“2666” is a well written book by an author who has read and understood more about society than many who have lived long lives in America.
Books of Interest Website: chetyarbrough.blog
“2666”
By: Roberto Bolaño
Narrated By: John Lee, Armando Duran, G. Valmont Thomas, Scott Brick, Grover Gardner
Roberto Bolaño (Author, 1953-2003, died at the age of 50, Chilean novelist, short-story writer, poet and essayist.)
“2666” is a journey around the world. One begins the journey as though one is sinking into inescapable quicksand. Roberto Bolaño dazzles one’s imagination. Its granular mix of western society captures one’s imagination. The book’s narrators trap “2666” listeners in a story of modern times.
Bolaño infers sex is an equal opportunity exploiter.
He suggests communism and socialism are distortions of Marxism and shows capitalism as a form of enslavement. Women’s societal inequality extends to physical abuse in many societies and, at an extreme, to murder. Bolaño’s many characters illustrate the way in which he believes these are societal truths.
The first part of Bolaño’s story tells of three highly educated people who travel for business and pleasure based on their professions and desires.
They are academics steeped in literature who lecture on poetry, philosophy, and great writers. They meet in different areas of Europe as a trinity of lovers, two men and one woman that form an emotional and sexual threesome. The woman appears the more dominant of the three with the two men abandoned for a time because of a younger lover in the woman’s life. The two men continue to travel together and apart but pursue a licentious life with women, some of which are paid for their sexual favors. The author seems to explain sexual desire is characteristic of all human beings, both male and female. Human desire can be exploitive, companionable, and/or a way to make a living.
Bolaño’s travels extend to Mexico and the United States after his literary journey through Europe.
He shows every form of government, whether communist, socialist, or capitalist fails to treat its citizens equally. He infers Marxist theory may hold an ideal of equality but suggests communism, socialism, and capitalism only distort the ideal of a classless society. Materialism, the struggle for recognition, and the value of labor are chimeras, i.e., wished for ends that are illusory in every known form of government.
Bolaño’s trek to Mexico reveals its poverty and the hard life of a country of the rich and many poor.
He focuses on a notorious record of women being murdered in Mexico by an unknown killer and rapist who may be one man or two. The grim view of Mexico dwells on the investigation of these horrific crimes. In the process, the listener is told about prison life in Mexico, a probable killer of the women and another that may still be on the loose. The murders of women continue. An FBI agent from America is involved in the investigation. This is a hard section of the book because of its repeated explanation of crimes against women, but it offers a view of Mexico’s poverty and the unfair, unequal treatment of women and others in the world.
The last chapters of Bolaño’s work are a flash back to WWII and Germany’s attack of Russia after Stalin’s mistaken alliance.
There are flashes of brilliance in this flashback, but the length of the novel begins to wear thin. “2666” is a well written book by an author who has read and understood more about society than many who have lived long lives in America, a land of opportunity with many of the faults noted in Europe and North America.
Having heard of Henning Mankell’s mysteries (of which there are many), Kurt Wallander is a reoccurring character as an investigative Swedish detective.
The relevance of “The Dogs of Riga” is in the transition that was occurring when Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia achieved independence from the U.S.S.R. The Baltics had been a part of and controlled by the U.S.S.R. since 1940. Mankell’s book was first published in 1992, one year after the 1991′ dissolution of the U.S.S.R.
Riga Technical University (Engineering Center in the Baltics)
It is interesting to find in “The Dogs of Riga” that Wallander’s daughter chooses to go to Riga for her college education which makes one wonder why Riga would be chosen. Is it because of the quality of education or just to be further away from family? In any case, the reason these books are recommended is to give some perspective to new visitors of other countries. An interesting observation one makes about “The Dogs of Riga” is a sense of resentment from the Latvians about Russia and their former domination of the Baltic States.
Season 3, Episode 2 of “The Dogs of Riga” on Masterpiece Theater.
Going back to the story, two Russians were shot in the heart, and set adrift on a raft in Swedish waters. Autopsy shows the Russians were well dressed indicating wealth. It was found they had high concentrations of amphetamine in their bodies. In investigating the murders, Wallander finds they came from Riga, the capitol of Latvia. An officer from Latvia goes to Sweden to talk to Wallander. After the visiting officer returns to Riga, he is murdered and Wallander is asked to come to Riga to investigate his death.
With the opening of Latvia to the western world, freedom from communist controls is a mixed blessing.
