Security Books

In this engaging book, George Pyle avoids clichéd hand-wringing about the "Crisis of the American Farmer." Instead, he delivers an informative, fascinating farmers'-eye-view account of US agricultural policy within the larger context of economic globalization, the energy crisis, global warming, water pollution, the US obesity epidemic, genetically modified foods and terrorism. Pyle enriches his account with links to slavery, communism, the Dust Bowl, Star Trek and Nobel economist Amartya Sen. Sprightly, direct writing, clear information and convincing analysis, all in 200 pages. Read this book, and you'll to understand where your dinner fits into the Big Picture.

Since the 1930's when subsidies were provided to farmers that grew program crops (corn, soybeans, wheat, cotton, tobacco...), we were told by pretty much every politician running for office that such subsidies were necessary to save the family farm. Finally, somebody has taken the effort to point out that telling this lie for over seventy years hasn't made it true. In fact, if there is any one factor which is working to limit the viability of mid-sized family operations, it is the grain subsidies which encourage overproduction and mismanagement of the land and water resources and has created a producer base whose primary skill is "farming the government" rather than being true stewards of the land.

While I agree with the author's main point, that grain subsidies are putting family operations at a disadvantage relative to the larger "mega-farms", I respectfully disagree with the point that the subsidies are being maintained for the benefit of all agribusiness entities. While major players in the grain market (Cargill, ADM, Continental Grain) have a vested in interest in having a lot of bushels of program crops around which they can handle and thereby tack a fraction of a cent/bushel margin on, I don't think this conspiracy includes the beef packing industry. Rather, this industry just evolved to its present state to operate in the environment which the subsidies created. If such obscene profits were being realized by all agribusiness entities, IBP (Iowa Beef Processors) would not have been boughten up by the poultry industry juggernaut, Tyson Farms and Swift Packing Co. would not be on Smithfield Farms acquisition list. In fact, I think these events provide a certain degree of circumstantial evidence that the grain subsidies provide a comparative advantage to the pork and poultry industries over the beef cattle industry. However, this one slip can easily be dismissed on the basis that the author is an aging baby boomer and raging against the establshment is what boomers do and shouldn't detract from the point that the grain subsidies are causing more problems than they solve.

I 'm a city girl and though I was raised in Kansas, I know little about the argricultural market. This book was an eye opener. The author's premise is sound and believe me, it took a lot of convincing on his part to bring me to this point.

Let's stop feeding the poorer nations with our "surpluses."

I've known farmers and always wished them well. However, I never really had a burning passion for their survival. Growing up in Houston didn't exactly make me a "man of the soil".

Yet, after reading George's book, I understand and finally do care about their success. This is a great book for folks who, like myself, don't understand. A side bonus - unlike a textbook, it's fun to read. George brings the issue down to the level of the consumer, then elevates that level to greater understanding. You learn about the health, security, and economic reasons that you care...even if you didn't know you cared.

I had the honor of working with George in Salina. Anyone who knows his body of work has to feel that, whether you agree with him or not, he's an excellent and entertaining writer. He's also a great guy.

Bryant

RAISING LESS CORN, MORE HELL: THE CASE FOR THE INDEPENDENT FARM AND AGAINST INDUSTRIAL FOOD by George Pyle is an eye-opening treatise on the damage that overproduction and overdevelopment of food does to our economy, our health and our ways of life. These wrongs are committed through the industrialization of food that has occured in the United States in the twentieth century, and Pyle makes a convincing case in easy-to-read reportage that outcomes of this process are not good.

Pyle, who is currently an editorial writer for the Salt Lake Tribune, was raised in Kansas and spent several years as editorial page editor at a newspaper in Salina, Kan. He was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 1998, and this book shows his valuable journalistic sensibilities in an issue of great public interest. He is able to clearly (and colloquially) make his case in all the areas he focuses on through thorough citation and primary reporting.

The book (after an interesting prologue titled "Searching for Roots: Or, How I Learned to Start Worrying and Love the Small Farm") is divided into sections with chapters that explore the aspects of "Wealth," "Health" and "Security." "Wealth" deals primarily with the faulty economic assumptions that spur American growers to grow not just crops but their own operations, borrow money for bigger and better machinery, and commoditize themselves right out of a profit. He also deals with the corporate farms and giant cattle and hog farms that are springing up all over the nation. (The farmers make all the investments in facilities and the corporations take none of the risks, but control all the prices. The corporations can also decide not to use a farmer for whatever reason after he or she has made the investments in all the facilities...) This sections lays the groundwork for the fundamental pricing issue of Pyle's thesis: Overproduction drives down prices for American farmers, causes worldwide commodity "dumping" and discourages developing nations from growing their own foods. It's really a "death cycle" of farm economics, but individual farmers feel compelled (and are supported by short-sighted governmental policies) to get as much as possible out of their lands to get bigger profits (or smaller losses) each season, even while this action contributes to driving down real farm wages over time.

