Walsh Books

I rec`d the first Michael Walsh book as a present as I am an ardent fan of ALW. Michael Walsh nit picks at the composer`s genious.I would like to know his qualification to be a music critic. I would buy such a book for curiosity, to prove that the lay person is the final ctitic.

My first impression of this book was that Michael Walsh must only be a fan of The Phantom of the Opera. It honestly seems to be the only show that he doesn't have an unkind word for. However, once you get past the comments that might be offensive to serious fans, you find a great wealth of material on the inside life of Lord Lloyd Webber. Everything is covered in this book, from the origins of his nickname (Bumper) to Jean's pet monkeys and days in "Bohemian" Lloyd Webberdom, to the recent revivals and productions of his shows. Even the musical structures of some songs from each show are analyzed. This is only the beginning; there is lots of great information that any fan will find infinitely interesting. Now if only Mr. Walsh would lighten up....

I rec`d the first Michael Walsh book as a present as I am an ardent fan of ALW. Michael Walsh nit picks at the composer`s genious.I would like to know his qualification to be a music critic. I would buy such a book for curiosity, to prove that the lay person is the final ctitic.

Okay, so there is very limited published information about Andrew Lloyd Webber, although ther eis plenty about his shows, there is little about the man himself. This is why this book is a great buy.

I find Walsh gets himself into a repeated pattern with each chapter, and the sypnosis of each story becomes very tiresome and the the musical analysis (ie, a key signature and time signature) is not really worth doing. Any five year old can open Lloyd Webbers music and find out the key and time signature. I wanted more detail about the music.

The book I brought was the reprinted one with information about Sunset, Whistle and the movie of Evita, although it was already worth the reprint and these chapters are no where near as enthused or informative as the previous chapters. Very disappointing, but still a great buy and well worth getting.

This is a must-have for Lloyd Webber fans; it truly is an in-depth account of his life and work. Packed full of information and many photographs, it was an interesting read. It has been claimed that Walsh concentrates too much on the chapter featuring "Phantom of the Opera", but I for one cannot blame him! Walsh has reason to, as he states "Phantom" was the first musical where Lloyd Webber developed his more mature style and a strong sense of key association than in his previous musicals. (He also admits it was after viewing "Phantom" he had the notion to write the book in the first place.)

The only reason why I would not give this book the full five stars is the fact it may be somewhat frustrating to read for musicologists and music students who wish to study Lloyd Webber's style in depth. Walsh tantalizes the reader with only brief excursions into analysis of the music; e.g. very brief descriptions of the keys and rhythms the songs are in, with no printed musical examples on how Lloyd Webber constructs the fabric of his scores.

However, in all, I would certainly recommend this book.

E.A. Bucchianeri, author of "A Compendium of Essays: Purcell, Hogarth and Handel, Beethoven, Liszt, Debussy, and Andrew Lloyd Webber" and "Handel's Path to Covent Garden: A Rocky Journey"

This is a definitive study of building a football franchise from the ground floor, even before there are desks and chairs in the executive offices.

The application is vast, since it can be explored at a variety of levels; those studying sports management, fans of the game who want an insider's perspective or those involved in the sport at any amateur/professional position.

I joke with people that the management of new Cleveland Browns needed copies of the book as owner Al Lerner launched that franchise in the 1990s. But all kidding aside, this gives the reader a comprehensive understanding on what it takes to get a team onto the field on Sunday afternoon and the foundation required before those cleats even hit the stadium turf.

The famous NFL coach explains how to go about recruiting, building and administering a winning team. It took me a while to be able to get a copy of this from Melbourne Sports Books, as the AFL coaches kept buying them.

A master who has built more than one team, and come up with new systems and adaptations of playing styles to suit changing conditions, or to give him, as he says, the Winning Edge.

Coach Walsh gives great details on every aspect it takes to run an NFL team, from ownership to the coaches secretary. Most of the football details (90%) focus on offense, with very little left over for defense. Some of the details of executive positions for NFL teams do not apply to anything but the NFL (dealing with the salary cap etc.) but are very wordy.

Simply put, everyone should own this book. Bill Walsh's book is insightful, inspiring, comprehensive, and can easily be applied to any business or sport.

In his book, Bill Walsh goes through football from A to Z. Everything, and I mean everything that you would ever want to know about football, from offensive and defensive philosophy to the role of the "head of football relations" to what to tell a team after a disappointing season is covered. Every serious coach has heard of Bill Walsh and understands the role his innovative offensive philosophy plays in modern football. Now read his exact ideas for yourself.

We at this point in history are required to grow misty eyed at the sudden recent discovery some twenty years later of alleged carefully hand written diaries beautifully bound of the now hallowed Reagan's recollections of times and events he later swore under oath he could not recall. We must remember earlier alleged handwritten diaries said to have been passed poolside at Managua's Intercontinental Hotel prior to a devastatng earthquake, from the scrawny hand of the elder Howard Hughes to an author later revealed as a fraud.

Let us rather bravely face the truth about the Reagan dynastic empire, run by papa bush (who claimed to be "out of the loop" while actually weaving it), and father to our present peril. Judge Walsh tells all, and then some, and describes all the subterfuge used to prevent his careful and judicious investigation from bearing any other fruit than an Ollie North career change.

As incredible as it may now appear, this book bears the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, supportable in a court of law as verifiable. Read it and watch how far down this darkly machiavellian path we have now proceeded, from this former time a generation ago in which the courts could still have possibly considered objective truth such as this.

This thick tome merits a place of honor upon your night reading stand. A more complete report may not be found in one place, but scattered throughout several other books and journals of that time. The criminals received no other punishment for their crimes against humanity and our Constitution than continued residence in the Oval Office.

Venceremos. No hay mal que dura un siglo.

