up a Pandora's box by launching Stuxnet. Unlike a bomb that explodes and is gone, these cyberweapons leave behind detailed explanations of how to make more exacerbating proliferation.

C - ♥ One Summer: America, 1927 Bill Bryson

This is indeed a great book. A complete snapshot of America in the year 1927. Flappers, Lindbergh and all the rest. Show boat makes its debut on Broadway.  This is a  transformational event in music theatre with two era: one before Showboat and one after.

The American Way of Poverty: How the Other Half Still Lives Sasha Abramsky

Books mentioned

So Rich, So Poor: Why It's So Hard to End Poverty in America
Peter Edelman