The second section, "Health," deals with the consequences of genetic modification of crops and the issues associated with feeding livestock corn and chopped up animal bits, contrary to nature. And there ARE consequences. Some of the consequences are trade related (the EU and other nations won't allow GM crops to be imported, resulting in trade embargoes, political conflict and accusations and aspersions cast on U.S. crop exports) and some are health related (cows should not be fed corn, as when they are, e. coli develop in their intestines... this would be fine if slaughterhouses were clean or careful enough to keep the organs away from the saleable meat, but they aren't... also, mad cow comes from feeding cattle, which are herbivores, bits of other animals, including brains, to fatten them up). Pyle makes such a convinincing case against both these practices, that it has caused me to be more careful in what I purchase and what I eat.

The third part, "Security" focuses on how easily U.S. food production could be terrorized, either by a malicious party or by nature because of its uniformity and its determined ignorance of natural threats and defense. The previous two sections figure in this argument given all that the author has laid out for readers leading up to this penultimate part.

The afterword is particularly instructive. Pyle ties together the themes of his work and focuses the reader on going forward toward something positive. We must find local growers of food, we must allow our food to be a local product, we must be receptive to nature's lessons, and we must seek change in the economic and political climate that encourages our own farmers to drive themselves out of business and our food out of natural confines.

The book is serious, but fun to read, as Pyle's voice is colloquial, strident, but personable. One of my favorite passages, in which he makes an analogy that instructs us on crop rotation, and intermixed crops: "Imagine that you are a discerning, well-cultured, and intelligent person. Imagine that you really like chocolate. But I repeat myself" (p. 187). His headnotes for chapters are diverse, interesting and eclectic, as he quotes communicators from William Shakespeare to William Shatner.

I strongly, strongly recommend this book. It's something we should all be concerned about, and Pyle's treatment of the issue is comprehensive and accessible. It changed my thinking about food, made me more informed as a consumer and a citizen, and I think it will do the same for you!

This is an excellent book. It makes so easy to understand - all those complicated stock terms, author makes use of beautiful examples from time to time. It is a must have for every person who wants to invest money in stocks etc. (may be, except the ones, whose primary carrier is stocks or stock trading). I myself bought and sold stock over the last few years but never understood the terminology completely. It is nice to have it in my library - Thanks to the authors.

If you're a twenty- or thirty-something looking for an accessible, useful guide to investing, look no further. This is a great how-to guide to the markets, written in an inviting yet not condescending style. Buy it. Read it. Tell your friends.

Ever traded baseball cards or comicbooks? You?ve taken your first step in investing!

This book succeeds where many others fail: It does an excellent job of breaking into layman's terms the most complex investing and financial concepts, while at the same time making the whole thing completely relatable for someone who knows *nothing* about investing. That is a talent many wish they had. This is no mean feat when you consider all the jargon you have to learn. Now, imagine having fun while doing it! Wow! Eric Tyson, eat your heart out!

Sure, it?s been a while since this book first came out, so you know it needs a little updating...get over it! I still give the book five well-deserved stars. I appreciate the authors for writing such an awesome little book, as reading a book is a big investment of time, and reading this book was definitely worth it.

Share it with a teen or twenty-something you love, and give them the gift of setting them on the path to becoming investors.

Before I bought this book, I was probably like a lot of young people out there... ya get paid from work and you go blow it on the weekend with your friends at the mall. You just manage to get your bills paid off, and wonder why you can never seem to get a decent amount put away in your savings account? People, wake up! This is the time you should be saving for your future, or you'll regret that you didn't when you get older! I bought this book with determination not to spend every dollar I make and how to put my money towards my future. The book gives excellent explainations on the stock market and how it works, and even explains all those Wall Street symbols in a way that it's actually fun to read! It explains everything from savings accounts, to stocks and bonds, to IRAs! When I was finished reading the book, I was so glad I had read it when I did, because the later you wait, the more you're wasting time! I recommend this book to all! Read it and you'll be glad that you did!

There is absolutely no better tool in the market today. It's a great handbook for those sophisticated Generation X'ers, and an even a better tool for that worldly, younger new generation who are blazing trails right behind the X'ers.

Hey Boomers, your children, the N'Gens, are going to take the world by storm. With your ideas and their cohesive, cooperative energetic spirit, there isn't anything that they won't accomplish.... But without the financial skills so wonderfully illustrated in this book, your child will be left behind the pack. He or She will fail to live up to their unbelievable potential.

As an owner of this book, I can honestly attest to its value. I think it should be part of every high school senior's core curriculum! It is the only book that can make sure your child is ready to assist his/her peers in shaping the future of America and the World.

If your school board has not yet adopted this text, then please makes sure before your son or daughter goes off to college this fall that they have this guidebook to the world of life. America and for that matter the World will be grateful.

A Financial Analyst and Real Estate Investor (Cincinnati, Ohio)

Reminiscences of Stock Operator is a classical works that testifies that the psychological and technical aspects that moves the market has not changed even to this present day... The beauty of the fictional story based on the greatest of minds that traded in the market and made millions and lost fortunes speaks very vividly to us today from their wisdom and experience... I have found the book to be full of wisdom, education and guidance that the financial markets is not a game to be played on the hopes of getting rich for nothing...To be successful requires the greatest discipline on our ourselves..And in the game of speculation this book let us know that the financial markets owes us nothing and that we can't force our hands...

