Paul Richards

Health Care for the Real World

Revisado: 12-13-21

Health cannot be looked at separately from the real world we all experience. The rule of patriarchal doctors and insurance companies within the medical establishment is truly a curse upon all of us. These two authors bring science, inspiration, and radical insights into understanding the limitations of our current health system and into envisioning what it might be without the patriarchy and insurance scams. Thanks to Rupa and Raj for a brilliant book that is historical and scientific at the same time. Recommended for everyone.

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A good read! ee,

Revisado: 12-08-20

Enjoyed this book. Interesting story , characters and setting.
HELD my interest up thorough the end. Well performed.

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Inspiring and deeply moving stories

Revisado: 12-27-19

Two amazing stories come together in this book. First is Corine Sombrun's story of a French woman becoming a confidant of Harlyn Geronimo, the great grandson of Geronimo, of her visions while she was in the Amazon forest that sent her to Mongolia, then her visions of Geronimo while apprenticing to a holy woman in Mongolia who lived in a tepee just like the Apache half way around the world. You could not make this up. It is a fantastic story that excites the imagination and stirs the soul because it derives from non rational forces of the human spirit that we all yearn for. The ancient connections between cultures and genetics in Mongolia and New Mexico are astounding revelations. Then, the second story is Harlyn Geronimo's story of his great grandfather, Geronimo. How he lived, fought and died in captivity. Harlyn's own story is no less moving as he tells of struggling to reclaim Geronimo's bones from the theft by Yale's secret society, Skull and Bones. Geronimo's skull and leg bones are believed to have been stolen during a 19th century raid led by Prescott Bush, the ancestor of two American Presidents. Wow. The story unfolds as Harlyn with his two young granddaughters in the back seat, drive Corine across the New Mexico desert talking and laughing all the way. The epilogue about their book tour of Europe and the on-going case to reclaim Geronimo's bones is a moving climax of both stories. The post script by Ramsey Clark about the case is right on point. I couldn't recommend this book any higher than I do. Incredible book! And I should add, that the narrators are excellent. The female story teller's voice is charming and captivating, a great bonus for listeners. The translator produced a seamless text that did not miss a beat.

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A Life Well Lived...A Story for the Ages

Revisado: 12-19-18

As a reasonably well informed reader of history and admirer of Frederick Douglass, I found this book immensely informative and enjoyable. The author, David W. Blight, is eloquent and measured in presenting the story. The narrator, Prentice Onayemi, is smooth and insightful in his reading. I knew about Frederick Douglass for many years but had never really comprehended the true nature of his contribution to the abolition of slavery. Nor was I aware of his vast popularity as an orator, a real live superstar of the 19th century, perhaps the best known man in the country. While I always strove to get behind the mainstream narrative of the civil war, which I understood to be tainted with racism from decades of Jim Crow laws and tolerance for injustice against black people, I never before read such a comprehensive account of the anti-slavery movement that Douglass spear headed. I found it remarkable that the militant voice of an escaped slave achieved great popularity in a vastly racist society. I marveled at his courage in confronting and even fist fighting hostile mobs all over the country during the pre war years. Then, once the war was over and slavery abolished, I was fascinated by the limbo Douglass endured trying to find a new purpose once his fight against slavery was victorious. It was painful to follow his life through the years when Jim Crow arose in the South and his Republican Party lost its way. Douglass fell into a limbo we see running throughout the 20th century. I experienced it directly in the mid 1960s when civil rights militancy gave way to pro war support for the war in Vietnam, when the loud cries for justice were drowned out by greed and the quest for empire. On the personal side, I found the story of Douglass' family, his wife Anna, mother of his five children, and then his second wife Helen, to be a compelling story of transformation of life that could only have happened once slavery was abolished. For those of us who understand that the civil war was all about slavery and slavery alone, this book will provide a deep glimpse into a century of history that gave birth to the modern world we all live in today.

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Love the Title

Revisado: 12-18-18

Fun fun fun. Well written and full of humor and delight. Looking forward to the next one. The narrator is also very good.

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Settler Experience Leaves Me Wondering

Revisado: 09-07-18

There was little repose in the angle. Can true satisfaction arise from wrecking the planet with mines and water works? Can "civilized" people ever overcome their distaste for nature and those living in harmony with it whom they call "savages"? After reading this book, or as much of it as I could take, I would have to say the answer is no.

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No It Wasn't the Ice Age. It was a Woman.

Revisado: 09-07-18

I guess patriarchal mind set can fool you into any mythological nonsense you might want to conjure up.

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The Untold Story of Slavery Finally Surfaces

Revisado: 05-17-18

This book is a gem. It tells a story that has not been told. Zora Neale Hurston wrote it between 1927 and 1934. It was published this year. The story of slaves and slavery is of great importance here in the US because of the racist suppression of Africa culture and the social and economic distortions that have occurred. It is also important for our view of the history of all civilizations which enslaved people since prehistoric times. Slavery and its destructive impact on our society today will never be overcome until we all understand what happened. It has been estimated that in 1800, 80% of humanity lived in some kind of slavery. That is the legacy that is playing out today all over the world. Modern humans are sleep walking in a dream (nightmare) created by the slave owners. Time to wake up.

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World without Women

Revisado: 04-28-18

Ignoring the matrilineal and matrilocal origins of human kind in our prehistory is the chief limit of this study. It is enlightening to know that farming and domestication of animals preceded city state by 4 thousand years. But what about the tens, even hundreds of thousands of years before that? A time when there is no record of war, of class, or male domination. Women hardly appear in his entire book..Did women create language? Did they create agriculture? Did they create string, nets, clothes, and tame animals? When the author claims that tribes were the creation of the city states, he abandons all reason for a comforting notion that male domination always existed and that human culture sprang spontaneously from the dark past in the exact image of our current society. The origins of male usurpation of the land, aka private property, is fundamental to rise of civilization and war. The origins of the slave trade and the subjugation of women cannot be understood without understanding the origins of private property in the prehistoric past. Did the raiding pastoral "barbarians" spring up whole like an apparition from an urban dream? Did pastoralists have a prehistory without male domination and war? Why ignore all these questions and the scholarship done mainly by women? The answer is sadly obvious.

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Destroying the Confederacy Was His Greatest Act

Revisado: 10-26-17

In this age of vile racist resurgences, I have gained considerable delight in reading Ron Chernow's biography of Ulysses S. Grant. Especially wonderful is Chernow's recounting of Grant's brilliant military leadership that led to the defeat of the Confederacy, Sherman's march to the sea and the role of black soldiers and freed slaves in snuffing the life out of the slave owning states. Such a glorious story, filled with heroes and triumphs. Perhaps, when all the Confederate statues and flags are removed from sight, we can learn to celebrate this time of liberation and memorialize it properly with new holidays and new statues that truly represent our values and our people. My great grandfather, Robert Richards, fought in the Battle of Shiloh, was wounded near Huntsville, Alabama while serving in the Wisconsin Volunteers in the Union Army. This book does him honor.

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