Fish That Ate the Whale: The Life and Times of America’s Banana King by Rich Cohen

 Fish That Ate the Whale: The Life and Times of America’s Banana Kingby Rich Cohen X

 A book I recommend reading if you want to synthesize several pieces of history. This takes one part- history Central America , one part-  history banana industry, one part- history american Jewish immigrant , one part- history New Orleans , one part- history CIA and ties it all together through the life of Samuel ZeMurray.

He inserts the famous poem by Peablo Neruda, which cast a large shadow over the view of a well- doing America and instead shines a light on the growth and expansion at all cost realty of America at the turn of the century and into the wars.

"THE UNITED FRUIT CO."

When the trumpet sounded,
all was prepared on the earth

and Jehovah parceled out the world
to Coca-Cola Inc., Anaconda,
Ford Motors, and other entities:
the United Fruit Company Inc.
reserved for itself the juiciest bit

the central coast of my land,
the gentle waist of America.

It rebaptized these lands
as "Banana Republics,"and over the sleeping dead,
over the restless heroes,
who had conquered greatness,
liberty and flags,
The Company established a comic opera,
drove all free will insane,
handed out crowns of Caesar,
unsheathed greed, and attracted
the dictatorship of the flies,
Trujillo flies, Tacho flies,
Carías flies, Martínez flies,
Ubico flies, flies moistened
by humble blood and marmalade
drunken flies buzzingover the tombs of the common people,
circus flies, wise flies
well versed in tyranny.

Among the bloody flies,
The United Fruit Company steps ashore, 
devastating the coffee and the fruits,
in its ships that sail
like trays
taking away the treasure
of our drowning lands.
All the while, near the sugary deep of the harbors,
the Indians fell,
buried in the morning mists:
a corpse tumbles, a nameless thing,
a fallen number, a bunch of putrid fruit
thrown on the compost heap

Translation by Mac Williamson

tzedakah- Traditional Jews give at least ten percent of their income to charity. ... "Tzedakah" is the Hebrew word for the acts that we call "charity" in English: giving aid, assistance and money to the poor and needy or to other worthy causes. Very clearly Zemurray supports Jewish and Israeli causes and the author uses this is as an example of Zemurray's Jewishness.but it seems as though it's a force fit; none of his kids were Jewish kids they all became Christian; he wasn't a faithful attendee of synagogue nor a big reader of the Torah. This appears to be the authors agenda (early works include the title of Tough Jews) he wants to look backwards make them into looking forward. 

" By 1954 the network of connections had grown so  extensive it was I hard to tell where the government ended and the company began, 

Those who manipulate the unseen mechanism of society constantly invisible government which is truly is true ruling power - if you're not familiar with that part of American history might be a surprise to you that's the reality of expansionism and conquest through capitalism.

The lesson learned from the Guatemalan war - by Hunt the head of the CIA was the same lesson learned by Che Guevara revolutionary :compassion is weakness mercy a disease; you must be willing to go all the way. How sad both chose the bitter lesson as opposed to the better lesson from war - and demonstrated that , in the future.

ZeMurray would be "insane it's cheaper to buy a donkey than a colonel in Guatemala". He Measured everything in business assets. Zemurray was defined by his PR master -Edward Bernays Who believe the public must be controlled by manipulation supposed to governing. And people can be mean behaves you want them to behave as possible to control the masses according to our will without their knowing about it. 

Those who lived in the banana lands were ruled not by foreign nationals bringing civilization and the word of God but by businessman looked on the field with a cold moneymaking eye.   To some a business hero others it's a story of the pirate the conquistador who took without asking.  Sams defining characteristic was his belief in his own agency his refusal to despair. 

“If you want to understand the spirit of our nation, the good and bad, you can enroll in college, sign up for classes, take notes and pay tuition, or you can study the life of the banana man - you'll enjoy the read.

Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli Pirates: The Forgotten War That Changed American History.  By Brian Kilmeade & Don Yaeger.

A quick and easy history in narrative form that chronicles the early US strivings to protect its commerce and its citizens from pirates and the governments that supported said pirates along the north coast of Africa. In reading reviews of the book it appears that some of the research might be faulty but in whole it tells the right story . And yes, I had forgotten the details of the Barbary Wars, to which this is a good refresher. 

