Month: May 2007

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CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS says “Religion poisons everything.” The Old Testament is “a nightmare,” and the New Testament “exceeds the evil of the ‘old” one.” Religion doesn’t make people behave better, and Eastern religions are no better than the Western ones. You say religion might not be true, but it provides comfort in the face of suffering and death? Hitchens replies: “How contemptible.” His new book is God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. Christopher will be reading and signing Mon. June 4 at 7pm at the downtown LA Public Library in the ALOUD Series— the event is officially “full-standby only” — and also Tues. June 5 at 7pm at Barnes and Noble on the 3rd St. Promenade in Santa Monica.

Also: What would it take to build a nuclear bomb today? William Langewiesche set out to see how hard it would be for a buyer to get his hands on a nuke—just one device, powerful enough to devastate a city like L.A.. He finds the necessary highly enriched uranium in a closed nuclear city in Russia’s southern Urals – and figures out how to get it out, through Georgia or Turkey. But it wouldn’t be easy. Langewiesche’s new book is The Atomic Bazaar: The Rise of the Nuclear Poor.

More stuff to read: my piece “A Day in the Life: Sgt. Pepper Turns 40,” at TheNation.com.

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Today’s show features our Washingon political update from JOHN NICHOLS of The Nation, who says the Iraq war funding bill is “not a compromise, it’s a blank check. . . . The willingness of Pelosi and Reid to advance a measure that does not include a withdrawal timeline allows Bush to conduct the war as he chooses for much if not all of the remainder of his presidency.” John’s new book is The Genius of Impeachment.

Also: GOD ON TRIAL: PETER IRONS talks about legal battles over the separation of church and state – from the placement of a 43-foot cross in a public park in San Diego to teaching “intelligent design” in high school biology class in Dover, PA. His new book is God on Trial: Dispatches from America’s Religious Battlefields. Peter taught constitutional law at UCSD and is a member of the Supreme Court bar.
Peter Irons will be speaking and signing at Vroman’s Bookstore, 695 E. Colorado Blvd in Pasadena, Wed at 700pm.
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Plus: the rise and fall of cigarettes in America.
ALLAN BRANDT talks about “the drama of consumer desire” in which advertising made cigarettes the tobacco of choice for nearly half of all Americans in 1950. Brandt is a professor of the history of medicine at Harvard medical School; his new book is THE CIGARETTE CENTURY: The Rise, Fall, and Dedly Persistence of the Product that Defined America.

More stuff to read:
–my new piece in The Nation on Alan Dershowitz’s campaign to block tenure for Norman Finkelstein;
–and my interview with Michael Chabon at the Dissent magazine website about his new novel The Yiddish Policemen’s Union.

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HAROLD MEYERSON talks about the LAPD’s May Day riot in MacArthur Park, and the tide of troubles rising around George Bush—Harold is an op-ed columnist for the Washington Post and executive editor of The American Prospect.

Also: The “Frozen Chosen:” MICHAEL CHABON won the Pulitzer Prize for The Amazing Adventures of Cavalier and Clay – now after seven years he’s back with another one that’s wildly imaginative and dazzling fun, The Yiddish Policemen’s Union. In the wake of WWII, the US permits immigrant Jews to settle in Sitka, Alaska (which was in fact proposed by FDR) after the defeat of the nascent state of Israel. Our hero is detective Meyer Landsman, “a noz for 18 years,” “a prince of policemen,” and “a crazy little Jew with a question and a gun.”
Michael Chabon will be speaking in the ALOUD series at the downtown LA Public Library Wed. at 7pm—and at Book Soup on Sunset Strip Thurs. at 7.

Plus: THE AGE OF BETRAYAL: THE TRIUMPH OF MONEY IN AMERICA is the new book by JACK BEATTY. He says “This book tells the saddest story: how, having redeemed democracy in the Civil War, America betrayed it in the Gilded Age.” In the late 19^th century, business men like Jay Gould manipulated the American government and oppressed the common man. Of course nothing like that exists today.
Jack Beatty is a senior editor at The Atlantic Monthly and winner of the American Book Award.

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ISRAEL: A PALESTINIAN VIEW. SARI NUSSEIBEH is a leading Palestinian intellectual and political figure, a long-time advocate of a two-state solution, and the PLO’s chief representative in Jerusalem in 2001. He is president of Al Quds University, the only Arab university in Jerusalem. His new book is Once Upon a Country: A Palestinian Life. He’ll talk about the July War in Lebanon, Israel’s Gaza pullout, and the recent electoral victory of Hamas.
READ about this interview at TruthDig.com

Also: LENI RIEFENSTAHL: she was Hitler’s filmmaker. Her “Triumph of the Will” and “Olympia” are seen  by many as our greatest documentaries.
She and her defenders have long claimed that her art transcended politics, that she devoted her life to Beauty, and that, in the words of critic John Simon, she is “the greatest woman filmmaker ever.” But STEVEN BACH found the facts about her passionate enthusiasm for Hitler and the way that shaped her “art.” His new book is LENI: THE LIFE AND WORK OF LENI RIEFENSTAHL. Steven Bach will be reading and signing Leni in the ALOUD series at the downtown LA Public Library Wed at 7pm. The event is “Standby Only.”
MORE STUFF TO READ: My article in The Nation on Alan Dershowitz’s efforts to block Norman Finkelstein’s tenure