It’s cloudy in Wildwood today. I did my daily bike ride with my son. Then I walked to our favorite store with Avalon – Hooked on Books. I love used book stores. We always walk out of that store with 5 to 10 books.
That gave me an idea. As everyone knows, the average TBP member is ten times as smart and well read as the average American. As I walk around Wildwood, I’m constantly reminded of George Carlin’s observation:
TBP members are constantly recommending books to other TBP members. I would like to add a new section on the right side of the page of recommended books by TBP members. Let’s use this thread to create a list.
I’ll create the section once you post you favorites.
TBP Restaurant
The Ascent of Money Author-Ferguson
Alas, Babylon
by Pat Frank
“Red Hot Lies” – Christopher Horner (Global warming fraud)
“Ordinary Men” – Christopher Browning
People’s History of the United States – Howard Zinn
The Deliberate Dumbing Down of America – Charlotte Iserbyt
A Small Place – Jamaica Kincaid
A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier – Ishmael Beah
Breakfast with Socrates – Robert Rowland Smith
Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room – Bethany Mclean/ Peter Elkind
To name a few…I am looking forward to seeing others favorite books.
Jeezus. Where would I even start???
Are you referring to ANY books … or a specific category like economics?
The George Bush Library….both coloring books.
‘Liar’s Poker’ and ‘The Big Short’ – both by Michael Lewis.
The holy bible- 63 various authors or maybe as low as 25 depending on who you read.
Star Ship Troopers. Robert Heinlein – I think H&MP should be required in schools NOW!
Freehold- Michael Z Willamson A look at what would work in the future
Economics In One Lesson…Henry Hazlitt
Atlas Shrugged….Ayn Rand
Road To Serfdom…F.A. Hayek
General Theory Of Employment,Interest And Money….John Maynard Keynes…gotta’ know the enemy
Theory Of Money And Credit….Ludwig Von Mises
America’s Great Depression….Murray Rothbard
War Is A Racket….General Smedley Butler
The Mystery Of Banking….Murray Rothbard
Secrets Of The Temple (How The Federal Reserve Runs The Country) ….William Greider
Creature From Jekyll Island…..G Edward Griffin….Had a few nice chats with him.
Last but not least……The Real Lincoln…..Thomas DiLorenzo
Beyond Good and Evil – Nietzsche
The Odyssey and Iliad – Homer (Robert Fitzgerald translation, the rest suck)
Security Analysis – Benjamin Graham
Small Gods – Terry Pratchett
Neuromancer – William Gibson
The Man in the High Castle – Philip K Dick
Point Counter Point – Huxley
May or may not relate to liberty. Just some of my favorite books off the top of my head. Excluded from the list are the obvious.
Considering the library I’m going to assemble for my 8 month old son… I’m thinking, get him every book I’ve ever read? Or select the cream of the crop of everything I’ve ever read for him, and then branch out and read other books with him? Perhaps reread everything with him as well. Reading books in school was only ever partially enlightening, even if the books were great. Just too much bullshit came along with it all. Teachers just wanted Sparknotes summations. Actual synthesis of thought was predetermined… Anything outside the box was discouraged.
Any parents out there? How did you build your children’s worldviews from scratch? I’m trying to not let the State stick my kid in the dark mindsphere of carbon copied retardo.
Just a smattering of off-the-beaten path books that have had an impact on me, in the realm of politics/economics/workplace:
“The Logic of Failure” by Dietrich Dorner
“Guns, Germs and Steel” by Jarad Diamond
“Your Work Matters to God” by Sherman and Hendricks
“Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds,” by Mackay
I could go on and on, but I’ll stop there, with a definite shout out to the Bible, with my preferred translation being the New American Standard.
If we start talking fiction, I’d list the works of Simak (particularly “Way Station” and “Time and Again”), and my own book, but that would be too self-serving so I’ll leave it out.
– Pete
One Second After- William Forstchen
Brave New World, Aldous Huxley*
1984, George Orwell*
Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury
The Catcher in the Rye, J. D. Salinger*
Animal Farm, George Orwell*
The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald*
To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
The House at Pooh Corner, A. A. Milne
The Just So Stories, Rudyard Kipling
Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Mark Twain
Can’t forget some of Steinbeck’s great works: “Of Mice and Men” and “The Grapes of Wrath”
ANY book that helps me understand The Founding Fathers better.
