Velociworld: Bedtime Stories

January 25, 2009

Bedtime Stories

Flynny asked in the comments below for a reading list for the ~~insipient Klansman~~ querying mind. As I told her, everthing I know in life I learned from William Faulkner's Sanctuary, which work to this day informs my opinion of corn cobs. For the more broad-minded, however, I can recommend the ten books below. Obviously my political tastes prejudice my choices, but I thinks it's a good start. And certainly any "Top 10" list is sure to engender nays and cries of bullshit, but it's like the old Ridgeley-Michael argument, ain't it?

Do all of these belong on a Top 10 list? Who knows. I just recommend these because I happen to have read them. I can't speak for anything I haven't.

Burke's is but a pamphlet, really. Kirk's is a doctoral dissertation, and Goldwater's is a brief snapshot of the writer's pet bugaboos. Goldberg's book belongs. It's well-documented and particularly timely as we watch a trillion dollar-plus experiment in fascist corporatism unfold.

Feel free to critique. Should you give umbrage I'll just delete the comment anyway. Fucker.

In no particular order:

The Road to Serfdom, Friedrich Hayek, 1944

The Conservative Mind, Russell Kirk, 1953

The Conscience of a Conservative, Barry Goldwater, 1960

Liberal Fascism, Jonah Goldberg, 2008

A History of the Modern World, 1917 to the 1980s, Paul Johnson, 1983

The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith, 1776

Up From Liberalism, William F. Buckley, 1961

Reflections on the Revolution in France, Edmund Burke, 1790

The Closing of the American Mind, Allan Bloom, 1987

Witness, Whittaker Chambers, 1952

Now go fill up the waste basket in your bathroom with corn cobs and get reading.

Posted by Velociman at January 25, 2009 9:19 PM

Comments

Tuco,

Respectfully submitted for your consideration . . .

11. A Monetary History of the United States, Milton Friedman, 1963

12. Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand, 1957

Best regards,

Blondie

Posted by: Strange. Love. at January 25, 2009 10:45 PM

How about Suicide of the West by James Burnham?

Posted by: Stan at January 26, 2009 2:20 AM

Like Blondie, I would throw Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand, 1957 into the mix as well.

Posted by: Sam at January 26, 2009 9:24 AM

Ditto Atlas.

Posted by: rob sama at January 26, 2009 9:52 AM

But.. but.... CONSERVATIVES are fashists, not liberals. Everyone lurns that at skool.

Posted by: Paul in TX at January 26, 2009 10:44 AM

Conservative Mind is the great primer on politics, but I can hardly get even conservatives to read it.
So it is with Democracy in America, and Tocqueville was a prophet.
But there is a little book available about our foibles, Ex America, a package of three essays by Garet Garrett (1938, 1951, 1952) originally published as Peoples Pottage.
As George Carlin would say fondly about his favorite drugs, these essays will "rip your head off'. There is not one thing happening right now that is not run down in numerical order by this carefuly laid out litte book.

Posted by: james wilson at January 26, 2009 11:36 AM

Fucking Randroids. I'll do a novel list in the near future. This ain't it. Otherwise A Fan's Notes would be on the list.

Posted by: Velociman at January 26, 2009 11:53 AM

Might i suggest "Sex and Bacon: Why I Love Things That Are Very, Very Bad for Me"

which, in its own way,is relevant- Excerpt: "A warm tongue in your ass is like being baby wiped; an infantile exercise in gentle, soap free cleaning, more about the idea of boundaryless porn star virtuosity than actual mind blowing erotic sensation"

Or maybe the acid is just leaching out of my fat and giving me a free latent ride. Either way, good list, Vman.

Posted by: og at January 26, 2009 12:19 PM

On the perils of junk science, Michael Crichton's State of Fear is pretty good.

Posted by: PeggyU at January 26, 2009 2:27 PM

"Fucking Randroids"...that's great!!!

Posted by: Sam at January 26, 2009 3:34 PM

Disclaimer: I am a recovering Randroid.

Rand had some very interesting things to say. A good deal of it even made sense. Putting Atlas Shrugged on every required reading list in the entire world would most likely have a net positive effect on, if nothing else, general literacy rates.

But.

She was also a logically inconsistent extremist, a female L. Ron Hubbard, if you will. Read her with a salt shaker handy and a ready reference to Logical Errors at hand.

Posted by: Randy Rager at January 26, 2009 6:26 PM

ATLAS SHRUGGED is a novel. Cut to the chase and read VIRTUES OF SHELFISHNESS. Straight forward ideology without the ongoing sexual tension and tormented love affair....

Posted by: Tbird at January 26, 2009 7:44 PM

thank you.

I am much more a reader of non-fiction, so this list suits me well. Although, I do know that any hope of expanding my imagination or appreciation for fine writing will inevitably require that I engage in fiction as well. I do admit to being surprised, however, to see that Twain and Faulkner and Dickens are not listed.

Oh, and I did a google for 'must reads' and Rand was on every list that came up.

Posted by: jmflynny at January 26, 2009 9:26 PM

"A Conflict of Visions" - Thomas Sowell

"The Vision of the Anointed" - Thomas Sowell

"Shelley's Heart" - Charles McCarry

"Slouching Toward Gomorrah" - Judge Robert Bork

"The Great Terror" and "Harvets of Sorrow" - Robert Conquest

The Gulag Archipelago" - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

The novel by McCarry is unique in its perfect rendering of how the Left actually operates in 21st century America. All his novels are great reads; but this one is the best.

I included Conquest and Solzhenitsyn because all lefties are Bolsheviks at heart.

Posted by: War Damn Eagle at January 26, 2009 9:27 PM

Captitalism: The Unknown Ideal is also a pretty good Rand read.

Keep a good reference to basic Logic on hand. She makes a few errors, although most of them are of the ad hominem sort.

Posted by: Randy Rager at January 28, 2009 9:39 AM

A Fan's Notes?
Yes, F.E.'s book is required reading in my little piece of the world.
Being a life long NY Football Giants fan with a strange sense of nostalgia for a time before I was conceived didn't hurt.

And Atlas Shrugged is a fun read for sure, nice sentiment, if completely out of whack with the realities of flesh and blood industrialists, but hey, it's a novel, and it is fun, despite its ludicrous Bruce Willis finis.

Posted by: C'thulu at January 28, 2009 1:52 PM

Speaking of Objectivists, The Ominous Parallels by Peikoff isn't too shabby.

Fucking scary, though.

Posted by: Randy Rager at January 28, 2009 11:49 PM

... by the by, did you hear about Updike's passing a few days ago?....

Posted by: Eric at January 29, 2009 8:08 PM

Free To Choose - Milton Friedman

Posted by: Denny at January 29, 2009 10:54 PM

I can't believe "Spiderman" is not on the list.

Posted by: james old guy at January 30, 2009 10:58 AM

Drawing Life by David Gelernter

Can't give you much umbrage. Running low on it now.

Posted by: Cappy at January 30, 2009 4:15 PM

Hey Potty Mouth what about "Bundling Up For Global Warming" by Al Gore and "Purity of Purpose" by Rod Blagojevich? Damn good reads!

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