Mankell begins to tell listener/readers something about Latvia and its suspicion of Russian residents in their country. Along with more freedom to pursue economic growth is the rise of a drug trade and criminal activity. Mankell’s story infers illegal activity is exacerbated by Russians who resent Latvia’s independence from the U.S.S.R. However, with greater freedom comes crime as well as improved economic opportunity. One reserves judgement about whether Russians are the primary cause of drug activity in Latvia because breaking the law is characteristic of all nationalities under all forms of government. The characterization of Russians as the cause of the illegal drug trade in Riga is possible. However, it is the same question one must ask themselves about America and the origins, causes, and persistence of its drug trade.
Freedom entails the pursuit of what one wants out of life. Money, power or prestige are goals of most (if not all) human beings.
However, those goals need to be based on equal opportunity. This is not to say those goals should include criminal activity, but only education offers a chance for all to understand the difference between right and wrong. When equal educational opportunity is available to every person in the world, they may pursue what they think is in their interests. This, of course, is not a world that exists or can exist because personal interest is not the same for everyone.
Getting back to Mankell’s story, Latvia is challenged by its new freedom from the U.S.S.R. The suspicion of Russians is undoubtedly a truth about Latvian culture based on Latvia’s former life as a part of the U.S.S.R. Whether Russians are the criminal master minds of the drug trade is not the point. The point is that human nature requires a reason for everything that happens in a culture. The bad experience of repression by the U.S.S.R. may make Latvians suspicious of every Russian in Latvia. It is similar to Trump’s vilification of immigrants and how that ignorance resonates with some Americans.
Mankell and the author of “The Lilac Girls” are worth reading or listening to if you plan a trip to the Balkans. Traveling to other countries is more interesting because of what writers of fiction and history have to say.
Caro’s facts do not prove truth, but they do reveal the means and consequence of political power and influence in American Democracy.
Books of Interest Website: chetyarbrough.blog
“Working”
By: Robert A. Caro
Narrated By: Robert A. Caro
Robert Allan Caro (Author, journalist, winner of 2 Pulitzer Prizes in Biography and many other coveted literature awards.)
Every non-fiction writer can appreciate this erudite and entertaining audiobook, personally written and read by Robert Caro. Caro explains what “Working” means to a non-fiction writer. Caro artfully explains why and how researching, interviewing, and writing a biography is a revelatory experience.
In “Working”, Caro focuses on his two Pulitzer Prize winning books, “The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York” and “Master of the Senate”, one of his four books about Lyndon Johnson. Both biographies are about political power in America.
Robert Moses (1888-1981) was an American urban planner and public official in the New York metropolitan area during the early to mid-20th century.
Moses (among many titles) was the New York City Parks Commissioner and Chairman of the Triborough Bridge Tunnel Authority. His political power and influence are detailed in Caro’s book, “The Power Broker”. Though Moses was never elected to political office, he arguably shaped the infrastructure of New York City as much, if not more, than any elected person in New York. “Working” explains how a reporter from a small Long Island’ newspaper manages to write “The Power Broker” and become one of America’s most famous biographers.
After graduating from Princeton with a B.S. degree, Caro is hired by the Long Island, New York’ newspaper, “Newsday”.
Caro explains he had been a writer for many years as a young boy and college student before getting a scut-work job at “Newsday”. He tells of a breakthrough report he writes that gets attention from the editor of the paper. He is given advice by the editor who recognizes the quality of his writing. The advice is that when writing a piece for the public, be sure of your facts by “turning every page”. Caro takes that advice and explains how it became a mantra, a repeated aid, in his writing.
Caro explains how he and his wife work to “turn every page” in researching the Moses and Johnson biographies.
Even though one may have read Caro’s two Pulitzer Prize winning’ books, “Working” offers a nearly perfect introduction to his biographies of Moses and Johnson that are, to the extent humanly possible, researched by “turning every page”. Caro is hard on himself for taking years to research and write his biographic books. It is a financial hardship for his family, particularly before his first success with “The Power Broker”. They sell their house in Long Island to support his book research. After that first success, the financial insecurity is offset by grants and the support of literary agents. “Turning every page” is a laborious process but it assures and reinforces the facts revealed in his biographies.
Caro explains how he and his wife meticulously researched public documents to confirm facts that corroborate the victimization of some New Yorkers by monied interests that gave Moses the political power to destroy low-income neighborhoods for new thoroughfares through the New York City area.
With the construction of over 600 miles of road many residents, renters and homeowners, were evicted from their homes. Most were left to fend for themselves.
Caro and his wife were willing to disrupt their lives and neighborhood relationships to pursue his obsession with verification of facts. Caro explains that he needed to move to Texas to understand what it was like for Lyndon Johnson to be raised in the Texas Hill Country. He could not just visit because local Texans would not talk to him with the candor he sought to understand where Lyndon Johnson came from. Many revelations are in his book about Johnson that could not have been corroborated without interviews with people who knew the Johnson family.