As I read this book I wondered if it was written recently, as most books written in the last couple decades seem to have the same info, including the 'newly discovered' psychology of trading. Save a ton of money and buy this book first. Then you may not want any of the others. It's well written, though the author's whole intent is to prove no one can 'beat' the market, which is a little discouraging. I mean, after all, I think I will. Everyone interested in trading should read this early in their career, if not first.

As useful in the mad 1920's and 30's as it is today! Every trader should read it... at least twice. If you're into Hedge funds, Private Equity or Asset Management, you should probably read it not less than 3 times - in between the lines!

Picture this; it's the early 1900's, the dawn of the Roaring 20's. Gatsby like characters abound and are romanticized in the Saturday Evening Post, Horatio Alger rags to riches stories are all the rave. Along comes Jesse Livermore, a ballsy, throw caution to the wind and risk it all by leveraging it up to the hilt and letting it ride type of guy. It's a time when the market is on fire and behaves something like the late 90's but the regulators are nowhere to be seen. Charles Ponzi takes Boston by storm with his promises of 50% in 45 days with his Ponzi Notes and creates an all out frenzy engulfing what seems like half of the City.

I read this book in 1990 when I first entered the securities business, and promptly bough 10 copies to give to friends. Over the years I have either given as a gift or recommended this book to everyone entering the business (Wall St. and the investing business in general).

In this edition the illustrations from the 1920's Post are worth every penny, however the market insight is invaluable. Just think about what you can learn from a guy that was day trading and scalping eights 70 years before it was in vogue!

I enjoyed the ride of the market throughout the 90's as a Wall Street broker and then moved on to real estate in 2001. I would recommend this book to anyone just starting out on Wall Street and for those that are Street veterans and have not read it yet, shame on you.

By Kevin Kingston, author of: A 20,000% Gain in Real Estate: A True Story About the Ups and Downs From Wall Street to Real Estate Leading to Phenomenal Returns

Blog: bloglines.com/blog/KevinKingston

If you believe Market Analysis,you ought to choose Jesse Livermore.If you believe Company Analysis,you ought to choose Warren Buffett.If you believe Country Analysis,you ought to choose Jim Rogers.Good lucky!

The book is a series of articles by different authors. It is only appropriate for professionals or trained amateurs in the field. Quality is uneven. The best is the editors one article which is worth the price of the collection.

I found this collection of essays helpful in securing a better understanding of the implications of portfolio decumulation strategies in early retirement. The essays are written for the practitioner and hence are easier to understand than much of the recent academic literature. I will recommend this book to my CFA.

As a recent retiree, who is not a professional financial planner, I found this book very helpful in understanding the "technical" details of various financial planning tools. I was particularly interested in Monte Carlo analysis (which I use) and how this tool can be used to objectively (albeit not in the most easily understandable form for a lay person) quantify my investment portfolio risk.

It was also very interesting in how the Monte Carlo tool is being misused to evaluate risks other than simple investment portfolio risk. I would agree with the authors conerns about how certain financial planners are trying to use Monte Carlo analysis to evaluate risk far beyond the investment portfolio.

Traditional financial planning advice would suggest an ultra-conservative investment strategy high in fixed income securities. For those willing and able to accept the variablity of the stock market, a significantly higher level of income can be generated with little additional risk. Monte Carlo is the tool (properly used) to evaluate investment strategies.

I have read over two dozen books on investing and retirement planning and this is among my favorites. First, there are few books which talk to the subject of distribution (as opposed to accumulation) strategies. Second, the authors have chosen to allow other experts to contribute to their book - 25 of them to be precise. So you are not just getting the advice of one or two people, but the opinions of over two dozen renowned experts in the field. There is a tremendous amount of wisdom contained in the chapters.

As anyone who is a student of investing and retirement planning will know, Harold Evensky is quoted routinely and widely recognized as an expert in his field. Simply getting his advice is more than worth the price of admission. An example is the Evensky & Katz Cash Flow Reserve Strategy (E&KS) which is discussed in chapter 11. I have no doubt I will use this strategy in my own distribution planning.

Also not to be missed in the work of Bill Bengen on sustainable withdrawals, which is presented in chapter 13. Anyone who is contemplating managing their own cash flows in retirement (and even those who entrust this to others) should not miss Bill's views and opinions. He is arguably the leading expert on sustainable withdrawal rates in the financial planning business. I would highly recommend that you also consider purchasing his book, Conserving Client Portfolio's During Retirement, in addition to this fine work. Fortunately that book has recently become available on Amazon so it is now easy to find and obtain. I purchased my copy about 9 months ago and had to order it directly from the Financial Planning Association.

While you may not agree with every opinion expressed in this book, it will certainly get you to thinking (perhaps outside the box) and pressure testing what you think you know.