This book is the story of a life-long Republican retired federal judge's seven year struggle to unravel the truth behind a vast government conspiracy to conceal willful violations of our country's laws by President Ronald Reagan and many members of his cabinet,CIA officials, members of his national security team and assorted Republican political operatives both inside Congress and out. Mr. Walsh does yeoman work in presenting the unvarnished truth he and his many assistants were finally able to decipher out of hundreds of thousands of original documents and the direct testimony of those his team were able to catch in their lies and bring into court under indictment. The complex legal issues and large cast of perpetrators makes this a difficult and necessarily repetitve slog, but the chilling story is one that Americans of any political persuasion need to be aware of. Lead by a naive President in the early stages of Alzheimers disease,and guided by a perverse notion of patriotic anticommunism that was the bedrock of cold war Republicanism, our top leaders deliberately violated laws put in place by Congress and even their own foreign policies relating to terrorism. When discovered these "patriots" launched an unprecedented web of lies and stonewalling to save Reagan from possible impeachment. Mr. Walsh was impeded at every step of his investigation and by all branches of the government. The importance of this account by Mr. Walsh is that irregardless of the legal results of the investigations, the truth of what happened and who did it is revealed for all to see. When this party touts its patriotism, beliefs in the rule of law and self responsiblity and the importance of character, remember what happened here.

The Iran-Contra case is well known as a bipartisan bludgeon. Are the news outlines of it accurate? Was the affair a minor bureaucratic transgression preyed upon by liberal hacks; a deceitful attack on the constitutional separation of powers (checks and balances); or a hyped media event?

Presiding (Republican) Judge Lawrence E. Walsh skillfully relates the jurisdictional history of the investigation and trial in `Firewall.' This includes the record of defendants Oliver North and Admiral Poindexter (both convicted), as well as Judge Silberman (known as `our ambassador to Iran' before he overturned the verdicts).

Media star Oliver North now makes an bountiful living hawking American `New-Order' patriotism for Australian Rupert Murdock. Admiral Poindexter left the current administration only after he sponsored a prospective internet website speculating (wagering) on terrorism targets. Judge Silberman was recently enlisted for an intelligence committee report (to obscure the 9/11 Commission findings?).

Though this may seem ancient history, the principals remain active. Walsh provides the best vehicle to examine their early history. You decide.

While I was at times confused by the legal problems Walsh's team were confronted with, I did clearly understand why Lawrence Walsh did not get very far with his investigation. Mainly it was because the targets of his investigation had designed a highly secretive plot and had the protection of the CIA or the National Security Council. Documents were denied or shredded, subjects lied or refused to testify all on the basis of "national security" or out of a belief that Congress had no right to interfere in foreign policy. After reading this book, I was shaken by the realization that under the guise of a "higher purpose" or holy war our democratic principles could so easily be dispensed with. Oliver North and President Reagan were rewarded with national affection despite showing utter contempt for the rule of law! Iran-Contra was a true case of Machiavellian politics because all of our most sacred principles were run over for the sake of the dictators ideology - that the end justifies the means. Firewall reveals the incipient dictatorship lurking beneath our fragile democracy.

At times, this reads as a text book. At times, it reads as a spy thriller. Walsh goes into great detail on the investigation and attempted prosecution of those involved in the Iran-Contra scandal. This book is best suited for those interested in the affair, and are anti Reagan/Bush. I was moved by the compassion of Walsh when after interviewing Reagan, felt it would have been more damaging to our nation to try and prosecute Reagan when it was apparent alzheimers had set in. Walsh felt Reagan knew more then he said, but he also knew that the alzheimers would have been humilitaing to Reagan, and would have made prosecution impossible.

I loved this book, and I really relate to the chick-lit noir genre it stems from. It's urban, gritty, real and miserable. If you like your women urban, your sexual pleasures perverse and your drugs frequent, this is the sort of book you will enjoy.

I liked the writing too, and thought the mechanism of having a male voice and a female voice, made the boy's version of events less commanding - woo hoo. Well written, very 'Trainspotting', but somehow also something more.

Bravo, bring on another!

If you are easily offended, this book is not for you. But if you are a fan of sexually-charged realist literature--from Bukowski to Henry Miller to Anais Nin--you might enjoy "Brass." The setting is Liverpool, England. The location is unusual, but at the very least, it shows that people in Liverpool don't just talk about the Beatles having got their start there. As with many Americans, they are leading aimless, anxious lives. Liverpool is described as dangerous, but also exciting. Millie, the protagonist, lives one never ending all-nighter, filled with boozing, whoring, and suicidal hangovers. As far as depictions of English nightlife go, "Brass" has the feel of the "Madchester" days of plentiful drugs and intense partying. Millie is a young college girl who is smart, but doing badly in school, independent but also self-destructive. Her lifestyle, however, is not depicted in a world free of consequences. Her hard living takes a physical as well as pyschological toll. She is about to crack up if she doesn't find her way. At one point, Walsh has a virtuoso scene where Millie is rummaging through her home to find a cigarette so that she can get relief from a feeling that she'll never come down from the drugs she took. A sociologist might say that she is one of the victims of post-feminist society: Millie seems incapable of a normal seuxal relationship. Others would simply say that she's messed up. The book is loaded with sex, drinking, and drug-taking. But I didn't find it a downer or immoral. It's about what many young people go through: intense bouts of anxiety that they only feel drinking, drugs, and sex can combat. In an age of so much gutless writing, Walsh does what many writers are too scared to do: she takes big risks. She went for broke her first time out. But unlike many other risky authors, she has the technical skill and intellectual gifts to make her book literature and not just entertainment. One is not likely to come away with a so-so reaction to her book. Judging from the reviews posted here, they will love it or hate it. This is Walsh's first book, and it is amazing. Honest, fast-paced, and compelling.

