The last brother

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Leonard Lurie

Senator Pothole: The Unauthorized Biography of Al D'Amato explains how and why the U.S. Senate's most controversial member has become one of the country's most important political figures, even though his name has been repeatedly associated with political scandal and his friends and personal associates so often end up in jail. Senator Pothole describes the deals and betrayals that resulted in his election to the Senate in 1980, defeating the venerable Senator Jacob Javits. The book shows how - for a price - D'Amato has set banking policy, determined whether leveraged buy-outs will be allowed, decided which part of society will bear the heaviest tax burden, and whether criminals would be put in jail or become the hidden manipulators of power. Senator Pothole reveals:. How D'Amato arranged Defense Department contracts for the Wedtech Corporation; tolerated the sale of subsidized, low income housing to his friends; and successfully headed off expulsion from the Senate in his roller-coaster (and supposedly last) re-election campaign in 1992. D'Amato's ties to organized crime; at one point D'Amato pleaded with then U.S. Attorney Rudolph Giuliani not to prosecute Godfather Paul Castellano. How D'Amato committed perjury before a grand jury and then admitted it ten years later when the statute of limitations had run out. His involvement in the savings-and-loan scandal. How D'Amato intimidated the Senate Ethics Committee members into slapping him on the wrist instead of expelling him from the Senate. How D'Amato let his brother Armand use his office to peddle influence in selling an obsolete Unisys weapons system to the Navy, which didn't want it. As a result, his brother was convicted of mail fraud in 1993. And much more. The author conducted over four hundred interviews with Senator D'Amato's family members, enemies, friends, and political associates. He also made extensive use of court records and transcripts. The result is the most explosive, eye-opening book written about probably the most corrupt member of Congress of our day.

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Allan Carpenter

A biography of the colorful Sam Houston who served America in many ways, but whose name is now inextricably linked with Texas.

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Kevin Hillstrom

"Provides an absorbing overview of Senator Joseph McCarthy and his anti-Communist "witch hunts" of the 1950s. Also explores the ways in which the McCarthy era shaped the trajectory of American politics and culture for decades to come. Includes a narrative overview, biographies, primary sources, chronology, glossary, bibliography, and index"--Provided by publisher.

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Darrell Dawsey

The statistics about young Black men are familiar: Homicide is their number one killer, one fourth are in jail, on parole, or on probation, and their rates of unemployment, teen fatherhood, educational dropout - and death - exceed those of any other demographic group. Moreover, in the public mind, even those who don't bear out the grim statistics have come to embody society's worst pathologies. Yet, when given the opportunity to speak for themselves, they speak of feeling as fearful as they are feared, as threatened as they are threatening. Living to Tell About It is the first book to look beyond statistics and perceptions to the real lives and experiences of most young Black men in America today. Over the course of a year, journalist Darrell Dawsey traveled across the country, listening to a mosaic of young men talk about their childhoods, relationships with parents and women, sexuality, self-respect, spirituality, ambitions, the race that binds them, and the diversity of class, education and geography that distinguishes them. Interweaving interview material with powerful reflections of his own background as a single-parent child of urban America and a young father, Dawsey portrays the trials, tragedies, and triumphs of young Black men in a society in which they have been the targets of disenfranchisement, neglect, racism, and hostility. The result is a compelling portrait of a generation facing the manifold challenges and dilemmas of Black manhood - and living to tell about it.