William F. Buckley is unquestionably one of the most articulate and knowledgeable American debaters of the second half of the twentieth century. Buckley seems to know a little bit--if not a lot--about everything, and he reflects and gives observations about various topics in this collection of essays from the mid-to-late 80s and early 90s.

As an author, Buckley is unfailingly witty and acerbic, and this book is littered with quips and sapient remarks. Buckley is particularly good at analyzing other peoples' positions, and at poking holes in their poor logic. That is where this book succeeds.

This book occasionally fails when Buckley attempts to elucidate his own position on an issue. For instance, in one essay Buckley suggests that Beethoven is "a national monument" and should be entitled to governmental protection, so that vacationers can listen to the great composer's symphonies when they are traveling in non-cosmopolitan areas. My suggestion to Buckley would be to rent a car with a tape deck or cd player. It is not necessary for the government to mandate all-Beethoven channels in all cities and towns in order for citizens to listen to Beethoven when they are on vacation.

In another essay Buckley spells out the case for allowing women to serve in the military, but then says that he takes the opposite position. His explanation for why he is against women serving in the military is vague. He says that allowing women to join the armed forces is repugnant to "human nature," which leads one to wonder how Buckley would respond to someone who believes that what he calls "human nature" is an artificial construct. Maybe he did not provide a response to that question because of spacial constraints, but I think that if he is going to base a policy position on human nature, he should provide readers with some sort of idea of what his theory of human nature is.
I hope that I have not accentuated the negative too much in this review, because Buckley truly is a wonderful writer and an interesting read. He has opinions about everything, and he is fun to read not only for what he has to say, but also for how he says it. His vocabulary is expansive and his word-choices are colorful. This book should be read by anyone who wants intelligent and fiercely-opinionated commentary on newsworthy events, and the various parties involved, from 1985 to 1992.

This is a fine collection of the thoughts and witticisms of William F Buckley. It covers most any area that Mr. Buckley holds an Interest whether it be politics, social affairs, sailing, classical music and spending time with dignitaries and well to do people. It is fantastically written (as can be expected from Buckley) however it seemed to talk just over the head of the common man. With his infatuation with the Ryder Cup and talking about people who are important to him, really have no impact on my life. All in all it is a very well written fast paced collection. I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys political and social commentary. And to anyone who just like to read something different than a novel or text of history.
Thanks For Your Time:
T

This is Buckley at his acerbic best on subjects as varied as John Lennon, Ted Kennedy and Elizabeth Taylor to academia, Gorbachev and The First Gulf War.

It's always illuminating and stimulating to explore the brain of one of America's foremost conservative thinkers and as these essays drift more into history, his insights and deliberations become astounding in their perspicacity and accuracy.

These essays cover everything from the fall of communism, the Los Angeles riots, Playboy magazine and lots more. The time spent reading this delightful paperback is time spent in the company of charming brilliance.

when will come new publish of this book ?

There are many excellent textbooks about Internal Medicine on the market, and I own a lot of them. But the Kelley's book is the one I look up more often. It stands out, since it gives you the broadest and deepest clinical coverage of the internal medicine you can find in a two-volumes textbook. The forthcoming 4th edition, which is scheduled for 8/2000 and will be edited by Humes, will expand furter the coverage, reaching an unprecedented range, at least as can be judged by the anticipated index. For the sake of clarity and completeness, each subspecialty (cardiology, endocrinology and metabolism, and so forth) is divided in three parts: the first group of chapters is devoted to the pathophysiologic foundations, the second to diseases and the third to the diagnosis and treatment. This format is clever, because allow you to study each section separately without being overwhelmed by the astonishing amount of information it contains. A lot of chapters are devoted to the approach to the patient with different symptoms, to the interpretation of instrumental data and to the treatment: they are another distictive feature of the book, making it invaluable. If you are a physician or a serious student searching for an authoritative, encyclopedic textbook with broad pathophysiologic coverage and wide sections about the management of the patient, the Kelley's textbook will not disappoint you. For many of us, it is a must buy. For all, it is a bargain. This textbook is the gold standard as Internal Medicine textbook: it got 5-stars from Doody, and as far as I know, it was the only one awarded with such a high acknowledgement. I agree: five stars.

most comprehensive work ever.an edge over Harrison &Cecil.must buy.

