Notable essay:

Malcolm Turnbull, MP (Paliment of Australia, personal website).
"My five", The Austrlian, 01 November 2006.

Reviews several books on water resources, most focus on Australia's Murray-Darling River Basin but also includes some on America. The books reviewed are:

Australia's Water Resources: From Use to Management.
John Pigram, CSIRO Publishing, 2006.

When the Rivers Run Dry: What Happens When the Water Runs Out?.
Fred Pearce, Doubleday, 2006.

Rivers as Ecological Systems: The Murray-Darling Basin.
W.J. Young (ed), Murray-Darling Basin Commission, 2001.

Talking Water: An Australian Guidebook for the 21st Century.
Farmhand Foundation, 2004, www.farmhand.org.au.

Water and Politics in the Murray-Darling Basin
Daniel Connell, Federation Press (February, 2007).

Cadillac Desert: The American West and its Disappearing Water.
Mark Reisner, Penguin, 1993.

Current History, Vol. 105, No. 687, January 2006.
Issue topic: The Middle East

The article "A 'Shiite Crescent'? The Regional Impact of the Iraq War" by Juan Cole is particularly good at describing the various competing and incompatible political and religious factions in Iraq and neighboring countries.

Véliz, "The Optional Descent of the English Speaking World" (2006)

Interesting Talk

Claudio Véliz, "The Optional Descent of the English Speaking World," The Anglosphere Institute, Hudson Institute, Washington, D.C., 11 October 2006.

• Event Description. [Update 20190115: no data]
• The Anglosphere Institute. [Update 20190115: no data]
• Hudson Institute.
• MP3 audio file, hudson.org. [Update 20190115: no audio]
• MP3 audio file, hudson.org via the WaybackMachine at Archive.org.
  [Update 20190115: This Works!]
• Video. (NOTE: The last 2 or 3 minutes are missing from the video version but present in the audio version.) [Update 20190115: no video]

Véliz discusses the voluntary adoption around the world of Anglosphere originated cultural practices, and thus the values embodied in those practices.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Author Information:

• Claudio Véliz (b. 1930), Wikipedia.
• Claudio Véliz. The New World of the Gothic Fox: Culture and Economy in English and Spanish America. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994.
  [Publisher; Google Books; Amazon.com.]
• Claudio Véliz. The Centralist Tradition of Latin America. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1980; 2014.
  [Publisher; Google Books; Amazon.com.]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Video: Claudio Veliz

• Claudio Veliz, "The Sun Rises in the West," Mannkal Economic Education Foundation, Perth, October 2010.
  • Veliz, Part 2 of 3.
  • Veliz, Part 3 of 3.
  • The Sun Rises in the West, Perth Conference, 7-8 October 2010, YouTube Playlist, Mannkal Economic Education Foundation.
  • Mannkal Economic Education Foundation, Australia.
  • Mannkal Economic Education Foundation, YouTube Channel.
  • Mannkal Economic Education Foundation, Facebook.
  • The Sun Rises in the West II, Perth, 2017, YouTube Playlist, Mannkal Economic Education Foundation and Institute of Public Affairs.
  • Institute of Public Affairs, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Notable essay:

Jeffrey Hart, "Ideology Has Consequences: Bush rejects the politics of prudence", The American Conservative, 20 Nov 2006.

The National Interest, Number 84, Summer 2006.

Notable essay:

The Muslim Problem and What to Do about It, Quadrant, Vol. L, No. 9, September 2006.

The leaders of Australia's two major political parties (Liberal Party of Australia, Australian Labor Party) have started to directly address this problem; American politicians continue dithering about a "religion of peace".

Science, 22 September 2006 (Vol. 313, No. 5794, pages 1700-1801).

Notable article:
"2006 Visualization Challenge"
Nice images illustrating scientific ideas.

Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture, Vol. 30, No. 9, September 2006.

I found the quality of the articles in this magazine uneven, a few were good but most had me wondering why I wasted my time reading them. If you're looking for periodicals dealing with issues of public policy, history, literature, etc. from a conservative perspective, I think your time would be much better spent with journals such as: The Claremont Review of Books, The New Criterion, City Journal, The American Conservative, First Things, Policy Review.

