Almanac of Political Corruption, Scandals and Dirty Politics
Author: Kim Long
Watergate. Billygate. Iran-Contra. Teapot Dome. Monica Lewinsky.American history is marked by era-defining misdeeds, indiscretions, and the kind of tabloid-ready scandals that politicians seem to do better than anyone else. Now, for the first time, one volume brings together 300 years of political wrongdoing in an illustrated history of politicians gone wild—proving that today’s scoundrels aren’t the first, worst, and surely won’t be the last….
From high crimes to misdemeanors to moments of licentiousness and larceny, this unique compendium captures in complete, colorful detail the foibles, failings, peccadilloes, dirty tricks, and astounding blunders committed by politicians behaving badly. Amid stories of brawlers, plagiarists, sexual predators, tax evaders, and the temporarily insane, this almanac tells all about:
•The only (so far!) president to be arrested while in office: Ulysses S. Grant, who was allegedly issued a ticket for racing his horse and buggy through the streets of Washington, D.C.
•The former New Jersey state senator David J. Friedland, who disappeared during a scuba diving accident in 1985. It turns out he staged the accident and served nine years in prison after being captured in the Maldives.
•Tape-recorded instructions from highbrow president Franklin Delano Roosevelt on how his staff should carry out some low-down political tricks
•The bizarre story of U.S. congressman Robert Potter, who castrated two men he suspected of having affairs with his wife. Potter won election to the state house while in jail—but was kicked out for cheating at cards.
•Texascongressman Henry Barbosa Gonzalez: he was charged with assault in 1986 after he shoved and hit a man who called him a communist. Gonzalez was seventy years old at the time.
At once shocking and hilariously funny, here’s a book that exposes the history of American politics, warts and all—and makes for hours of jaw-dropping, fascinating, illuminating reading.
Interesting book: Group Discussion or Content Rights for Creative Professionals
One Soldier's Story: A Memoir
Author: Bob Dol
At last, in his own words, Bob Dole tells his legendary World War II story -- a personal odyssey of tremendous courage, sacrifice, and faith.
In One Soldier's Story, Bob Dole tells the moving, inspirational story of his harrowing experience in World War II, and how he overcame life-threatening injuries long before rising to the top of the U.S. Senate. As a platoon leader in the famed 10th Mountain Division, twenty-one-year-old Bob Dole was gravely wounded on a hill in the Italian Alps just two weeks before the end of the war. Trying to pull his radioman to safety during a fire-fight against a fortified German position, Dole was hit with shrapnel across his right shoulder and back. Over the next three years, not expected to survive, he lapsed in and out of a coma, lost a kidney, lost the use of his right arm and most of the feeling in his left arm. But he willed himself to live. Drawing on nearly 300 never-before-seen letters between him and his family during this period, Dole offers a powerful, vivid portrait of one man's struggle to survive in the closing moments of the war. With insight and candor, Dole also focuses on the words, actions, and selfless deeds of countless American heroes with whom he served, including two fellow injured soldiers who later joined him in the Senate, capturing the singular qualities of his generation. He speaks here not as a politician, but as a wounded G.I. who went on to become one of our nation's most respected statesmen. In doing so, he gives us a heartfelt story of uncommon bravery and personal faith -- in himself, his fellow man, and a greater power. This is the World War II chronicle that America has been waiting for.
The New York Times - William Grimes
One Soldier's Story is really two stories, plainly told, with a generous sprinkling of family letters. The first is a harrowing tale of wartime courage and suffering. But Mr. Dole devotes nearly as much attention to describing his childhood years in Russell, which he describes as "a quintessential Midwestern community, a picture postcard of rustic values and plainspoken wisdom." Heartfelt and highly idealized, this picture of small-town life in the Midwest before the war takes on a kind of mythic power. Mr. Dole held tight to his all-American vision throughout his ordeal, and indeed, has rarely failed to mention Russell - its people and its values - when articulating his political philosophy or his personal struggles.