As a medical transcriptionist, there are many times when a doctor will say the name of a drug incorrectly or I cannot quite understand what the doctor is saying. In the Quick Look Drug Book, there is a section in the back of the book called the Indication/Therapeutic Category Index. In this section, you can look up the patient's diagnosis and it will list the medications used for that illness. Most of the time I am able to determine what drug the doctor is referring to by using this method. It has saved me a lot of time and effort over the years. I highly recommend this book if you are a medical transcriptionist.

Great book! Use it a lot, but would like to have the latest vesion..

Sam Price

It's a free-for-all. It dispels any notion that mystery writers--when they start out--always take it slow, take time to warm up, blossom three books later. Yellowthread Street, the debut novel in the series of the same name--is a fireworks display, crackling with nonstop humour, frenzy, jagged but compelling style, and crazy subplots buttressing a crazy main story. Typical Marshall, right out of the gate--and, if anything, this first entry is the most gonzo of all I've read. So far.

The top dog is Inspector Harry Feiffer, who investigates a series of jewellery-store robberies, where the perpetrator wields a nasty blade called a kukri, targeting the fingers of unhelpful store owners or staff. Feiffer is also busy fielding phone-calls from his concerned wife, as well as an anonymous caller with a grudge. Then--when it turns out that certain jewellery stores that were robbed are connected to organized crime--Feiffer has got a posse of gangsters to worry about; he and they hunt the finger-chopping robber simultaneously, but gangsters like to use machine-guns, indulge in shoot-outs, and also employ henchmen who dabble in clubs with spikes.

Detectives Auden, Spencer, and O'Yee also appear for the first time, all working bizarre cases. A cinema-owner anticipates being held up now that an American destroyer has docked in the harbour, a married couple from New Jersey have become separated and are both beckoning the cops to help find each other (???), and there's been a double axe-murder (oh wait, Feiffer's handling that case too). The cops' heads spin--as may the reader's--as they try to wrap up each case in time to help Feiffer face the gangsters and the finger-chopper in a violent finale.

Ed McBain had mined this territory a few years earlier in a frenetic little gem called Hail Hail The Gang's All Here!, so Marshall's opener is not totally original. But he takes frenzied, multi-scenario, multi-cop loopiness to another level, and then actually tones it down in later Yellowthread Street books. I tend to prefer the more controlled chaos of most of the follow-ups, but what a daring debut!

This was the first in the series of ficitonal murder mysteries set in Hong Bay, Hong Kong. Protected by Detective Chief Inspector Harry Fieffer, Detective Inspector Christopher O'Yee, and Detectives Phil Auden and Bill Spencer, Hong Bay seems to be an authentic, frenzied, violent part of Hong Kong. While the station deals with a 'lost' American tourist and his harridan wife, more serious crime intrudes, with a Mongolian who is demanding 'protection' from local merchants, and attacking those who resist. The denouement is typical Marshall, a combination of fast action, violence, and chaos, with chaos being the most prominent factor. In this book, Spencer is the 'new guy', and Marshall convincingly shows us how Spencer has a difficult time fitting in with the other detectives. But as experienced Yellowthread Street readers know, the detectives prevail---at a price. Marshall is the pre-eminent writer of humorous, suspenseful police procedurals writing these days, and I am continually impressed by his expertise. Long may the detectives of Hong Bay continue to fascinate us!

This is a very good guide to the hikes that it covers. All 50 hikes are rated and include a range of difficulties from easy to strenuous. Many are in some of the most beautiful parts of the North Carolina mountains. And topographic maps help show the routes well and clarify what one shoule expect. A chief drawback (only hinted at in the low-key extended part of the title after the colon), is that it is less than a comprehensive guide to North Carolina mountain trails. It covers nothing west of the central part of Great Smoky Mountains National Park or west of the Cashiers area to the south thereof. North Carolina extends more than a hundred miles west of those areas, and there are plenty more mountains that way. So if that western extremity of the state is where you're wanting to explore, this is not the guide for that. But for mountains to the east thereof, this book should serve you well. One irony is that, although omitting that vast area of westernmost North Carolina, it does have a
"Foothills" section that includes at least three hikes properly described as in the Piedmont, hardly foothills at all. Those are at Reed Gold Mine and Duke Power State Park (as the book still calls it). They can be pleasant and rewarding hikes, but if you go there expecting mountain or foothill vistas, you could be disappointed. By the way, Duke Power State Park has since been renamed Lake Norman State Park. You'll need to know that if you look for signs directing you there (like from Interstate 77).