Caro and his wife move to Austin, Texas to be near the Texas Hill Country to research and understand the society in which Lyndon Johnson is raised.
Many insights are a result of the move. Experiencing the loneliness of the Texas Hill country because of its sparse population helped Caro understand Johnson’s need to be bigger than life. Interviewing Johnson’s brother reveals the tensions that existed between Lyndon and his father. Johnson’s father was heir to the original Johnson ranch that was lost because of the soils’ unproductivity. It had too much caliche, a clay content that would not support a cash crop. When Johnson’s father repurchased the ranch after its loss by the family, he failed to understand the land could not provide enough income to pay its mortgage. The ranch is lost to the bank again. The relationship between Lyndon and his father deteriorated as Lyndon grew older because of Lyndon’s disappointment with his father’s ineptitude and domineering personality. Ironically, Caro notes it is a personality that Lyndon is heir to and for which he is criticized. On the other hand, Caro explains it is also a personality characteristic that makes Lyndon one of the greatest masters of the Senate. No Senate leader since Johnson has as successfully led the Senate in passing government legislation.
Samuel Ealy Johnson Jr. (Lyndon Johnsons’ father. 1877-1937.)
Lyndon’s brother implies Lyndon’s conflicts with his father became part of his drive to be more successful than his father.
Caro infers Johnson and Moses were forces of nature. Both were political power users that understood how to use it to get their way. Obviously political power can be used for ill or good. One can argue New York City open spaces and parks were a great benefit to the city. On the other hand, many people were displaced to provide those open spaces. The Civil Rights Act passed during the Johnson administration benefited millions of minorities in America. On the other hand, an estimated 2,000,000 Vietnamese were killed, 58,000 American soldiers died, and another 288,000 Americans were wounded and/or disabled. How many Vietnamese, and Cambodians were wounded or disabled and how many are still being hurt by leftover landmines?
Caro offers a great service to the public in his writing about political power in American Democracy. Democracy is not a perfect political system, and Caro reveals where that imperfection lies by “turning every page”. Caro’s facts do not prove truth, but they do reveal the means and consequence of political power and influence in American Democracy.
Science will lead or lose the “Real…” world of human beings.
Books of Interest Website: chetyarbrough.blog
“Real Americans” A Novel
By: Rachel Khong
Narrated By: Louisa Zhu, Cric Yang, Eunice Wong
Rachel Khong (American writer and editor.)
(Ms. Khong’s book is an entertaining listen but a little too long except for listeners who are most interested in the story. Others are interested in its societal meaning and often discount its entertainment value.)
The main characters in Khong’s novel are Lily Chen, Matthew, Nick Chen, and May. In one sense, the author’s story is about the randomness of life. We are born from fertilization of a male sperm with a female egg. In our world, the randomness of being born is based on chance encounters of violence or seduction. (The reference to violence and seduction is not meant to suggest the nuance of relationship can be ignored, e.g. love comes from the act of seduction, not from violence.) In the 21st century, violence and seduction remain but in today’s science, state and institutional influence bear down on human procreation. The science and possible future of genetics is Khong’s theme in “Real Americans”.
“Real Americans” is about a young college graduate making her way in New York city, a capitol of opportunity in America.
As a poor young graduate, New York city is a ticketed opportunity for American success and failure. Khong’s story is particularly interesting because the main character, Lily Chen, is born American to well-educated parents who emigrated from China. She does not speak Chinese. She is living the life of a young, intelligent American trying to support herself by whatever job she can find in New York City.
Lily’s mother and father are geneticists.
Like the trials and rewards of Cinderella, the trials of Lily’s life are transformed by the wealth of a prince. What makes “Real Americans” more than a fairytale is its theme that life’s beginnings are a matter of violence or seduction, including state and institutional complicity. (“State and institutional complicity” refers to acts of government and business that discriminate based on prejudice or narrow emphasis on income rather than ethics.)
Lily seems to have luckily met Matthew; an immensely wealthy heir to an American medical conglomerate founded by his family. They marry after an on again, off again relationship.
After their marriage, Lily has two pregnancies that do not come to term and chooses to have invitro insemination to have a successful pregnancy with the birth of a son they name Nicco. Matthew and Lily go to China on a business trip where Lily chooses to visit the college where her mother became a geneticist. She meets a professor who knew her mother and is told a story that initially puzzles her about what her mother was like when she was young. She finds her mother, as a student geneticist, was a risk taker and magical thinker.
The next one learns is that Lily divorces her husband and moves from New York to Tacoma Washington, an island between Seattle and its capital to raise her son by herself.
