The Price Of Peace: Money, Democracy, And The Life Of John Maynard Keyes, Carter - B+, Incomplete

            "Keynes was a philosopher of war and peace, the last of the Establishment intellectuals who pursued political theory, economics, and ethics as a unified design." His concerns were not about taxation or government spending, but rather the survival of civilization. His overarching vision of the future was a"vision of human freedom and political salvation."

             In August of 1914, the thirty-one year old Cambridge don hurried to London where the Bank of England had paid out two-thirds of its gold reserves. Everyone wished to hoard gold, but Keynes convinced the government to continue to redeem gold and issue a paper currency. He was appointed to a top position at Treasury. The war "transformed him from an inconspicuous, content academic into one of the most influential figures of his generation." He had a position in Treasury that thrust him into almost every important financial decision of the war. But, on a personal level, his role brought consternation to his Bloomsbury friends, and he became unsettled by the government's increasingly jingoistic sentiments. He was discomfited  by Britain's almost total reliance on the US to finance the war. When Wilson came out with his Fourteen Points, Keynes was one of many supporters. Wilson was perceived in Paris as the person who would save Europe from itself. Keynes went to Paris to represent the Treasury. "German reparations became the central, iconic drama of the peace conference." The British and French wanted blood money. The Americans and Keynes wanted a manageable number that wouldn't push Germany into poverty. America's reasonableness did not extend to forgiving any of its war debt. Overwhelmed by demands for absurd reparations and endless politicking, he resigned from Treasury and returned to England that summer. "The Economic Consequences Of The Peace is a provincial, shortsighted, vicious, and in many respects deeply unfair polemic. It is also a masterpiece and very likely the most influential work Keynes ever put his name to." He brilliantly predicted the ill-fated consequences of the treaty, made a lot of money because it became a run-away bestseller, and annoyed almost everyone in the British government.

             He returned to Cambridge, and began speculating in financial markets. He also met Lydia Lopokova, a Russian ballet dancer. The gay Maynard, one of the country's best known homosexuals, fell for, and eventually married the Russian dancer in 1925. His writings and his ownership of the newspaper 'Nation' meant he was once again accepted in the nation's political circles, even though he had taken on the need for the gold standard. He was asked to join a new committee when the Great Depression descended on the world. He delved into the causes and consequences of the Slump. He published a monstrous book called A Treatise On Money that garnered world wide attention and acclaim. His predilection for government intervention in economies was challenged by an Austrian, Friedrich Hayek, an apostle of laissez faire. Their arguments still resonate today, particularly in America. As he watched the world sink further into depression, he was extremely frustrated by the world's governments trying to solve the problem by raising taxes and attempting to balance budgets. 

            The year 1933 saw someone finally adopt his policies, and it was the United States that would reverse course first. FDR closed the banks, reopened them with a guarantee of their deposits, took the US off the gold standard, and proclaimed that it was the government's responsibility to manage the free market system for the benefit of the people. Cheap credit and public works programs were at the heart of Keynesian theory. At about the same time, he began work on his life's masterpiece. "The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money is one of the great works of western letters, a masterpiece of social and political thought that belongs with the monuments left by Aristotle, Hobbes, Edmund Burke, and Karl Marx." Its focus is on alleviating inequality and posits that prosperity "must be orchestrated and sustained by political leadership."

           Maynard's health began to fail in the mid-1930's. He credited his recovery to "Hitler's aggression" and went back to work as an unpaid advisor for the UK when WWII broke out. He eventually accrued so much influence and power that he became the functional wartime Chancellor of the Exchequer. In 1944, now Lord Keynes, he headed to America for the Bretton Woods Conference. "At age sixty, with his health failing, Keynes had reached the zenith of his intellectual and political powers. Bretton Woods would be his final grueling test." He was influential in the creation of the IMF and World Bank, but held a losing hand throughout the conference as the representative of a bankrupt nation from a bankrupt continent. It was America's world to rule. He returned to America in early 1946 for the ratification in Savannah of the Bretton Woods decisions and died soon thereafter in London. He was 62. "No European mind since Newton had impressed himself so profoundly on both the political and intellectual development of the world." He lived an astonishing life and dominated political economics throughout his life and for the three-quarters of a century since his death.

       Usually the grade of Incomplete accompanies my inability to complete a book. In this instance, it means I did not finish the last fifth of the book dealing with the consequences of his thoughts which bring the story to this century. It also addresses the fact that I had to skip through innumerable pages of deep dives into the dismal science, which I acknowledge is both beyond me and something I find very boring. Eight years ago, when there was a flurry of writing about WWI, I stumbled upon two of the most brilliant minds of the 20th century: George Kennan and John Maynard Keynes. I would heartily recommend anything Kennan wrote, and in terms of Keynes, "The Economic Consequences Of The Peace" is one of the 33 A's on this blog of 967 books. It's magnificent. Thanks again to Greg Weiss for recommendations that challenge me.

         

Give Unto Others, Leon - B

        In the latest Guido Brunetti novel, we find the commissioner helping an old friend who tells him she is worried about her daughter. She's not really worried about her daughter, but is trying to get the police to look at some of the shabby things her retired husband is doing. It is not the illegalities he may be up to, but rather the younger financial advisor he is likely bedding. It all falls apart for her and her husband as Guido sorts it out, and we are treated to a view of La Serenissima during the pandemic.

Fallen Mountains, Grant - B+

                Earlier this month, I commented on this young woman's second mystery set in the north woods of Pennsylvania. This is her first. A terribly unpopular and incredibly selfish SOB, son of the richest man in town, shows up after an absence of years. His presence invokes memories for his best friend, his old girlfriend, the town's loser whom he used to torment, and the sheriff. His fiancee reports him missing and soon the hunt is on. He has met a gruesome ending, but none of the potential suspects are responsible. Comparing the two books shows the author's growth over a few years and compels me to look forward to her future efforts. One rather likable trait is that the conclusions are not at all negative. I won't say they are happy endings, just not bad endings.

The Goodbye Coast, Ide - C+

           This is an attempt by a pretty good LA-focused author to bring Phillip Marlowe into today's City of Angels. As I have never read Chandler, I have no idea if there's any effort to reflect or recreate whatever his idiosyncratic style was. In this novel, Marlowe accepts two missing persons cases and is thrust into the world of failing Hollywood types and Russian bad guys. The story started off well, but completely dragged to the end. The reviewers seem to like it, so if you're a Marlowe or an Ide fan, I guess it might be worth the effort. 

Vietnam: An Epic Tragedy, 1945-1975, Hastings - B+

            "The struggle for Vietnam...lasted three decades and cost between two and three million lives." It destroyed "one US president and contributed to the downfall of a second." The war "was predominantly an Asian tragedy, upon which a US nightmare was overlaid: around forty Vietnamese perished for every American."

            Vietnam was occupied by imperialist France in the late 19th century. By the 1930's, a few hundred French families dominated the 70%of a populace that lived in near-slavery. It was a world of  "institutionalized cruelty" that Nguyen Sinh Cung was born into in 1890. The world would later know him as Ho Chi Minh (Bringer of Light). Young Ho would become a Vietnamese nationalist, revolutionary and communist. By 1940, he was the leader of the Vietnam Independence League (Vietminh). As WWII ended, he declared independence from France. The French announced "ironclad opposition" and began a war that would eventually cost them 90,000 dead. Ho's ruthless and vicious tactics afforded him the chance to dominate the north and rule from Hanoi. The French, motivated to retain all of their colonies in order to restore their dignity, occupied Saigon. The French then captured Haiphong and Hanoi while Ho and his military leader, Giap, turned to guerilla warfare.  The Chinese communists began to help their Vietnamese colleagues in 1949. The Vietminh were soon able to field armies in the north, and in 1951, inflicted major casualties upon the French while capturing vast amounts of abandoned material. 

          The French found a willing paymaster in the US. After the loss of China and the beginning of the Korean War, we would make no distinction between colonialism and anti-communism. The US poured billions into the French effort and encouraged them to seek a definitive battle. The French selected a place called Dienbienphu. They began to occupy the valley 175 miles west of Hanoi in late 1953. Eventually, twelve thousand men fought for the France at what was called a fortress. Slowly, the Vietminh dragged equipment into place as they spent  months surrounding the garrison. It became obvious to the French that their presence in the valley was an egregious error, but they would not walk away. Paris insisted on fighting. The country was ruled "by men burdened by the humiliations of the previous decade and thus constrained in every decision by a yearning to restore national honor, revive la patrie's glory." Giap attacked on March 13th. Soon, the airstrip was closed, artillery battered every corner of the camp, and infantry began to overrun the outer defenses. They surrendered in early May. The US had thought long and hard about intervening, but could not garner the necessary congressional approval.

      Attention turned to Geneva, where the British and Soviets were conducting a conference on Vietnam at which John Foster Dulles turned his back when Zhou Enlai extended his hand. A division of the country was settled upon at the 17th parallel with elections to follow. The French would leave and Ho would lead the north and Diem the south. The British, French, Chinese and Soviets endorsed the Accords, but neither Vietnamese delegation did, nor did the US. The north and south "both fell into the hands of oppressive authoritarian regimes." Nonetheless, a million people fled south as the communists destroyed the middle and upper classes. Collectivization and outright slaughter were the north's policies. The focus of Ho and Giap was internal. War and aggravating the Americans were not on their agenda.

      The south of the country was untouched by war and was home to the Mekong Delta, a rice-producing powerhouse. It was immeasurably more prosperous than the north. However, it was led by a man lacking in charm, unloved by the people, and seemingly uninterested in them as well. Diem, appointed by the French puppet emperor, Bao Dai, was a Catholic in a Buddhist world. For most folks, he seemed a continuation of colonialism. Dulles tried to remove him in 1956 but failed. As American money poured in, corruption ran amok and extended to Diem's family. Corruption, nepotism, favoritism of Catholics, persecution of critics, and a failure to initiate land reform were just some of Diem's problems. "The regime's domestic excesses and shortcomings, rather than its failure to hold reunification elections, provided communists with the tinder to rekindle the war in the South." In the late 50's, southerners asked Hanoi for permission to fight. It was reluctantly granted. In 1959, the Vietcong killed two American advisors in an attack on an ARVN position. A year later, the VC picked up the pace, brutally terrorizing the population and exhorting against the government in Saigon. From the perspective of the US, the problems of South Vietnam were not governance problems, but a security issue requiring a military response. 