The Pirates Islamic credo that they called upon as justification of their actions, not too dissimilar to today's jihadist: "all nations which had not acknowledged the Prophet were sinners, whom it was the right and duty of the faithful to plunder and enslave" (today's version would include blowing them up). This is juxtaposed by Jeffersonian views of  all people were "endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights."

Kidnappings, ransoms, disguised bombs and vessels; it reads so much like today's headlines like the recent 'truck bomb' in Nice France. The Tripoli wars in fact never seem to have been won, nor finalized. Simply suspended while the sides regroup and the players shift chairs. It an enjoyable , quick read. Leaves the question unanswered - will there ever be reconciliation . If so how, if how, when?

An Amelia Peabody Novel of Suspense by Elizabeth Peters

An Amelia Peabody novel of Suspense .... By Elizabeth Peters

Peters had a PhD in Egyptology but her real  name is Barbara Mertz. The series of books written are an historical mystery series centered in Egyptology in the Middle East.  The books are a diversion  and fun to read. I think I've read all the books in the series a couple maybe twice.so quickly I digested " a river in the sky".   Set up in Jerusalem as opposed to the normal books in Egypt. the quick read with pseudo Egyptology in the Middle East studies making me think I'm traveling in the turn-of-the-century as an English explorer- not. My dad read "Cat who.."  by Lilian Jackson Braun and the "Cadfael Chronicles" by Ellis Peters (I think we got into them by mistake confusing I was Ellis peters with Elizabeth peters -both turned out to be winners )among others as his fun reads. I shared reading them with him. Interested in the series of Elizabeth peters ? start with "the crocodile on the sand bank"

Enjoy .

Understanding the Book of Mormon by Grant Hardy

A thoughtful book that examines the Book of Mormon as literature.

That being said, close examination of the manuscripts and various printed editions of the Book of Mormon help readers appreciate the true integrity of its text. This kind of scholarly examination of a text is called a “critical text” analysis(Rs)

Examples:

the first two-thirds of the book of Alma according to a series of parallels" (304). Alma 4-16 includes three sermons delivered to three different cities. Alma 36-42 includes Alma's three charges to three different sons (Alma 36-42). The sermons and charges overlap in theme, respective length, order, and source (primary documents are utilized in each case). This city/son parallel is even more interesting considering Alma preached in five cities but only three accounts are included in the narrative. Altogether, this indicates remarkable coincidence or deliberate construction: Zarahemla/Helaman (morally ambiguous), Gideon/Shiblon (clearly righteous, shortest), Ammonihah/Corianton (clearly wicked, longest)

In speaking of geographical details provided in the BOM (there are upwards of 1000 passages of potential geographic significance.[5]) Hardy finds"Amidst this dizzying array of details, the text’s demonstrable geographic consistency shines forth as a powerful witness to the sophistication and complexity of the Book of Mormon.[14] Upon careful inspection, Grant Hardy, a professor of history, has found, “It requires considerable patience to work out all the details of chronology, geography, genealogy, and source records, but the Book of Mormon is remarkably consistent on all of this.”[15] 

Royal Skousen in a recent  essay observed that: The Book of Mormon’s title page, translated by Joseph Smith,[i] ends with a rather intriguing disclaimer for a book of scripture: “And now if there be fault, it be the mistake of men. Wherefore condemn not the things of God, that ye may be found spotless at the judgment seat of Christ.”[ii]

By its own admission, the Book of Mormon is not a perfect text, something the book’s authors and compilers themselves frequently insisted (1 Nephi 19:6; Mormon 8:12, 16–17; Mormon 9:31; Ether 12:23–25).

Many have wondered how this could be if there were possible mistakes made in the book’s textual history. Latter-day Saint scholar Hugh Nibley answered this question by distinguishing between the message of the Book of Mormon and the “mechanical details” of its printing:

Joseph Smith . . . proclaimed [the Book of Mormon] the most correct book on earth. Most correct in what sense? . . . What is a “correct” book? One with properly cut margins, appropriate binding, a useful index, accurately numbered pages? Not at all; these are mere mechanical details, as are also punctuation, spelling, and even grammar—those matters about which the critics of the Book of Mormon have made such a to-do.[iv]

Scholarly study of the Book of Mormon and discovered Anachronisms in the Book of Mormon don't give me fear.  They give me further cause to study, pray and ponder. To seek out through the Spirit what I need to learn and live by. It seems clear that the Book of Mormon is the “most correct book on earth” because by living and applying its teachings one can come closer to God than by any other book. If you want food for thought - it's a good and meaningful read; if you are intellectually lazy or of faint heart - skip it.