Lily’s mother had met Matthew’s family before Matthew began dating Lily. She knew Matthew’s father who began a hugely successful medical company that researched genetics. (The significance of her mother’s knowledge of the genetic research of Matthew’s family is at the crux of Lily’s feeling of betrayal.) The theme of the author’s story begins to take a turn. Lily leaves Matthew. (She leaves because of the bias of Matthew’s family in using Lily as a surrogate for pregnancy without disclosing their personal interest.)
As her son grows to manhood, she refuses to tell him the name of his father, where he lives, or the history and wealth of the family in which he was born. The remainder of Khong’s book is the story of the circumstances surrounding the birth of her son, how he learns of his father, and what led to her divorce from Matthew.
Khong is writing about the pandora box of genetics which opens the world to designer babies. She seems to conclude, regardless of birth circumstance, care and nurture make people “Real…”. Science will lead or lose the “Real…” world of human beings. (Understanding the science of genetics and the potential for manipulation of human life is a god-like power with all the ramifications of genetic inheritance that can aid or destroy human life.)
The concern one may have about the interconnected world is that it homogenizes society. Anand’s interconnected world implies free-will is a fiction.
Books of Interest Website: chetyarbrough.blog
“The Content Trap” A Strategist’s Guide to Digital Change
By: Bharat Anand
Narrated By: Jason Culp
Bharat Anand (Author, American economist, Professor of Business administration at Harvard Business School.)
Bharat Anand offers a compelling explanation of how connection has become as important as “…Content…” in the digital age. His point is not to say content is irrelevant but without understanding digital interconnectedness, Anand infers profits, personal achievement, and commercial success are diminished or lost.
In the digital age, Anand argues if success is measured by profit, longevity, or fame, the key to success is adapting to interconnectedness.
Anand argues business managers and companies will fail if they do not adjust to changes in the way the public sees, understands, and uses the digital world. To give examples of his point, Anand notes the adjustments made by Apple, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, and the Fox TV network that have changed their business models to adjust to a digital world. Anand explains the digital world is a ubiquitous force (interconnected by computers, smartphones, and the internet) used by insightful individuals and businesses to achieve their goals.
Apple initially focused on product design and utility and earned a reputation for excellent product.
However, as the product evolved, Anand notes Apple’s specialization in quality meant less to their success than the connectivity to sources of information, entertainment, and people. The iPhone became ubiquitous and highly profitable when they improved Apple connectivity among iPhone’ users. They expanded that connectivity with their iTunes creation, audio book features, and various internet media offerings.
Microsoft specializes in software development tools that can be used by individuals and businesses to improve their communication skills and connectedness inside and outside their business.
Microsoft’s software enhances interconnectedness and communication while providing useful information to banks, affiliates, and users to understand the value of their business and how they may or may not complement each other’s performance. Microsoft expands their interconnectedness with an annual subscription system that appeals to repeat users of Microsoft’s updated software.
Google substantially improves their reach into the digital age by choosing to pay Apple $20,000,000 a year to use their search engine.
Though that is challenged by the government as a monopolization of trade, it illustrates the truth of Anand’s observation about the value of interconnectedness among companies in today’s digital world as a way of improving profits, growing, and assuring longevity.
Amazon ranks as one of the leading retailers and suppliers of consumer goods in America.
Bezos introduces many marketing innovations based on interconnections with customers that include many consumer enhancements. Amazon created its own storage and delivery service to directly compete with same day availability of product that showed customers could get product as fast as they could by going to a box retailer. Amazon capitalized on book selling by creating a portable library with Kindle that lowered NY Times’ best-selling books at half or less than the recommended retail price.
Fox television rose to compete with the big three television networks by buying the rights to NFL football at a price far beyond what the networks at that time were willing to pay. Digital age football fan connectivity gave Fox the power and influence to become the 4th major tv network in America.
Anand’s point is that adaptation, rather than opposition to evolving human connectivity, is the key to success. Identifying what is happening in the world and adapting to societal inevitabilities offers opportunities to keep pace with change and prosper. Anand is not saying content does not matter but that content is improved by adapting, rather than resisting or fighting evolving societal norms.
Anand addresses a favorite publication of many, “The Economist”, an international newspaper that has weathered the storm of newspaper disappearance in the 20th and 21st century.
Anand notes “The Economist” has prospered since the 19th century, despite the collapse of the newspaper industry in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. He argues it survives and prospers because of editorial development of international’ news through consensus of its experienced and educated writers. One might accept his observation but with reservation because of a recent survey request from the “Economist” for reader response.
The “Economist” survey form is daunting because it infers a pricing scheme based on digitalization of its articles. Having received the survey, some (like me) choose to throw it away.
The appeal of “The Economist” is in its editorial opinion of the world. Those who have traveled around the world are fascinated by the editorial opinions of a group of educated generalist opinion writers. Their survey may have been to solicit better reader connectivity, but it read like a prescription for higher prices for publication.