William Laurence was a newspaper reporter, that was one of the first in now what we are used to routinely seeing: a tagalong. Laurence was allowed to tour some of the Nuclear Weapons facilities, interview the key players, and even was present for the dropping of the device on Nagasaki. It is fascinating to listen to a reporter who is pro-nukes, and how he tries to retain secrets that we now all know. The book ends on a positive note, listing the many proposed uses of nuclear power, many of which we see every day, such as nuclear medicine. This is a hard book to find, and a good addition to a nukeheads' shelf.

although the articles of this book are definitely of excellent quality, there is little directly on the Tractatus. The only one such is Hylton's short but quality article dealing with how the function-operation distinction in the Tractatus is addressing Russell's rather than Frege's issues... the others deal mostly with the later Wittgenstein..

This book is essential reading for anyone who is interested in the history of the First Amendment. Levy is the starting point for debate on what freedom of the press meant to the framers of the first amendment. Levy contends that the framers had a very limited conception of freedom of the press, and presents a wealth of evidence of suppression of press freedoms in colonial America. There is a wealth of interesting information in this book, although it is not casual reading by any stretch of the imagination. Moreover, many scholars have criticized Levy for ignoring both the actual practices of colonial printers--who behaved as if they were quite free despite the law--and for ignoring the philosophical contributions of English Whig thinkers to the American conception of press freedom. In my view, you have to start with Levy if you are interested in this topic, but you shouldn't stop with him.

With attempts by our current President to allow federal funds to go to religious charities, a better understanding of the history and meaning of the First Amendment is desparately needed. One could hardly be better qualified to give us such an education than Leonard W. Levy in his book on the Establishment Clause.

In his book, Levy refutes the nonpreferentialists' claim that the First Amendment clause, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion," merely prohibits Congress from providing preferential aid to one church. If "an establishment of religion" meant only single-church establishments, Congress would only be prohibited from exclusively benefiting one church but not prohibited from aiding religion impartially. But, as Levy points out, history does not support the nonpreferentialists' interpretation.

Although the five southern colonies did have exclusive Anglical establishments, the colonies of New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Hampshire came to have multiple religious establishments, and, indeed, the colonies of Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New Jersey never had establishments of any kind. After the Revolution, opposition to establishments increased, resulting in states having to replace their exclusive or dual establishments or even ending their establishments altogether. Thus, the historical fact of multiple establishments of religion contradicts the nonpreferentialists' interpretation that "an establishment of religion" referred only to single-church establishments, and, therefore, does not support their claim that the establishment clause only prohibits Congress from making laws preferring one church. Nor is their interpretation supported by the debates between the Federalists and Anti-federalists.

Anti-federalists feared loss of liberty and pressured Federalists to accept recommendations for amendments to the new Constitution, which included protection of religious liberty. But Federalists countered that such amendments were superfluous because, as Levy succinctly restates the argument, "[T]he unamended Constitution vests no power over religion." Moreover, Madison stated in an October 17, 1788 letter to Jefferson that these amendments ought to be "so framed as not to imply powers not meant to be included in the enumeration." Thus, Levy concludes, "To argue, as the nonpreferentialists do, that the establishment clause should be construed to permit nondiscriminatory aid to religion leads to the impossible conclusion that the First Amendment added to the powers of Congress even though it was framed to restrict Congress. It is not only an impossible conclusion; it is ridiculous."

From his demolition of the nonpreferentialists' interpretation of the establishment clause and his statement in the Preface that his "sympathies are clearly with the separationists," one might conclude that Levy is a strict advocate of an impregnable wall of separation between church and state. However, he is not. Of zealous separationists who interpret every crack in the wall as disaster, Levy says, "[They are] like Chicken Little, screaming, 'The wall is falling, the wall is falling.' It really is not and will not, so long as it leaks just a little at the seams. If it did not leak a little, pressure on the wall might generate enough force to break it."

