The Storm Before the Calm


Book Description

*One of Bloomberg's Best Books of the Year* The master geopolitical forecaster and New York Times bestselling author of The Next 100 Years focuses on the United States, predicting how the 2020s will bring dramatic upheaval and reshaping of American government, foreign policy, economics, and culture. In his riveting new book, noted forecaster and bestselling author George Friedman turns to the future of the United States. Examining the clear cycles through which the United States has developed, upheaved, matured, and solidified, Friedman breaks down the coming years and decades in thrilling detail. American history must be viewed in cycles—particularly, an eighty-year "institutional cycle" that has defined us (there are three such examples—the Revolutionary War/founding, the Civil War, and World War II), and a fifty-year "socio-economic cycle" that has seen the formation of the industrial classes, baby boomers, and the middle classes. These two major cycles are both converging on the late 2020s—a time in which many of these foundations will change. The United States will have to endure upheaval and possible conflict, but also, ultimately, increased strength, stability, and power in the world. Friedman's analysis is detailed and fascinating, and covers issues such as the size and scope of the federal government, the future of marriage and the social contract, shifts in corporate structures, and new cultural trends that will react to longer life expectancies. This new book is both provocative and entertaining.




Before the Storm


Book Description

Acclaimed historian Rick Perlstein chronicles the rise of the conservative movement in the liberal 1960s. At the heart of the story is Barry Goldwater, the renegade Republican from Arizona who loathed federal government, despised liberals, and mocked "peaceful coexistence" with the USSR. Perlstein's narrative shines a light on a whole world of conservatives and their antagonists, including William F. Buckley, Nelson Rockefeller, and Bill Moyers. Vividly written, Before the Storm is an essential book about the 1960s.




The Storm Before the Storm


Book Description

The creator of the award-winning podcast series The History of Rome and Revolutions brings to life the bloody battles, political machinations, and human drama that set the stage for the fall of the Roman Republic. The Roman Republic was one of the most remarkable achievements in the history of civilization. Beginning as a small city-state in central Italy, Rome gradually expanded into a wider world filled with petty tyrants, barbarian chieftains, and despotic kings. Through the centuries, Rome's model of cooperative and participatory government remained remarkably durable and unmatched in the history of the ancient world. In 146 BC, Rome finally emerged as the strongest power in the Mediterranean. But the very success of the Republic proved to be its undoing. The republican system was unable to cope with the vast empire Rome now ruled: rising economic inequality disrupted traditional ways of life, endemic social and ethnic prejudice led to clashes over citizenship and voting rights, and rampant corruption and ruthless ambition sparked violent political clashes that cracked the once indestructible foundations of the Republic. Chronicling the years 146-78 BC, The Storm Before the Storm dives headlong into the first generation to face this treacherous new political environment. Abandoning the ancient principles of their forbearers, men like Marius, Sulla, and the Gracchi brothers set dangerous new precedents that would start the Republic on the road to destruction and provide a stark warning about what can happen to a civilization that has lost its way.




America, Before the Storm


Book Description

AMERICA, BEFORE THE STORM Portrait of a Nation By Gerald Lewis Geiger (Copyright 2005) This is a collection of poems in rhythmic and rhymed verse, about America, her place in Atlantica and the World, and a Time in Our Age that brought out the best in us. We all are gathered and accounted for in this company the mighty and the not-so, the many and the few; all those who serve and those who only stand and wait. All of us are rich and fortified because of it, foras the Ancients had itpoetry is music of the spirit without the notes! Poetry is lovepure and straight and steadyfor it nourishes that by which we live with food not otherwise obtainable. Poetry will lilt the soul through days and years of choring, searching, grasping, through fortune and calamity and leave us better, nobler beings. AMERICA, BEFORE THE STORM Portrait of a Nation starts with the 9/11 bang that jolted us and US awake. Against the background of our national hurt and anger, the work marshals our spirit and braces our resolve. It reaches back to trials past and glories gained. It proclaims our case and spotlights our feats that make so many throughout the world seek our land and ways. AMERICA, BEFORE THE STORM - Portrait of a Nation, by Gerald Lewis Geiger, tellsin lyrical languageof an Honor Roll, writ in sweat and blood, spelled out by the genius and guts of a people, young yet wise enough to build and plant and nurture generations. It sends a hearty Hello! to all the generations, including the X-ers, who built this magnificent House and Home America! We all are there, and what we did and do and plan; deeds are recorded, fairly marked; due credit is awarded. Somewho should know better-rattle on and on about this-that-the-other-thing they disapprove of in America. But then they copiously copy us! Such flattry in their imitation of our course! In the epic poem The First Day of Forever, the author honors America. He shows us whats at stake and calmly tells us that its we! The author brings our priceless Classic genre into Modern Times with A Prince for All Time the humanly elegant tale of a search for a new home to strike roots, certainly a timely topic in our Age of Mass Worldwide Migrations, what with people crossing land and sea frontiers, settling far from place of birth, to build a career and raise a family. He pays tribute to the martyred artists of the Prague Spring and Maos Hundred Flowersboth of which shook a caring humankind with A Thousand Flowers Died. And he asks the abyssal question of All Ages: Who art Thou, Man? Whence came you, Man? And whither goest Thou? His answer is so obvious and, yet, so profound. The book puts Americas wars in perspective in Roll Call of Liberty to highlight our gains and sacrifices as we sail in Harms Way again. Full faith and credit is given to Atlantica, the fertile furrow for seeds of human genius, and to The Atlantic Family, the composite catalyst of human progress, the historical marriage of the best from West and East and North and South. POWER POETRY FOR THE PEOPLE A poem a day keeps the blues away! This is THEME Poetry and the Theme is AMERICA, the Core of the American Idea the Promise of the American Ideal This is To the People Poetry It SOUNDS OFF in the clearwithout a dozen footnotes on each page. It LILTS the routine pace of life along. It LIFTS the burdened spirit. It LOFTS our thoughts and dreams. It BOOSTS the Will to Win. It SPARKS the Imagination. It SUMMONS the Ingenuity. It BRACES the Sinew. A constant call to the Heart and Reason of Americans as America once again sails in Harms Way. These poems show us whats at stake and tell u