The threat of digitization of the “Economist” may ruin its appeal to many readers. It seems the “Economist” would change if it follows what seems the intent of their survey. The “Economist” survey seems like a digitization of their work to make it more connected to an untraveled public. They risk falling into the trap of “breaking news” rather than an insightful editorial opinion about non-western cultural policies and beliefs. They would be following the lead of many newspapers that couldn’t adjust to the interconnected digital world and had to close their doors.
Anand’s book is interesting and seems largely correct about the road to economic success, i.e., people and companies adjusting to the reality and understanding of an increasingly interconnected world.
The concern one may have about the interconnected world is that it homogenizes society. Anand’s interconnected world implies free-will is a fiction.
A “Chicken in Every Pot” will not come from fixing food prices or from job creation by reducing taxes on the wealthy.
Website: chetyarbrough.blog
AMERICAN POLITICS
Anyone who has read this blog knows its writer is not a fan of former President Trump. His position on immigration, tax policy, and American Constitutional ideals are only political props for rambling, muddled speeches that dangerously divide America. His promotion of American division was made clear on January 6, 2021.
Trump’s promotion of American division was made clear on January 6, 2021.
His speeches about immigration are only meant to vilify rather than manage its impact on the economy. It is the failure of Congress to approve legislation meant to ameliorate some of immigration policy’s faults. Trump waves a false flag of immigrant invasion when he is only a 2nd generation immigrant himself.
The vilification of immigration is a false flag.
He is supported by some wealthy Americans like Ms. Adelson whose family made a fortune in the Las Vegas casino business. In his 2017 election he was supported by the Koch family, one of the largest privately-owned companies in America. The argument made by many wealthy donors for Trump’s re-election is a belief that with the less taxes they pay, more jobs are created to lift the poor into the middle class. It is the ideal of capitalism and government that creates jobs. It is the ideas and hard work of people, not inherited wealth, that have made America great.
Trump believes in “trickle down” economic policy. His belief in cutting taxes is based on that belief.
Trump forgets where he came from. Despite his family success in America, Trump’s speeches reek with vile comments about immigrants. Without detailing some of the bad things Trump has done to become rich and influential, he lies about his past failures, and the worth of his assets. Trump revels in his moral turpitude. He is found liable for defamation and sexual abuse. He is a convicted of civil fraud for inflating his wealth to gain favorable bank loans. Trump does not represent what makes America great. He represents what makes America and capitalism flawed.
Trickle-down economics to reduce poverty, like the current economic idea of Kamela Harris for regulating food prices to help the poor, is not supported by history.
A “Chicken in Every Pot” will not come from fixing food prices or from job creation by reducing taxes on the wealthy. Roosevelt knew that; hopefully Trump will not be re-elected, and Kamela Harris will not make Hoover’s mistakes.
Trust is the most important characteristic of a patient’s relationship with their physician.
Books of Interest Website: chetyarbrough.blog
“How Medicine Works and When It Doesn’t” Leaning Who to Trust to Get and Stay Healthy
By: F. Perry Wilson MD
Narrated By: Shawn K. Jain, F. Perry Wilson
F. Perry Wilson MD (Author, Harvard graduate with honors in biochemistry, attended medical school at Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons. He is a practicing nephrologist at Yale New Haven Hospital.)
Doctor F. Perry Wilson is a physician with a biochemistry degree from Harvard, and a medical degree from Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons. Wilson works at Yale New Haven Hospital where he specializes in kidney issues. Wilson’s book is a problematic view of doctor/patient relationship and what a patient can or should believe about a physicians’ medical diagnosis and treatment. A problematic view is not Dr. Wilson’s intent, but it is a conclusion a reader/listener may arrive at as he/she completes “How Medicine Works and When It Doesn’t”.
Dr. Wilson argues any advice from medical professionals may be listened to with skepticism but not disdain.
In general, that argument seems logical and fairly balanced. Wilson infers skepticism extends to trained medical professionals and the medical industry in general. The reason a lay person may accept that conclusion is based on personal experience and rationality.
As one who has been diagnosed with heart trouble from blocked arteries and medical treatment for an alleged heart attack, the last ten years have been an educational journey.
The first cardiologist who reviewed details of a physical weakness felt while working, suggested the weakness may have been caused by a mild heart attack. After a heart scan, the cardiologist found an artery serving the heart had a blockage. The doctor recommended a stent be inserted to clear the blockage. After surgery, the cardiologist noted the stent could not get through the blockage. Changing cardiologists seemed a prudent action considering the doctor’s failure.
A new cardiologist recommended regular check-ups, stress tests, and medicine to address the cause of the blockage.
