Saturday, November 21, 2009

Smoke gets in your...

The Cigarette Century: The Rise, Fall, and Deadly Persistence of the Product That Defined America The Cigarette Century: The Rise, Fall, and Deadly Persistence of the Product That Defined America by Allan M. Brandt


My rating: 4 of 5 stars

It is difficult to find a person who has not been touched in some way by the all-encompassing reach of the tobacco industry -- from the carefully crafted marketing manipulations to the well-documented health risks associated with smoking and second hand smoke.  The cigarette has featured prominently in our culture, politics, legal system and public health debates for more than a century. 

In The Cigarette Century:  The Rise, Fall and Deadly Persistence of the Product that Defined America, Allan Brandt draws upon an exhaustive array of historical documents (i.e., secret in-house memos, court records, advertisements, government reports, scientific research, etc.) to illustrate "how the cigarette reflects the most powerful cultural and political debates of our time." 

Brandt sheds light on the tobacco industry and its masterful efforts, at the turn of the twentieth century, to capitalize on Edward Bernays's (Sigmund Freud's nephew) insights from the budding field of public relations or "the science of 'group mind' and 'herd reaction.'"

Long before the latest health insurance industry staged "town hall" fiascoes, Bernays's approach called for the manipulation of public opinion by "staging" public events that could then generate news that could be tainted to serve the self-interests of the corporation.

Under the guidance of the PR expert, the tobacco industry initiated a campaign to solicit new female smokers by planting photos and news items in local papers connecting cigarette use with women, beauty and smoking accessories. Thus, the new science of public relations delivered a fresh new group of consumers upon which to profit.

When scientific evidence, supporting a connection between cigarette smoking and disease, began to accumulate in the 1940's and 1950's, the industry shifted tactics.  Industry representatives began to raise questions about the basis for research findings that established a link between smoking and chronic illnesses like cancer.   Tobacco companies hired their own scientists to create a smokescreen that effectively hid the mounting truth about the health impact of cigarettes behind a shroud of "controversy". 

Throughout the latter part of the twentieth century, as these strategies effectively shielded the industry from accountability, tobacco executives managed to deftly dodge a variety of efforts to limit the potential harm of cigarette smoking through efforts to bring forward civil lawsuits and governmental regulation.

Even in the moment when it looked like the weight of whistle-blowers' disclosures of previously hidden documents, class action lawsuits and punitive damages would bring the industry to its knees, cigarette manufacturers demonstrated a keen persistence in "cultivating" new markets in the developing world for its deadly products.

As Brandt makes painfully clear, the tobacco industry has employed a variety of tactics to explicitly market and profit from the sale of a product that caused death and disease for millions for over a century.  They conducted this campaign largely beyond the scope of public scrutiny and government regulation.

In documenting this sinister history, Brandt has provided us with an important, well-researched and engagingly written analysis of exactly how corporate greed and power have come to take precedence over our health and well-being.

Check out this video segment of Jon Stewart's interview with Allan Brandt on The Daily Show.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart
Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Allan Brandt
www.thedailyshow.com

Daily Show
Full Episodes

Political Humor
Health Care Crisis

View all my reviews >>

Thursday, November 19, 2009

Republican Gomorrah...tales from the dark side

Republican Gomorrah: Inside the Movement That Shattered the Party Republican Gomorrah: Inside the Movement That Shattered the Party by Max Blumenthal


My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Max Blumenthal has done what few contemporary commentators have managed to do. He has sifted through the extreme rhetoric of the Right Wing of the Republican Party to analyze the underlying conditions that have fueled their assault on our democracy. Republican Gomorrah helps to cast a bright light on the dark side of Fundamentalist Christianity and its bigotry.

In doing so, his book goes a long way toward helping those seeking to understand why ordinary Americans often align themselves with the interests of the rich and powerful against their own well-being. It is a familiar strategy -- divide and conquer -- that wraps itself in the flag and twisted interpretations of the Bible.

Blumenthal has provided a well-written and richly documented account of the tendency toward authoritarianism in American politics. Highly recommended.

You can see a video segment on Republican Gomorrah with Max Blumental below.



View all my reviews >>

Shock and Awe...

The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism by Naomi Klein


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
While other writers have documented the growth of corporate power, the rise of the military-industrial complex and the shredding of our constitution in the expediency of protecting us from international terrorists, few have managed to piece the shards together to provide a crystal clear view of the major crises facing our country and the world. 

Drawing upon documentary evidence of the CIA's use of shock therapy to remold human beings, Klein makes a striking comparison with the use of extreme tactics as part of the "Shock Doctrine" to remake nations along the lines of privatization schemes.

To support her case, Klein paints a grim portrait of what she calls "disaster capitalism" -- the self-reinforcing cycle of corporate pillage and neglect of the public sector, the environment, etc. that then feeds the recurring pattern of natural and political disasters which in turn, create the need for lucrative governmental contracts.  In the process, corporations enrich themselves on the public largess.  Their actions are not part of some sinister plot cooked up in back rooms, but rather the result of the pursuit of neo-conservative free market ideology.  And so it goes.  