     There were some in the Kennedy administration who tried to counter the communists on a social level, but for the majority the belief was "that military power...could achieve political objectives in post-colonial states." Under JFK, the number of military advisors grew from 400 to 16,000. The life and death struggle with communism would continue. The early 60's were a foreshadowing of what was to come. The VC ratcheted things up, the ARVN mostly avoided fighting, the US press pointed it all out, and MACV told Washington everything was going great. The spring of 1963 saw the Diem government begin its final downward spiral. The ARVN lost a pitched battle in the Mekong Delta, security forces violently suppressed a Buddhist protest in Hue, and a Buddhist priest self-immolated in front of western cameras in Saigon. With explicit US approval, the Vietnamese generals disposed of Diem a few weeks before JFK was assassinated. In the north, an aggressive Le Duan succeeded an aging Ho, and with an increase in aid from the Chinese, prepared to pursue unification.

   The decision makers in Washington feared losing to the communists more than anything else and thought about either bombing or invading the north. The US was regularly dropping commandos off in the north, and in August of 1964, there was  contact between a US destroyer and some North Vietnamese patrol boats. The USS Maddox was ultimately found to have a single bullet hole on its upper works. We retaliated with our first bombing of the north. LBJ and McNamara, characterizing the Gulf of Tonkin incident as an attack on America, received from Congress near unanimous approval to our "taking all necessary measures." LBJ was elected in a landslide by a populace that could reasonably conclude war was not on the horizon. He famously said he would not "send American boys to fight a war Asian boys should fight for themselves." Yet, once the election passed, the administration began studying its escalation options. It was obvious to all that the south would soon succumb without direct American military action. "A dramatic expansion of America's war in Vietnam became inevitable."

   The new year saw the VC increase its terror tactics and for the first time, regulars from the north came south to fight. The administration knew a war would be unwinnable, but was afraid to tell the America people or Congress how hopeless it looked. The ongoing turnover of leadership in the south with coup after coup, when combined with the ARVN's lack of will, pointed to abject and immediate failure. VP Humphrey,  Sens. Mansfield and Russell and Democratic eminence grise Clark Clifford all encouraged the President to not fight. Nonetheless, McNamara continued to encourage the president to escalate. Haunted by history- the appeasement at Munich, the loss of China and the ambiguity of Korea - LBJ began to send US troops that spring. Soon, we had 175,000 men there.

     By the end of 1966, there were 385,000 Americans in Vietnam, 6,000 fatalities and a cost of $15B for the year. The US poured vast amounts of money into the country, fueling pervasive corruption throughout Vietnamese society and the US military. The USAF bombed and napalmed the country with limited effect on the enemy. The Army and Marines conducted thousands of search and destroy missions with little consequence. While the VC terrorized specific members of the populace, the US policies of indiscriminate violence killed many as well. 

     The US also escalated the bombing of the north, but it never produced the desired results. The primary problem was that there really wasn't much to bomb. North Vietnam was a primitive agricultural society. Because LBJ did not wish to risk Soviet or Chinese retaliation, Haiphong harbor was off limits, as were targets within specific distances from Hanoi and the Chinese border. The north built up its anti-aircraft skills with Soviet equipment and eventually downed 2,600 Navy and Air Force planes. One of the more important consequences of the bombing was that it rallied the north against the US menace from the air.

        Nineteen sixty-seven saw the war intensify and the anti-war movement begin to fiercely oppose it in the states. "The consequences of the rising tide of domestic turbulence were profound" and led to an army "infected by a cult of dissent, drugs, and disbelief." That summer saw Hanoi call for decisive victory through a general offensive-uprising. It was also the year that saw the upgraded M16 in the hands of infantrymen in Vietnam. Unfortunately, the weapon jammed in the jungle and caused endless problems for the grunts. The Army's reaction - classify the information and deny the truth of what the US men were experiencing. 

       January 30, 1968, Tet, was arguably the most important day in the thirty-year history of the Vietnam War. The north unleashed all it had across the entire country and suffered massive casualties. Only a few hundred southerners joined in. Although the US and the south prevailed, it cost LBJ the WH because Tet destroyed the fallacy of MACV that victory was around the corner The broadcasting of touch and go fighting in Saigon, particularly at the American Embassy, proved that very little had been accomplished in three years of US involvement. "Perception is critical, and the events of February 1968 became a perceptional disaster for American arms." Sixty-seven thousand fighters attacked 36 of the country's 44 provincial capitals. A small commando unit breached the walls at the Embassy and their feat was broadcast around the world. Also flashing around the world was one of the most famous pictures of the war, an ARVN officer blowing the brains out of a captured VC. Art Buchwald wrote with a Little Big Horn dateline that George Armstrong Custer now sees "the light at the end of the tunnel." The most severe fighting took place in Hue where it took almost the entire month to displace the NVA from the city. The NVA and VC were demoralized by the loss of a third of their attackers. Indeed, they had put so much into their failed effort that it would take years for them to recover. But it mattered not. On February 27th, Walter Cronkite stunned America. "To say we are closer to victory today is to believe in the face of evidence...optimists who have been wrong...To say we are mired in a stalemate seems the only realistic yet unsatisfactory conclusion...It is increasingly clear to this reporter that the only rational way out is to negotiate-not as victors, but as honorable people who lived up to their pledge to victory and democracy and did the best they could." Gloom descended on the WH. A month later, Johnson announced he would not run again. In May, the US and North Vietnamese began desultory talks in Paris. The war continued and the year 1968 would end with 16,899 more dead Americans. After one of the most tumultuous years in US history, Richard Nixon would now try to find peace with honor.

    The NVA and VC suffered through casualties and supply challenges knowing that they would eventually win. It was clear that the US did not have the willpower to push through to any semblance of victory. Indeed, the US Army was "crumbling from within." It was now plagued by drug abuse, racial strife and lack of discipline. "From 1968 until the end, the effectiveness of American forces was in serious decline."Nixon and Kissinger felt that the US could not walk away and, at the same time, did not have plan, even though Nixon had campaigned saying he had one to end the war. They expanded it by authorizing the bombing of Cambodia and began to withdraw American combat troops, replacing them with ARVN soldiers. In late April, 1970, US and ARVN soldiers invaded Cambodia, leading to massive anti-war disturbances in the US. In early 1971, a heavily US supported ARVN invasion of Laos was an total failure, one that led to the WH becoming very concerned about whether Vietnamization could hold the war together until after the 1972 elections. In March 1972, the north unleashed a major offensive in the Central Highlands. Throughout the spring, the southerners fell back under the unrelenting northern efforts. In response, Nixon unleashed the heaviest bombing of the war. The southerners eventually prevailed in the battles of 1972, leaving both sides emotionally and physically exhausted.

     The ultimate settlement comprised many provisions, but only two counted. The communists could stay wherever they were in the south and the US would leave. The north was certain it would be only matter of time. Nixon and Kissinger were sure they had obtained the 'decent interval' they were hoping for. The happiest consequence of the peace for the US was the return of the 588 POW's. The war continued without the US. Two years later in April, 1975 Saigon fell. The communists brutalized the losers. As for the US, a general summed it up best: "The Vietnam war did more to change this country than anything in our recent history. It created a suspicion and mistrust we've never been able to redeem."

   An American professor at the University of Texas, and an author of a Vietnam history reviewed the book for the Times. He states, that unlike most historians who try to shade the war in gray, Hastings sees it in black and white. The only real problem is that it's all black. Hastings castigates the barbarism of the communists, the incompetence of the southerners and the the American penchant for destroying the country they were allegedly trying to help. The reviewer suggests that there is not enough focus on motives, just consequences. 

   Notwithstanding my respect for this author, this has been a real slog. At 752 pages of text, it is a bit long. But the primary challenge for me has been the lack of narrative. By telling the story through the experiences of thousands, the book has a chopped-up feel to it. That said, my positive takeaways are led by the highlighting of the institutional brutality of the communists, who ruled with a Stalin-like single-mindedness. Both the people of the north, and the south after 1975, paid a high price for their independence. The tragedy of the south is that it was prosperous and had potential, but there simply never was any leadership. Hastings suggested it could have been like South Korea. Instead, it's still part of a top-down dictatorship. And as for the US, I once again am astounded by our institutional delusion and still befuddled by a democracy's decision to consistently lie to its people.                                                                      

    

These Silent Woods, Grant - B+

         This is a magnificent novel about a man, Cooper, and his daughter, Finch. Cooper left what I am guessing is the wilds of Pennsylvania and served three tours in Afghanistan. His best friend in the Rangers, Jake, was badly wounded, but was alive thanks to Cooper's efforts. Back home, Cooper's girlfriend Cindy has a baby, but dies in a car accident soon thereafter. Because he is suffering from PTSD, Cindy's parents, powerful members of the community, obtain a court order and take the baby. He kidnaps the baby, goes deep into the woods, and stays at Jake's family's place. Cooper and Finch create a loving, and very close to nature, almost idyllic life together. For eight years, Jake comes to resupply them every December. One year, Jake's sister, Marie, shows up because Jake has succumbed to his wounds. The same week, a young woman goes missing in the national park near Cooper and Finch's cabin. Their world is about to unravel, when a mysterious neighbor deflects the authorities in a different direction. This is a wonderful tale of love and nature. Highly recommended. 