I read one page and that was enough for me. I'm no prude.. I've read books with graphic sex and violence but this was graphic for the sake of being graphic. This book is great if you're a sicko.

This is a striking book; it's very disturbing, erotic, depraved, and dark.
Millie's story is startling, sexually depraved, frenetic, and self destructive. Once her mother leaves her father and her to fend for themselves, it all changes dramatically for her. She shuts down and lives in her thoughts, hating everything and everyone. She loses herself and runs away from reality every chance she gets and she cannot stop herself, she just cannot stop.
She learns that she is gay when she finds a pornographic magazine on her best buddy's room, she checks the pictures of a couple of women together and it changes everything for her forever.
She needs depravity to get turned on and she looks for filthy corners and hookers, she looks for women perched on window sills doing nothing, just waiting for the men that are used to paying for sex; they are waiting to sell their bodies and their souls, and Millie loves it, she loves the depravity of it all and craves for it as much as she craves for cocaine, ecstasy and the love of Jamie, her best buddy.
This is a story of a girl who grows up too fast once her mother is gone and who has no limits set to her, she can do as she pleases, she can stay the night wherever she wants and she is throwing away her chance at a career. She is blowing everything away.
Raw, a story of queer predilections, bad choices, and the descent into a life of hedonism, loneliness, and dark days with darker nights; I can only recommend it to those who like ruthless books, crude awakenings and profound stories, there is nothing shallow or superficial about this book and I liked it for that, it's real, unpleasant, and unashamed.

Right away I'll tell you that I hate fiction. Which is why after reading an Esquire write up about this book, I figure I read my one fiction book for the year. As a guy, I gotta say that Millie's alright in my book, infact Millie's like alotta guys, she hates dealing with reality, likes to get drunk and chase after whores.
I hate to bring up Catcher in the Rye, but Millie reminds me of Holden Caulfied except she actually gets laid by females. Truth be said anybody who went to college in the last decade can relate to her strife. I'm not to keen on Jamie, I know he's the beacon in the Novel leading to a rightious goal, but the guy's a bit of a biscult(censorship). Millie on the other hand is a bottle of Southern Comfort, tough to take at first but the after taste is sweat. Then after a while the ride gets bumping, but your willing to take the courage cause god dammit, ordinary life sucks. And then when the pain of the next morning hits and everything about the ride sucks, you swear off Millie, but truth be said it wasn't Millie's fault we all just wanted to join in the fun.
Helen Walsh if your reading this, I love you. But if your anything like Millie, I think I'd rather hang out with an ex of yours, so I can expierence you from third person.

I read this book way back in 6th grade. Even then, it was very enjoyable, honest, and witty. A must for anyone who loves classical music.

I enjoyed this book and still refer to its recommendations for music to listen to. Walsh's recommendations are not always the obvious warhorses and popular pieces; rather they are truly insightful and inspired choices that dig deep into the classical repertoire. For example, instead of recommending Beethoven's most popular 5th Piano Concerto (the famous "Emperor" concerto), he suggests the 4th instead, a piece which I also find to be a much more profoundly moving and enduring.

However, you have to put up with Walsh's constant attempts at irreverent humor, which I found tiresome and somewhat irritating.

I've also purchased "The Vintage Guide to Classical Music" by Jan Swafford and "Classical Music" by Phil Goulding. The former is an excellent introduction that is easy-to-read while being very educational about music history and major musical concepts as well. Its approach is more straightforward than the Walsh book, which is highly opinionated and idiosynchratic. Both books are worth getting and they are complementary to each other.

Goulding's book is the weakest of the three. It is not bad, but is more of a synthesis of conventional wisdom rather than a reflection of the author's own views and tastes. It tends to simplify a lot, but is presented in a very clear, easy-to-navigate format. If you already have the other two books, you can pass on this one.

This book, though by nature opinionated at times, is a very good look into classical music as something other than the sacred form it has taken. My favorite parts of the book look at composers not as demi-gods, but people. An amusing chart in the back lists major composers with their main vices! A joy to read, for sure.

This is a very good introduction to classical music. It's also very unconventional--it's not one of those books whose primary recommmendations are Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, the Nutrcacker, Pachebel's Canon etc. As Walsh says, he's trying to get you to love music, not appreciate it. Sometimes, yes, he does forget who his audience is and throws out a couple terms or names without explaining them (e.g. "scherzo" or Rossini), and his recommendations are, to say the least, electic--his first recommended opera is Berg's Wozzeck, and in the symphonic repetiore he skips, say, Haydn and Tchaikovksy entirely, and includes Ives and Messiaen. But this makes the book more unique and mind-opening, and means you can still read it even if you already know something about classical music. Walsh also includes a few biographical chapters about Bach, Mozart, Wagner etc., and a very interesting (but one of the most confusing) one about modern American composers. He discusses the problems with classical music today, such as the seemingly closed-circle repetoire and gap between composers and audience. In short, a very good introductory book that can give pleasure even for a more learned person than Walsh is writing for. (By the way, Walsh does indeed discuss the Beethoven sonatas and quartets, and his "more respected than loved" comment only refers to the Op. 18 quartets.)

