Tag Archive for 'book'

The Mad Monk

Published
by
Mark
7 months, 3 weeks ago
in Authoritarianism, Books, Writers & Writing and Politics
. 121 Comments

I’ve got a feeling that the mix of a seemingly random collection of crazy authoritarian policy ideas (covenant marriage, raising the pension age to 70, bringing back WorkChoices, the federal government taking over everything) and arrogant self-congratulation that appear to make up the content of Tony Abbott’s book based on the extracts that have appeared is not doing him or the Liberal Party any good.

And will anyone actually buy the thing?

Possibly the only winner in this publishing deal is Labor (and maybe News Limited…)

Elsewhere: Andrew Bartlett.

Matthew Hindman – The Myth of Digital Democracy

Published
by
Mark
1 year, 2 months ago
in Activism, Blogging, Books, Writers & Writing, Elections, Media, Politics, Sociology, The Web and USA
. 0 Comments

I have a review of Matthew Hindman’s sceptical tome over at Inside Story.

Adapted from a Facebook meme

Published
by
Mark
1 year, 3 months ago
in Books, Writers & Writing, Film, TV, Video etc, Life and The Web
. 60 Comments

Maybe I’m easily amused but I really liked this one!

Rules:
* Take the closest book from you
* Open to the page number 56
* Look at the 5th sentence
* Write down this sentence as your status
* Comment on your status and copy these instruction in a comment
* Don’t look for the book you prefer or the coolest but the closest book

Mine is:

Marius’ imperious habit of awarding citizenship to whole cohorts of Italian allies as a reward for exceptional valour was gratefully remembered.

That’s from Tom Holland’s Rubicon: The Triumph and Tragedy of the Roman Republic. It’s a great book – I’ve been watching the second series of HBO/BBC’s Rome and thought it was an apt choice to start rereading last night, so it was right next to me on the couch.