Damascus Station, McCloskey - B+

        This is a superb spy thriller set in Damascus a decade ago. It is a debut novel by a former CIA agent based in the Middle East. It is very, very good. Sam loses a colleague, Val, in Damascus, but like everyone else working for the US, he is not overly concerned because she had a diplomatic passport. Unfortunately for Val, the passport did not help, as the Syrians murdered her in custody. The man responsible for that crime is targeted and will be killed. Sam is tasked with recruiting a young woman, daughter of a minister, whom they suspect may have her doubts. Mariam winds up working for Sam and the CIA, although in the middle of her recruitment, she and Sam wind up in bed. She soon proceeds to provide Damascus Station with pure gold. At about the half-way point in the novel, the story gets very complicated, stretches one's imagination a bit, and finishes in sequential scenes of both individual and city-wide violence. Nonetheless, the book excels at tradecraft revelations and gives insightful specifics of the hell that is the civil war in Syria.

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, Christie - B+

               This ninety-six year old novel is considered the greatest murder mystery ever written.  It is narrated by Dr. James Sheppard, the general practitioner in King's Abbot. Roger Ackroyd was troubled by the suicide of his fiancee, Mrs. Ferrar, who had confessed to him that she had poisoned her husband a year earlier.  Ackroyd was reading a letter she had posted to him explaining that she was being blackmailed when he was murdered in his study. The letter is missing, presumably taken by the blackmailer/killer. All facts point to Ralph Paton, Ackroyd's step-son and fiance of his niece, Flora. Paton was in financial trouble and Ackroyd was considering cutting him off. Ralph disapeared the night Ackroyd was killed. The following day, Flora asked Hercule Poirot, noted private detective, now quietly retired in the village, to find the murderer. He accepted immediately and began to interview the staff. One of his first conclusions was that Ralph, notwithstanding all of the circumstantial evidence, was innocent. Slowly and methodically, which is Poirot's method, he examines the people in the household and unearths something each person is holding back. However, whatever the lie is, he says it is not relevant to his search.  He pursues and deduces - oh what an insult to Dr. John Watson - that the narrator is the killer. It was Dr. Sheppard who had learned how Mr. Ferrar had died and proceeded to blackmail the murderer/widow. He did so to pay his extensive gambling debts. Greatest ever? I think not.

The Last Platoon, West - A*

          This fabulous novel is set in the last days of our war in Afghanistan. The WH is trying to tamp down Talib activities in Helmand Province and put a dent in the poppy/opium trade. It's harvest time and an Iranian with millions is buying up the valuable poppies.  There's conflict among the locals as some are fighting with the Americans while others are negotiating with them. Diego Cruz, an enlisted man promoted to captain, with extensive combat experience, is sent over by an old superior to embellish his promotion opportunities and to lead a platoon providing security to the fire base that is central to the efforts in Helmand. Cruz's presence unnerves the colonel at the base who happens to be a political officer with no combat time under his belt. The mission is complicated by the presence of three CIA men who are there to interdict the opium trade and, at the direction of the president, capture the drug lord known as the Persian. The Marines find a vast store of heroin in a cave under a mosque, torch it and capture the drug lord. The following night, however, under cover of a sandstorm, the Taliban counter. Suicide bombers make it inside the wire. The concussed political colonel relives Cruz, who ignores him and goes out to re-seal the barbed wire perimeter. With nine dead, no amount of ass-covering by the colonel can save him from being relieved. Cruz lands on his feet with a job offer from the CIA. As for the mission, it was all part of a cynical play by the WH to to have Helmand be declared a neutral province in a deal with the Taliban. The author is a Marine combat vet with a tour as a civilian high up in the DOD, lending credence to both the combat and the politics. This is a delight and I thank Linda Meir for the recommendation.

        Perhaps, the most amazing takeaway here is the extensive use of technology on today's battlefield. Not only are there drones everywhere providing spot-on visual  intelligence, but our people have the ability to listen in on any local Afghani cellphone conversations. Wearing headphones, everyone in the squad can talk to everyone else. Most of the men follow the terrain around them with iPads capable of identifying friend and foe, and of course, the US can always call in fire support from nearby and high in the sky. 

King Richard: Nixon and Watergate: An American Tragedy, Dobbs - B+

         This is a limited re-telling of the Watergate story, focusing on the early days of Nixon's second term, Jan. 20 - July 17. It hones in on the inner workings of the WH as each individual slowly realizes what a mess he has gotten himself into, and that there is no way out. As Kissinger put the finishing touches on the peace deal with N. Vietnam, the Watergate burglars were being pressured by trial Judge John Sirica to state who they had taken their orders from.  Sirica sent Liddy and Magruder to DC jail to await sentencing. Howard Hunt insisted on money from John Dean before he went to jail, prompting the White House Counsel to tell the president that Dean, Mitchell, Magruder, Haldeman and Ehrlichman had all committed crimes and that there was a "cancer" on the presidency. In late March, the first cracks in the dam appeared when McCord's sentencing was deferred because he indicated a willingness to cooperate with Judge Sirica. Nixon and Haldeman decided that Magruder and Mitchell were expendable. Dean was concerned that he was too. Dean retained counsel and began to bargain for immunity. In mid-April, Hunt "told all" and Magruder struck a plea bargain deal. With information piling up, the DOJ briefed the AG, who told Nixon he needed to get rid of Haldeman and Ehrlichman. At this point in mid-April, Nixon struck upon a theory he would try to foist upon the world and the WH press corps: that he just learned about all of this and now was the chief investigator. He and Haldeman listened to the tape of Dean's "cancer" meeting to try to establish that the president did not approve of buying off Hunt, when the eventual release of the tapes showed that he actually did. Nixon eventually asked Haldeman and Ehrlichman to resign, and he announced their departure on national tv. Dean was unable to reach a deal with the prosecutors, but was entitled to "use immunity" for anything he testified to before the Senate Select Committee. On June 25th, John Dean began to testify, mesmerized the nation, and dug the administration's grave before the Watergate Committee. A month later, Alexander Butterfield disclosed the existence of the taping system. Nixon decided to not destroy them because the tapes would exonerate him. "The story of Richard Nixon's fall is neither a Greek tragedy nor a Shakespearean tragedy but a uniquely American drama that we continue to live with today. It is a story without an end because it is the story of us all."

         Most Watergate histories are top-down, and this one is the opposite. This is not a big picture of what happened, when and how it all unravelled, but rather an inside the coverup look at everything falling apart. There is an extensive recounting of who said what to whom in the WH that highlights the completely delusional thinking that went on in Nixon's world.

        

Trespasser, Doiron - B+

   This is the second book in the Mike Bowditch series. The Maine Game Warden is called out late at night, near the and of a 12 hour shift, for a car/deer collision.  He finds the car, but there's no driver and the deer is gone. He has an idea which local lowlife may have taken the deer, but for the life of him he can't sort out where the driver went. A state trooper comes by and tells Mike to go home. It's now a police matter and he has it in hand. When it turns out that the driver is found murdered, Mike blames himself and goes off the reservation seeking to find out what happened. Like all police procedural series, this one has its quirks and idiosyncrasies. Here, it is that Mike is a bit smarter than many around him, and likes to charge ahead and cross a lot of lines. Hopefully, as the series progresses, every police officer in Maine isn't mad at him. 

A Game Of Fear, Todd - B

                 Rutledge is off to the Essex coast in the spring of 1921. A woman sees a murder outside her window, but there is no body. She is a member of the landed gentry and her suspicions need to be addressed. No one believes her, but Rutledge does his duty. He soon determines that what she saw was a performance to scare her, so someone could access her house. Not long after Ian's arrival in Walcher, a war widow is found murdered on the nearby closed airbase. Clearly, there is someone very bad nearby and Ian goes to work to solve the case. This is a fine addition to the long running series. There is a superb blending of the present and all of the overwhelming anxieties and sadness from the war. To top it off, Ian's promoted to DCI. I compliment the authors for only advancing the tale 2+ years in Ian's time over two and a half decades.

Leave the Gun, Take the Cannoli: The Epic Story of the Making of The Godfather, Seal - B

     "Based on one of the bestselling novels of all time, it revitalized Hollywood, saved Paramount Pictures, announced the arrival of Francis Ford Coppola..., minted a new generation of movie stars, made its writer, director, and producer rich, and sparked a war between two of America's mightiest powers: the sharks of Hollywood and the soldiers of the Mob." 

      Watching Joseph Valachi testify before Congress in 1963, "a dead-broke writer" living on Long Island decided to write a novel about the Mob. Mario Puzo had grown up in Hell's Kitchen, where his Sicilian-born mother managed her seven children in the rough and tumble neighborhood in the Depression. Paramount gave him an advance after seeing the first 100 pages, and when completed, the novel was a sensational success. Fame and fortune followed for its author. The novel was so realistic that people in the Mafia could not believe that it was based on research, and that Puzo had never met a real mobster.  He was hired to write the screenplay and moved to Hollywood. Francis Ford Coppola, a director more interested in art than big studio productions, and with a few flops to his name was to be director. Coppola worked closely with Puzo on completely redoing the screenplay to hew closer to the novel, and away from the studio's suggested approach. Coppola had a vision for the film and had settled on who he wanted for every principal role. He won each and every casting battle with the studio. But the battle over Pacino as Michael was the one he almost lost. Evans hated the fact that Pacino was short and stated over and over again that he would not get the role. Evans wanted Redford, O'Neal, Hoffman, Nicklaus, anyone but Al. Coppola persisted, and was almost fired before Evans finally gave in.

    The Italian American Civil Rights League and a real life crime figure threatened to stop the production but they ultimately relented Shooting started in NY in the spring of 1971. The film was "shot in 120 New York area locations over 67 days." Clearly, Francis Ford Coppola is the genius who made this magnificent film as great as it is, and for him, the entire process was the most difficult time of his life. There was no fun or satisfaction in the filming. He, his pregnant wife and two children were living in his brother-in-law's two bedroom apartment in Manhattan for the simple reason that Francis was broke. Every day he waited for Evans, who had sent Jack Ballard to be his eyes and ears on the set, to fire him.  Ballard second guessed every move Coppola made. Pacino too was very uncomfortable in a key role working with such well known actors. The dailies they were seeing at Paramount involved a Brando they couldn't quite hear. There were people working on the film calling for Coppola to be fired, so Francis fired six of them. But when Evans saw the restaurant scene when Michael kills Sollozzo and McCluskey, everything changed. The scene saved Coppola's and Pacino's jobs. 