This is a good light intro if you're curious about classical music but have yet to "take the plunge," or if you have a friend in a similar situation. I'd recommend "The Vintage Guide to Classical Music" by Jan Swafford more than this, but this is a pleasant-enough book and a good breezy intro. Occasionally Walsh forgets who he's talking to and goes off on a tangent that only a more seasoned classical person might get something from, and there are a few small errors, but what book doesn't have these? I disagree with some of his recommendations and find his tastes a little mainstream, but he's the first to admit his opinions are hos own and oftentimes arbitrary at that. Also, while he compares Schubert to the Beatles with a straight face (this seems to be the rage in academia these days) he examines only the songs. The Beatles never produced anything approaching Death and the Maiden or the String Quintet or the "Unfinished" Symphony, but he does not deal with this, focusing on the songs instead (where I'm still not convinced). More critically, there are some major pieces and movements he simply glosses over ("If you like these works, check out Beethoven's late string quartets or piano sonatas," without further discussion of the works or why they're important) and other lesser works he spends too much time with--could it be his own personal familiarity and lack of? He also raised my eyebrows with a few tossed-off comments, my favorite being, regarding Beethoven's string quartets, "These works are more respected than loved." (Really!?) --Still, this is a fun book that can get a newcomer deeply immersed in real classical music (not crossover crap or "lite classics for dinnertime") without intimidating them. He's also good at aquainting the reader with classical terminology ("Adadio," "sonata form," "fugue") in an unintimidating manner, though why people find it intimidating when they are capable of learning all sorts of arcane things about football or the stock market or html is a mystery to me.

This book captures and portrays how young (boy) adventurers use their imaginations in play. Simple text and detailed drawings. You'll enjoy reading this to a young boy.

With TV and all of the other distractions, it's more of a challenge to keep your kids imagination alive. This book is precious and encourages imagination.

I love this book. It is absolutely my favorite book to sit down and read to my two young boys. Most children's books these days are fluff. They are some artist's attempt at showcasing their drawing or painting ability with a pointless story thrown in. But this one has meat, and my kids love it. It has real values and a sweet approach. I'm going to shop for other books by this author.

This is the perfect bedtime book for a little boy. It takes the reader through the day of a little boy playing at being a cowboy. Right through to bedtime. It's just gorgeous.

This is an exciting book to read and enjoy with your kids. My son and I read this book and looked at the wonderful pictures. It was a great afternoon of fun to see the imagination of my son growing along with the imagination of the little cowboy.

Libertarians tend to live in a Manichean world of right and wrong where the means justifies the ends. Ironically the author insists that Libertarians are pragmatic. He does this without backing up this assertion but insists on it strongly and repeatedly. Mr. Walsh relates a story about a man with a habit of threatening people with his large collection of guns. Pulling a Beretta on his estranged wife he cocked the trigger in front of their child. He told a coworker he was going to visit her boyfriend with an AK-47. After being scolded by the courts he continued to threaten her and her friends so a federal court indicted him for unlawfully possessing a firearm. And the victim in this story? The gun owner. On economics he writes, "It's a fundamental libertarian belief that people ought to have unrestricted - or nearly unrestricted - liberty to accumulate, control and transfer property, whatever the consequences or constraints may be for other people" Pragmatic??? Oh boy. In one flash of honesty the writer refers to Libertarianism as an "extreme philosophy" Much truer than calling it pragmatic.

Generally I've found Libertarians to be pleasant but James Walsh is a rather prickly character. He refers to Atheist Michael Newdow as a "grandstanding jerk" and writes that, "An American who calls himself a libertarian but doesn't support the right of a citizen to own a weapon is an as*". He states that, "If you put all your retirement money in Enron stock while it was flying high, you were greedy and stupid" That's pretty cold and ignores the fact that investors were up against a large cadre of talented people (including auditors) who worked hard to make the failing company appear highly profitable.

It's funny that the author accuses the ACLU of being partisan's hacks when Libertarians, including James Walsh, are often loyal sycophants to the GOP. Sure, the author criticizes many Republican politicians but given the last 8 years Libertarians should be burning them in effigy. Even when he agrees with the left he can't resist attacking, calling the 2003 anti-war protests "infantile" He writes, "Loyal Democrats despise Bush because he's not one of them and is fairly popular to the general public" Yes, THAT'S the reason Democrats despise Bush and even in 2004 when this book was published calling Bush "fairly popular" was a stretch. About the Dems he writes his confusion that, "a party that will do anything to protect a `woman's right to choose' an abortion won't support her right to choose a school for her child". Talk about some logical contortions.

The author also supports some truly bizarre ideas. He's a fan of the abandoned `terror futures" project proposed by the Pentagon where investors could wager on when and where terrorist strikes would occur. In my opinion the problem with this scheme (beyond the horrifying image of a national dead pool) would be that unlike crop or mineral futures a terrorist could conceivably influence this market with an opportune bombing. The author also thinks that video surveillance should be monitored by private citizens in their spare time using the internet. I cannot even fathom how that would work.

For me the coup de grâce was the following line, "To political activists who complain that the 2003 war in Iraq was all about oil money, the libertarian response is...of course it's about oil money. That's the best reason that exists for attacking someone" This follows a lengthy defense of Libertarianism by those who claim they are nothing but greedy, amoral corporate tools. I don't think I even need to add anything to this one. If this is the kind of thinking that gets you charged up by all means rush out and get this book.

The terrorist attacks of 2001 have been much less dangerous to the average American than the massive government grab for power that happened in the succeeding months. The author asserts that liberal/conservative or Democrat/Republican no longer apply. The new designation should be statist/libertarian.

Libertarians believe that liberty is about fundamental rights, while statists feel that liberty is about quality of life. Libertarians feel that self-ownership is vital to human dignity; government should adopt a laissez-faire attitude as much as possible. Statists believe in a powerful central government that delivers quality of life to the people. This book explores a number of present-day political issues from a libertarian perspective.

