Events Books

These authors have done a remarkable job with synthesizing complex data and rendering it into a discussional and informational manner easily comprehended by all emergency planners and responders. The constant reinforcement of "system" play and interoperability as well as a function rather than an agency approach lent great assistance to my team being able to immediately apply the knowledge to the crafting of our contingency response templates.

Great job by the composers, fantastic text for you or your organization!

I like the fact that the authors have taken the time to include a very robust reference appendix section. It has proven to be unquestionably my go to book on this subject matter.

In addition to the front matter which is invaluable, I now have to only grab one book to reference the myriad of references, case in point is the streamlined access to federal response plan, MSDS sheets, radiological references etc.

If you are an operator, supervisor, manager, planner or instructor this text is for you!

This book covers all the bases and met all of my expectations. It has become a permanent fixture in my response bag should I need a ready reference. Frankly, this is perhaps the best book on the subject for emergency responders that I have seen to date. A great value for the price!

This book is a breath of fresh air that restores my confidence that responders who have the experience and background of planning for & operating at terrorist events are sharing their expertise & knowledge.

Understanding Terrorism provides you the VITAL information you need to perform your duties as a responder as well as provides security directors & safety managers expanded knowledge on what is expected for their functional areas in times of terrorist events.

The information is provided in a cohesive manner that aids the users with easy comprehension and utility of the material. It also compiles all the needed references under one cover to make your job easier.

The approach the authors have adopted with this book is a big bonus. Frankly I am tired of books that adopt a "shotgun" approach or use theoretical [terminology] to convey the message of safe and effective response strategies; they fail to address the implementation and operational application issues effectively. THAT IS NOT THE CASE WITH UNDERSTANDING TERRORISM. This book helped me each step of the way as well as provides me with the benefit of being a "one book" planning and response reference.

Public or private sector emergency managers, responders or security officials, if you are responsible for the emergency response, Understanding Terrorism is the one book you should own, read and use.

Yes, to error is human but that really doesn't appear to be the problem here. A great deal of the problem appears to be that a percentage of health care providers make multiple errors because no one stops them. According to Grayson and Singh many nurses do not recommend their place of employment to their family and friends.

When people are not held accountable for their actions and the consequences of those actions everyone is endangered. Taking or being forced to take personal responsiblity for your actions and their consequences plays a large part in how many mistakes you make.

I would think it would be every irresponsible health care provider's nightmare to literally have to personally experience everything that they inflict on their patients.

Since health care providers are safe from the magic wishing wand, the next best thing is to guard against such mistakes and be public with the information. It is a matter of ethics. When you are ten and don't want to "rat out" a buddy it is rarely life or death. But health care providers are not ten anymore and it is their ethical obligation to put the safety their patients or potential patients first. Please read this book and tell others about it. All of our lives depend on it.

This book is both a record of suffering and joy and a metaphor to inspire all of us in de-walling!

Some of my best book friends when I was a kid were the wonderful illustrated histories of Genevieve Foster, and the one I loved most was *Augustus Caesar's World.* I recently introduced it (and a few others: *Washington's World*, *Lincoln's World*, *John Smith's World*, *Columbus's World*) to my 8 year old, and he's discovering the magic in them I did so many years ago.

There are three qualities to *Augustus Caesar's World* that make it so entertaining and educating. The first is that it's incredibly well written. Foster has the gift of breathing life into historical accounts. In reading about Cicero's execution or the life of Siddhartha, for example, one experiences all the dreadful waste of the one and the liberating wonder of the other. Second, the book is wonderfully illustrated by Foster herself. The illustrations are themselves instructive: along with individual scenarios, she provides time-lines, illustrated most fetchingly, that conveniently encapsulate events and persons. Finally, Foster's histories are really world histories. In *Augustus Caesar's World,* she focuses on the events leading up to the end of the Roman Republic and the establishment of the Empire (roughly, 44BCE to 14 CE). But she doesn't limit herself to Roman history; she also examines events taking place across the world during the time frame in which she's working: the druids in Gaul, Hindus in India, Confucius in China, Mayans in the Americas, and so on. She even includes intellectual history: the origins of Christianity and Buddhism, the Upanishadic culture of the Hindus, etc. Her aim is to give the reader a wide angle of vision, and she succeeds wonderfully.

I'm grateful that Foster's histories are being republished. They don't patronize kids by resorting to silly gimmicks that supposedly make learning more palatable (or at least more marketable). Instead, they make history fascinating the old fashioned way: by showing that it's a great story in its own right. They're a great discovery for my son, and a great rediscovery for me.

Thomas Sowell is more than just a critical thinker: he has a penchant for expressing his ideas with a clarity with which it is difficult to argue. He uses that uncommon commodity known, for some strange reason, as "common sense."

Sowell points out`the ludicrous incongruities of the liberal "philosophy" in terms so plain and unvarnished that only one attempting a proctological examination on themselves could miss it.