     Nonetheless, the tension and constant oversight of Ballard who fought every expenditure, meant that stress and anxiety were the handmaidens of  the filming of The Godfather. Post-production and editing began: Evans in Hollywood and Coppola in San Francisco. Both men claimed the credit for making the movie the masterpiece it was. Evans, though, did have the clout to convince the studio to allow it to run almost three hours. The next battleground was the music. Evans hired Henry Mancini; Francis wanted Nino Rota. Once again, Coppola prevailed.

     Both the NY and Hollywood premiers were met with stunned silence. Coppola was so discouraged that he accepted an offer to write a screenplay and flew to Paris to work on it.  The film was a phenomenal success. "It broke Gone With The Wind's record in a week and a half." It was soon grossing a million dollars a day. Oscars followed, and for those with points, Coppola, Puzo, and the producer Al Ruddy, vast wealth came too. As for Coppola and Evans, they continued to hate each other and hurled insults back and forth. For Godfather II, Coppola had it written in his contract that Evans would have nothing to do with the film. Evans went to his grave believing it was his film.

      The first half of this book dealing with Puzo and his struggles is much better than the second half covering the actual production, perhaps because so much has been written over the years. Obviously, the major takeaway is Coppola was brilliant and patient, while Evans comes off as evil incarnate.

  

    

Smoke and Ashes, Mukherjee- B

               The setting is Calcutta at Christmastime in 1921. The entire city is on edge as a visit from the Prince of Wales is days away and the Congress Party is protesting.  Captain Sam Wyndham and Sergeant Surendranath Banerjee are investigating a series of brutal murders tied to a test conducted by the army and the military is  keeping them away from the facts. The murderer is a Gurkha soldier who is AWOL and who is possibly targeting the Prince as well.  Sam and Surrender-not (his British imposed nickname) investigate the murders, liaise with the leaders of the Congress Party, and make all the correct calls to protect the Prince. There actually was a massive protest when Edward visited Calcutta, but the threat to his life is fictional. This is the third in the series and it continues to excel at addressing the tensions between the occupiers and the occupied. Sergeant Banerjee, as a servant of the Raj, is in a particularly difficult position, experiencing the racism of the British and the disapproval of his own people. Sam Wyndham's opium addiction is explained as a result of the morphine he received as treatment for his combat injuries. The novel closes with Sam headed off to rehab. 

The Anomaly, Le Tellier - B

           This highly-acclaimed French novel is an international bestseller and winner of the Goncourt Prize. An Air France Paris to JFK flight takes off, experiences severe turbulence over Nova Scotia and lands at Macguire AFB in NJ - 106 days after it has taken off. Th original flight faced the same turbulence, landed on time and all 243 people on board have moved on with their lives. Unsure of what it all means, the US releases everyone and offers the late arrivals a chance to enter witness protection and establish a new life. As a third Air France 006 approaches the US mainland a few months later, the US blows it out of the sky. The Times reviewer posed a question or two: "Is it science fiction dressed up as philosophy? Metaphysics disguised as a high-concept thriller?" I for one have no idea.

Powers and Thrones: A New History of the Middle Ages, Jones - B

          This history begins with the fall of the Roman Empire and finishes with the Protestant Reformation. "By the end of the fifth century A.D., the Roman Empire in the west no longer existed." With its expiration, the west inherited traditions of slavery and Christianity, an infrastructure of roads and aqueducts, the Latin language, and a legal system. "It [Rome] was the foundation on which everything in the Middle Ages was built." The western empire had been lost to barbarians from the east. The Huns were forced to cross the Volga and enter Europe because of a 4th century 'megadrought' on the steppe. The Huns compelled the Goths, Alans, Suevi, Burgundians, and Vandals to move further west. Over the course of a century, the various barbarians, and the kingdoms they established, replaced the the greatest empire history has ever known. The century after the fall of Rome saw a rebirth in Constantinople. The Emperor Justinian led the way with a law codification that"set a gold standard for constitutional reform in the Middle Ages." He built the Hagia Sophia and recaptured North Africa from the Vandals and Italy from the Ostrogoths.  The empire was frequently at war with Persia, but it would be Arabia from which a monumental challenge arose in the 7th century. Syria, Palestine and Egypt quickly fell to the Muslims, thus severing from the empire lands it had ruled for seven centuries. All of North Africa and Spain followed. The Arabs even twice threatened Constantinople itself. When their efforts at conquering the imperial city failed, they turned east and went as far as Pakistan. When it was decreed that the Arab language must be used by all in government, a cohesiveness was brought to the vast empire that stretched from Spain to the Asian sub-continent.

        The 8th century in Europe saw an impressive consolidation of lands on both sides of the Rhine by Charlemagne and a concurrent assault by the Vikings from the north. On Christmas day in 800, Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne Roman Emperor. His empire extended from the Baltic to Tuscany and from Bavaria to the French coast.  The empire didn't last and was carved up by his heirs in the middle of the 9th century. At the same time, the Vikings descended on Europe conquering and wreaking havoc. They eventually settled down and established important political entities throughout northern Europe, and of particular import, the Danelaw in England, and Normandy in France. The 10th century saw a significant rise in the wealth and power of the monastic system, led by the rise of the Cluny monastery. William of Aquitaine endowed Cluny, and its abbots became international leaders in the golden age of monasticism. Cluny itself was the largest church in Christendom. The monasteries became "centers of literacy, education, hospitality, medical treatment, elderly social care, and spiritual counseling..." A Cluniac monk was elected Pope Urban II. 

           In the late 10th century, Otto, a German king, defended against a Magyar attack by utilizing heavy cavalry, horsemen fully armored and very capable of defeating the plains horsemen who had been threatening Europe for centuries.  "For the next two centuries, powerful, mounted warriors dominated battlefields, while also beginning to burnish their status in society at large." Knights became the epitome of chivalry, "which would inform art, literature, and high culture long beyond the end of the Middle Ages." In the late 11th century, the besieged Byzantines asked for help from their western brothers, a request that led to the Crusades. Pope Urban II urged a crusade to release the Holy Land from Islam's oppression. Anyone who died while crusading was assured a remission of sins and immediate entry to heaven. Spilling vast amounts of Muslim, Jewish and Christian blood, the Crusaders took Jerusalem in 1099. The crusader states in the Levant would survive for two hundred years. The first challenge came from a Kurdish warrior and leader, Saladin, who reconquered the Holy land in 1187. Europe responded with another crusade. Frederick Barbarossa, King Philip II of France and Richard the Lionheart of England all took part. They recovered Acre and the ports on the coast, but not Jerusalem. A new pope, Innocent III, directed the crusading spirit inward, inspiring troops to advance the reconquest of Spain, to conquer and convert the pagans in the north of Europe, and to wage war against heretics, particularly the Cathars in southern France. In 1291, the last crusaders left the Holy Land. "Crusading - a bastard hybrid of religion and violence, adopted as a vehicle for papal ambition but eventually allowed to run as it pleased, where it pleased, and against whom it pleased, was one of the Middle Ages' most successful and enduring poisonous ideas."

            The 13th century would see Europe threatened from the east by an extraordinary and powerful force - the Mongols, who would conquer Eurasia from Korea to Hungary.  As violent and brutal as they were, they rebooted trade between Asia and the west, enhanced the transfer of technologies, knowledge and people, established an efficient postal service and implemented a rule of law. Arguably, their achievements would not be surpassed for centuries. 

            The 13th and 14th centuries saw a commercial revolution that changed way the world traded.  Money and goods were flying around the world. Power was now in the hands of merchants and bankers; kings and emperors had to give way. In Italy, the city states of Venice, Padua, Florence, Pisa, and Genoa dominated the finances and politics of Italy and the Mediterranean. At the same time, there was a vast increase in the numbers of books published as scholarly pursuits took hold. Works of antiquity were translated and universities grew. The expansion of learning led to some of the first challenges to the established church by men such as Jan Hus and John Wycliffe. It was also an era of major construction projects.  "The thirteenth and fourteenth centuries were a golden age of monumental architecture in the west, in which some of the most iconic buildings in world history were erected." These structures sent "spires and towers soaring toward the heavens, telling interwoven stories of wealth, power, piety, and dominion." The progress Europe was making toward the future was shattered in the 14th century by famine and plague. The Little Ice Age contributed to a famine from 1315-1321. Twenty-five years later, the Black Death tore through Europe, killing an estimated half of the population. "The first economic consequence of the pandemic was to wreak havoc on prices and wages." Riots and revolts followed, the most famous of which was the Peasants' Revolt in England. The populist uprisings were suppressed, but did lead to the loosening of feudalism's ties.

            First in northern Italy, and later throughout Europe, the cultural movement known as the Renaissance began. There was an increased interest in the glories of Greece and Rome, and  rapid technological advances in painting, sculpture, construction and education. It was "the culmination of a long road back to civilization".  The art of Leonardo, the sculpture of Michelangelo and the dome of Brunelleschi highlight the extraordinary leaps made in this era. 

         When the Turks captured Constantinople in 1453, trade with the east became more complicated and rulers in Portugal and Spain were motivated to seek alternative routes. This led to the historic world-changing discovery of the Americas and the European exploration of Asia. In 1522, Magellan's circumnavigation was completed, global empires were being created, and the Middle Ages were coming to a close. In 1455, Gutenberg published his Bible. "Mechanized printing changed western culture in the fifteenth century as fundamentally and profoundly as the creation of the smartphone changed it at the turn of the twenty-first." The availability of the printed word and the increasing exchanges of information throughout Europe led to the last act of this story - the Protestant Reformation. Ironically, the first item Gutenberg printed was a Papal Indulgence, the 15th century financial/confessional abuse that led the list of concerns about the church articulated by Martin Luther. The printed version afforded the church immeasurably more sales opportunities than was the case for those written by hand. The sale of indulgences transitioned from a service to scandal under Pope Sixtus IV in the 1470's. Luther's Ninety-Five Theses were published in 1517. His ideas spread completely throughout Europe in a year. "By the 1530's, the western world was no longer medieval." England withdrew from the Catholic church. Protestants and Catholics were fighting in France and Germany. An imperial army had sacked Rome in 1527. "The rise of the printed word, encounters with the New World, the collapse and fracture of the church militant, the demographic rearrangements caused by waves of the Black death, the humanistic and artistic revolutions of the Renaissance - all these things and more recast the shape and the feel of the west, in ways that contemporaries explicitly recognized, even as the process was taking place."