Current History, Vol. 105, No. 693, October 2006.
Issue topic: Russia and Eurasia.

John Fraser Hart.
The Land That Feeds Us.
New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1991 (reprint 1993).
Book information: Amazon.com.

An introductory survey of the history, economics, geography and practice of agriculture in the United States, characterising regional farming practices in the East, Mid-West and South. Much of the book is based upon the author's visits to farms in 1958/1959 and again in 1982/1983, which illustrate his discussion of why particular patterns of farming occurred in each region and how those patterns changed over time due to economic and technological factors. (Those changes include: fewer farms with greater acreages; increased specialization; increased mechanization; greater yields per acre; less labor input per unit output.)

The National Interest, Number 85, September/October 2006.

Notable essays:
"9/11/06, Five Years On".

Notable essay:

Joshua Kurlantzick. "Crude Awakening: The coming resource war", The New Republic, 2 October 2006.

The New Republic's article is based on an essay that appeared in The National Interest:
Flynt Leverett and Pierre Noel. "The New Axis of Oil", The National Interest, Number 84, Summer 2006.

Roff Smith, photographs by Sam Abell.
Australia: Journey Through A Timeless Land.
Washington, D.C.: National Geographic, 1999 (reprint 2001).
Book information: Amazon.com.

A large format picture book with essays describing various regions of Australia; a good introduction to Australia, somewhat oriented towards potential tourists, but not a travel guide. More detailed versions of the author's travel anecdotes can be found in his other book.

William J. Lines.
A Long Walk in the Australian Bush.
Athens, Georgia: The University of Georgia Press, 1998.
Sydney: University of New South Wales Press, 1998.
Book information: Amazon.com, Booktopia.

An account of a long distance hike during September/October 1993 along the Bibbulmun Track in southwestern Western Australia. The Track route was redesigned 1993-1998 so the book's account does not correspond to the current Track.

Additional Bibbulmun Track links:
Dept. of Conservation and Land Management (CALM), WA (due to mergers now called the Dept. of Environment and Conservation)
Aushiker: Hiking in Western Australia
Wikipedia
John Chapman (bushwalking enthusiast and guide book author)

On the frame of a travelogue the author hangs short essays dealing with: the environmental history of the region, forestry (particularly the Jarrah tree), exploitation and management of natural resources, Aboriginal lore, ecology, native & non-native flora & fauna, human interaction with nature. Rather than a travel guide for tourists the book is a survey of how people interact with nature.

The author is a strong critic of the destruction of Jarrah and Karri forests by dams, logging, bauxite mining, and the negligence associated with the spread of Phytophthora cinnamomi infection (dieback). (Land clearing for agricultural uses was historically a major cause of deforestation but the author doesn't have much to say about this except for an episode after World War I when a government scheme promoted the clearing of land that turned out to be unsuitable for crop farming.) Much of the author's intent is to examine the sources of human thought and action at group and individual levels that lead to the destruction of forests and a general disregard for nature. In the author's analysis some wellmeaning people who contribute to this destruction include: (a) government forestry managers who actively enable the depredations of the logging and mining industries; (b) people who live their lives entirely within a human fabricated setting and are constitutionally unprepared to defend or relate to nature on its own terms; (c) environmentalists who operate within the rationalist framework of industrial, free-market civilization and thereby become unwitting accomplices in the destruction of Western Australian forests. The author distinguishes between himself as a nature lover and environmentalists, perhaps a strange distinction on its face, but one can find some sense in it in light of the author's philosophical opposition to the ideas of progress and growth: human material progress, economic and population growth invariably occurs at the expense of the destruction of wilderness. In the author's analysis no amount of "sustainable" or "renewable" practices can prevent such destruction in a context of growth and "progress."