Ten years have passed and there have been no further incidents, but relocation required finding a third cardiologist who reviewed medications, conducted further tests. The new cardiologist recommended continued medical treatment largely based on statin prescriptions and further tests. Here is where Dr. Wilson’s book becomes problematic to a patient seeking medical advice from trained medical specialists.
As noted by Thomas Hager in “Ten Drugs”, the relationship between statins and blocked arteries as a cause of heart attacks is somewhat unclear. The unclearness is not that taking stains reduce cholesterol but that statins have side effects. Science-based tests show statins do reduce cholesterol but inhibit memory, reduce cognition, and may cause liver and kidney damage. To add to negative side effects, there is medicine producing industry’ bias that promote statins because they are big revenue producers.
What Doctor Wilson’s book reminds one of is the mid twentieth century game show “Who Do You Trust”. Wilson infers truth is only science-based probability, not certainty.
What both doctor and patient know is based on experience and education, not certainty. For both doctor and patient, it comes down to “Who Do You Trust”.
Wilson’s book is an important example of why patients should use their intuition to trust or change doctors when their health is at risk.
Doctors have spent the greater part of their lives understanding human medical problems and the effect of drugs in treating patients. Patients are unlikely to have had the same level of training or understanding about their own health or the health of the general population. What a patient is left with is the principle of trust. If one trusts the doctor who is prescribing and/or treating one for their illness, the probability of good outcome is logically better.
Doctor Wilson acknowledges profit motive for pharmaceutical companies drives their relationship with the medical profession and the public.
He offers concrete examples of mistakes that have been made by the pharmaceutical companies like the Thalidomide prescriptions that harmed unborn children. Of course, mistakes get made in every discipline of life. The other side of mistakes are the incredible success of vaccines for polio, smallpox, and our world’s most recent crises, Covid 19.
The conclusion one draws from Wilson’s book is trust is the most important characteristic of a patient’s relationship with a physician.
This is not meant to suggest one should shop for a doctor that tells one what they want to hear but to depend on the education and experience of a person who knows more about medicine and its effects than you.
Hager’s history of the drug industry illustrates the strength and weakness of human nature whether one is a capitalist, socialist, or communist.
Books of Interest Website: chetyarbrough.blog
“Ten Drugs” How Plants, Powders, and Pills Have Shaped the History of Medicine
By: Thomas Hager
Narrated By: Angelo Di Loreto
Thomas Hager (Author, science historian, editor, publisher, Oregon native, received master’s degree in medical microbiology and immunology from the Oregon Health Sciences University.)
“Ten Drugs” is a critical view of today’s drug industry, its drug discoverers, the medical profession, and its manufacturers. Hager explains opium is proven to have been used by Mesopotamian Sumerians in 3400 BCE but older than its known cultivation. The Sumerians called it “hul gil” which means “joy plant”.
Thomas Hager begins with opium and its discovery thousands of years ago when the bitter taste of a poppy seed capsule is tasted by a curious African’, Egyptian’, Greek’, or Roman’ Homo erectus.
Wide use grew to affect national relations between China and the western world in the opium wars of 1856-1860. China’s Qing dynasty lost territorial control of Hong Kong to Great Britain when opium became a cash cow for international trade.
Hager explains how opium offered both risk and reward to the world. It threatened society with addiction and overdose while offering surcease of pain for the wounded or health afflicted.
Addiction significantly increased among the Chinese during and after the opium wars. After many tries to prohibit opium, it was in the early 20th century that addiction was internationally condemned. It was the People’s Republic of China in 1949 that launched an aggressive anti-opium campaign that dramatically reduced opium purchase and use in China. Later, Hager infers China’s success in eliminating the trade is by murdering its dealers and penalizing its users. Ironically, Hager notes former President Trump called for the death penalty for drug dealers to combat America’s drug crises, a policy only likely to be implemented in an authoritarian country.
The first opium war in China, 1841.
Hager infers China’s success in eliminating the trade is by murdering its dealers and penalizing its users.
Hager explains the history of opium evolved into drug derivatives like morphine, laudanum, and codeine to offer pain relief from a variety of medical maladies. These derivatives were effective but still carried the risk of addiction. Hager explains later that addiction is related to nerve system receptors at a molecular level that create a craving for the effects of particular drugs. Opium and its derivatives eventually became regulated because of their addictive character. In America, the Harrison Narcotics Tax Act of 1914 marked the beginning of strict control of opium’s derivative prescriptions in the U.S.
Edward Jenner (1749-1823, English physician and scientist who discovered the use of cowpox to inoculate against smallpox.)