           

Into The Forest: A Holocaust Story Of Survival, Triumph, And Love, Frankel - B-

                     In September,1933, Miriam Dworetsky and Morris Rabinowitz were married in Vilna, Poland.  The couple moved to Zhetel, a town of 5,000, 80% of whom were Jews. Daughters Rochel and Tania arrived in 1935 and 1937 respectively. When the war began, Zhetel was occupied by the Soviets. Life went from bad to worse two years later when the Germans came. The Wehrmacht passed through, and then the SS and the Einsatzgruppen arrived. Some of the early roundups that summer missed the extended Rabinowitz family. However, most of Miriam's family was killed in December. In February of 1942, the Jews of Zhetel were moved into a ghetto. A few months later, the liquidation of the ghetto began. Before it was finished that August, the Rabinowitz's fled to the woods hoping to join the partizans. "The Bialowieza Forest was an ancient place...one of the earth's last remaining primeval woodlands." Soon, there were 800 Jews hiding in the woods. When winter began, the Germans stopped hunting and decided to let the weather do their work for them. The following year, Morris spun his group off from the larger one and hid deeper in the forest. The summer of 1943 saw 65,000 German troops attack the forest. Somehow, Morris' evaded the SS and survived. The following summer saw the arrival of the Red Army, and the departure of the Germans. The Rabinowitz's had beaten the odds - the family was alive and intact. Only 200 of Zhetel's Jews made it. Morris took his family to Lublin and began to plan an escape to Palestine. In 1946, they boarded a train for Austria and walked into Italy. The UN's DP camps provided the Jews with housing, food and a return to some sort of normalcy.  The opportunity arose to go to America and the Rabinowitz's took it. They settled in Hartford, where they prospered.  Rochel, now known as Ruth, fell in love and married Phillip Lazowski. Life had come full circle: a dozen years earlier, Miriam had let a young Phillip join her and the girls as the family survived the first selektion in Zhetel. Tania married a few years later. Morris and Miriam died in the early 1980's. Their life was a testament to love.

The Temple House Vanishing, Donohue - C+

              This is a coming of age story set in an all-girls boarding school in Ireland in the early 1990's. Louisa is a new scholarship student who comes under the spell of the handsome young art teacher, Mr. Lavelle, and one of his proteges, Victoria. The disappearance of Mr. Lavelle and Louisa twenty-five years earlier is being investigated by a journalist. Everyone thinks they ran away. The police think he killed her. Neither are correct. 

Five Decembers, Kestrel - B

                 Joe McGrady is a Honolulu PD detective who catches a gruesome double homicide a few weeks before Pearl Harbor. The murder of a young American man and a Japanese woman is front page news. Joe flies to Hong Kong following his prime suspect and is captured and taken to Tokyo when the war breaks out. A Japanese diplomat, Takahashi, rescues him from a harsh imprisonment. The young woman in Hawaii was Takahashi's niece, so he hides and protects Joe for the duration of the war in the hope that Joe will catch the killer after the fighting. Joe survives and catches up to his prey in Hong Kong. This is perhaps one of the most preposterous plot lines I've ever seen.

Tunnel 29: The True Story of an Extraordinary Escape Beneath The Berlin Wall, Merriman - B

           When the Wall goes up in August, 1961, Joachim Rudolph is a twenty-two year old student in East Berlin. He has survived war, the death of his father, years of living in the rubble strewn city, and nonetheless has excelled in school. But because he never joined any of the socialist youth movements, his future is uncertain. He and his best friend, Manfred, decide they have to escape. They head south of the city, find a relatively quiet spot and walk across to freedom at night. Soon thereafter, Joachim is a student in West Berlin when he and Manfred  are recruited to help build a tunnel into the east. They scout out a place to start and on May 9, 1962, they begin to dig. They've studied the east side of the wall, have identified a building that is their goal, and estimate that it is 120 meters away. Progress is slow and money becomes an issue. One of the organizers learns that NBC News is looking for an escape story.  A deal is made. NBC will pay for the excavation in exchange for filming rights. As the tunnelers continue to work, in the east the Stasi are working just as hard. When the tunnel floods, the diggers try an alternative route. With informers everywhere and dozens alerted about an opportunity to leave, the secret is out, and on August 7, 1962, the Stasi round up 43 East Berliners who were hoping to escape. Joachim, who was leading the dig, barely escapes. They head back to their original tunnel and find it has dried out. They begin again. On Sept.14, once again with Joachim in the lead, the diggers break into a basement in East Berlin. They welcome 29 people and usher them to freedom. The story soon is a world wide headline, but there is so much anxiety about the secretive filming of the project that the US State Dept. criticizes NBC, which decides not to air it.  The State Dept. relents and NBC shows the film in December. It's a massive hit and the USIA is soon showing it around the world.  The following year, Jack Kennedy makes his famous 'Ich bin ein Berliner' speech, but it would be decades more before the Wall comes down.

Razorblade Tears, Cosby - B

      Ike and Buddy Lee are the fathers of Isiah and Derrick, who were an interracial married gay couple. They have absolutely nothing in common but the desire to find and exact revenge on whoever murdered their sons. While in pursuit, they spend a lot of time talking about dealing with a gay son. Neither of them had handled it well, and both suffer from grave misgivings about their conduct. Their success carries a heavy price.

Looking For The Good War: American Amnesia And The Violent Pursuit Of Happiness, Samet - Incomplete

          "More than seventy-five years on, World War II remembrance continues to distort the country's past... such is the...mythology... of WWII - the good war that served as prologue to three-quarters of a century of misbegotten ones..." "In 1945, the United States was a power as dominant, its vanquished enemies as inhumane, as any the world had seen." All of our wars since then have "inherited that wars moral justification." 

             The highpoint of America's fond remembrance and idealization of the war came around the celebration of the 50th anniversary of D-Day and was led by historian Stephen Ambrose and journalist Tom Brokaw. Both men spoke of an almost universal support for the war and ignored the depths of the opposition articulated by the America Firsters, which opposition ran very deep in the midwest and mountain states. While focusing on the character of the generation, both writers paid little heed to the violence necessary to win the war. And because that violence led to a world we were enamored with, one in which we were heroic, "it leads us repeatedly to imagine that the use of force can accomplish miraculous political ends even when we have the examples of Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan to tell us otherwise."

           The premise of this book resonated with me, as our messianic approach to foreign policy has troubled me for decades. But once the author passed beyond the introduction, bafflement became the order of the day.

            

56 Days, Howard - B

            This is a pretty good police procedural/psychological thriller set in Dublin during the opening weeks of the pandemic in 2020. Oliver and Ciara meet by chance and quickly hit it off. They decide to tackle the challenges of the lockdown together as a couple at Oliver's apartment. Both are cautious and careful, as each of them is hiding a very big secret.

Catching The Wind: Edward Kennedy And The Liberal Hour 1932 -1975, Gabler - A*

          "Ted was the heir, the one who said after Robert's death that he now had to pick up his brothers' fallen standard, and his own death, however tarnished his personal reputation might have been, not only stirred memories of his brothers but also signified the end of the Kennedy era in American politics and for many, the extinguishing of a last flickering hope." He lived in their shadow, in their reflected glory. He was always the 'least' of the clan. Yet he accomplished more than they ever had, he was one of "the most consequential legislators of his lifetime, perhaps in American history."

            This book is the first of two volumes that "tell what is perhaps the most important story of the late-twentieth and early-twenty-first centuries in American politics: the story of the shift in the nation's political tectonic plates from liberalism to conservatism." "This book tells how he caught the liberal wind and tried to keep riding it, and in telling that story, it attempts to tell how the entire country, for a brief time, seemed to have caught the wind too, before it stopped blowing."

            The ninth Kennedy was born on Feb. 22, 1932.  Joe Kennedy raised his children to be very close and to always compete to win. Family was both a fortress and a weapon. Ted's childhood was lonely and friendless as he shuttled to an endless array of schools as his parents were constantly on the move. Rose moved him so often that the schools he would alight in for a few months couldn't even sort out what grade to put him in. His life settled down in high school when he was able to go to one boarding school for four years. His time at Harvard was brief after his freshman year expulsion for cheating and in the summer of 1951, he joined the army. Ted met regular, rough, poor, and Black people in the service and began to develop a sense of empathy, as well as learn how to handle life on his own. That said, his assignment to the MP's at NATO headquarters in Paris had Joe's hand behind it. He left after two years, and went back to Harvard, albeit on probation. He finished in the top half of his class and lettered in football. He was then on to Virginia Law School, where he and his lifelong friend, John Tunney, studied and had a fair amount of fun. Ted's grades were mostly gentlemen's C's, but somehow he and Tunney won the prestigious Moot Court competition. He married Joan Bennett of Bronxville and Manhattanville College in the fall of 1958 and graduated the following spring.

         Jack in the White House, Bobby as AG and Ted in the Senate was Joe's plan. Ted worked very hard in 1960, and made significant contributions to Jack's victory. Joe advised his sons that Ted would run for the Senate in 1962 and began the process. The vaunted Kennedy organization went to work, favors were called in, money was spread around, and most importantly, the hardest working Kennedy went to work. Ted hustled from one end of the state to the other. Both Jack and Bobby professed neutrality but pulled an endless number of strings. Ted was the best campaigner in the family, an extrovert who loved people, in contrast to his diffident brothers, who despised retail politics. He beat Ed McCormack in the primary, and George Cabot Lodge in the general. He won because he was the best candidate. As the ninth child in the family, Ted understood how to defer to and how to work with, if not charm, older people and this was a very important skill when he went to the Senate. It was run by the southern bulls who commanded all of the important committees. He went slowly, stayed quiet and averted attention. He was there to become a Senator and not cruise by on his last name. He loved the Senate and wanted to be a Senate man.  He courted James Eastland, chair of the Judiciary Committee which Ted had joined. And as unlikely a pair as anyone could imagine, they became friends. 