Klein's book is profoundly unsettling in a way only true stories can be.  Yet, do not be frightened away.  In the pages of The Shock Doctrine, the reader will find a way to put together the fragments so that one can begin to make sense of the ecological, economic and political crises we face. 

Check out online interviews with Naomi Klein. http://www.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine/video-audio

View all my reviews >>

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Tales of postsuburban sprawl...and how it got to be that way

Inventing Autopia: Dreams and Visions of the Modern Metropolis in Jazz Age Los Angeles Inventing Autopia: Dreams and Visions of the Modern Metropolis in Jazz Age Los Angeles by Jeremiah B.C. Axelrod


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
As a former resident of Southern California who has often wondered how L.A. area got to be so congested, so disorganized, and so bogged down with freeways, Jeremiah B.C. Axelrod's fascinating new book, Inventing Autopia:  Dreams and Visions of the Modern Metropolis in Jazz Age Los Angeles provided me with some answers. 

Contrary to popular belief, the sprawl that characterizes the L.A. area did not just spring up in a haphazard fashion.  Instead, as Axelrod argues, this pattern of development resulted from the process of conflict over competing visions of the possible. 

Going back to the early 20's, planners in L.A. were divided between two camps.  One group sought a concentric model of L.A. with a downtown business zone and outlying areas devoted to suburbs (think of a target with the bull's eye as the downtown region and the series of circles spreading out).  This model dominated the major Eastern metropolis such as Chicago and New York City.

The other model, based on utopian visionary Ebenezer Howard's notion of "the garden city", offered a different view of urban development.  Howard proposed the garden city as an alternative to the alienation of the modern city "to disrupt and debunk the concentric emphasis on the city by replacing it with an ideal of self-contained towns ordered on a more human scale."  In this way, "the garden city would be tailored to promote social familiarity and community interaction instead of alienation and impersonality endemic to the metropolis."  This vision of L.A. sought to provide residents with a more humane balance to the onward march of modernity.

Axelrod's analysis traces how the social and political clash of these competing ideologies resulted the establishment of Southern California as a "postsuburban region."  Rob Kling, Spencer Olin and Mark Poster characterize this pattern of development as "the fundamentally decentralized spatial arrangement...in which a variety of commercial, recreational, shopping, arts, residential, and religious activities are conducted in different places, linked primarily by private automobile transportation." (p. 221)  

For a detailed analysis of this phenomenon readers are encouraged to check out their book, Postsuburban California: The Transformation of Orange County since World War II.

The impact of these changes are still being experienced today, not only in Southern California, but across the country.   Axelrod has provided us with a highly readable and informative analysis to help us better understand how "postsuburbia" became the dominant model for communities.  Recommended for those who struggle each day with lengthy commutes, congested communities and seemingly never-ending development.  If you've ever wondered how did it get this way, this is the book for you.

View all my reviews >>

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

A glimpse behind the wall of sound -- the life and times of Phil Spector

Tearing Down the Wall of Sound: The Rise and Fall of Phil Spector Tearing Down the Wall of Sound: The Rise and Fall of Phil Spector by Mick Brown


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
As a kid, I remember listening to AM radio while riding in the car with my parents.  Invariably, we would be serenaded by catchy pop confections -- Da Do Run Run, Be My Baby, -- to name just a few.  The music found a place deep in my soul.  When I stumbled upon Mick Brown's Tearing Down the Wall of Sound  I was intrigued -- it combined two of my favorite things -- biographies and musical history.  Brown did not disappoint.

Tearing Down the Wall of Sound is a well written and engaging biography of the arc of Phil Spector's life and musical career.  Brown tears down the wall of sound, exposing the multiple layers and complexity of the man behind the music.  The book begins with his early days in tragic detail giving the reader a glimpse of the musical genius as a wounded child of an absent father (who committed suicide when Spector was a boy) and an overbearing mother.

Brown is at his finest when he traces the early history of rock 'n roll and the music industry.  Through Spector's life story, the reader gets a tour through the inner sanctum of the Brill Building and its cadre of songwriters and into the recording studio's where Spector crafted what came to be known as "the Wall of Sound" -- a bigger than life ensemble of layered sound that characterized his contribution to pop music.

The last third of the book follows Spector's spiral into madness and ultimately up to the moment a young actress, Lana Clarkson, is found dead of a gunshot to the face in his home.  It stops short of the resolution of the trial and sentencing. 

Overall, this book is highly recommended.  It is filled with behind-the-scenes tidbits and anecdotes of the history of pop music in the second half of the twentieth century as seen through the lens of "the rise and fall of Phil Spector." Those seeking a glimpse behind the wall of sound will find much to enjoy.

One of Spector's most well-known hits featuring the "Wall of Sound":  "By My Baby" by the Ronettes (1965) -- for your listening pleasure.



View all my reviews >>