I'm sure I will use it as a constant guide in managing my own finances.

I have been reading retirement and investment books extensively over the past 2 years (Graham, Gibson, Slott, Stein etc.) and while some have touched on saving for retirement, few have touched on withdrawal strategy. In this book, Harold has gone to great length to spell out the retiree's psychological and economic needs, and offers up excellent options to address both. That section, plus the other fine chapters by other authors, make this a must-have book for the enlightened counselor.

With this book, David Feldman takes the mystery out of reverse mergers. Going public via an APO (alternative public offering) is a legitimate way to take a micro-cap company public while raising the necessary funds to grow the business. His strategies and insights, written in plain English, are invaluable for any CEO/CFO who is contemplating a reverse merger, especially after the recent SEC rulings. I would, however, caution that the book is not a do-it-yourself "how-to-guide" but rather a starting point to get acquainted with the reverse merger process. My biggest take-away is to make sure you bring in a capable and experienced team of advisers to make the reverse merger process a seamless transaction.

This is a most informative book and tells you how to do it. The concept is mysterious at first but is clearly explained in this book. It is a must for anyone considering taking his business public. I highly recomend it.

If you want to know the right way to organize and structure Reverse Mergers, this is the book to go for. It's an excellent up to date reference as well as a guidebook of do's, don'ts and "tricks of the trade"; even better, it's written so both newbies and professionals can benefit from it.

At the very minimum, Reverse Mergers will pay for itself many times over in saved legal fees; more importantly it will almost certainly save you a lot of time and may well save you from some very expensive mistakes. If you intend to do anything in this area, Mr. Feldman's book is undoubtedly the best $50 investment you can make.

Well, maybe it didn't exactly change my life, but it gave my law firm a new direction. My firm specializes in strategic transactions - initial public offerings, private placements, mergers & acquisitions - but we had steered clear of reverse mergers because of the uncertainty and confusion. Feldman and Dresner cleared up that confusion we now offer reverse mergers as part of our services.

This book showed the mechanics of structuring a reverse merger, how to create shell corporations and guidelines on financing. It covers due diligence, securities filings and and plenty of mistakes to avoid.

Whether you're an attorney, accountant, investment banker, business owner or private investor, this book will offer you an new strategy for growth and finance by way of reverse mergers.

Only a few years ago, it seemed that nearly every company was going public with an IPO. Now many quality companies are locked out of the IPO market, but companies have other ways to go public. One of the most popular paths is a "reverse merger." In this transaction, your private company merges into a public company (often a "shell") and controls it, giving you a public stock with which to raise capital. This may sound shady, but it's not: many well-known companies have gone public through reverse mergers, including Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway, Turner Broadcasting System, Occidental Petroleum and Blockbuster Entertainment. Experienced Wall Street securities attorney David N. Feldman takes you through the reverse merger process in detail. The book is wonderfully clear and thorough, and should become the definitive textbook on reverse mergers. It is, however, a dry read. A profusion of technical rules and especially acronyms (SPAC, SOX, Form 10-B, Rule 419, Regulation A, SB-2, PIPE) make the book slightly MEGO (My Eyes Glaze Over) for the uninitiated - but then, they are not its target audience. We enthusiastically recommend this book to sophisticated investors, lawyers, accountants, investment bankers and executives who want all the details on this increasingly popular financing technique.

Rich Shareowner, Poor Shareowner!: Common Sense For Investors And Managers! by Will Marshall is a basic shareholder money matters guide that presents its core principles in very easy-to-understand format of anecdotes and vignettes. Individual chapters cogently address the definition of shareowner value, determining the 'cost of capital', how acquisitions can actually erode shareholder value, and much, much more. An excellent introduction to the conflicting, varied, and sometimes financially perilous world of the share market, Rich Shareowner, Poor Shareowner! is very strongly recommended reading for anyone who is investing in today's volatile stock market.

Business books usually present the same level of satisfaction to the reader as a serving of steamed broccoli - fulfilling and valuable though less enticing than the main course. But Marshall's book is different. Rich Shareowner, Poor Shareowner! presents important and valuable instruction on business valuation and investment as part of an enjoyable read. Marshall weaves his business issues around a gentle story filled with lively dialogue among interesting characters in charming settings. Lead by a sage cowboy, the reader is guided through complex concepts at a comfortable pace, fed in bite-size pieces. The result is an effective combination of instruction and entertainment that should be the goal of all educators and authors. This book teaches; it is the main course.

Will Marshall has found a way to teach even the non-financial public about shareowner value. It's a book everyone should read! He has taken a difficult topic and made it user friendly by building a story around the financial information. Will's common sense approach to creating value for the shareowner is something every company should apply.

This is the book I wish I had read a few months ago. Will Marshall has provided tools that will make me a wiser investor and a better manager. The concepts presented in this book cut to the heart of accurately determining, tracking and growing the value of an enterprise - critical tools for the business investor and manager alike.

The information is presented in an enjoyable to read story format as a group of people exchange questions and ideas around morning coffee and evening campfires while visiting at a western dude ranch. An easy to read and informative book.