The right to privacy is an important check on the power of the state. It should be the right of every citizen to have, or not to have, a faith. But that does not mean that all mentions of religion should be removed from public life. Libertarians need to do a better job of convincing the public that an open-border policy and a vibrant immigrant population is a sign that the economy is growing and that a rising tide lifts everyone. Among the state's few, legitimate purposes is to ensure safety for its citizens. Risk-free existence is not possible, but steps can be taken to stop groups that will destroy the citizens of a free state if they get the chance. A proof that the Patriot Act is a bad law is that the best argument by its defenders is that it is not used as often as people think. The state should get out of the marriage business; offer civil unions to any qualifying couple and leave the granting of marriage to churches. Prohibitions of drugs like marijuana are a bad idea for several reasons: prohibiting the behavior of reasonable adults erodes self-ownership, passing laws that won't be enforced leads to a disregard for all laws, and laws that "send a message" misuse the state's powers and are redundant.

Perhaps it is time for a different way of looking at politics in America; the present system doesn't work very well. The author says that it is not easy to be a libertarian, but for those who are interested, this book is an excellent place to start. It is recommended for everyone, including that who simply want to know what libertarianism is all about.

If you're unsatisfied with Republican abuse of power, then don't expect the Democrats to save the day with an even more powerful government on which the people are even more dependent. That's the unifying theme of this insightful overview of libertarianism.

Do you ever wonder what's in the Patriot Act? Do you ever wonder why the Democratic Party, for all its railing against statist Republican policies, did little to oppose them, and why the Democrat-controlled congress does little to curtail them? The answers may surprise you.

This book goes a long way toward exploding many of the common misconceptions about libertarians, in particular, that they are conservatives. Libertarians are liberals, as evidenced by the fact that they primarily value the liberty and well-being of the individual. However, libertarians differ from statist liberals (largely represented by the Democratic Party), who believe that the greatest threat to individual liberty is from corporations and from other individuals. Walsh argues, convincingly, that both history and economics support the view that the much greater threat to individual liberty is from the government itself (whether democratically elected or not), and moreover, that the framers of the United States Constitution were keenly aware of this.

Chapter by chapter, we see the relevance of this debate to contemporary issues, and how libertarianism offers pragmatic solutions.

Walsh's arguments are eloquent and passionate, although not always convincing. (Even the most dyed-in-the-wool libertarian will find a thing or two to disagree with here.) But most importantly, this is a rare glimpse into the clear thinking of a true libertarian.

In its zeal to deemphasize the economics of libertarianism in favor of its principles, the book overlooks the crucially important point that the history of government intervention ostensibly to benefit the working class at the expense of corporations has largely had the opposite effect. The interested reader should consult Free to Choose: A Personal Statement.

Perhaps most striking are the proposals that this supposedly radical political viewpoint does *not* make. It does not advocate anarchy or the abolition of the federal reserve. It does not call for an end to intellectual property rights or anti-trust litigation. Even the Libertarian Party gets a well-deserved shunning. Ultimately, it all comes down to upholding sensible values.

The book gives a broad but shallow libertarian perspective on current events. I would have liked to have seen more historic context. On the plus side the book is well written and organized.

When the Founding Fathers started the United States of America, they had a strong notion of what liberty meant. It meant freedoms and rights; but it also meant taking responsibility for your beliefs and actions. They expected every American to balance these rights and responsibilities in his heart and in his life. We've drifted such a long way from that....
This book gives you a road map for getting back to those strong notions. Walsh explains the rights that Americans should expect--and the responsibilites they should accept. He makes it really clear.
I've read lots of books about politics and society but I've never read one that puts things so well. In such a balanced way.
To me, libertarians have always seemed like a kind of wacky and extreme group. But this book isn't wacky at all.
I don't know anything about James Walsh. But why isn't he better known in mainstream political circles?

i like this book..
Good detail, easy to understand, and nice examples..
well written... for all readers...
You even get to read a little about Mr. B.B.

One of the best books about Monetary Theory and Policy.

If you want to find the book about the theory of monetary or finance, this is the one you should have it.

This great book helped me to get a better understanding of modern monetary theory, and so I thought I'd make a few comments on that, perhaps couched in easier to understand language and more mundane examples than in this much more sophisticated and technical book.

Basically, the question is what really is the value of money in a country's economy, and how do fluctuations in the value of the currency and the amount of the currency in circulation affect the overall economy? That might seem simple at first, but consider the following.

You may know the story of the hyperinflation that occurred in Germany in the post-WWII years. Germany was saddled with some serious war debts and reparations, and so the government started printing money in order to pay them off. There's even some suspicion that they did this deliberately in order to pay them off faster with inflated dollars, which royally annoyed the French, who were basically getting stiffed. Very sneaky, if true. And clever--if you can make it work. However, it's also very risky, because there are few things more ruinously inflationary than the government printing money, and eventually those pigeons usually come home to roost, which they did in the case of the German economy with a vengeance. So the situation got out of control, and soon it almost took wheelbarrows full of money to buy a loaf of bread.

However, the most interesting thing is how the German monetary authorities stopped the hyperinflation and got things back to normal. What they did was start buying back the worthless paper Deutschemarks with gold. This reduced the supply of Marks, and when people saw that they could get real gold for the paper money, they cashed in in droves. Eventually, the German Deutsche Bank, basically their Federal Reserve, pulled enough money out of circulation to get the inflation under control.

This brings up the interesting question of whether one needs gold backing for your currency. Well, in the modern world, it's no longer necessary, since countries like Japan have very little gold backing for their currency, and yet the Yen is one of the so-called "hard currencies." Contrast that with the former Soviet Union, which at least in the past had a lot of gold backing for their currency, and yet it wasn't worth much. What really determines the value of your currency in the modern international economy is it's value on the international monetary exchanges, which is basically what people will pay to buy it in order to buy your goods and exports and so on, and to do business with you, not how much gold backing it has.