An example: "The point of being a superpower is so that no one will attack you and require the sacrifice of more and more young Americans like those buried in this cemetery. We were attacked at Pearl Harbor because we were sitting ducks who had allowed our military forces to dwindle away until we had an army smaller than Portugal's--and not enough equipment even for this small force." Page 7.

Or: "Multiculturism is one of those affectations that people can indulge in when they are enjoying all the fruits of modern technology and can grandly disdain the processes that produced them. None of this would be anything more than another of the many foibles of the human race, except that the cult of multiculturism has become the new religion of our schools and colleges, contributing to the mushing of America. It has become part of the unexamined assumptions underlying public policy and even decisions in courts of law." Page 19.

Or: "Much of the current uproar about IQ differences between blacks and whites does not get down to the rock-bottom question: What is there to explain? The average score of blacks in IQ tests in the United States is about 85, compared to a national averge of 100. Is that unusual? No. It is not." He goes on to explain that various groups of various ancestries have had IQs of 85 at various times and places, and he names some of them, and says that the phenomenon is not peculiar to the United States, and he admits that he doesn't know why. Even American aoldiers of the First World War had lower IQs than our soldiers of the Second World War. Page 176.

This is a man to be reckoned with, and these essays are valuable for their insights, most of which effectively puncture widely and emotionally held ideas, especially those that are deemed "politically correct," and institutionalized unquestioned dogma of the liberal anointed who think they are qualified to tell the rest of us how to think and act.

Joseph (Joe) Pierre

author of Handguns and Freedom...their care and maintenance
and other books

For almost a decade Rosenberg traveled through Latin America not shying away from really messy situations trying to make sense of a history of violence and very little respect for human rights. Tina experienced many of the situations herself such as being soaked with diluted acid by the police in the streets of Santiago, Chile, during marches against Pinochet or taking a nightmarish truck bed trip through guerrilla infested Peru. The Latin American economic, political and military elites also had their points of view captured by Rosenberg resulting, as far as I can tell, in a very well balanced collection of personal perspectives on the problem - violence in Latin America - intermingled with background historical information.

Rosenberg is very competent in summarizing the recent history and the roots of violence in Latin America. The author brings the historical review to life by interviewing perpetrators and victims. Violence in Latin America as viewed by Rosenberg emanates from a history of inequality. The native populations and the unwillingly imported black slaves and their descendants have been for five centuries exploited and victimized by greedy white Europeans. The resulting instable societies in turn fall prey of guerrilla groups, organized crime, drug lords, or the old fashioned military economic and political elites. The victimized population looses faith in the state and became passive or takes matters on their own hands solving social problems or even threatening or overthrowing governments. To tip the balance back the oligarchies can inevitably count on the CIA for supposedly counter insurgency help.

It's a chilling book with no solution on sight and Rosenberg didn't even include some remarkable facets of violence in Latin America such as domestic violence in a notably sexist society and the petit and not so petit common crime. Colombia is the first market worldwide for bulletproof cars - Brazil is the second.

It's an important book mainly for American readers since it shows the impact of American interference. Sadly it offers no solution - maybe there isn't.

Leonardo Alves - Tucson, Arizona - June 2002

Moreover, Ms. Rosenburg provides the reader with six different cases from six differnet countries. From Escobar's Medellin to Argentina's "Dirty War", she examines and analyzes different types of violence motivated by unique sets of circumstances.

I COULD NOT PUT THIS BOOK DOWN; A MUST READ FOR ANYONE INTERESTED IN LATIN AMERICA!

The book starts with introduction of Survival triangle: You have to survive both physically, mentally, and legally to fully survive an violent encounter. The authors keep that in mind through the book, while the stress is on mental survival. Next the authors discuss the selection process of police recruits, and the nature of violence the police are forced to encounter in their line of duty. Next they give a thorough explanation of fear and it's effects on a person, and they address the issue of training, as well.

The main portion of the second part of the book (about 100 pages) is real-life stories told by cops, and the author's comments of the events. There is not any tactical reviewing, but the incidents are discussed on a psychological point of view. At the end of the second part there is a chapter of psychological injuries, starting from physical effects right after the incident, going to post-traumatic stress disorder and difficulties with relationships with other persons.

The third part of the book covers the treatment of a traumatic event survivor. The authors cover all aspects: What the survivor himself can do, what his superiors, family members, peers and so on can and should do. The authors also stress that there are many different kinds of encounters that can cause post-traumatic stress disorder other than gunfights, and that all participants of such encounter can develop mental problems, not just the ones who pull the trigger. There is also advise to detectives who investigate officer-involved shootings.

All things considered, this book is a very complete package. It is easy to read and the text is not too "scientific" for a layman to understand. This was the first book by Loren Christensen I have read, but it sure won't be the last!

Wayne D. Ford, Ph.D, author of Managing Police Stress. docwifford@msn.com