Hager moves on to vaccination. Interestingly, Hager explains the discoverer of inoculation by transfer is not Edward Jenner (1749-1823), a British physician called the Father of Immunology. It was a wealthy English woman named Lady Mary Worley Montague who learned of the use, of what became known as vaccination, in Turkey. She had survived a smallpox infection. Ms. Montague accompanied her husband, who was the British ambassador to the Ottoman empire in 1716.
Ms. Montague learned of a Turkish custom of transferring infected smallpox exudate to healthy children to give them a milder form of smallpox. That transferred exudate inoculated the young from getting a fatal dose of the disease in later life. Smallpox is estimated to have killed over 300,000,000 people (a statistic roughly equivalent to every person alive in the U.S. in the in the 1990s). The Turkish custom of inoculation was found highly effective.
Lady Mary Worley Montague who learned of the use of vaccination in Turkey. Earlier in her life, she had survived a smallpox infection.
In her return to England, Ms. Montague widely disseminated information about the success of the Turkish custom to prevent smallpox. Edward Jenner chose to use cowpox as a substitute tissue for smallpox vaccination of his patients. Jenner found cowpox infected tissue was equally effective in immunization and less dangerous than the using smallpox exudate. Jenner’s discovery of cowpox vaccination in 1796 became widely accepted but nearly 80 years after Ms. Montague’s worldwide promotion of Turkey’s vaccination procedure. Jenner’s vaccination success led to the World Health Organization’s claim that smallpox eradication could be achieved through an international inoculation program. Smallpox is alleged to have been eradicated as a disease in 1980.
The next drug identified as important by Hager is sulfa, a major cause of death from infected open wounds.
The common cause is a bacteria called Streptococcus. Bayer Corporation, a dye manufacturer in Germany, decides to enter the drug industry because their investment, facilities, and research scientists were ideal for entry into research and manufacture of drugs. They compound a drug called Prontosil that is discovered as a sulfa based chemical compound that successfully kills Streptococcal bacteria that cause fatal infections from open wounds. Bayer’s discovery saved many lives as WWII was gathering in the 1930s. Ironically, one of the saved lives is FDR’s son who had a severe streptococcal infection in 1936.
Hager notes personal mental illness and social dysfunction are perennial maladies that plague society through the 21st century.
Isolation and various therapies have been used to address mental illness. In early days, asylums were created to isolate patients who could not cope with daily life. Palliative treatment ranged from isolation to Freudian consultation, to electroshock, to newly discovered drug treatments. Though not mentioned by Hager, a little research shows the first significant breakthrough drug was lithium in 1949.
John Cade (1912-1980, An Australian psychiatrist discovered the effects of lithium carbonate as a mood stabilizer in 1948.)
Lithium was actually discovered in 1817 but did not get used for mental illness until 1948 when John Cade, an Australian psychiatrist, found that lithium carbonate stabilized mo0d and reduced the severity of manic episodes in patients.
Though Hager doesn’t mention lithium, he notes the French chemist Paul Charpentier identified antihistamine in 1950 as an antipsychotic to aid his patients’ erratic behavior. The use of Thorazine became a common drug synthesized by Rhone-Poulenc Laboratories in France. It was released in the 1950s and considered a major breakthrough in psychiatric treatment. It had a calming effect on severely schizophrenic patients by attacking excess dopamine production in the brain.
The major criticism Hager has of drug manufacturers and the medical industry is in the inherent influence of money, power, and prestige that distorts honest evaluation of drug effectiveness and side effects.
The drug industry depends on the success of their research for new drug discoveries to maintain the cost and improve the value of their businesses. However, human nature gets in the way of every human being. The lure of more money, power, and prestige enter into evaluative judgements and descriptions of tests for new drugs. The financial success of a drug that mitigates or cures particular societal ills make millions, if not billions, of dollars for drug manufacturers. Drug manufacturers are not eleemosynary institutions. They are in the business of making money and preserving their longevity while enriching themselves and their stockholders. Hager argues human nature distorts the truth of drug efficacy with tailored reports of a drug’s true benefit and potential for harm. He offers statins as an example of drug manufacturers’ misleading promotions.
Hager reviews the history of statins and correlations drawn by the medical industry about their efficacy in reducing heart ailments.
He suggests clinical studies by manufacturers often distort the entire effect of statins in preventing heart attacks. Statins are designed to reduce cholesterol in the blood stream. However, many studies that correlate cholesterol with heart disease are only partly related to heart attacks while having measurable side effects that diminish human cognition, memory, and potential organ damage, i.e, liver and kidney damage. Hager cautions those who take statins not to stop without discussing it with their physicians. However, Hager recounts an unsolicited personal contact that suggested he should be taking a statin because he is over 60 and had a brain vessel bleed in his earlier medical history. The contact recommended Hager take a statin based on that history. Hager notes that he felt his private medical history had been hacked, and that the contact is evidence of drug industry promotion of statins for profit more than public benefit.