         The assassination of John Kennedy changed Ted's mission because he felt he had to carry on the dream and the hope engendered by the young president. 
"And that task would be both a thrilling obligation to honor his brother and an agonizing burden he would never be able to lift." His first Senate speech was in support of the civil rights bill that Jack had introduced and LBJ now pursued. It passed in June, 1964. That very night, Ted was in a plane crash that very nearly killed him. The doctors were unsure he would live or ever walk again. Six months later, he walked out of the hospital. He had made good use of his time and elicited legions of scholars to tutor him on political and economic issues. Someone compared the Ted Kennedy transformed by injury to FDR forty years earlier, when the young Franklin had grown and matured after contracting polio. And although Ted was a better and stronger human being, the best athlete in the family would spend the rest of his life in pain wearing a four pound brace every single day.  The Senate he returned to, after the 1964 Democratic landslide, was focused on fulfilling longstanding liberal dreams. Amongst the flood of new laws was the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act, which was a topic near to JFK's heart and which Ted had an instrumental part in passing. He slowly and methodically became a player in civil rights and community healthcare as well.

        Losses in the 1966 mid-terms and the increasing unpopularity of the Vietnam War began to take the wind out of the sails of the triumphant liberals. Both Kennedy senators opposed the war, but only Bobby was willing to go public with his concerns. Ted was an institutionalist and traditionalist and was unwilling to take on the administration. His Immigration and Refugee Sub-committee held hearings putting the US actions in a very bad light. It would not be until January, 1968, after a twelve day visit to Vietnam, that Ted decisively parted with LBJ. As Tet unraveled the US commitment to Vietnam, and as Gene McCarthy rattled LBJ, Bobby dithered about running for president. Ted was completely opposed because he did not think the establishment could be beaten and he feared for his brother's safety, that some wacko out there would go for a twofer. Bob announced on March 16 and LBJ withdrew two weeks later. A week later, MLK was assassinated. Bobby's campaign drew crowds and he started winning primaries, although most believed he could not catch Hubert Humphrey's deep party support among the professional politicians. Bobby's victory in the California primary was an ecstatic moment that ended in tragedy and another death. Ted eulogized his brother at St. Patrick's, and descended into a summer of overwhelming grief. He spent it sailing up and down the Long Island and Nantucket Sounds.

        Ted committed to carrying the flame forward during a speech in August. "Like my three brothers before me, I pick up a fallen standard...I shall try to carry forward that special commitment to justice, to excellence, and to courage..." He returned to the Senate, but didn't really participate. Colleagues noticed that his drinking ticked up a notch or two. He ran for, and was elected, whip of the caucus and prepared to face the presidency of Richard Nixon, a man who relied on fear and resentment to propel himself forward. Ted's plan was to establish a liberal counterweight to Nixon's agenda. He "embraced the burden in the Senate of saving the country's soul for his late brother..." Ted slowed down Nixon's ABM plans and spoke up against the ongoing conduct of the war. He worked hard, but continued to drink, and it was apparent to all that he still was buried in grief for Bobby. His life further spun out of control in July when he drove a car off a wooden bridge at Chappaquiddick, killing Mary Jo Kopechne, and inexcusably failing to report the accident. Upon reflection, he knew he had "cost himself the inheritance his brothers had left him." "There would be no resurrecting Camelot after it, no Ted Kennedy regency." For many, the party and the whole liberal cause went off that bridge too. It would be a remorseless pain for the Kopechne's for the rest of their lives and it would haunt Ted for every day of his remaining forty years.

         Physically diminished by a 20 pound weight loss and emotionally scarred, he returned to the Senate and realized he had to start over. And he did. Many observers felt that he was a stronger human being, and in turn, a better Senator afterwards. A speech against the war in September led the paranoids in the White House to renew their snooping and focusing on Ted as an existential threat. The Plumbers were looking into Chappaquiddick, and the White House tried to counter everything he did or said. At the same time, Joan began to drink more and more. She had never been comfortable as a Kennedy, was troubled by Ted's incessant womanizing, and after Chappaquidick succumbed to alcoholism, the disease that ruined her mother's life.  With his re-election on his mind and forever fearful of the Kennedys, Nixon went down the path that would cost him the presidency in 1974. He authorized dirty tricks, the use of federal agencies to find mud and specifically targeted Larry O'Brien, DNC chair, because he was a Kennedy man. "To get Ted Kennedy. That became Richard Nixon's political mission..." He mused about IRS investigations, wiretapping, and had spies trailing Ted around. And perhaps the White House had reason to fear Ted. In the year before the election, he traveled the country eviscerating Nixon's polices. Nixon, of course, won re-election and in so doing, put the final nail in the heart of the old Democratic coalition, with the blue collar vote now firmly in the Republican column. 

      Nixon told Haldeman that the second term would be "awesome power with no discipline" because he wouldn't have to run again. Ted determined to fight Nixon on every front. Knowing that Nixon's men were thugs, Ted had his Administrative Practices Sub-committee begin the investigation of the Watergate burglary before Mike Mansfield set up the Select Committee under Sam Ervin. A special prosecutor, Archibald Cox, was appointed to investigate Watergate under a remit that Ted structured. Nixon's paranoia was so extreme that he believed Ted was manipulating the burglars, who were now pleading guilty and implicating their superiors. When Cox was fired, Ted led the charge against the administrations actions. In the midst of the Watergate crisis, the Kennedy family faced a major crisis when Ted, Jr. had to have a leg amputated because of cancer. Ted took his son to almost all of his treatments, often staying overnight on a hospital cot.  The experience took Ted away from Washington quite a lot that winter and further enforced his commitment to health care as a necessity for all Americans.  Ironically, Nixon so needed a distraction from Watergate that he authorized discussions on national healthcare between his administration and Ted Kennedy. They actually came close before Nixon's August resignation. Ted co-sponsored the first law authorizing public funding of elections and worked to expand the FOIA. When the democrats swept the mid-terms, the party and Ted seemed revitalized and poised for the future.

         Both Gerald Ford and Ted Kennedy began to think about the 1976 election in an America that had shifted to the right in the last few years. The question Ted did not have an answer to was whether he could overcome Chappaquidick. He still was spending a considerable amount of time with Ted Jr. who was undergoing experimental treatment in Boston. He also faced a very troubling series of events in Boston. The Boston Irish were vehemently opposed to busing, something that Ted had supported in the Senate. On two different occasions in 1975, Boston crowds cursed and insulted him and threw bricks and bottles at their own Senator. Announcing that his primary responsibility was his family, Ted stated publicly that he would not run.              In many ways, this is a very grim assessment of all things Kennedy, with special and unyielding criticism of Joe and Rose, as not being the creators of an American dynasty, but rather the enablers of an American tragedy. They are presented as uncaring, indifferent and only interested in the appearance of it all.  Joe's life was an obsessive  fight back against Protestant dismissiveness of the Irish. Joe, Jr is criticized for wasting his life in order to compete with Jack's military record. And, Jack, in turn is depicted as lazy and diffident; Bobby, too strict and moralistic. The author, however, appears to have great respect for Ted as someone who overcame difficult odds and unimaginable personal pain to commit his life to helping the underprivileged and who did it very well. This is a long book at 732 pages of text and, for any student of the period, is a rehashing of the era. That said, as a reasonably attentive person who has read a great deal about the Kennedy's, I admit to having know very little about Ted. Thus, for me, this has been a constructive and rewarding effort.

The Plot, Korelitz - B

         Jake, a novelist, has a stunning debut, but hits a wall for years thereafter. While teaching in a summer writers' program, he hears of a plot line a student is working on and realizes that the young man has a sure fire hit in the making. A few years later, he learns the student has died and the novel was never published. He adopts the story line and upon completion of the book, is on top of the world again. Until he starts receiving texts and emails accusing him of stealing the story. Clearly, someone in his former student's life knows, and who that person is leads to one heck of a plot twist, turn on a dime, fantastic finale.

Poacher's Son, Doiron - B

            This is the first book in the series mentioned last month involving Mike Bowditch, Maine game warden. A shooting that kills a Maine cop and a representative of a forestry company has the authorities in the north woods searching high and low. The primary suspect is Mike's dad, a nasty piece of work, but someone who knows his way around the great outdoors. Mike is in complete denial and helps the police try to convince his father to surrender. His dad can't be found, but eventually shows up at Mike's door. Any 600+ page book that goes so fast you that you can't believe it qualifies as a full tilt page-turner.

The Statement, Moore - B

       This 30-year old novel is set in France in the late 1980's. Pierre Brossard, seventy, is still on the run after 40 years in hiding, and with two death sentences on his record. He was part of the police in the south of the country who persecuted Vichy's Jews and sent them off to their death. He is hidden by the church, and moves from one monastery to another. Like the previously mentioned Journal recommendation, this novel too is very introspective. It has many of the usual thriller highlights, but is really a long conversation that Brossard has with himself about Vichy standing up for all things French, and Gaullism being nothing more than political correctness in the face of communism. Similarly, the churchmen who take him in discuss the need to preserve the morals of the past, the France of the WWI era before the socialists dominated the government. For Brossard, killing Jews simply seemed to be the right thing to do, and for the churchmen, protecting Brossard is their opportunity to ignore modernity. Unfortunately for Brossard, his long term protector in the national police hierarchy has decided he's expendable and too much of a risk.

The Last Kings of Shanghai: The Rival Jewish Dynasties That Helped Create Modern China, Kaufman - B+

             This is a history of two Jewish families who dominated Chinese business for decades, the Sasoons and Kadoories, who were lost in the fog of China's erasure of its history from the century of 'humiliation.' Shanghai, once a great world city, is the locus of this story. In the 1930's, the city was the fourth largest in the world. "Together the Sasoons and the Kadoories helped shape a city that made them billionaires - and inspired and enabled a generation of Chinese businessmen to be successful capitalists and entrepreneurs." The two families were also able to protect 18,000 European Jews who fled there during WWII.