But getting back to the German situation, something very similar happened here back in the early 80s when the prime interest rate hit 21%, because the government was printing money due to the Vietnam war and the deficit spending of the late 60's and 70's. With that level of inflation per year, funny things start happening. For example, it's in the interest of capital-intensive industries or businesses requiring large on-hand inventories-- such as retail stores or firms selling big-ticket equipment items and so on--to buy as much inventory as possible on credit, and then to pay the debt off with increasingly inflated dollars, which reduces your overall cost-- essentially, not so different from what the Germans were doing.

This might sound strange since you're talking about the "price" or cost of money and how inflation affects it, but inflation has the interesting effect of making future money payments less expensive to the borrower, so they have a vested interest in loading up on goods on credit and then paying it off over time. The longer the horizon or loan term the better they make out as long as inflation continues.

In other words, with inflation running at 21%, in two years, the business paying back the loan gets a 42% discount on their cost of capital, assuming the interest rate is fixed, which is usually the case in business loans or at least businesses with good credit. Of course, lenders such as banks and savings and loans know about these tricks but surprisingly, there's very little they can do to hedge and protect themselves. This is one reason so many savings and loans went out of business back in the 80's.

Now all of this might make inflation sound like the ultimate economic evil, but actually, and here's another odd fact about monetary economics--the reverse situation is actually worse--which is known as deflation. Recessions usually don't go into serious deflation, but a real bona fide depression will. This is what is really happening in a depression.

In the case of a serious depression or deflationary spiral, the money supply contracts to the point where the total amount of money circulating isn't enough to keep the economic wheels of the country greased and operating smoothly thru what is known as the bank reserve ratio and negative multiplier effect. In other words, there is a systemic shortage of liquidity. Unfortunately, this situation is extremely difficult to correct, much more so than the inflationary situation.

That's because with interest rates falling and/or very low, no-one has any incentive to lend dollars since, as in the case during the Great Depression, banks get their money from private depositors, and with banks failing, and interest rates at almost zero, no one has any incentive to put the money in the bank if the bank might fail, or if the business that took out the loan could go bankrupt and fail, as many do during depressions. So people stuff it in the proverbial mattress. Hence, there's no money to lend, and so businesses which depend on loans and outside financing (which is about 99% of big and medium size businesses in the U.S.) can't get the money to operate and the economy grinds to a standstill. The government can even print all the money it wants, but nothing happens, since the prime lenders don't want to borrow the money at the so-called Federal Reserve Discount Window and pass it on to borrowers and risk losing it for some measly return and interest rate. In other words, the risk/reward ratio just isn't worth it.

To give you a better perspective on this, I can give you a fascinating fact. The average person tends to think of the stock market as synonymous with the overall economy, because it gets all the press and publicity, and that's true to some extent, but the truth is the bond markets operating behind the scenes which get much less press and attention (well, bonds are pretty boring compared to stocks) are actually ten times the size of the stock market and have a much greater impact than even the stock market on the overall economy. With no money to lend for loans and bonds, the economy grinds to a stop, until someone like the government "primes the pump" to restart it, the policy mechanism that the great economist, John Maynard Keynes, became famous for explaining, among other things. That's what happened back in the 1930's, but we really had to wait for the huge government spending of WWII to turn the situation around.

So during deflation, money is tight and scarce, but the value of the currency keeps going up--just the reverse of inflation. So those who have money have more than they had before. But since deflation causes serious unemployment and underemployment and poverty, most people don't have excess dollars, so they're still poor. So you just can't win. That's why economics is sometimes called "the dismal science." :-)

If this all sounds strange, just think of what happens with a resource or a commodity when there's a shortage of supply--such as with oil right now--it goes up in price, right? That's just normal supply and demand. Same thing in deflation. With a shortage in the supply of greenbacks, the value goes up just like in the case of any material good, except it's confusing to think of lots of money causing a lack of purchasing power as in the case of inflation, and a lack of money creating more purchasing power as in the case of deflation. In practical terms, the dollar's worth more--but no-one is spending them! Hence, paradoxically, money is worth more in a stagnant economy where no one has any incentive to spend it. You might wonder how something can be worth more when no one wants it, since, in most cases, what determines the value of something is the demand for it, but this is where monetary theory parts with normal intuition and common sense about how supply and demand should work, and that's just the way it is.

Anyway, that's not a bad little summary of monetary economics. If you understand that you actually have most of the important points. As you can see, it's strange stuff in some ways, but fun once you get the hang of it since it is powerful and explains some puzzling issues.

If this book were a car, its selling would long have been forbidden! The "typos and corrections" offered by Carl E. Walsh's homepage have by now reached 10 pages. Chapter 6.5 "A Basic Open-Economy Model" has this way been completely revised by the maître. So, in case you are determined to read this book, start with a download of those typos and corrections! The publisher does not give the slightest hint of this problem within the book (Maybe, because the standard "errata-note" would have become an "errata-booklet"). This is really annoying, since you may lose a lot of time by trying to understand mathematical derivations, which are simply wrong. Weak consolation: the "typos and corrections" of Michael Woodford's supposed to be classic "Interest and Prices" sum up by now of 8 pages (Or should we say 38 pages, since "certain equations" of Woodford's chapter 5 are corrected in a separate paper? Unfortunately, I'm not kidding). However, Walsh's book does also suffer from contents-related problems: Throughout the book he derives all results based on the social planner solution of his models. He never even discusses the problem of this approach in the presence of the "wedge of inefficiency" that the usage of money can introduce in such models (Lucas, 1987, Models of Business Cycles). So after having yourself worked through Walsh's book and his typos and corrections, you cannot be sure that the conclusions and policy recommendations he draws will also hold for the market solution of his models.