Additional links for the Jarrah forests, Australian conservation organizations, etc.:
Western Australian Forest Alliance (WAFA)
WAFA: About our Jarrah Forest: The World’s Only Jarrah Forest: Reversing the Decline
The Wilderness Society - Western Australia
The Wilderness Society - The Western Australia Forest Campaign
Conservation Council of Western Australia
Australian Conservation Foundation
The Colong Foundation for Wilderness
Environmental Defender’s Office of Western Australia
Southern Forests (tourism information) nice map
Managing WA forests (state government website)
Forest Products Commission (state government agency)
Alcoa in Australia (bauxite miner)

Roff Smith.
Cold Beer and Crocodiles: A Bicycle Journey into Australia.
Washington, D.C.: National Geographic, 2000 (reprint 2001).
Book information: Amazon.com.

I would be happier if this book were twice as long and had more pictures (many Amazon reviewers also comment that the book seems too short to them). The author bicycled a counter-clockwise route around Australia starting and ending in Sydney during 1996/1997. Most of the text discusses the regions he visited during the first half of his trip: New South Wales, Queensland, and the Top End. He has very little to say about southwestern Western Australia, South Australia, Victoria and Tasmania. He relates many stories of encounters with the inhabitants during the first half of his trip; after that his interest in the adventure wanes. The desolation of the northwestern, western and southern coasts, a crash with injuries in Western Australia that required a 3 week recovery, followed by the Nullarbor Plain, cumulatively seems to have broken his spirit (the author admits this on page 277). Then he picked up a viral infection in South Australia that hindered the remainder of the trip. The book may be insightful for NSW, QLD, NT and parts of WA; it is very weak for SA, VIC, TAS.

Bill Bryson.
In a Sunburned Country.
New York: Broadway Books, 2000, 2001.
Book information: Amazon.com.

Travels around Australia during 1999 & 2000.

Tony Horwitz.
One For The Road: An Outback Adventure, revised edition.
New York: Vintage Books / Random House, 1999.
Originally published: Sydney & New York: Harper & Row, 1987.
Book information: Amazon.com.

Hitchhiking the Australian outback during 1986/1987.

Elizabeth Kay Berner and Robert A. Berner.
Global Environment: Water, Air, and Geochemical Cycles.
Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1996.
Book information: Publisher, Amazon.com.

This book is a revised second edition of the authors' earlier book The Global Water Cycle: Geochemistry and Environment, 1987. The book is a good introduction to aquatic chemistry in various geological contexts: rainwater, rock weathering, rivers, lakes, estuaries, oceans. With respect to chemistry the book is very introductory; occasionally extensive literature reviews give the book a tedious character.

More substantial accounts of the topics discussed in Global Environment: Water, Air, and Geochemical Cycles can be found in books like the following:

• James I. Drever.
  The Geochemistry of Natural Waters: Surface and Groundwater Environments, Third edition.
  Prentice Hall, 1997.


• Werner Stumm and James J. Morgan.
  Aquatic Chemistry: Chemical Equillibra and Rates in Natural Waters, Third edition.
  Wiley, 1996.


• C.A.J. Appelo and D. Postma.
  Geochemistry, Groundwater and Pollution, Second edition.
  Taylor & Francis, 2005.


• Edward A. Laws.
  Aquatic Pollution: An Introductory Text, Third edition.
  Wiley, 2000.


• René P. Schwarzenbach, Philip M. Gschwend, Dieter M. Imboden.
  Environmental Organic Chemistry, Second edition.
  Wiley, 2002.


• Michael Jacobson, Robert J. Charlson, Henning Rodhe, Gordon H. Orians.
  Earth System Science: From Biogeochemical Cycles to Global Change.
  Academic Press, 2000.
  (The first edition of this book appeared under the title Global Biogeochemical Cycles in 1992.)


• Patrick A. Domenico and Franklin W. Schwartz.
  Physical and Chemical Hydrogeology, Second edition.
  Wiley, 1997.


• G. A. Cole.
  Textbook of Limnology, Fourth edition.
  Waveland Press Inc., 1994.


• Abraham Lerman, et al., editors.
  Physics and Chemistry of Lakes, Second edition.
  Springer Verlag, 1995.


• Roy Chester.
  Marine Geochemistry, Second edition.
  Blackwell Publishers, 2003.


• and the books on Atmospheric Chemistry listed here.

Notable Essay:

Crisis in Europe by Bruce Bawer (The Hudson Review, Vol. 58, No. 4, Winter 2006).