            The Sasoons were Baghdad's richest merchants, the family that had led the Jewish dominance of the city's trades for almost a millennium. However in 1829, trouble with the Turks forced David Sasoon to move to Bombay. The British Empire was expanding, and the free market capitalism and its foundation on the rule of law made India the perfect place for Sasoon to reestablish his prominence. "David became a bridge between the traditional trading practices of the Middle East and the new global system developing under the British Empire." Within a decade of his arrival, he was one of the richest men in India. He created Sasoon schools to teach young men how to work in his businesses, and then provided jobs, and later pensions. The British invasion of China afforded the family an entree into the booming opium business, and the second of his eight sons, Elias, was sent to Shanghai to develop that trade. He was wildly successful. When the Second Opium War made the drug legal, the Sassoon businesses controlled 70% of the opium going into China. 

            A distant Baghdadi cousin, Elly Kadoorie, went to work for the family in China for a very brief time before striking out on his own. He had no capital to speak of, but became a stock broker in Hong Kong and a long term investor in a great many businesses. His success was founded on the burgeoning rubber business and the connections provided by his London born wife, Laura. His two sons, Lawrence and Horace, were educated in proper English boarding schools and joined him in Shanghai. While China struggled after the 1911 revolution to find leadership and a steady footing, the city boomed. The British ran the International Settlement and it became the Paris of the Orient, the most fascinating and cosmopolitan city in the inter-war era. A visiting Douglas Fairbanks said it was the most "interesting and progressive" city in the world.

          David Sasoon's sons preferred to spend money and enjoy their wealth in England. It took a grandson, Victor, to reestablish their place in Asia. In the 1920's, he feared the rising independence movement in India, liquidated the family's businesses there and turned to Shanghai. He built the nine-story Sasoon House, a combined office building and luxury hotel. He maintained a close relationship with the Nationalist government and was soon one of the richest men in the world. As the city boomed, there were clouds on the horizon. Anyone looking into inequality could not help but be concerned about the communists. And Japan menaced. 

        Because Shanghai was an open city, no visa was required for entrance, and beginning in 1938, the Jews of Europe began to arrive. They were supported by both families, who funded almost every social service in the Settlement in an effort to feed, clothe and house the refugees. By the time war began in Europe, there were 18,000 Jewish refugees in Shanghai. The Japanese controlled access to the city and brought so much pressure on Victor Sasoon to support them that he left for India in November, 1941. In December, the Japanese occupied Shanghai and interned the British and Americans.  Elly Kadoorie died in Shanghai in 1944 at the age of 80. At war's end, Victor paid his employees three years of back wages. Both families began to liquidate their assets as it became apparent that the communists would win. The Kadoories went to Hong Kong and Victor to London and later Nassau, the Bahamas. The PRC confiscated all holdings in Shanghai. The Kaddoories were able to rebuild in Hong Kong because the British retained sovereignty. The brothers were instrumental in re-creating the city and in providing assistance to the thousands fleeing the communists. Although the Red Army threatened the city in the 1960's, the PRC never attacked. By the 1970's, Hong Kong was booming and would have been the 25th largest economy in the world if it were a nation. When China began to modernize under Deng, it approached the Kadoories to help integrate the country into the world's economy. Lawrence became the liaison between China and the west. In conjunction with the Thatcher government, he tried to forestall the takeover in 1997, but could not. He died a few years before the transition as a member of the House of Lords. His son Michael carried on developing business relationships with emerging China. Today, Shanghai too is booming again. This is an absolutely excellent book. Thanks to Ed Lukes for the recommendation.

Forgetfulness, Just - B+

            The author was a war correspondent for the Washington Post during Vietnam, and later a successful novelist. He was a contemporary of LeCarre, and although not in that class, he seems, in this fifteen-year old novel, to have reached some of the same cynical conclusions about western, particularly American, imperialism. "The tone of the reports suggested an America exclusive of  other nations, a remote empire on a fabulous continent that worshipped a benevolent god and fortified itself in order to remain apart, a garrison state exempt from natural law and under the special protection of a watchful providence." That sentence could have been written by either. The book came up on my radar when the WSJ's quirky Saturday book section included it in a five best spy novels list. Not sure I'd rate it that high, but I certainly recommend it.

            The story is mostly about reflection and memories in that world. Thomas was never really in it, but rather spent his entire life painting and moving around, having finally settled down in the French Pyrenees with Florette. They were happily married, he in his mid-60's, and she a decade younger. Their life was quite remote, and far from the modern world. He occasionally had visitors, two childhood friends from Wisconsin, who were in that world as older, but still active, members of the CIA.  They were with him one afternoon having a few drinks when Florette went out for a hike, broke her ankle on the mountain, and was found the next day. She had probably frozen to death, but it did look like her last moments were hastened by a quick knife cut. As Thomas dealt with her death, his friends had French authorities find the men who had been with her.  The men were Moroccans on their way to Amsterdam to spread terror and death in the name of Allah. The book is uniquely thoughtful and contemplative. 

M, King's Bodyguard, Leonard - B+

         Chief Inspector Melville is high up in London's Metropolitan Police and is personal advisor to the royal family. This excellent novel is set in the week before Victoria's funeral in 1901. London is inundated with royalty, including the Kaiser, King Leopold of Belgium, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and dozens of others.    Unfortunately, anarchists and assassins are also present and on the hunt for royals, with Wilhelm as the prime target. Melville teams up with the Kaiser's man, Gustav Steinhauer, in pursuit of a man named Akushku, perhaps a Russian, but certainly a skilled murderer and plotter. This is a historical novel as good as they get, and actually is based on an exhaustive biography of Melville and Steinhauer's memoirs.

The Corpse Flower, Hancock - B+

       This Danish novel justifiably received a number of awards. It is a great read - bordering on a must. A Danish journalist is contacted by a woman wanted for murder, but the woman is so far off the radar that neither Copenhagen police nor Interpol can find her. The killer offers tantalizing bits of information in order to have Heloise reopen the files at the paper, and even draw the investigating officer back into the case. The motive for the murder has nothing to do with the perpetrator's presumed lunacy and leads to a hair raising story involving a dozen of the city's luminaries. Police procedural/ psychological thriller - flat out page turner.

Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death And Art, Sykes - B

         "These pages will paint a twenty-first century portrait of the Neanderthals: not dullard losers on a withered branch of the family tree, but enormously adaptable and even successful ancient relatives." They lived for 350,000 years before their fossil history disappeared 35,000 years ago. They ranged from Wales to Siberia, and as far south as Iraq. The finding of fossils in the Neander Valley 160 years ago began the study of our most immediate ancestors. As the world of archeology expanded to 20th century carbon dating and 21st century DNA analysis, our knowledge of them has increased almost infinitely. "Genetics can illuminate many shadows archaeology cannot." The source of our understanding is bits and pieces of 200-300 individual Neanderthals. DNA testing has confirmed that all Europeans have about 2% Neanderthal genes, but they were perceptibly different. Their brains were about the same size, but their heads were differently shaped, their noses were larger and they inhaled more air into bigger lungs, their bones were heavier and they were more muscular. Their legs were further apart and  shorter, but their hands were bigger and stronger. They were different from each other, those from Scandinavia having different features than those from the Middle East. "They rode the earth's climate rollercoaster for hundreds of thousands of years, coping with extremes in weather..." They roamed through every type of landscape. Based on their size, it is estimated that they required twice as many calories as today's homo sapiens. The majority of those calories came from meat. They hunted prey from rabbits up to mammoths, always seeking the fattest animals. Fish and birds were also consumed. The evidence also points to their being "herbaceous connoisseurs." They skillfully managed and processed their food supply for a third of a millennium. One issue that has eluded scientists has been their use of fire. They clearly used it to cook, but just how often and where has not been resolved. Equally uncertain to us is the degree of their mobility, because we know they likely moved in small bands, but we do not know how far.  Also, whether or not they ceremoniously buried their dead is unresolved. As their throats and ears were complex, and because they engaged in collaborative ideas, it appears likely that they were capable of some sort of speech. They wore clothing and probably some decorations. How, when and for how long they interbred with homo sapiens remains unresolved, as does how and why they died out as a species. There is so much that we don't know, but we do know that they were not "a failed early release hominin on the road to nowhere.." "Compared to the millions of years before, Neanderthal existence was a major upgrade to hominin life." This topic has always fascinated me. Four decades ago, the discussions and assessments were based upon a rudimentary study of fossils. Today, the ability to study those fossils down to the the cellular level has revolutionized our knowledge

Hello, Transcriber, Morrissey - B+

                Hazel is a transcriber for the Black Harbor, Wisconsin police department. She is 28, in a miserable marriage, and, at long last, is intrigued by her job. Black Harbor is the 'worst' town in the state, but transcribing oral reports that the cops dictate is captivating. A suspect in a case happens to be her next door neighbor. As she pays more and more attention to the case, she becomes fascinated with the voice of the detective and starts to meet him for an occasional soda or coffee. They fall for each other, which is just about as inappropriate a work place relationship as one can dream up. Good plot, a few deft touches and just enough excitement.

               This is the debut novel for a young University of Wisconsin grad who worked for three years as a - police transcriber.

Dead By Dawn, Doiron - B+

           This is a fascinating, fast-paced thriller set in the north woods of Maine and featuring Mike Bowditch, a state game warden and investigator. Mike's in his early thirties, and a graduate of Colby College. He is asked to look into a death by misadventure four years earlier of a 77 year-old who fell off a boat and drowned. Accident or murder? Once Mike reopens this inquiry, he attracts some unwanted animosity and attention that sees his vehicle sabotaged, and him plummeting into the Androscoggin river in the middle of winter. There is a lot of intriguing information about the wilds of Maine, and the folks who live there. Apparently, this novel is part of a long-running series, suggesting a look at the earlier ones is in line.

