In recent decades, American medicine has become increasingly politicized and politics has become increasingly medicalized. Behaviors previously seen as virtuous or wicked, wise or unwise are now dealt with as healthy or sick--unwanted behaviors to be controlled as if they were health issues. The modern penchant for transforming human problems into diseases and judicial sanctions into treatments, replacing the rule of law with the rule of medical discretion, leads to the creation of a type of government social critic Thomas Szasz calls pharmacracy. Medicalizing troublesome behaviors and social problems is tempting to voters and politicians alike: it panders to the people by promising to satisfy their needs for dependence on medical authority and offers easy self-aggrandizement to politicians as the dispensers of more and better health care. Thus, the people gain a convenient scapegoat, enabling them to avoid personal responsibility for their behavior. The government gains a rationale for endless and politically expedient wars against social problems defined as public health emergencies. The health care system gains prestige, funding, and bureaucratic power that only an alliance with the political system can provide. However, Szasz warns, the creeping substitution of pharmacracy for democracy--private medical concerns increasingly perceived as requiring a political response--inexorably erodes personal freedom and dignity. Pharmacracy: Medicine and Politics in America is a clear and convincing presentation of this hidden danger, all too often ignored in our health care debates and avoided in our political contests.

As in his earlier screenplays, Todd Solondz peers deeply into the underside of American suburban life and concerns in Storytelling, with sometimes shocking, sometimes hilarious, results. The film is in two parts: "Fiction" deals with the relationship between students and their black teacher in a college creative writing class while hammering away in decidedly non-PC fashion at the most sensitive social and political concerns of our time: race, sex, prejudice against the disabled. "Nonfiction" follows the attempts of an underachieving documentary filmmaker to capture the day-to-day life of an underachieving high-school student and his family--with surprisingly horrifying results. The film--which stars John Goodman and Julie Hagerty as the parents in the second part of the movie--caused something of a sensation when it was first shown at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2001.

Drawing on newly declassified documents, this behind-the-scenes story of Israel's first year as a sovereign state presents revelations about the attitudes and actions of the Jewish state-builders

Dirty Linen concerns the investigation of a Select Committee into the moral standards of the House of Commons - a somewhat unconventional investigation, rendered not less so by the presence of an ultra-sexy secretary whose clothes have a trick of whisking off in the hands of various members. New-Found-Land is a duologue between two Home Office officials, with a tour-de-force speech on America by one of them.2 women, 8 men

Set in 1930, this play tells of a young English poetess on an extended visit to India at a time when the movements and personalities who were to lead to independence were making themselves known. She meets an Indian artist as well as representatives of raj society, high and low.

"In this stirring rumination, Wallace Shawn considers justice, inequality, blame, revenge, eleventh-century Japanese court poetry, decadence, Beethoven, the relationship between the Islamic world and the West--and the possibility that a better world could be created."--Back cover.

The corruptible power of money and ambition in American politics begins in Venice where a Washington woman reporter trying to repair a bad marriage suddenly spots a professional jeweler, a key figure in the world of Washington’s powerful social and political elite. When she returns to Washington she is shocked to discover that the jeweler has not returned and has, in effect, disappeared. This piques her curiosity and what she uncovers goes to the heart of political corruption on a grand scale; deals with diamonds smuggled into the country to finance a Presidential political campaign and how money and politics impacts on family, children, friends and lovers. This tantalizing and complex thriller deals with the dark side of ambition and the lengths people will go in an effort to attain political power.

Dive into the heart-pounding mystery by the renowned and provocative writer Warren Adler, famed for his blockbuster "The War of the Roses." In the shadowy corners of upper Michigan, Josh and Emily Flanagan, escapees from the high-pressure world of Manhattan's elite, launch an eccentric antique store. Emily, with her keen eye honed in the cutthroat antique appraisal scene, and Josh, a shrewd art and antique insurance adjuster, find their quiet life shattered when a mysterious man arrives, desperate for an antique doll for his sick grandchild. This innocuous request spirals into a whirlwind of dark family secrets, betrayal, and a chilling murder. The Flanagans are thrust into a perilous game of cat and mouse, using their astute investigative skills and creative thinking to uncover clues and untangle a web of deception. At the heart of this suspenseful novel lies a profound mystery. It promises to keep readers on the edge of their seats until the shocking truth is revealed. Readers are hooked on Flanagan's Dolls: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "This story has a bit of Holmes, Christie and Fletcher. Loads of characters to choose from." - Goodreads Review ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "This is a book of luxurious enjoyment for anyone who loves a good mystery, or comedy, or sparkling good characterization. It has all three and much more." - Goodreads Review ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ "Quite different from most of Adler's books, but still a great cozy!" - Goodreads Review

