Category Book Reviews
Holiday book recommendation: Bubble in the Sun
Christopher Knowlton’s recent work, “Bubble in the Sun,” <a href="http://<a target="_blank" href="https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1982128380/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1982128380&linkCode=as2&tag=theflosqu-20&linkId=b58c4f315dcacbab9ba96d2d1ee43d5d">Bubble in the Sun: The Florida Boom of the 1920s and How It Brought on the Great Depressionis the most complete and definitive look at the Florida land boom and bust of the 1920’s that is available publicly. The book covers the mass get-rich-quick […]
Holiday book recommendations: Rick Perlstein’s great political reads, 1960-1980
For the better part of the last 15 years, Rick Perlstein has written a narrative about the period from 1960 to 1980 and the effective conservative takeover of America. Perlstein’s four books provide the quite possibly the best societal and political critique of that era. This narrative is split up into four volumes. The first […]
Holiday Book Recommendation: Poisoning the Press: Richard Nixon, Jack Anderson and the Rise of Washington’s Scandal Culture
This campaign cycle and the 24-hour cable news channel combined with Twitter, Reddit, Facebook, could be the tipping point of the political press being poisoned? Or is it just part of the evolution toward a completely scandal-driven, personality-based brand of political reporting? Poisoning the Press: Richard Nixon, Jack Anderson, and the Rise of Washington’s Scandal […]
Florida Holiday Book Recommendation: Last Train to Paradise
Les Standiford’s Last Train to Paradise: Henry Flagler and the Spectacular Rise and Fall of the Railroad that Crossed an Ocean is a definitive history of the railroad told by a fiction writer. This gives the narrative perhaps more color and flow than some boring histories written by historians and political writers. The decision to build a […]
Book Review: These Truths by Jill Lepore
American history is more important now to comprehend and understand than perhaps anytime in our lives. Jill Lepore’s momentous single-volume These Truths, a critically acclaimed work provides a lens into the past and delivers a narrative of unparalleled significance for our times. Writing a sweeping narrative of American history is very difficult. It’s even more […]
Review of David Frum’s Trumpocracy and what it all means
David Frum is a contradictory character in the world of many on the left. Frum was arguably my favorite intellectual conservative in the 1990’s but became George W. Bush neoconservative propagandist in the 2000’s (I’d argue this was more from idealism than any sort of broad agreement with the Cheney’s of the world, but I […]
Democrats collapse in the South – What’s the Matter with Kansas vs A National Party no More
A review of A National Party No More: The Conscience of a Conservative Democrat and What’s the Matter with Kansas?: How Conservatives Won the Heart of America. Two books, two perspectives on the decline of Democrats in the South and Midwest from a decade ago. I bought both these books in the summer of 2004 while embroiled in […]
Holiday idea: Reading about the politics of the Everglades
The Everglades get more tourist visits during this time of year than any other. That makes it a great time to also read about the history of the ecosystem and some of the political battles that have shaped it. Then Time Magazine National Editor (current Politico writer) Michael Grunwald’s The Swamp: The Everglades, Florida, and […]
Holiday book reading recommendation – Poisoning the Press: Richard Nixon, Jack Anderson, and the Rise of Washington’s Scandal Culture
This campaign cycle and the 24-hour cable news channel combined with Twitter, Reddit, Facebook, could be the tipping point of the political press being poisoned? Or is it just part of the evolution toward a completely scandal-driven, personality-based brand of political reporting? Since Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio failed in their respective White House bid […]
Holiday book recommendations: The Bush America – American Dynasty and American Theocracy
Jeb Bush’s failed bid for the Presidency in 2016 provides the perfect time to discuss a timeless classic with a little more comfort. Kevin Phillips, who was dubbed in 1995 by one of my Political Science Professors at the University of Florida as “the smartest Republican around,” is widely viewed as the chief architect of […]
The Florida Squeeze 