Book Review: “My Boyfriend’s Back: 50 True Stories of Reconnecting with a Long-Lost Love” by Donna Hanover.

As a New Yorker and Rudy Giuliani fan I was fully prepared to dislike this book, but I ended up enjoying it. From 1994 through 2001 the author was First Lady of New York City. She and Giuliani were married for 18 years and had two children. She was the lead anchor for the 10 p.m. news on WPIX Channel 11 for much of the 1980s. She previously was an anchorwoman in Miami and also appeared on the syndicated Wall Street Journal Report.
Donna Hanover and Mayor Giuliani had a public and messy divorce in which she refused to move out of NYC’s Gracie Mansion. The theme of the book is encountering the romantic past, and many of the couples had not seen each other since high school or even grammar school. They claim these rekindled relationships have erased the decades. The stories are mostly, but not all, happy endings. The age ranges of the reunited couples range from 20s thru 70s. It includes regular folks and some celebrities.
Among them are Carol Channing, who married her high school sweetheart, Harry Kullijian, in 2003, when they were in their early 80’s. Suzanne Pleshette and Tom Poston, both of “The Bob Newhart Show,” were wed in 2001, 45 years after their romance went bust. The designer Nicole Miller also reconnected with an early love, as did Carole Keeton Rylander. She called herself “one tough grandma” when she won re-election to the state comptroller’s job in Texas in 2002. In August 2003, Donna Hanover, 53, married Edwin A. Oster, whom she met in high school at a debate team competition in Northern California.
Her point is that a romantic interest from the distant past leaves an imprint on your mind that never goes away. It is not that you just happened to meet the right person at 15. The sharing of roots is very significant. These couples have things in common from growing up the same way. The fantasy is that you see this person the way they were. You look at an 80 year old woman and see an 18 year old. There is plenty of scientific evidence to support Hanover’s thesis regarding the impact of early romances.
Hanover relies heavily on the work of Nancy Kalish, a psychology professor at California State University in Sacramento and author of the 1997 book “Lost & Found Lovers: Facts and Fantasies of Rekindled Romance”. Kalish has spent 11 years collecting data from more than 3,000 adults who tried reunions
In Kalish’s initial sample of 1,000 lost-and-found lovers, ages 18 to 95, nearly three-quarters remained together after a decade of study. When these past lovers married each other, their divorce rate after four years tallied in at no more than 1.5 percent. Usually, second marriages are relatively fragile: In the public at large, nearly one-quarter of all couples who remarry get divorced again within five years.
If you are seriously interested in this topic you should read Kalish. If you want light reading with amusing anecdotes than Hanover is the best choice.
The first chapter of Hanover’s book includes the following dialogue:
“It was August 2002, a stifling hot afternoon in New York … Nothing stood out about that day until the phone rang. “Donna, it’s Ed Oster.” I sat down. Ed Oster was my high school love. He was also my college love – until he broke my heart. I tried to hear Ed’s voice over the pulse pounding in my ear.
“I was wondering,” Ed asked tentatively, “if you’re planning to go to the Stanford reunion.” This was interesting to say the least. What was going on here? This was the guy who had dumped me freshman year and had spoken to me for maybe two minutes at our reunion five years ago.
“Yes,” I said and then waited. Silently I prayed, “Please don’t let this be about fund-raising.” “Well, the reunion isn’t until October,” Ed said, “but my work is bringing me to New York next week. I was wondering if I could take you out for coffee.” I thought to myself, “I gotta call somebody – no one’s going to believe this.” Oh-so-casually I responded, “Let me check my calendar.” After flipping through several weeks of blank “date” pages, I said, “I think I can free up a little time.”