Examples of leaks which Levy feels need not be repaired are the Supreme Court beginning its sessions with "God save this honorable Court," the money motto "In God We Trust," the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance, tax-supported chaplains for military and legislative bodies, etc. Although Levy is aware of the concern of separationists that "big oaks grow from small acorns," he invokes for "trivial" leaks an aphorism which was also advocated by Madison: "De minimis non curat lex" ("The law does not bother with trifles"). A more controversial leak, however, is Levy's advocacy of tax aid for parochial schools.

Although he agrees that the "claim of 'double taxation' is a misnomer," he asserts that the Supreme Court "ought to relieve the burden of so called double taxation on those who pay to send their children to private school." He also says, "If proper restraints exist on the funds for parochial schools so that tax monies are not spent for religious purposes, and the aid rendered is comparable to the value of the secular education provided by the schools, fairness seems to be on the accomodationist side." To say the least, Levy's leaky wall is problematic. It is impossible that parochial school aid would not set free additional dollars for sectarian indoctrination, and the idea that, with "proper restraints," taxpayers' dollars could be secure from misuse is too good to be true.

In the course of discussing establishment-clause cases, Levy amuses his reader with some pot shots at the High Court. He says, for example, that "the Court has managed to unite those who stand at polar opposites on the results that the Court reaches: a strict separationist and zealous accommodationist are likely to agree that the Supreme Court would not recognize an establishment of religion if it took life and bit the Justices."

Levy obviously writes with passion, and his scholarship is as good as his views are controversial. Notwithstanding my disagreement with him over parochial school aid, I found his book both provoking and educational.

Animal lovers beware! Frogmouth equals terrific and highly original mystery, but the killer's horrid specialty is the slaughter of animals by the droves. In the Hong Bay district of Hong Kong (Marshall's lively fictional setting), a petting-zoo is massacred, no creature left alive. The descriptions of hoards of found-dead "dumb chums"--mainly birds--that occur early in the novel, and then again later as the hateful killing spree continues, are of course unpleasant, and I did not enjoy them; but Marshall goes only so far as he needs to go in describing the carnage, and moves on. I just know, however, that for dedicated animal lovers the scenes involving the murderer's work will be more stomach-turning than they may have been for me, and I was quite unsettled m'self.

The author is smart enough to run an over-the-top, supremely humourous subplot (as usual, really), where two of his stable of Yellowthread Street detectives stake out an automated banking machine, favourite spot for a run-and-grab thief who may simply be too fast for anyone to catch--his escape route, after snatching money out of bank patrons' hands, is up a steep hill that gave one pursuing cop a heart attack. Enter Detective Auden, who ends up running several impromptu races against the thief--apparently a cheery Tibetan who eggs on any intrepid pursuit so as to have some strong competition--while bigger and bigger crowds of people watch and wait for free money to be dropped during the action, and Auden's partner, Spencer, acts as "coach" for his fellow detective, but otherwise does nothing constructive. It is, typically, a very funny little subplot, not without its hidden puzzle (Spencer wracks his brain trying to figure out who is making any money out of this, if it ends up flying all over the street!).

There is a third, also successful, subplot: something is haunting the Yellowthread Street squadroom. Strange, frightening noises prompt Detectives O'Yee and Lim (naive greenhorn) to start tearing the place apart to find ghosts, maybe spectres of prisoners who were tortured in the holding cells (now which of these likeable cops would DO such a thing?). I felt sure that the explanation for the "haunting" would not be steeped in the supernatural--as weird as Marshall's incredile police procedurals get, he does not deal in spectres and such--but just when I convinced myself that there were no poltergeists infecting the cops' headquarters, Detective Feiffer, out at the scene of the second, terrible animal slaughter, thinks he sees a ghost, of an old man, sitting
sadly on a bench in the receding mist. Then, the man, or whatever he is, disappears...

Frogmouth is unique, even among other entries in this series. Ultimately, it is a sad, heart-rending story, with a final revelation that did bring a tear to my eye, because of the poor, dead animals, but also because of the pain a person is revealed to be feeling, which would cause him or her to harm so many harmless creatures. Frogmouth has an inherently disturbing plot, but it is hauntingly, powerfully effective.