This is the book I wish I had read a few months ago. Will Marshall has provided tools that will make me a wiser investor and a better manager. The concepts presented in this book cut to the heart of accurately determining, tracking and growing the value of an enterprise - critical tools for the business investor and manager alike.

The information is presented in an enjoyable to read story format as a group of people exchange questions and ideas around morning coffee and evening campfires while visiting at a western dude ranch. An easy to read and informative book.

An excellent book for officers and supervisors alike. Chapters were well organized and material referenced appropriately. Following the book, any officer or supervisor will make better, more sound decisions on discipline.

If you are a supervisor, you MUST read this book. It provides a wealth of information, enough for a two week training course.

I'm a recently appointed supervisor of the Internal Affairs Division and this book contains information that protects both my department as well as the guys and gals employed here. Anyone looking for information relating to regulations pertaining to the Police Officer's Bill of Rights should look into this book.

As an Internal Affairs commander and, later, Chief of Police, the various editions of this book have been my first reference for the administrative processes. Now, as a consultant in the area of policy review and internal investigations, I recommend this book to my clients and students. Every police supervisor should have ready access to this book, and it should be on every IA investigator's desk.

This is a must have for every law enforcement officer no matter what his position or title. I wish I could provide everyone in my Department with a copy.

This was an excellent read. I must say as a public servent that all police officers should have an up to date copy of this book in his/her bag.

Knight's Risk,Uncertainty and Profit(RUP) is a classic work ,especially with respect to Knight's analysis of the distinction between risk and uncertainty and the role each plays in the decision making calculus of the entreprenuer or the firm.For instance,Knight recognized that the negative impact of uncertainty could be reduced for those firms that were able to increase their size and get larger and larger over time.Advertising would allow firms to deal with the uncertainty of consumer responses to the introduction of new products over time ,as well as to changes in consumer preferences.Knight was the first to clearly recognize that economic profit is the return to the successful entreprenuer or owner of the firm to compensate them for the bearing of uncertainty.Knight's analysis of the connection between uncertainty and economic profit corrected the errors of Ricardo and Marx,who regarded economic profit as an unearned surplus .Keynes's integration of expected economic profit into the specification of his aggregate supply function,Z,where Z =P+wN(P equals expected economic profit),can be traced back to Knight's earlier discussions.It is strange that economists still are having trouble specifying Keynes's Z function nearly 70 years after the publication of the General Theory in 1936.However,Knight's theoretical analysis of uncertainty at both the micro and macro level is not as impressive as Schumpeter's analysis of uncertainty in his Theory of Economic Development(1912)or of the path breaking analysis of John Maynard Keynes in chapters 6 and 26 of the A Treatise on Probability(1921).In this latter book,Keynes operationalized a quantitative method of dealing with uncertainty(insufficient weight of the evidence,w)by means of his conventional coefficient of risk and weight,c.This coefficient allows a decision maker to incorporate uncertainty and nonadditive probabilities into a technical analysis of decision making.The only author who comes close to Keynes is D.Ellsberg with his practically identical index to measure ambiguity called rho.There are still some unanswered questions that can be asked in this area of economic thought.Why didn't Knight cite the earlier work of Joseph Schumpeter on the risk versus uncertainty distinction?Further,why didn't Keynes cite both Knight and Schumpeter in his chapters 12 ,17 and 22,where he discussed the issue of the effect of uncertainty on investment in new capital goods and on stock market speculation?

Even though the recent research in microeconomic theory has paid attention (somewhat reluctant in my opinion) to the topic of the "uncertainty", i.e. the Knightian uncertainty, it has not been successfully incorporated in the main theoretical framework, yet. The one of the evidences may be that we still cite D. Ellsberg's paper in QJE as the one of the most important work in this field: it is like citing Keynes' "General Theory" in every microeconomic paper as in 1950s and 1960s.

The book is pleasant to read: it is full of insights, usually forgotten by now, including the complemental tendency of the theoretical and empirical works in economics. The most important accomplishment is that he argued that the exisence of the "uncertainty", the event whose probablity cannot be estimated priori or from empirical data, explains the instablity of the perfect competition, the (lucklustre) justification for the monopoly and the oligopoly, and the superiority of the private property system (capitalism). It is noticable that many phenomenons metioned in the book can be still applicable now, and the last part implies the author's thought regarding to the path of the capitalism, which is explored in more depth in Schumpeter's work despite the differences in two economists' predictions.

Knight is one of the economist who lived in the transition of classical into neoclassical economics. The book predicts the emergence of more mathematical economists, but cannot escape from the influence of the former. The same thing can be said of the works of Schumpeter, Viner, and Veblen. Despite being one of the most famous economists, he and Schumpeter has no student who followed their lines of works: is it because their imaginative ways in conducting the reserach, or because of the trends in economics which trapped their students? (Stigler was a student of Knight, but which interest do their works share, except for their interests in history of economic thoughts?)