“Losing Mum and Pup: A Memoir” by Christopher Buckley — Book Review by Gregory Hilton

My admiration for the William F. Buckley’s will not come as a surprise to anyone, but this book is a real disappointment. Christopher Buckley is a successful novelist but I could never have done a hatchet job like this on my parents. He harshly criticizes them for what appear to be minor infractions. He portrays his mother as a borderline alcoholic and a pathological liar. He also tell us she was not religious and a hypocrite:
“I don’t think I ever once heard Mum utter a religious or spiritual sentiment, a considerable feat considering that she was married for 57 years to one of the most prominent Catholics in the country. But she rigorously observed the proprieties. When Pup taped an episode of ‘Firing Line’ in the Sistine Chapel with Princess Grace, Malcolm Muggeridge, Charlton Heston and David Niven, Mum was included in the post-taping audience with Pope John Paul II. There’s a photo of the occasion: she has on more black lace than a Goya duchess. The total effect is that of Mary Magdalene dressed by Bill Blass.”
Christopher tell us his father neglected him. He complains because his dad left his Yale graduation ceremony before it was over, and he withheld encouraging words about Christopher’s books.
At the very least, Christopher used his father’s means and name to establish himself, and that alone is enough to demand a shred of loyalty.
William F. Buckley was a prolific and highly regarded author. Perhaps he was a workaholic and Pat Buckley could have been a alcoholic. This is a book that never should have been written, and should not be read. I would have told Christopher to talk to a friend, a pastor, or a therapist about issues with his parents. His parents now have no way of explaining or denying these accusations.

The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington by Robert D. Novak

The best part is Novak's response of Ambassador Joseph Wilson

The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington by Robert D. Novak

The book has many entertaining stories about DC in the old days, and we are missing a lot from that era. The book’s original manuscript was 1,400 pages which was reduced to 672 pages. At the end I wanted to read more and I am now wondering what I missed.
The best part was Novak’s rebuttal of former Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who in 2004 published “The Politics of Truth: Inside the Lies that Led to War and Betrayed My Wife’s CIA Identity: A Diplomat’s Memoir.” In late February of 2002, Wilson was sent to Niger on behalf of the CIA to investigate the possibility that Saddam Hussein had a deal to buy enriched uranium yellowcake. Wilson’s July 6, 2003 New York Times op-ed article became one of the focal points for the 2004 president campaign. Wilson claimed President Bush lied because of the controversial “16 words” in his 2003 State of the Union Address: “The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.”
Wilson said Iraq was never trying to acquire uranium from Niger, but Novak demonstrates that the person who was lying is Wilson. Wilson’s claims were rebutted by the Senate Intelligence Committee report, the British government’s Butler Committee report and by Wilson’s prior actions. The British Inquiry said “It is accepted by all parties that Iraqi officials visited Niger in 1999. The British Government had intelligence from several different sources indicating that this visit was for the purpose of acquiring uranium. Since uranium constitutes almost three-quarters of Niger’s exports, the intelligence was credible.”
A July 13, 2005 “Wall Street Journal” editorial also says Wilson lied in his “What I Didn’t Find in Africa” article. The Journal says Wilson lied about “what he’d discovered in Africa, how he’d discovered it, what he’d told the CIA about it, or even why he was sent on the mission.” An editorial headlined “A Good Leak” published in the April 9, 2006 “Washington Post” claims “Mr. Wilson was the one guilty of twisting the truth and that, in fact, his report [to the CIA] supported the conclusion that Iraq had sought uranium.”

Book Review: The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression by Amity Shlaes

A new and revised paperback edition has now been released.

The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression by Amity Shlaes

I highly recommend this book because it has important lessons for policy makers in the Obama Administration who will address the current international economic downturn. The book is an excellent rebuttal to anyone who claims “FDR’s policies got us out of the Great Depression.”
The New Deal programs of the 1930’s such as the establishment of Social Security, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the FDIC were essential reforms. A significant number of President Franklin Roosevelt’s reforms were actually began during the Herbert Hoover Administration. A significant change was that FDR began the process of reversing the disastrous protectionism of Hoover’s Smoot-Hawley Tariff, which raised rates to 70% and resulted in trade barriers around the world. The tariff rates came down but they were still too high to generate global trade.
Other New Deal efforts to limit supply and control wages and prices were definitely not successful. In fact, the author demonstrates how the National Recovery Act and the Works Progress Administration were a hindrance to economic recovery. The Great Depression began at the end of October in 1929, but in 1938 another serious downturn occurred. This was called “a depression within a depression,” and it emphasized the failure of so many New Deal reforms. FDR’s attacks on the business community, his high tax rates and his class warfare rhetoric all resulted in a dramatic drop in the type of investment which was essential for recovery.
I have read many books on the causes and consequences of the Great Depression and I would rank this as one of the best. I saw many parallels to the increased tax and spend policies which are being advocated today.