America's Great Storm


Book Description

When Hurricane Katrina hit Mississippi on August 29, 2005, it unleashed the costliest natural disaster in American history, and the third deadliest. Haley Barbour had been Mississippi's governor for only twenty months when he assumed responsibility for guiding his pummeled, stricken state's recovery and rebuilding efforts. America's Great Storm is not only a personal memoir of his role in that recovery, but also a sifting of the many lessons he learned about leadership in a time of massive crisis. For the book, the authors interviewed more than forty-five key people involved in helping Mississippi recover, including local, state, and federal officials as well as private citizens who played pivotal roles in the weeks and months following Katrina's landfall. In addition to covering in detail the events of September and October 2005, chapters focus on the special legislative session that allowed casinos to build on shore; the role of the recovery commission chaired by Jim Barksdale; a behind-the-scenes description of working with Congress to pass an unprecedented, multi-billion-dollar emergency disaster assistance appropriation; and the enormous roles played by volunteers in rebuilding the entire housing, transportation, and education infrastructure of South Mississippi and the Gulf Coast. A final chapter analyzes the leadership skills and strategies Barbour employed on behalf of the people of his state, observations that will be valuable to anyone tasked with managing in a crisis.




Aftershocks of Disaster


Book Description

Two years after Hurricane Maria hit, Puerto Ricans are still reeling from its effects and aftereffects. Aftershocks collects poems, essays and photos from survivors of Hurricane Maria detailing their determination to persevere. The concept of "aftershocks" is used in the context of earthquakes to describe the jolts felt after the initial quake, but no disaster is a singular event. Aftershocks of Disaster examines the lasting effects of hurricane Maria, not just the effects of the wind or the rain, but delving into what followed: state failure, social abandonment, capitalization on human misery, and the collective trauma produced by the botched response.




The Thunder Before the Storm


Book Description

Iconic activist and AIM cofounder Clyde Bellecourt tells "the damn truth" about the American Indian Movement as he lived it.




1913


Book Description

An International Bestseller "An absolute gem of a book." --The Observer Just before one of its darkest moments came the twentieth century's most exciting year . . . It was the year Henry Ford first put a conveyer belt in his car factory, and the year Louis Armstrong first picked up a trumpet. It was the year Charlie Chaplin signed his first movie contract, and Coco Chanel and Prada opened their first dress shops. It was the year Proust began his opus, Stravinsky wrote The Rite of Spring, and the first Armory Show in New York introduced the world to Picasso and the world of abstract art. It was the year the recreational drug now known as ecstasy was invented. It was 1913, the year before the world plunged into the catastrophic darkness of World War I. In a witty yet moving narrative that progresses month by month through the year, and is interspersed with numerous photos and documentary artifacts (such as Kafka's love letters), Florian Illies ignores the conventions of the stodgy tome so common in "one year" histories. Forefronting cultural matters as much as politics, he delivers a charming and riveting tale of a world full of hope and unlimited possibility, peopled with amazing characters and radical politics, bristling with new art and new technology . . . even as ominous storm clouds began to gather.




Two Men Before the Storm


Book Description

In the early 1850s, Arba Crane, a young Harvard Law School graduate, arrived in St Louis to begin his law career. Working alone late in the evenings, Crane forms a friendship with the office janitor, a slave named Dred Scott. As Scott recounts his life as a slave, Crane realizes that Scott has a legal claim to freedom and persuades him to file a lawsuit. Crane fights for Scott's rights for years. The case reaches the US Supreme Court before a spellbound country. But the Court's catastrophic decision in Scott v. Sandford holds that slaves are property without rights and that Congress has no power to halt the spread of slavery. While the decision marks the beginning of the path to civil war, it is not the end of Dred Scott's quest for freedom. Two Men Before the Storm is a work of fiction (with detailed historical endnotes) based on historical events: the profound friendship between a young lawyer and a slave and a fight for justice that fundamentally changed our nation.




Corridor of Storms


Book Description

Panoramic, authentic, explosively dramatic—this is the breathtaking new series The First Americans, which began with Book I, Beyond The Sea Of Ice. Now the heroic great hunter Torka, his woman Lonit, and his adopted son Karana emerge from a land forbidden to all men, a land where mountains walk and spirits speak. Across the fierce glacial tundra Torka leads his people—survivors of a horrifying natural disaster—to a winter camp where many bands gather to hunt the great mammoth. There he and his followers encounter an evil more dangerous than the wild lands—the magic man called Navahlk, who vows cruel destruction of the bold hunter Torka. To survive they must draw upon the courage of one brave boy who will grow to manhood and see with his mind’s eye where the sun’s light has led them—to the dawn of man on the American continent.