It is worth reading because it reminds of what economics is or should be about, not because it prescribes the solution which could not be found in the modern economic works. We are witnessing the transition of several countries into the private economics with the mixed results. It should be noted that Hayek's work is the starting point in this field, the transition economics or the comparative economics, but Knight's work is more appropriate, pratical, and dynamical.

Thus, if you are uncomfortable with the current economics, want to explore more idiosyncratic works in economics and think about the big picture in the path of the society, or are tempted to diverge from the dullness of the business books in your bookshelf, then this may what you have been looking for. Unless you are struck with the optimism that cannot be easily found in the present.

This is the standard work in the field, give or take some stuff Keynes wrote on risk and capital.

This is the best work of economic theory I have ever read. There is no work in economics that evinces better judgment on the main issues or that does a better job of balancing theory with a sense for the facts. Knight begins by defending theoretical (that is, deductive) economics. Unlike the economic rationalists, however, Knight does not believe that theoretical economics can lead to precise results. The application of the "analytic method" must always be "incomplete," he argues. Theoretical economics thus can only deal with "tendencies," that is, "with what 'would' happen under simplified conditions never realized, but always more or less closely approached in practice." This methodology Knight describes as "the method of successive approximations." Knight also warns of the dangers of rationalism and the necessity of constantly checking one's results against the facts. "When the number of factors taken into account in deduction becomes large, the process rapidly becomes unmanageable and errors creep in... It is better to stop dealing with elements separately before they get too numerous and deal with the final stages of the approximation by applying corrections empirically determined."

Armed with the method, Knight proceeds to tackle several important problems in economics, especially dealing with the theoretical construct of "perfect competition." By always keeping his head firmly within the empirically real, Knight is able to bring a great deal of sound judgment to a number of issues. Knight had a keen sense of human nature and how human beings behave in the real world of fact. He knew that most economists had made men out to be far more rational than they really were. Businesses, he argued, did not merely seek to meet the needs of the consumers; no, they sought to create new needs through innovation, advertising, and even a sort of manipulative hypnotism. In this, Knight argued, we find both progress and abuse, civilization and fraud. Knight also brings a good deal of sense to the problem of interest, demonstrating the psychological inadequacy of all time-preference theories of interest. But Knight's most important contribution consists in his analysis of the difference between risk and uncertainty. Risk, Knight argues, is a measurable probability that something could happen, like the probability that an individual will be struck by lightening or hit by a car. Uncertainty is a kind of immeasurable risk--e.g., predicting short term flucations in exchange rates. Knight's analysis is crucial to understanding economic reality. Knight's distinction between risk and uncertainty, for instance, explains why the rise of derivative securities in financial markets is so dangerous. Derivatives attempt to insure uncertainty, which is immeasurable, as if it were risk (which is measurable).

Frank Knight hit the ground running with his dissertation, which he published as Risk, Uncertainty, and Profit. Knight makes a simple but important distinction between quantifiable risk and uncertainty. The distinction between risk and uncertainty is important in understanding markets, profits, and entrepreneurship. Knight connects entrepreneurship with uncertainty and profit. These factors do not square well with conventional notions of perfectly competitive equilibrium.

Risk, Uncertainty, and Profit is a work of major importance. This book constitutes a serious alternative to the theories of entrepreneurship developed by Schumpeter and Kirzner. While most modern economists underemphasize entrepreneurship, Knight examines uncertainty and entrepreneurship as a way of bridging the gap between abstract theory and economic realities. Knight saw the obvious fact that we do not live in a world of perfect competition. He, like Shackle and Keynes, recognized that we must explain uncertainty if we are to ever understand how the capitalist system really works.

Knight was a major figure in the generation of interwar economists who sought to explain the dynamics of capitalism. Risk, Uncertainty, and Profit is indispensable to anyone who aims at understanding uncertainty and dynamics in microeconomics, along with the work of Schumpeter, Hayek, Coase, Kaldor, Mises, Lachmann, and Shackle.

We finally have a book that pulls several different IOS security strategies together. So many references prior to this one touch on these topics sporadically but I have yet to find a better resource that covers all the bases as does this one.

The things I like about this book:

So many authors tend to try to spread their subject matter out too wide and take too broad of an approach when writing about network security. Schudel and Smith didn't do that. Instead they focused on specific areas and worked diligently to stay on target. It was very refreshing to read a book that actually didn't wander off on tangential subjects on a regular basis.

As for actual subject matter I was very pleased to find a book that discussed the various "planes" within Cisco IOS. In my opinion Cisco has not been very good about documenting this subject and so this book has cleared up several knowledge gaps I had prior to reading it. All of the bits of information I've heard or read about in the past were pulled together in a clear and concise manner. It was also pleasing to see just the right amount of configuration "shows" rather than pages and pages of them.

I also was very happy that this book was not full of fluff. The authors used just enough background info to convey their message but did not go overboard in non-essential detail. As with any technical reference I prefer thorough and correct information but many times there is just too much description that just gets in the way.