The truth about the impact of "new" people on a mountain resort. In this collection of fictional short stories, the reader will find insights and truths engendered by the modern invasion of "new folks" to glorious mountain enclaves now dubbed "resorts." These acclaimed stories capture the truth, warts and all, of how modern life can corrupt and enhance a traditional environment. They are based on the author's experience as a long-time resident of this pristine valley in Wyoming nestled in the heart of the Grand Tetons, America's most beautiful mountain range. Warren Adler is the Founder of the Jackson Hole Writer's Conference and the former Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Jackson Public Library.

Warren Adler is the acclaimed author of 25 novels, published in 30 languages. Two of his books, "The War of the Roses" and "Random Hearts" were made into major motion pictures. He lives in Jackson Hole, Wyoming and New York City.The people who run the influential newspaper the Washington Chronicle have just exposed and brought down a President with their investigative reporting. Flushed with power, they now attempt to create their own choice for Chief Executive. Clashing relationships within the media and in the political arena reveal the motives, insecurities, and thirst for ascendancy between rival factions fighting for power. With rich emotional characterizations, this story tears away the curtain from the spin-doctors and sinister figures that populate the corridors of power in the nation's capital. Here is the ultimate Washington insider novel that reveals the machinations of a media that will stop at nothing to achieve power and influence over the political agenda."The most courageous and truthful novel to come out of Washington in years."· Viola Drath"A tight, absorbing, timely story."· West Coast Review of Books"A Washington cliffhanger."· Kirkus Review"A fast-paced suspense story."· Washington Star

Jack Cooper is an unhappy man-mind, body, and spirit. He has lost his longstanding job to the economy, his mother to illness, and his wife to her secret lover. All in the blink of an eye. Beaten, broken and crippled by tragedy, Jack withdraws into total isolation, narrowing his life down to the simplest routines to block out the pain. His day begins with a strenuous workout at the Bethesda Health Club, his oasis. There, his mind and body can be free. His day ends in his tiny apartment, where he escapes from reality with his books until he can lose himself in sleep. Rinse and repeat. That is until he meets the enigmatic Mike Parrish. Parrish has no official identification. He was stolen from the hospital as a newborn and passed around from household to household. To the government and the world at large, he does not exist. He is an anonymous drifter but also the first person who breaks through Cooper's emotional confinement. Cooper finds solace in his friendship with Parrish, a man who understands his plight and is sympathetic to his pain. But then Parrish suddenly disappears, leaving Cooper to search for a virtually invisible man. As he looks for clues as intangible as ghosts and chases down leads as fleeting as shadows, his search leads him back to the one place he called his refuge: the Bethesda Health Club. How much can be taken from a man before he has nothing to lose?

Hang on for a Wild Journey through the Political and Spiritual Adventures of the Baby-Boom Generation Join Wes "Scoop" Nisker as he takes us on a hilarious, wild ride through the heyday of the Beats and the Hippies and the birth of the modern environmental movement, and the surge of Buddhism in the West.

In this timely and provocative study, William I. Robinson challenges received wisdom on Central America. He starts with an exposition on the new global capitalism. Then, drawing on a wide range of historical documentation, interviews, and social science research, he proceeds to show how capitalist globalization has thoroughly transformed the region, disrupting the conventional pattern of revolutionary upheaval, civil wars, and pacification, and ushering in instead a new transnational model of economy and society. Beyond his focus on Central America, Robinson provides a critical framework for understanding development and social change in other regions of the world in the age of globalization. Demonstrating how the very forces of capitalism have brought into being new social agents and political actors unlikely to acquiesce in the face of the emerging order, Transnational Conflicts shows why the Isthmus, along with other regions, is likely to return to the headlines in the near future.

The home of successive waves of immigrants, from the Huguenots in the seventeenth century to the Jews in the nineteenth and the Bangla-Deshis today, London’s East End has been the scene of its worst poverty and exploitation, and has inspired its greatest philanthropists, reformers and radicals. The East End is, and always has been, a place where conditions are tough, crime violent and work hard, but in which Cockney optimism and love of life are proverbial. In this evocative book, the area’s turbulent past and continuing traditions are accurately explored in text and pictures. If East End life has a character that transcends period and generation, it is vividly captured and delineated here, in a book which will delight and intrigue alike the citizen, the historian, the general reader and the visitor. Full of B&W historical photos.