September 5, 2013 – Peace Corps Worldwide

Chris Matthews (Swaziland 1968-70) Gives a Shout Out For the Peace Corps

Sep 05 2013

On this evening’s Hardball, Chris Matthews had a new (I think) twist to his show by answering Tweets and someone tweeted: “Chris, what can I do to help America?” or words to that effect. Chris answered immediately with “Join the Peace Corps” and then gave a simple, rational and sound reason why the man should join for all the reasons we know from our own experiences. While most Americans might ask: is there still a Peace Corps? at least Matthews is raising the flag for all of us. He doesn’t have to do it, but he does. He believes in the Peace Corps. As we believe in it. The world is going, as my mother would have said, ‘to hell in a handbag,’ with wars and Arab Springs, and struggles to find a way to create democracies, and for some reason Obama and Congress and all the powers-that-be forget that . . .

Bob Shacochis (Eastern Caribbean 1975-76) Novel Amazon Best Book of the Month

Sep 05 2013

Editorial Reviews of The Woman Who Lost Her Soul Amazon.com Review An Amazon Best Book of the Month, September 2013: In this breathtakingly ambitious work, spanning the globe and many decades, Shacochis has crafted a (mostly) fictional backstory to 9/11, tracing the ancient hatreds that continue to infect history. At the story’s core is Jackie Smith (aka Renee Gardner, aka Dottie Chambers), posing as a photojournalist in late-1990s Haiti, a feral and dangerous place — where Jackie fits right in. Beautiful, heedless, and damaged, Jackie/Renee/Dottie is a man-eater: “Hers would be a slavish cult of eager youth and wicked men.” Among those who fall under her spell are the earnest humanitarian lawyer Tom Harrington and the malleable gung-ho Special Forces operative Eville Burnette, not to mention her Croatian-turned-America father, whose inappropriate attentions add a creepy touch. Lording above all is a group of golf buddies, shadowy puppet masters from the . . .

Archive - September 5, 2013