Some reviewers stated that the authors repeated themselves within this book. For me this was not a negative. There are certain topics that I very much need repeated in order to retain it thoroughly and so this was not a problem for me. The repetitious content was neither significant nor time consuming so I consider it to be a positive rather than a negative.

The things I do not like about this book:

This is trivial but I would have much preferred a hardback book rather than a paperback. This is a personal preference of course but hardbacks tend to last longer for me.

That's just yet another great title from Cisco Press!. This book does a great job of logically dividing the overall router security into each logical context by way of describing the router's planes. I also found very elaborate and diverse "Further Reading" towards the end of each chapter very useful. I particularly liked the idea of overall structure and quality of contents in the book which relate to both a casual and an advanced reader!

Book is structured into four Parts;

Part I focuses on laying the foundation for the rest of the book. It achieves this purpose by talking about the Enterprise and SP network fundamentals. This also includes day-in-the-life-of-a-packet through various router switching mechanisms. Chapter 2 re-hashes the network security/threat models but does a nice job of dividing it into various aspects of architectures including various IP VPNs scenarios.

For an advanced reader, this should serve as a nice refresher!

Part II introduces you to real meat of router security, i.e., securing the router planes in both IP and MPLS networks. Authors do a good job of describing the details of each component. Chapters in this section contain working details and IOS configuration snippets to enhance the understanding of various concepts discussed. An advanced user will find all the details given here very useful, and prefer read them cover to cover.

Part III walks you through various case studies to further the concepts explained in the prior chapters. I particularly like the idea of covering both Enterprise and SP case studies. It provides use cases, application examples, and best practices guidelines for the key concepts discussed in the whole book

In Part IV, I very much like the idea of not just copying pasting the headers as-is, rather adding the security implications of each and putting them into its context. Cisco IOS to IOS-XR Security transition is also useful although to mostly SP audience.

This book discusses security as in Router planes for both IP and MPLS VPNs Security. A few times you can notice that authors are repeating themselves.

Overall, I strongly recommend this book to all network security engineers as MPLS (due to its inherent advantages and applications) is gaining momentum not only in the service provider space but also in the enterprise market segment.

Router Security Strategies is a book about protecting ip networks by dividing them into different segments. Network engineers for service providers and larger enterprise networks will benefit most from this manual.

Chapters 1 through 7 are not a cookbook that you can look up sample configurations, but a broad coverage of security concerns. The authors spend these chapters leading the reader to an understanding of how ip traffic can be broken down into different categories, and how to define them as well as the particular vulnerabilities each has.

Schudel and Smith describe a three dimensional way of looking at security. Whereas we may have previously thought of securing each interface in a path, this book explodes this view into a multi-dimensional paradigm of data, control, management, and services. Like parallel universes each must be addressed separately while maintaining a big picture of how each plane can affect the other. The data plane is the actual payload for applications. The control plane indicates protocols that keep the traffic flowing to their destination. The management plane concerns the network administrator's access to the equipment. Special features such as Virtual Private Networks and Quality of Service constitute the services plane.
Chapters 8 and 9 give case studies that include diagrams, numbered line configurations, with documentation.

Appendix B details of each section of IP, TCP, and other protocol packets with vulnerabilities for each part. This is the first time I have seen this type of break down and found it made several aspects of attacks clearer to me. There are several other appendices that cover the IOS XR image and an excellent section on security incident handling that one could use as an outline for their company to use. I give Router Security Strategy 5 stars.

Gregg Schudel's and David Smith's book, "Sec Router Security Strategies: Securing IP Network Traffic Planes (Networking Technology: Security)", provided some of the best layering of security technologies I've read to date. It provides the needed understanding of security concerns and the methods to control them, from the bottom of the stack within the box to the top, deep into the application layers. Because it includes both IT and SP network considerations, I'm able to recommend this to all my consulting engineers.

D. Stewart, Engineering Manager
DeBrick Consulting

Router Security Strategies (RSS) is the sort of Cisco security book I like to read. Some of you were surprised by my three star review of another recent Cisco security book -- LAN Switch Security (LSS). I suggest the authors of that book take a look at RSS as a model for writing a second edition of LSS. RSS is well-organized, very clear, and backed by plenty of actionable command syntax. Were it not for a tendency to unnecessarily repeat and summarize material, I would have rated RSS five stars. Nevertheless, anyone operating Cisco routers would do well to consider how RSS approaches the network security problem.

RSS focuses on ways to protect transit, receive, and exception IP traffic in the data, control, management, and service planes of Enterprise and Service Provider (SP) networks. That one sentence almost summarizes the entire table of contents, where Chs 4-7 cover the four planes, Chs 8 and 9 provide case studies for Enterprise and SP networks, respectively, and Chs 1-3 provide introductory and conceptual material. This is how to write a technical book! Tangential material appears in four appendices, and the authors keep the reader on track through the entire text.

