Books – Page 28 – Everything Nonfiction

Review of The Challenge: Hamdan v. Rumsfeld

Salim Hamdan was Osama Bin laden’s personal driver. That was the extent of his involvement in terrorist activities. Yet the government’s position was that he was one of the “worst of the worst” as Dick Cheney was so often quoted as saying when describing the prisoners at Guantanamo. The reality is that Salim was just a family man trying to scratch out a living. He was no more a terrorist than Osama Bin Laden’s food taster. Fortunately for Salim, though, he was assigned two lawyers who actually went to bat for him all the way to the Supreme Court.

Review of Six Minutes To Freedom

The story that Kurt has to tell begins with a clandestine attempt to interfere with radio broadcasts controlled by the corrupt government of Manuel Noriega in the late 1980s. Kurt, and a few co-conspirators, devised a way in which they could hijack the broadcast signal of the official Panamanian radio station and broadcast their own anti-Noriega message. This obviously didn’t go over very well with Noriega and Kurt was eventually arrested in detained.

Review of The Nine

The ideal of nine legal experts sitting together to discuss some of the most important legal issues confronting our country is a facade. Most of the opinions are written by law clerks. The justices themselves hold up in their offices like kings and queens disconnected from the populace. Justice Roberts once made the comment that judges were nothing more than umpires who simply follow the rules. Author Toobin, however, rightfully points out that this is certainly not the case for the Supreme Court justices, whose decisions end up forming the rules.

Review of The Making of The Lords of Flatbush

Students of film will find glimpses of lessons learned, as in don’t make the same mistakes that Stephen Verona makes. The author starts by talking about his background and growing up in Brooklyn and how the film is mostly autobiographical. He takes the reader from original idea to completed film, albeit via a circuitous route in which the reader is introduced to every individual the author has ever met in the past thirty years.

Review of For The Thrill Of It

This story takes place in Chicago in 1924. Two teenagers, both well educated and both from wealthy families, decide to commit what they believe will be the perfect crime.

Review of 1421

Gavin describes the huge treasure ships and the large armada that accompanied them carrying a combined total of some 28,000 men. The ships also carried concubines, horses, plants, jade, grains, and enough food to remain ocean bound for months at a time. As the ships traveled from port to port, the fleet grew in size to as many as eight hundred ships.