
Commonplace Book: Karl Kraus and Charlie Hebdo
“Many people want to strike me dead. Others want to spend time chatting with me. The law protects me from the first group.” — Karl Kraus Continue reading Commonplace Book: Karl Kraus and Charlie Hebdo
“Many people want to strike me dead. Others want to spend time chatting with me. The law protects me from the first group.” — Karl Kraus Continue reading Commonplace Book: Karl Kraus and Charlie Hebdo
In this installment of Mondays with the Supremes, I investigate two books that discuss the death penalty and its implications. Comments encouraged. Continue reading Mondays with the Supremes: The Death Penalty
This week I review “The Passage of Power,” Robert Caro’s 4th volume in his epic biography of Lyndon Johnson. Continue reading CCLaP Fridays: The Passage of Power, by Robert Caro
A limited-run series where I review three books about the Supreme Court of the United States, exploring its historical and ideological conflicts, and the transformations it wrought upon law and society. This week, I examine the Justices who hold the “swing vote.” Continue reading MONDAYS WITH THE SUPREMES: PART V: SUPREME COURT SWINGERS
A limited-run series where I review three books about the Supreme Court of the United States, exploring its historical and ideological conflicts, and the transformations it wrought upon law and society. This week: Three Supreme Court cases that examine “binding precedent”, race, and national security. Continue reading MONDAYS WITH THE SUPREMES, PART III: KOREMATSU, BROWN, AND PADILLA
I begin a limited-run series where I review three books about the Supreme Court of the United States, exploring its historical and ideological conflicts, and the transformations it wrought upon law and society. Continue reading Mondays with the Supremes: Part I: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court
The ghosts of Sixties radicalism return to haunt the life of Boston real estate lawyer Alan Ripley in KC Frederick’s new novel. Continue reading After Lyletown, by K.C. Frederick
Why is Alfred Buber an important character for modern readers? Alfred Buber’s story is a riff off several things: isolation, male loneliness, a feeling some of us may have that for others life is richer, more sensual, more rewarding than it ever will be for us. Buber is frozen by that feeling, by the sense that he is a spectator at his own life, shut out of any chance at love, at being wanted, at feeling full and satisfied. He mistakes these feelings, I think, for desire, and I believe many men do this: conflate loneliness with desire, as if … Continue reading An Interview with David Schmahmann, author of The Double Life of Alfred Buber
Contracts are everywhere. Richard Stim makes this obvious in the introduction to Contracts: the Essential Business Desk Reference. Enumerating everything from employment contracts to those involving insurance, credit cards, toll roads, and music and book downloads, contractual relationships are everywhere and nowhere. Because of this situation, Contracts is an essential tool for navigating the occasionally intimidating aspect of signing the dotted line. Following or breaking contracts have real consequences for all involved. The book organizes the various terms associated with contracts in alphabetical order. Aided by cross-references, it provides easy navigation of topics. Nolo, the publisher, also boasts dictionary definitions … Continue reading Contracts: the Essential Business Desk Reference by Attorney Richard Stim
If Permanent Press had a prestige novel, To Account for Murder by William C. Whitbeck would it. The novel presents a fictionalized version of real life events that happened in Michigan. In 1945, Senator Warren G. Hooper was murdered in a gangland-style slaying. To this day, the murder case has never been solved. William C. Whitbeck, the author of the novel, also works as Chief Judge of the Michigan Court. He presents us with the tale of one Charlie Cahill, a disabled vet, prosecutor, and son of an Irish bootlegger. Set in Lansing during 1945 and into 1946, Whitbeck paints … Continue reading To Account for Murder by William C. Whitbeck