I've just finished my residency and had to go through two editions of Campbell. Considering the 8th, the 9th is beyond comparison. Colors (gasp) Indexed pages. All great points in making this the updated bible of urology. Unfortunately I've found more than a handful of typos. There was also a bad reference in the text pointing me to Chapter XXX (really). Also some pictures (esp the ones depicting the vasovasostomy) were blown way out of proportion. I've also found a picture that was severely pixellated (in the chapter written by nonother than Dr Walsh himself). The CD rom was good but I still don't know why I have to pay extra to get the text on disc. I hear that the Internists get their Harrison on CD. So here's to hoping that the 10th will be a bit better.

Having pretty much read every edition since the Fourth from cover to cover, I have to say the reorganization of the Ninth edition is much more logical. When using the actual text, I would invariably pull out the wrong volume when I wanted to look something up. That is now a moot point with a well-done e-edition. The boxed "key points" are useful during review. The multicolor tables and charts are easier to follow, but the addition of color to the surgical illustrations is generally not helpful, and not as aesthetically pleasing as the plain line drawings. None of these points is very important, since every urologist needs to own this text. Make it easier by picking the e-edition.

This compilation of study questions is intended as a study review of the basic text of urology, the same text on which the board certification and recertification exams are largely based. The questions are very much like the SASP exam, but without the CME.

Campbell Walsh Urology Edition 9ed 4 Volumes with Full Online Access - WEIN ISBN:1416029664 EAN:9781416029663Binding:

This will get you the hard copy 4 volumes and a CD-ROM containing ONLY references and link to abstract on pubmed. Unlike the previous edition the entire text and images of the book ARE NOT (emphasize - ARE NOT) available on CD anymore. You can access the entire text book through a computer ONLINE only after logging in. NOTE as per publisher- Purchase of this book includes a limited personal license to the online version for use exclusively by the individual who has purchased the book. This license and access to the web site operates strictly on the basis of a single user per PIN. The sharing of passwords is strictly prohibited, and any attempt to do so will invalidate the password. The license and access may not be lent, resold, or otherwise circulated.

Coming to the REVIEW OF THIS BOOK which you all want to read - "FANTASTIC" should say it in one word. Huge improvement in the presentation, contents, pictures, videos & diagrams. The layout and presentation makes this book more enjoyable and interesting to read compared to the 8th edition. The key points in boxes in most pages are good for quick review. Similarly the multicolour tables are helpful. The book is overall well updated and is relevant to early 2006 when it was written. The online edition updates this to current relevance partly and it will be interesting to see how good this new option will be as time goes by.

The NEGATIVE points are - some of the diagrams are too gaudy and oversimplified and therefore practically not good (more like primary school diagrams). Some of the surgical photographs are of poor standard have blood in the field glaring and you can hardly see the anatomy they are pointing to. They need to weed out such photographs & diagrams drastically in the next edition.

Coming to the ONLINE ACCESS of the text book [...]The text search option is miles better than the previous edition and brings out the relevant ones and there is an indicator showing the relevance to your keyword search. It also brings up the image library with relevant images at the same time with rating of relevance to the topic searched which is significant improvement.
There is a scrapbook in your online account which stores all saved searches, bookmarks and your notes. Select multiple images into the "lightboxes" and download the images at the end of your browsing.
You can print the pages you want in a printer friendly format. You can send pages you want to your PDA for browsing as needed.

Overall opinion - 4.5 out of 5 stars. All urology residents and consultant should have this, preferably with the online access "E-dition" option (will cost an additional Euro 100 approx compared to option 2- see below).


OTHER AVAILABLE OPTIONS -
Campbells Urology 9ed 4 Volume Book with CDRom Video Clips - WEIN ISBN:0721607985 EAN:9780721607986 . Details same as above but WITHOUT access to online 4 volume text and updates . CD Rom has diagrams, photographs and references with links only.


THIRD OPTION:
Campbell-Walsh Urology Online, 9th Edition (like a ebook which you can access 4 volumes of text with updates online only) - you are excluding the hard cover book option. ISBN: 978-1-4160-2968-7.


So remember Campbell Walsh Urology Edition 9ed 4 Volumes is available in 3 TYPES/ OPTIONS !!

Happy reading & Enlightment

Campbell Walsh Urology Edition 9ed 4 Volumes is available in 3 TYPES/ OPTIONS !!

I am surprised and amazed that the publishers have not taken the trouble to explain the type of options available while purchasing the text book. They have not informed what is INCULDED OR NOT in your purchase and the exact contents of the CD- Rom. I had to search various websites to get the information and even then was not well informed before I purchased the first option reviewed below.

FIRST OPTION -
Campbell Walsh Urology Edition 9ed 4 Volumes with Full Online Access - WEIN ISBN:1416029664 EAN:9781416029663Binding:HardbackList Price:Euro 525 (guide price at a book store- costlier than on Amazon of course).

This will get you the hard copy 4 volumes and a CD-ROM containing ONLY references and link to abstract on pubmed. Unlike the previous edition the entire text and images of the book ARE NOT (emphasize - ARE NOT) available on CD anymore. You can access the entire text book through a computer ONLINE only after logging in. NOTE as per publisher- Purchase of this book includes a limited personal license to the online version for use exclusively by the individual who has purchased the book. This license and access to the web site operates strictly on the basis of a single user per PIN. The sharing of passwords is strictly prohibited, and any attempt to do so will invalidate the password. The license and access may not be lent, resold, or otherwise circulated.

Coming to the REVIEW OF THIS BOOK which you all want to read - "FANTASTIC" should say it in one word. Huge improvement in the presentation, contents, pictures, videos & diagrams. The layout and presentation makes this book more enjoyable and interesting to read compared to the 8th edition. The key points in boxes in most pages are good for quick review. Similarly the multicolour tables are helpful. The book is overall well updated and is relevant to early 2006 when it was written. The online edition updates this to current relevance partly and it will be interesting to see how good this new option will be as time goes by.