I’ve hardly read any … I know I need to read more. I don’t know which ones out there are really really good.
They seem to have MORE WISDOM than all the dickhead pols combined since 1861, Like this gem from Jefferson …
“What country before ever existed a century & a half without a rebellion? & what country can preserve it’s liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to facts, pardon & pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. It is it’s natural manure.”
Yesirree. It;s time to refresh the tree of liberty!!!
Try Space Viking by H. Beam Piper (1961)–interesting comment on types of government and a good adventure.
Also, The Odyssey by Homer–amazing story on all levels.
Earth Abides by George R. Stewart–the US after a virus kills nearly every one. How we decline and start over.
Not mentioned above:
The Forgotten Man, Amity Shlaes. A new history of Depression #1
Illusions, Richard Bach. I really don’t know why. Just keep rereading and rereading and rereading.It changes over the decades.
The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning
Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell
5000 Year Leap
The Tao of Warren Buffett by Mary Buffett
America’s Great Depression by Rothbard
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Covey
Crash Proof by Peter Schiff
What Government has done to our money by Rothbard
The Mentor Lead by Tony Dungy
Blues Like Jazz by Miller
Any of Ron Paul’s books
Any of John Maxwell’s books
Twilight in the Desert by Simmons
The Millionaire Next Door by Danko
@ jIGGERJUICE
That needs to be a whole nother topic. I had to fight for my son’s brain and also tried to deprogram several foster kids. When my son was in 8th grade his 2 teachers wanted a conference about my son. They had his reading list and it was split about 50-50 between frogs and military history. They actually had the gall to suggest that I put a restriction on my son as he seems ” fascinated” by war. Now of course I did not mention that the day before my son and I had shot 600 rounds of 9 mil and .223 but i did lay down the smak about how you teachers have no right to try and social engineer MY kid and if you want to raise a ball less panzy boy who can not look out for him self then do that to your child. I also asked that the topics of our meeting be placed in his file with my response. They were not too keen on that idea so I suggested that we walk down to the principles office and ” discuss ” the idea with him.
I also believe that a truly fine young man can be helped along in the boy scouts. My son is working on his Eagle project ( repairing and resetting headstones of fallen soldiers back to the civil war ) and has grown into a fine, strong, smart young man. To bad he will have to grow up during the great power down……
Admin: this is gonna take a while. You might think about re-running this post a few times spread out at a month apart and we can make lists to post the next time it comes along…
MA
Stucky
Re your remark on books about the Founding Fathers. I’ve visited Mt. Vernon at least a dozen times, and on one of my first visits to the on-site bookstore, I asked a docent about what she would recommend as the best biography ever written on George Washington. Without hesitation, she said, “Washington: The Indispensible Man” by James Thomas Flexner.
So I bought it. Great read. Give it a shot. I’d recommend it for the TBP Members Readers List.
Body of Secrets – James Bamford
Think and Grow Rich – Napoleon Hill
Mentored by a Millionaire – Scott
Rammed Earth House – Easton
Jmarz has the rest – funny, most members here share a lot of the same reads.
Davos
I didn’t list any other books since most other TBPers already listed them. I think the book list idea is great. I’m always looking for a good book to read and since so many people on this site are pretty damn smart, I know any book recommended will be a good read.
Davos
How is that Mentored by a Millionaire book?
Jmarz: I liked Think and Grow Rich better, but the two were both good. Basically I became friends with a commercial developer, over dinner he told me how he made a million bucks in one weekend. He turned me onto Hill’s book and the Mentored book came up in a search or suggestion.
Bottom line is both books taught me that ideas are money.
PS: Disclaimer, I never made a million in a weekend like my friend, but I did make 102k in 90 days. Working on better ideas to hit one out of the ballpark.
The entire Dune series by Frank Herbert.