In the light of what we know By zia haider Rahman

In the light of what we know

By zia haider Rahman 

An enjoyable book to read. I wasn't sure where it was heading and what I was to learn from it. And as such, the author invested 125 pages more in writing than I devices value from.  Rahman distracts us with a fair amount of material.

The  final few pages of the novel left me wanting for some closure on characters and situations that just didn't happen though  "the narrator reaches some easy metaphor about Kurt Godel’s Incompleteness Theorem and the nature of truth and friendship".

"The book is all about knowledge — who has access to it, who doesn’t, and how people who do have access use it. But it is equally about ignorance, and how people may, consciously or unconsciously, choose to shut out certain information so that they can go through life without questioning their perceptions of themselves

Sometimes a person will only  face the truth when The situation outside becomes so dire that the outside begins to notice." It is a story of classes, the stratification of society. As grandma Blair  use to say ' poor people have poor habits'' it's inverse is true ,and the book gives rise to the question can one migrate between the two. 

I was enjoying the book , just enveloping myself in the words; and for that reason was not going to pull quotes out. However,  there were enough that arrested my reading and we're giving me pause, and slowing my reading that I concluded I might as well pull some out.

"It is well to have a few memories of extravagance in store for hard times vs it is the memory of extravagance that makes the other times hard"

 "That one what one takes to be a change in another person is in fact only in improvement of one's own understanding of that person or that what we thought we knew is shown to be a false presumption of our own making

His personal tragedy was the tragedy of all men they cannot shake off the lives that might've been and the unlived lives that follow them"

"Evangelize by all means ,and if necessary use words"

 St. Francis of Assisib

"The best lessons have no teacher only a student...You"

Bad math teacher early  in one's life is devastating for all future math understanding 

"In Mathematics station ,position,  authority do not matter who you are counts for nothing"

"Answers can only begat questions- honesty commands declaration not of Faith but of ignorance"

"There are Different lights and different truths Depending on matters of simple caprice" 

"It is an obtuse notion that a given game of chess stands alone and apart, that is free of past and future an egoistic notion that the game at hand is that one game that matters. Only arrogance can allow such of view.  What matters is the beat and rhythm the heave and ho of game after game so in the cumulative history shows One the texture of what might be, what is inherent in the 32 pieces and the 64 squares and most of all the board..."

"take a real risk write it down on a piece of paper in a mind map redefine the situation"does free will really exist is choice an illusion "

Pgs 270-277

"A metaphor is useful only for transforming what happens in enriching it  in someway. it never tells you what exactly happened how it happened why it happened. ( interesting aside in 3nephi no parables are used just the straight doctrine ) Everything new is on the rim of our view, in the darkness, below the horizon so that nothing new is visible but. in the line of what we know.... We cannot see the light rays going across our field of vision and we are only seeing the impressions left by the dust particles fortuitously sent in the direction of our eyes . The conclusion of this is that if we look on a ray of light from the side and the air is free of dust , then the light will in fact be invisible!"

"Choices a trick of the light"

" Listening is hard as my friend once said because you run the risk of having to change the way you see the world."

"The world is mostly divided between mad men who remember and madmen who forget"

"His departure from the strange world a little ahead of me that means nothing press believing physicist distinction between past present and future is only a stubborn illusion" Einstein 

Ingredients to successful marriage trust and respect

"It was hard not having someone to talk about making decisions with something about doing it with someone else...and just talking about it something about I would leave to feeling afterward decisions seem lighter everything is lighter "

"There are those who do not talk because they have no one to talk to those who do not talk because they have nothing to say and those who did not talk because they hold their own hand to their mouth. talking is easier said than done."

Th book is a compelling read. However don't expect to walk away with all the answers. Though you should expect to add a few questions to the list.