Discusses the lack of liberty-mindedness in Europe, particularly among European intellectuals and Europe's Muslim immigrants. Bawer is the author of While Europe Slept: How Radical Islam is Destroying the West from Within.

The American Interest, Volume 1, Number 3, Spring 2006.

Notable Essay:

Civil Society at The Second Draft by Richard Landes and Pedro Zúquete.

An introduction to the concept of civil society (and its relationship to pre-modern / traditional / aristocratic / agricultural / hiearchical societies). The Second Draft website has many insightful essays, many of a general nature providing a philosophical framework for understanding political disputes, in addition to those particularly related to the Arab-Israeli conflict. See also Richard Landes' blog Augean Stables.

First Things, Number 162, April 2006.

Notable essays:

• Theology’s Continental Captivity by R.R. Reno.
  [Discusses differences between analytic philosophy and continental philosophy.]


• Iraq: Then & Now by George Weigel.
  [Discusses the Iraq war in the context of just war theory; opposes those who (mis)use just war theory to oppose the Iraq war.]

City Journal, Volume 16, Number 1, Winter 2006.

Notable essays:

• The Plot to Shush Rush and O’Reilly by Brian C. Anderson.
  [Politically motivated attempts to squelch free speech via campaign-finance "reform".]


• Marriage and Caste by Kay S. Hymowitz.
  [Marriage is the sine qua non for the overall well-being of children.]

Notable Essay:

The Return of Patriarchy by Phillip Longman. Foreign Policy, March/April 2006.

"Patriarchal societies come in many varieties and evolve through different stages. What they have in common are customs and attitudes that collectively serve to maximize fertility and parental investment in the next generation."

Peter Brimblecombe.
Air Composition & Chemistry, Second Edition.
Cambridge University Press, 1996.
(Series: Cambridge Environmental Chemistry Series, Volume 6.)
Book information: Publisher, Amazon.com.

An introduction to the chemistry of planetary atmospheres. The discussions of lapse rate and chemical kinetics had me reaching for a physical chemistry book: the author's discussion is necessarially compressed and incomplete; throughout the book the derivation of mathematical expressions for physical laws are compressed, abbreviated, and even completely eliminated. The book also lacks exercises. Despite these criticisms, this book is a very good introduction to the subject.

Standard textbooks in this area include:

• Richard P. Wayne.
  Chemistry of Atmospheres: An Introduction to the Chemistry of the Atmospheres of Earth, the Planets, and Their Satellites, Third Edition.
  Oxford University Press, 2002.


• John H. Seinfeld and Spyros N. Pandis.
  Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics: From Air Pollution to Climate Change.
  Wiley-Interscience, 1997.


• Peter Warneck.
  Chemistry of the Natural Atmosphere, Second Edition.
  Academic Press, 1999.


• Barbara J. Finlayson-Pitts and James N. Pitts, Jr.
  Chemistry of the Upper and Lower Atmosphere: Theory, Experiments, and Applications.
  Academic Press, 1999.

The National Interest, Number 82, Winter 2005/2006.

Notable Essays:

• Thinking Seriously: About Energy and Oil's Future by James Schlesinger (pages 19-24).
  A warning about the coming "plateau" in the supply of petroleum (end in growth of supply). Of immediate concern is the need for increased refinery capacity; of longer term concern is the economic and social disruption that will occur as liquid fuel supplies plateau.


• War, Trade and Utopia by Barry C. Lynn (pages 31-38).
  Discusses the strategic and economic dangers of the unprecendented rise over the past 15 years of industrial interdepencence between China and the USA.


• Prone to Violence: The Paradox of the Democratic Peace by Edward D. Mansfield and Jack Snyder (pages 39-45).
  Newly democratizing states have proven to be prone to international and civil war. The authors' book is Electing to Fight : Why Emerging Democracies Go to War.


• Her Majesty's Secret Service by Steven Simon and Jonathan Stevenson (pages 48-54).
  Despite its title, this essay considers the state of Islamic radicalism and measures to identify and mitigate it in the UK, continental Europe (briefly), and the USA (at length).


