Reading List

On the plane-ride home from Birmingham...

1. Newsweek - "What Bush Got Right" by Fareed Zakaria

Zakaria thinks the Bush administration of 2008 has come a long way since version 1.0 but is still chiefly marked by ignorance and disrespect for the rest of the world. Still, he argues that Obama and McCain must avoid simply reversing his policies just as Bush did with those of the Clinton administration.

2. Newsweek - "Rise of the Sea Turtles" by Melinda Liu and Duncan Hewitt

Liu and Hewitt seek to get to the bottom of China's continued and anti-Western sentiments, ultimately citing a successful propagandistic nationally-enforced education and wondering if this deep-seated nationalism will make China's rising, overseas-educated stars good for the world or only China.

3. Newsweek - "The Pickens Profile You Haven't Read" by Karen Breslau

T. Boone Pickens' capitalist-driven energy plan aims to make the American plains the "Saudi Arabia of alternative energy" and appears to be driven by a pure legacy instead of self-seeking profit. After all, the famed oil-man and takeover titan is 80 years and has more cash than he knows what to do with.

4. The first 50 pages of Secrets of Film Writing by Tom Lazarus

Lazarus' wonderfully readable and irreverent style reveals sensible nuggets of wisdom from a career spanning more than thirty years. I hope my screenwriting professor doesn't look down on his sometimes controversial methods...