The men selected to be the astronauts during the “space race” were portrayed by the government and the media as perfect heroes and their wives were required to be just as perfect. This book by Lily Koppel provides interesting insights into the human side of both the astronauts and the wives, and often the women were more admirable than the men. I recommend the book for the detailed history of the space program presented in context with world events, such as the Soviet launching of Sputnik (fellow traveler) and the interesting descriptions of the wives and how they dealt with the invasive microscope of media scrutiny. Continue reading
Author Archives: RF_Alum
Buy The Farm
This expression came to mind as I was reading and reviewing The Astronauts Wives Club and thinking of the accidents that killed several astronauts. The Phrase Finder explains that the expression means “To die, particularly in an accident or military action.” The origin of the expression is uncertain, but explanations often include something to do with buying something at the cost of a serviceman’s life. The Phrase Finder suggests it might come from the fact a family receives an insurance payout when a serviceman is killed in action and that payout might be used to pay the family mortgage. However, it is admitted “…that we don’t have full evidence, that’s just speculation.”
Muslim Brotherhood Origins
I’ve been baffled trying to understand the basis of Islamic terrorism and what I have been hearing about the Muslim Brotherhood. One example of my confusion was how the young men who flew airplanes into buildings on 9/11 after living in the U.S. in complete freedom and tolerance could have enough hate to do what they did. I recently read the book “The Closing of the Muslim Mind” by Robert R. Reilly (that is reviewed on this date) and it provides some answers. I remain conflicted that any God could want the murder of people innocent except that they haven’t read the book of the chosen God and lived their lives strictly by his teachings. However, Reilly’s book explains why there are Islamists who are not conflicted by that. Continue reading
The Closing of the Muslim Mind
The subtitle of this book by Robert R. Reilly is “How Intellectual Suicide Created the Modern Islamist Crisis,” and the author certainly documents the basis for that subtitle. I did not enjoy reading this book for several reasons. It provides the Islamic words to interpret various descriptions and meanings, and I found that quite distracting.(Page 43 has 14 examples, to include fard for duty and mubah for permitted.) I was also disappointed early when the author announced that he was going to focus strictly on Sunni beliefs and was not going to discuss the “Shi’ites…except tangentially…” I was disappointed there wouldn’t be any help for me understanding the differences between those two groups.
The best of book is Chapter 8, “The Sources of Islamism.” It answers many of my questions about the Muslim Brotherhood and its widespread influence. The origin of the Muslim Brotherhood is traced back to the shock among Islamists over the abolition of the caliphate by Kemal Ataturk in 1924. (I have done a commentary including discussion of that event that I intend to post with this review.) The Muslims decided this must have been caused by their lack of faith. The only solution was to restore “…Muslim faith to a pristine condition.” In late forties and early fifties Sayyid Qutb traveled from Egypt to college in Greely, Colorado. He was disgusted by what he saw as a materialist and degenerate culture. He traveled back to Egypt and became a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood. He went to the gallows in 1966 smiling, and that image inspires his followers today. It is worth noting that there were periods in the development of the Muslim Brotherhood that they modeled themselves after the Nazi Brownshirts and later were part of the Communist party in Egypt. Continue reading
Can of Worms
This expression has been around since at least the 1950s, although some web sites think it might have originated much earlier. There is no doubt the expression is used to describe, as explained by mentalfloss.com, to describe the impossible task of solving a problem that is equal to trying to identify one worm in a mass of worms. The result is “…more trouble than you bargained for.”
Booby Prize
The Phrase Finder explains that this is an expression for a “…prize given to make fun of the loser in a contest or game.” Further explanation is that the word “booby” has been used to mean dunce or nincompoop since the late sixteenth century. “The word probably derives from the Spanish word ‘bobo’ meaning ‘fool’ or ‘dunce’.”