• Terror and the Fifth Republic by Alexis Debat (pages 55-61).
  A survey of France's considerable counter-terrorism efforts (France lacks the Constitutional restrictions of the USA and thus has very wide powers to monitor and prosecute those who would disrupt the peace).


• Mexico's Wasted Chance by Fredo Arias-King (pages 87-93).
  A good essay on Mexican politics. The reform party Partido Accion Nacional (PAN), or more precisely, its leaders (starting at the top with President Vicente Fox), have been compromised and now follow the path of corruption like their predecessors, the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI). A helpful essay for understanding the obstacles to economic, political, and legal progress in Latin American countries.


• Why Anglos Lead by Lawrence M. Mead (pages 124-131).
  It's due to the political, legal, and economic culture of England and its colonial extensions, the USA, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. Mead explicitly says that he is not writing about James Bennett's "Anglosphere" idea (Link).

The Claremont Review of Books, Volume VI, Number 1, Winter 2005/06.

Notable Essays:

• Philosophy in Democratic Times by Algis Valiunas.
  On George Santayana.


• The Logic of the "Peace Process" by Angelo M. Codevilla.
  The United States has prevented the majority Shia and Kurds from forcefully dealing with the Bathist Sunni minority, thus encouraging the Sunni instigated Iraqi civil war. Without a decisive victory over the Sunnis there can be no peace in Iraq. Unfortunately, USA policy makers have no stomach for the kind of victory that would ensure pease.
  Note: Codevilla is the author of No Victory, No Peace.

A. R. (Andrew Robert) Burn.
The Persian Wars: The Greeks and the Defence of the West, c. 546 - 478 B.C.
London: The Folio Society, 2002.

Previously published as:
Persia and the Greeks: The Defence of the West, c. 546 - 478 B.C., Second Edition. London: Gerald Duckworth and Co., Ltd., 1984.
American Edition: Stanford University Press, 1984 (Amazon).

This book covers mostly the same period and events in Greek history as Herodotus (less Egypt and Scythia); thus I found it an excellent sequel to reading Herodotus. In many ways the book is a commentary on and updating of Herodotus, using all the resources of history and archeology accumulated since the time of Herodotus.

The Claremont Review of Books, Volume V, Number 3, Summer 2005.

Notable Essays:

• Between Idealism and Realism by Adam Wolfson.
  A good essay on President Bush's foreign policy.


• The Long Detour by William A. Rusher.
  A survey of the rise of the Conservative movement in 20th century American politics. It describes how Richard Nixon, an opportunist who opposed the Conservatives, delayed the Conservative electoral triumph from 1968 until 1980.

Theodore Dalrymple (psuedonym of Anthony Daniels).
Life At the Bottom: The Worldview That Makes the Underclass.
Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, Publisher, 2001.

The denial of individual responsibility and free will yields a rotten fruit when those ideas, promulgated by intellectuals (cultural leaders such as teachers) and practiced by the functionaries of the welfare state, are adopted by the weakest members of society (namely the poor and unintelligent, or merely ignorant). The excellent essays comprising this book arose from Dalrymple's experience as a physician/psychiatrist in Birmingham, England and were originally published in City Journal.

Links to Book Reviews and Other Essays by Dalrymple:

• Manhattan Institute (Links to Book Reviews on the left side of this page.)


• Brothers Judd (Links to Book Reviews and other Dalrymple essays at the bottom of this page.)


• The Social Affairs Unit (A London public policy research group.)


• Our Culture, What's Left of It: The Mandarins and the Masses, Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, Publisher, 2005. (A more recent collection of his City Journal essays.)

Policy Review, Number 134, December 2005/January 2006.

Notable Essays:

• China’s Quest for Asia by Dana Dillon and John J. Tkacik Jr.
  Describes China's increasingly aggressive foreign policy in which China uses economic bargaining to coerce Southeast Asian nations to align with China and (perhaps) against the United States. Part of this realignment is clearly due to the United States' neglect of diplomatic relations with Southeast Asian nations.


• Making Democracy Stick by Gerard Alexander.
  One of many essays published recently in foreign policy journals discussing the problems of exporting democratic government to regions with historically authoritarian cultural traditions. (See, for example, The National Interest: here, here; and Foreign Affairs: here, here.)