many of you know that this old dem grew up during the cold war and has been reading various histories about that war, and the smaller hot one that supposedly kept the cold one from turning hot in order to try to understand how we got to this point.
i've been reading lots of history of that period, mostly because i was so busy living my life that i didn't dig too deeply into the well of history while it was happening. i'm trying to do this now.
i recall my first knowledge of a presidential election (nixon/kennedy) and my first realization that what everyone called the "cold war" could heat up quickly and with little warning (cuban missile crisis).
my awakening to liberal politics, and the embracing thereof, was probably in high school when our teacher, was forced to make us read an abominable book by j.edgar hoover. she did that because the conservative fundamentalist parents in our school district (yes, all of these existed in the dark ages) objected to our reading "brave new world". why? because of the sex, not the politics. that's when i realized that sex and politics are incredibly entwined, wow, was THAT an awakening!
we were forced to read "Masters of Deceit". while i do not condone censorship, if i did, i'd call for the burning of that piece of right wing propaganda immediately, hopefully, though, it's out of print, although, i'm not going to check that information because i never want to get near anything by j.edgar ever again due to the inherent batshit looniness of such tripe.
so...i usually credit that book, horribly written and supremely poorly edited, with my political awakening. that and the nixon presidency.
i'm curious...what book(s) helped shape YOUR politics? movies, lectures, songs, people...anything you found made you think about your politics is welcome! thank you all in advance, you're all so intelligent...ALL OF YOU regardless of your candidate!
TAKE A BREAK FROM CANDIDATES AND STRIKES AND SUCH AND JUST HAVE FUN WITH THIS ONE PLEASE!