The NEGATIVE points are - some of the diagrams are too gaudy and oversimplified and therefore practically not good (more like primary school diagrams). Some of the surgical photographs are of poor standard have blood in the field glaring and you can hardly see the anatomy they are pointing to. They need to weed out such photographs & diagrams drastically in the next edition.

Coming to the ONLINE ACCESS of the text book at [...] -The text search option is miles better than the previous edition and brings out the relevant ones and there is an indicator showing the relevance to your keyword search. It also brings up the image library with relevant images at the same time with rating of relevance to the topic searched which is significant improvement.
There is a scrapbook in your online account which stores all saved searches, bookmarks and your notes. Select multiple images into the "lightboxes" and download the images at the end of your browsing.
You can print the pages you want in a printer friendly format. You can send pages you want to your PDA for browsing as needed.

Overall opinion - 4.5 out of 5 stars. All urology residents and consultant should have this, preferably with the online access "E-dition" option (will cost an additional Euro 100 approx compared to option 2- see below).


SECOND OPTION -
Campbells Urology 9ed 4 Volume Book with CDRom Video Clips - WEIN ISBN:0721607985 EAN:9780721607986 Binding:HardbackList Price:Euro 410 (guide price at a book store). Details same as above but WITHOUT access to online 4 volume text and updates . CD Rom has diagrams, photographs and references with links only.


THIRD OPTION:
Campbell-Walsh Urology Online, 9th Edition (like a ebook which you can access online only)
PIN Code and User Guide to Continually Updated Online Reference Euro 398 or GBP 265.00, E-dition Access, Reference at Elsevier site
(which is cheapest of the three options as you are excluding the hard cover book option)

While buying cross check the International Standard Book Number (ISBN) or EAN-European article number code to give you an idea about the text option.

I love the illustration style - however, the story of this book is overly long and really not so interesting. My son won't stay by my side to listen to me read all the text in the book; I have to edit the book myself for him to be interested at all. I think the Seibolds' have produced better books (like the Olive stories, or the first Mr. Lunck book) and would reccommend those before FREE LUNCH.

Just in case you're new to this whacked-out series, the San Francisco-based team of Seibold and Walsh open with a few relevant facts in a opening page right out of Disney's Toon Town, or Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland." (The page, like much of the book features about a dozen flat colors, optical effects, and a font called "arbitrary bold." Here's the opener:

MR. LUNCH WAS VERY GOOD AT CHASING BIRDS* IN FACT HE WAS A PROFESSIONAL* our story begins..."

And it never lets up. It's very much like a theme park ride, if the designer let go of most conventions, indulged in a sort of minimalist cubism/punk aesthetic (mixed with a little Dr. Seuss and some genetically-altered styrofoam), and had the free-wheeling command of a Jack Kerouac.

This artistic garbage (and I say that with affection) isn't easy, it only looks like it. It mixes so many artistic styles that it's like taking a computer-speeded one-minute tour of an entire modern art museum. The trick is that the pictorial and narrative elements are just familiar enough that kids and adults can follow it. I think it's humorous, unconventional, and energizing, but others will hate it. Know your kid.

Here's the plot, which is really kinda secondary. When he's not playfully chasing his bird friends, our hero, Mr. Lunch, sells birdseed. The seed supplier, however, is under new management; namely, an elephant who looks like the product of twisted evolution: He dresses like a poorly dressed cowboy, stands on two feet, and his trunk looks like one of those long Roman horns announcing that Spartacus has entered the building. When Mr. Lunch discovers that the new seed packets actually contain rocks, he and bird friends Ambrose and Gunhild investigate. However, the evil elephant manages to get Mr. Lunch arrested on a hastily constructed leash law, knowing that he'll languish in jail because the judge--a nocturnal owl-- will never be awake to hear his plea!

The story has a spellbinding cadence, mixing long and short sentences, and delivering offbeat lines a la Daniel Pinkwater: with a totally straight face. For example, when Ambrose asks a chef to hide a little something inside a cake to help Mr. Lunch escape, the squid-ish looking chef replies "no-no, that would be breaking the baker's code." Waiting for his rescue, Lunch gazes out of a single window and sees all sorts of cloudy shapes, including a bear holding a camcorder.

WARNING, SPOILER AHEAD: The birds sneak in an escape map, however, leading Mr. Lunch to a cave containing rubies and the FORMER elephant owner of the birdseed company. Our friends escape, the real elephant owner makes a hat out of a broken umbrella, the bad elephant is arrested (though he's pictured calling out "I'M SORRY!"), MR. Lunch returns to chasing his bird friends, and...

I found a fold-up piece of paper in the middle of the book, obviously written by a kid, that says the following:

"A Bookmark to know where you are in the book." (flip it over):
"I LOVE Reading!!!"

Now I could tell you that this book is goofy and smart, iconoclastic and clever--a twisty, pop art, five-flavored ice cream of a book--but I don't think anything I said could be a stronger endorsement than what that kid wrote and left for some other Mr. Lunch reader.

My nephew loves Mr. Lunch, and so do I. We were very distressed to see our hero victimized by the machinations of a very, very bad elephant in this installment. However, we know that Lunch will always prevail -- with a little help from Ambrose, of course.

OK, so it may have great pictures and cute characters, but it is also a good story! Your kids will definitely love it...i did, and i am not even that young!

Mr. Seibold and Ms. Walsh have that rare ability to create an entire new world, a completely foreign world that somehow you feel you're vaguely familiar with. The writing style is dead-on and tight -- never a wasted line, never a worthless word. And the illustrations are truly brilliant. And they're all done on Adobe Illustrator, which is astonishing to me, considering that mostly I associate that product with USA Today infographics . Mr. Lunch and all the other Seibold/Walsh books are gifts from some divine probably Japanese artistic entity, likely the same one who gave us Parappa the Rapper, toy robots, and Pizzicato Five.