In Hager’s last chapters, he explains how the drug industry is being attacked for influence peddling. In drug manufacturers drive for profits, they offer incentives to the medical profession (e.g. trips to conferences in exotic resorts, personal solicitations from sales reps, etc.) to use specific drugs in their practices.
In the end, Hager argues there are exceptions to the medical industries drive for profits by telling the story of British researchers Georges Kohler and Cesar Milstein who made a discovery in 1975 that changed the focus of drug manufacturer to what is called monoclonal antibody drug development. Kohler and Milstein found a process for creating drugs that have fewer side effects by creating antibody drugs that exclusively attack diseases at a molecular level. The irony of their discovery is Kohler and Milstein chose not to patent their discovery. If they had patented their discovery, they could have gained income for every company who chose to create monoclonal antibody drugs.
British researchers Georges Kohler and Cesar Milstein
Research is growing to create drugs that more precisely address the known molecular cause of disease without affecting the general health of patients. Not surprisingly, today’s manufacturers of monoclonal drugs use Kohler’s and Milstein’s process while requiring patents for their drugs.
Hager’s history of the drug industry illustrates the strength and weakness of human nature whether one is a capitalist, socialist, or communist.
One chooses how they live life, but death is nature’s or God’s choice, a thing beyond human’ control.
Books of Interest Website: chetyarbrough.blog
“The Theater of War” What Ancient Greek Tragedies Can Teach Us Today
By: Bryan Doerries
Narrated By: Adam Driver
Bryan Doerries (Author, Artistic Director of Theater of War Productions, an evangelist for classical literature and its relevance to today’s lives.)
The title and book cover of “The Theater of War” is as puzzling as Bryan Doerries’ beginning vignette of his personal life. Doerries graduates from Kenyon College where he majors in the classics. He goes on to earn a Master of Fine Arts in Directing from the University of California. “The Theater of War” recounts Doerries’ journey to become cofounder, artistic director, and historian for creation of a theatrical teaching tool about life and death. The trigger for his understanding comes from the last days of his personal relationship with Laura Rothenberg who dies at 22 from cystic fibrosis. Her death is the introduction to why “The Theater of War” is created.
Doerries and Phyllis Kaufman are co-founders of “The Theater of War” Productions. Ms. Kaufman was the producing director from 2009 to 2016. She died at the age of 92 in 2023 but was instrumental in organizing production events, coordinating actors, and ensuring practical aspects of theatrical presentations.
“The Theater of War” is about the living and how to deal with permanent disability or death. Death comes in many forms from different causes but as the Latin expression says “Memento mori”, “Remember you must die” because death is a part of every life. Doerries explains how famous Greek tragedies were, and still are, teaching tools for those who have life and death influence over others. What “The Theater of War” creates are acted reproductions of classic Greek tragedies for living life when you or someone you know is permanently disabled or killed.
With the help of actors like Adam Driver (who narrates the book), the great tragedies of Sophocles and Aeschylus are presented to military, penal, and nursing audiences across America.
Combat veterans, prisoners, and terminally ill patients face extreme conditions of life. Combat may end in death or future disability. Prison life is about loss of control of oneself and being under the control of others. Terminal illness is also about loss of control of oneself when one is diagnosed as destined for death.
The suicide of Ajax as depicted on an ancient vase in the British museum in London.
Sophocle’s tragedy, “AJax”, offers the truth of psychological trauma and moral injury from battle. In despair, Ajax kills himself because he feels deeply humiliated by the gods for not being given the armor of Achilles who is killed in the Trojan war. Achilles’ armor was given to Odysseus rather than him.
Sophocle’s “Philoctetes” explains the pain and personal isolation that comes from the physical and emotional damage from war. Today, it is diagnosed as PTSD.
Sophocles “Antigone” deals with civil disobedience, justice, and conflict between personal and state ethics. These conflicts are reflected in mobs of unruly citizens demonstrating against what they perceive is wrong.
Aeschylus’s “Prometheus Bound” reflects on the unfairness of a penal system that infringes on human rights.
The recited dramas offer cathartic release and potential change to those who are personally affected by their situational experience. That is the purpose of the presentations. Doerries creates theatrical readings of these classics before military, penal, and nursing personnel.
The presentations lead to questions and answers about the truth of societal disagreement, death’s inevitability, and how to live with their consequences.
Some military generals and prison guards are offended by the implications of their mistakes, but the plays recitals provide a forum for discussion that offer potential for improved human understanding and societal decisions and action.
The Greeks understood dying is part of life. One chooses how they live life, but death is nature’s or God’s choice, a thing beyond human’ control.
REVIEWS AND VIEWS OF LIFE 