Rogues Gallery: The Birth of Modern Policing and Organized Crime in Gilded Age New York, Oller - C+

             Between 1870 and 1910, the city's population grew from 1.5 million to 5 million. Fully 40% of the residents were foreign born, and almost as many were first generation Americans. Crime grew exponentially, and the NYPD had to learn to police the increasingly complex and immigrant-filled city. The man who ushered the police department into the modern era was Thomas F. Byrnes, who joined the department in 1863, the year of the draft riots.  As a captain fifteen years later, he became famous for cracking the Manhattan Savings Institution heist, still the biggest in NY history. It was the first time ever in the city that bank robbers were arrested and convicted. Soon thereafter, Byrnes was promoted to Inspector and put in charge of the Detective Bureau. He initiated the 'rogues gallery' by publishing the daily mug shots of everyone arrested in the city. "Under Byrnes, the NYPD's detective bureau came to rival the great detective departments of Paris and Vienna, Austria." In 1888, the state legislature made him a chief inspector, number two in the police department. Four years later, he was superintendent. His eventual denouement began in the early 90's when crusading moralist, Reverend Charles Parkhurst, began to point out that there still was a great deal of sin and crime that the police let slide. Byrnes countered that they couldn't stop all crime and Parkhurst hammered away on departmental corruption. Byrnes' live and let live approach to minor crime was soon to be over. In 1894, the legislature created the Lexow Commission to investigate corruption in the department. When summing up, the committee's counsel said, "that despite using a microscope, the Lexow Committee had yet to find a business in the city that wasn't being extorted by the NYPD." The committee tried, but couldn't lay a glove on Byrnes. However, he soon met his match in the person of the new police commissioner,  Theodore Roosevelt. TR wanted to clean house, and he did, starting with Byrnes. TR was a high-minded progressive who wanted a professional, depoliticized, and above all, an honest department. He upgraded procedures, enhanced the use of telephones and introduced mobility to the NYPD with his adoption of a bicycle squad. In a short period of time, he transformed the department. Following the letter of the law, Roosevelt closed every saloon in the city over the summer of 1895, leading to his achieving unprecedented heights of unpopularity. He resigned two years later. The reform efforts of the TR and the Lexow Committee affirmed that the department should be clean and honest. However, within a few years, it was back to business as usual with saloonkeepers, prostitutes, and small-timers kicking back to the police. The gangs and violence that once was the exclusive purview of the Irish were replaced by newcomers, the Jews and Italians, who now predominated on the lower east side. The newcomers were rougher and tougher. When the city sent its first Italian-American detective to Palermo to research the criminal records of various gang members, he was gunned down in the Sicilian capital. Thomas Petrosino was the only on duty city policeman ever to die on foreign soil. By the end of the Gilded Age, both the NYPD and the Mafia were established, powerful organizations.

All Her Little Secrets, Morris - B

    This is an excellent thriller set in modern day Atlanta, featuring a 40-ish woman of color, Ellice Littlejohn. She is promoted to general counsel in a large privately owned delivery business. The only problem is that her boss Michael is murdered, and she is sleeping with him and discovered his body. Things start to unravel when Michael's wife acknowledges to her that she knew all along, and discloses information that implies the killer might have been someone at the company as Michael had discovered something very bad and was prepared to resign. Plus, Ellice's estranged half-brother is somehow involved. As it turns out, the company is a den of thieving, money-laundering white supremacists and it takes awhile for Elllice to unravel the mess. The novel fades a bit at the end but still holds your attention.

The White Russian, Bradby - C+

         This is a historical novel set in St. Petersburg (Petrograd after WWI started) in the early days of 1917. Revolution is in the air and the empire is crumbling. Alexander Ruszky, the chief of homicide, tries to do his duty but is caught up in a mess that involves his adulterous wife who is carrying on with a Grand Duke, his brother, his dad, the assistant finance minister, a ballerina who he is in love with and the staff at Tsarskoe Selo.  It sheds very little light on the time and place.

Hero Of Two Worlds: The Marquis de Lafayette in the Age of Revolution, Duncan - B

        Gilbert de Lafayette was born on Sept. 6, 1757 to a family of noble heritage on his father's side, and significant wealth on his mother's. His father died two years later. He grew up in the Auvergne region in south central France until his mother moved him to Paris when he was 11. A year later, she too died. Gilbert was now the wealthy Marquis de Lafayette. The noble de Noailles family set sights on him as a future son-in-law. He and Adrienne were wed in 1774. The following year he summered at Metz where he was a newly appointed officer in the army, joined the Masons, and began to consider freedom and equality as the foundation of his political philosophy. Before his career could begin though, he was caught on the wrong side of an army reorganization and was out of a commission.

      Dreaming of glory, he turned his attention to America and somehow convinced the Continental Army's recruiter in Paris to offer him a commission as a Major- General. His value was his membership in the nobility, his connection to the crown, and his wealth, which he used to purchase a ship to take him and others to America. He arrived in Philadelphia in the summer of 1777 and was warmly welcomed.  At Brandywine, he fought bravely, was wounded and won praise from Washington.  He worked in 1778  as liaison when the French forces arrived in America, and at year's end returned to France, where he was proclaimed a hero.  He returned to America in 1780, and announced more troops, supplies and funds were on the way. Washington assigned Lafayette a division and tasked him with pursuing an army in Virginia. As both sides traversed Virginia, Lafayette had the good fortune to command the army that actually bottlenecked Cornwallis at Yorktown. The twenty-four year old general was in charge of the attack that led to the British surrender. Lafayette had made his name.

   Returning to Paris, he took up the life of a wealthy and famous family man with three children. He was one of 144 Notables called to an assembly in 1787 to try and find a solution to the kingdom's precarious finances. It soon became evident that France's financial mess was caused by the profligacy of the Bourbons, and that massive tax revisions were necessary. However, no consensus was reached and the situation continued to deteriorate. The marquis was identified with the reform oriented republicans and lost favor at the court. When the coffers were completely empty in the summer of 1788, the creditors demanded reform through a calling of the Estates-General. Lafayette was part of the first convocation of the Estates-General since 1614, and made a notable speech on the topic of the rights of man. However, events soon overcame the assembly when the Bastille was stormed on July 14, 1789. A great revolution was underway.  In the new realm, Lafayette was put in command of the national guard, where he had to juggle preserving liberty and keeping order. His design of the guard's uniforms in white, red and blue eventually became the national flag. He deftly averted a peoples attack on Versailles in October and, in the course of seeking a compromise, convinced the king to move to Paris. As the king had indicated a willingness to create a constitutional monarchy, the marquis believed he was heading the revolution toward a peaceful resolution On the first anniversary of Bastille Day, Lafayette hosted a Fete de la Federation involving hundreds of thousands honoring the royal family and the National Assembly. He was at the apogee of his career, and would soon plummet. When the king attempted to escape France in the summer of 1991, Lafayette erroneously told the the government that he had been kidnapped. He had previously assured the Assembly that the king would not run. He was clearly wrong, and was the target of abuse by the angry radicals. When, in the midst of a confusing riotous day on the Champs de Mars, he ordered his men to fire, Lafayette sealed his fate. He resigned in October. He and his family left the city for their ancestral home in Auvergne. A year later, he was accused of treason. Danton, a long term opponent signed an arrest warrant, and the marquis fled the country.  The Austrians considered him an instigator of revolution and arrested him. By doing so, they probably saved his life. His wife was arrested and all of his assets confiscated. The new American ambassador, James Madison, saved Adrienne from the guillotine. The US passed a law authorizing full pay for Lafayette, thus affording him a chance to upgrade his life while imprisoned. Adrienne was set free in early 1795 as a gesture of goodwill to the US. She and her two daughters joined Lafayette in jail. Freedom came in 1797 when Bonaparte defeated the Austrians and they let their French prisoners out.

      Impoverished and unwelcome in France, the family moved to Denmark. He was allowed to return in late 1799 with the admonition to stay out of politics and Paris. The family moved to a chateau in LaGrange that Adrienne's family owned. His citizenship was reestablished, but he and Napoleon were wary of each other. The emperor wanted his support; he wanted liberty and freedom for all. Lafayette focused on his farming and his family. On Christmas Eve in 1807, Adrienne died at the age of forty-eight. Lafayette was saddened by France's losses, but welcomed the downfall of Napoleon. Louis XVIII's restoration bestowed a charter of rights, but it was a gift from the king and not a true constitution. In 1818, he was elected to the Chamber of Deputies. As the monarchy turned to the right, Lafayette began to work to overturn it. He was involved in a plot that failed, and managed to avoid indictment, but did lose his seat in the 1823 elections. With reaction prevailing, he decided it was time to return to America. Accompanied by his son, Georges, and a secretary, the marquis arrived in New York in the summer of 1824. He was honored for a full year throughout the country, where he visited all twenty-four states and commemorated the 50th anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill by laying the cornerstone for a new memorial. He met just about every luminary in the land including Jefferson, Adams, Monroe, Madison, Jackson and President Adams. He sailed to France in a US ship christened Brandywine in his honor.

     Charles X was now king and was bound and determined to turn back the revolution. As part of his program was the restoration of the aristocracy's wealth, Lafayette was once again a wealthy man. He was again elected to the Chamber of Deputies. In July of 1830, the king tried to eliminate many of the freedoms that were now part of the body politic. Rioters in Paris put Lafayette back in charge of the National Guard and forced the king to abdicate. He supported the duc d'Orleans for the throne because the duc believed in the principles of the liberals. He and Lafayette stood on the balcony of the Hotel de Ville waving the tricolor flag. Lafayette was again the toast of the country, and Louis Philipe, the new king, vowed to support republican institutions. The king lapsed into the Bourbon's old ways and the opposition had Lafayette removed from power, although he stayed on in the Chamber and continued to argue for expanding the electorate. He wound down his activities in Paris, and died at his country home in 1834 at the age of seventy-seven. His funeral procession in Paris attracted 200,000 spectators. The extraordinary Marquis Lafayette was buried in a churchyard with his wife.