RSS makes a compelling case for network security in a world where applications and Web 2.0 are all the rage. I believe many people who scoff at network security have no real idea of the complexities inherent in modern network infrastructure. Too many application-centric people take it for granted that they can reach whatever Web victim they're attacking; perhaps that is a credit to network engineers who've made their creations just work and not be the center of attention. Should attackers decide to focus on network infrastructure, RSS provides plenty of techniques for defending routers and even some switches. I enjoyed learning more about several uRPF techniques, Flexible Pattern Matching (FPM), Selective Packet Discard, Receive ACLS, Control Plane Policing, Dynamic APR Inspection (DAI), and CLI Views. Many of these methods exist to protect the network itself, not necessarily the endpoints. While the authors do mention a desire to protect hosts, I liked seeing such a focus on defending infrastructure. Perhaps "network security" should be a term transitioned to solely mean protecting network platforms?

I thought Appendix B would be the standard catalog of TCP/IP header diagrams, but I was pleasantly described to see a different approach. App B did depict IP, TCP, UDP, ICMP, IEEE 802.3, and 802.1Q headers, but the authors provide a security implication for each field in these headers. I found that to be original and informative.

I subtracted one star for two aspects of the book which bothered me. First, the authors tend to use the term "threat" in a manner which is not consistent with real threat terminology. For example, p 87 speaks of "the potential threat and impact of a given vulnerability". Threat, impact, and vulnerability are all separate concepts. Ch 2, where such terminology appears, is titled "Threat Models for IP Networks." If you read the chapter it is a catalog of attacks, which sections titled "Resource Exhaustion Attacks", "Spoofing Attacks", and so on. Clearly Ch 2 is "Attack Models for IP Networks".

Second, although the material in RSS is excellent, the authors' tendency to repeat concepts wore me down. It's usually acceptable to begin a section by referencing and/or rephrasing material from an earlier chapter, or at worst farther back in the same chapter. It's simply annoying to be told the same material that appeared in the last paragraph. Any time the reader encounters "as stated in the last section" or similar, the authors should reconsider discussing the concept again. Edits like these wouldn't necessarily shrink the book that much, but the text would not treat the reader as if he or she has too short an attention span to remember what he or she just read.

Despite those two concerns, I still very much enjoyed reading RSS. You will probably get more out of the book if you have MPLS experience, but the authors provide plenty of background anyway. One of the best aspects of RSS is the presentation of extensive IOS syntax for all of the major concepts in the book. The authors do not talk about a technique and then leave it as an exercise for the reader to determine how that idea should be implemented in IOS. Those trying to protect data, control, management, and service IP traffic will be well-served by reading RSS.

I feel Richard presented an excellent review of the sequence of events that lead up to the terrorist act and an even better chronicling of the investigation following the disaster. His attention to detail and his understanding of the investigative and political complexities of a multi-agency effort made this a very interesting read. F Uteg

This is the true story of the international investigation of the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988. It was written by the FBI agent who led the US task force formed to find the culprits in conjunction with Scottish police agencies. This behind the scenes look examines all the suspects, discusses the problems of these types of investigations and takes the reader into the investigation itself. The trial in the Netherlands is analyzed and there is much discussion how the results of this case relate to what is going on in the world today. Numerous lessons for law enforcement and intelligence agencies are learned. This book is a must for any law enforcement or intelligence professional today or anyone wanting to see what actually is involved in coordinating the largest international criminal investigation in history.

This is an intriguing insider's tale from the one American who could write it. Retired FBI executive Richard Marquise has traveled the world, teaching the intricacies of counterterrorism and major case investigation to law enforcement officials. In Scotbomb he brings his expertise to the general reader as well as criminal justice professionals. Scotbomb tells the story of a horrific crime. It is also the account of a group of international police officers who refused to leave an investigation over the course of many years. This is a "must read" for anyone involved in counterterrorism.

Marquise's work is important on three levels. Using practical insight, law enforcement skills, and investigative strategy, Marquise provides a step-by-step account for criminal investigators. Second, it is an excellent case study for criminal justice classes. (My students are using it to develop a training session on major case investigation.) Finally, and most importantly, Marquise has told the story with one group of people in mind, the families of Pan Am Flight 103. His compassion for the victims flows throughout the narrative.

As news networks and public attention jump from one terrorist attack to the next, Marquise stays focused on the victims of a single event in the past. The world may have forgotten their life-altering pain. Marquise has not.

There have been an array of books written about the tragedy of Pan Am flight 103. From bereaved families to conspiracy theorists, everybody has a theory with every theory being ultimately self-serving or just plain wrong. This book is an accurate and detailed book about the investigation of this case. Mr. Marquise was intimately involved in this investigation and provides an inside look to an extremely complex case involving multiple jurisdictions from different countries. Other authors seem to assume this investigation could be conducted like any investigation in the US. This is just not true and Mr. Marquise makes that very clear.

The events that led to the conviction of the Pan Am 103 assasins would be dismissed as improbable were they not true. This reads like a fast paced novel, and has all the momentum of a film while remaining focused on the facts of the investigation. Marquise comes through as a modest man with an immense capacity for work, inspired by the families of the victims and determined to find justice. What justice was relaized was his achievement. Highly recommended.