Publishers Weekly
This affecting memoir chronicles the Republican senator's arduous coming of age through the early 1950s. After a poor but for him idyllic childhood in Russell, Kans., Dole arrived at college and then the army during World War II a sunny, callow young man; his letters home-many reprinted here-are preoccupied with Mom's cooking, college sports and fraternity hijinks. The story darkens and deepens when he is sent to Italy and, near the end of the war, gravely wounded by a German shell blast that leaves him all but paralyzed with spinal cord damage and a maimed shoulder. The bulk of the book is taken up with Dole's agonizing three-year convalescence. His restrained but poignant account details his painfully slow struggle to regain the use of his legs and arms, the strain put on his family by his physical helplessness and his reluctant coming to terms with the ruin of his once handsome and athletic body. The book is very much a political autobiography, full of tributes to faith, family and hard work, but the harrowing experiences that put these ideals to the test elevate Dole's memoir above mere boilerplate. Photos. (Apr. 12) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
Library Journal
In April 1945, three weeks before Germany surrendered in World War II, 21-year-old Lt. Robert Dole suffered near-fatal wounds to his shoulder and spinal cord from German machine-gun fire as he tried to pull his radioman to safety. In this often moving book, based on the 300 letters Dole exchanged with his family, he tells the story of his three-year ordeal to relearn how to walk and use his arms. In addition, he describes his childhood in Russell, KS, and his years as a three-sport athlete at Kansas University. While being treated at Percy Jones Army Medical Hospital in Michigan, he began lifelong friendships with fellow war heroes Phillip Hart and Daniel Inouye, who would become fellow senators as well. Dole largely attributes his remarkable recovery, which included two near-death infections and nine operations, to his faith, the values instilled by his parents, and his sense of humor. He concludes with his poignant tribute to the World War II generation at the 2004 dedication of the World War II Memorial in Washington, DC. Writing without the anger about inferior medical care for veterans that distinguishes Ron Kovic's Vietnam memoir, Born on the Fourth of July, Dole has produced a journal of hope and recovery that will resonate with its readers. Highly recommended for public libraries. [See Prepub Alert, LJ 12/04.]-Karl Helicher, Upper Merion Twp. Lib., King of Prussia, PA Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
Sixty years after the fact, the former senator and presidential candidate recounts the wartime incident that left him wounded for life-and that gave him "a ferocious determination to take the next step." At the outset of this nicely written memoir, Dole protests that the handle "the greatest generation" is not one that his generation claimed for itself. "Truth be told," he says, "we were ordinary Americans fated to confront extraordinary tests. Every generation of young men and women who dare face the realities of war . . . is the greatest generation." He warms up to the title in time, however, while recalling a poor childhood on the Kansas plains, made more complicated by the arrival of the Depression; by the time he arrived in Italy as a new lieutenant, he had already faced plenty of character-building tests. Dole, whom later parodists have portrayed as being thin-skinned, admits to being a little put off early on at not being embraced by the mountain troops under his command; but, considering the low life expectancy of field unit commanders, he reckons, "No wonder the forty or so men of the 2nd Platoon didn't go out of their way to get to know me when I arrived. They figured I wouldn't be around long." They were right: while assaulting Hill 913 on the German line on April 14, 1945, Dole was severely wounded by a high-explosive shell fragment, with multiple injuries to his upper body. His account of the years-long process of recovery takes up much of his story, and Dole delivers it with grace and economy: he writes movingly, for instance, that he has viewed his full body in a mirror fewer than half a dozen times in 60 years ("I don't need any more reminders"), and he offers, without atrace of mawkishness, a fine brief on what the Rodgers and Hammerstein song "You'll Never Walk Alone" means to him. For all his reluctance to lay claim to hero or greatest-generation status, Dole deserves accolades. So, too, does his memoir. Author tour