Even the ones his son, Brian Herbert wrote but they’re not as good… but great reads.
i’m contemplating the significance of a shelf with howard zinn, ben graham, hayek+mises, nietzscke and william gibson all together. sounds like my shelf.
lots of great suggestions. i like dense histories or relatively recent times, like evan’s 3-volume nazi history, recent bios of teddy roosevelt, hamilton and that cia history, legacy of ashes.
but i’m gonna recommend some of my all-time favorite author. the honorable doctor hunter s. thompson. anything at all, hell’s angels, fnl las vegas, one of the campaign histories, any anthology of his columns. i though some of his best stuff was in his last years, on espn.com (i think there is a collection, called Hey Rube!)
i cannot recommend thompson too highly for the young people. he was my hero when i was in my 20s, and grew in my heart every decade since.
The Very Hungry Caterpillar…a GWB favorite.
How about a DO NOT READ list Jim?
Myron Magnet comes to mind for this list. Why? Because so many took what this igmo wrote as fact [[which helped GWB/Rove form their really bad public policy]]
Green Eggs and Ham
The Cat in the Hat
One fish two fish red fish blue fish
And several others… including That Fucking Grinch. I hated him. Never finished the book once.
But I’m pretty much over that now
The L Ron Hubbard “Mission Earth” decology.
Richest Man in Babylon
E-myth and E-Myth Revisited
Rich Dad, Poor Dad
What Color is Your Parachute
Smokey sent me his list….it’s pretty short.
1) Portnoy’s Complaint
2) Penthouse Forum
3) Soldier Of Fortune
I have a few, these are books that have not been mentioned so far…
1. Franz Kafka “The Trial”
2. Franz Kafka “the Castle”
both of these Kafka book help explain the dangers of bureaucracy gone amok these fictional books written over almost 100 years ago are very relevant to our day and age.
3. Paul Kennedy “Rise and fall of great powers”
while his prediction of Japanese ascendency was incorrect, has historical view of how empires decline is dead on.
4. Francis Schaeffer “Trilogy” (which includes “the God who is there”, “Escape from reason”, “He is there and He is not silent”)
these books really help to explain the bankruptcy of Secular humanist thought, and the value of Christianity in this “post-modern”, “post-Christian” world.
5. CS Lewis Space trilogy (“out of the Silent planet”, “perelandra”,”that Hideous strength”)
not as well known his other works, he covers a lot of ground in these three books. He Confronts the ideas of freewill, good and evil. In the last book the organization “N.I.C.E” has an eerie resemblance to many modern think tanks.
6. Tom Holland -Rubicon: the Last years of the Roman Republic
I t is scary the parallels between the end of the roman republic and current events in this country
7. Barbara Tuchman – the March of Folly: from Troy to Vietnam
a great book of about Nations that do stupid things. Every member of congress, the supreme court and the white house should be required to read this
8. David Fromkin – Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East
every wonder while the middle east is so screwed up. this book explains it all.
9. Ursula K. Le Guin – the Lathe of Heaven
a brilliant novel that cover the ideas of freewill, power and unintended consequences.
ok this last one is NOT a book but a TV series…
The Prisoner
a 17 episode British show which confronts head on many of the evils we face today. possibly the most brilliant and surreal television series every made
American Caesar
The Birth of the Modern
The Glory and the Dream
Catch 22
Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas
Babylon’s Banksters – Joseph Farrell
The Franklin Scandal – Nkc Bryant
Prosecution for Treason – Mary Maxwell, PhD
Trance Formation of America – Cathy O’Brien
The Cosmic War – Joseph Farrell
LBJ and the Conspiracy to Kill Kennedy – Joseph Farrell
those are all non-fiction and extremely eye-opening.
The Prince- Niccolò Machiavelli.
Family of Secrets: The Bush Dynasty, the Powerful Forces That Put It in the White House, and What Their Influence Means for America – Russ Baker
Churchill, Hitler, and “The Unnecessary War”: How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World – Patrick J. Buchanan
1776 – David McCullough
Hamilton’s Curse: How Jefferson’s Arch Enemy Betrayed the American Revolution–and What It Means for Americans Today – Thomas DiLorenzo
Hope of the Wicked – Ted Flynn