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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 9:04pm CET
The Mafia Encyclopedia (Facts on File)
Publisher: Checkmark Books | ISBN: 0816038570 | edition 1999 | CHM | 414 pages | 15,4 mb
They're all there, starting with Anthony Joseph Accardo (1906-1992), the Chicago mob leader known as Tony to crime pals, Mr. Accardo to underlings, Joe Batters to his subordinates, and as "having more brains before breakfast than Al Capone had all day" to syndicate supporters, and working through the alphabet to Abner "Longy" Zwillman (1899-1959), a crime-syndicate founder and New Jersey boss, one of the most feared of the Jewish Mafia, known as the "Al Capone of new Jersey," and much revered for his love affair with Jean Harlow.
Between Accardo and Zwillman, Carl Sifakis explores the lives, reputations, exploits, and subcultures of more than 450 Mafia perpetrators and personalities. Sifakis describes the individuals, codes of behavior, misdeeds, legal scrapes, rivalries, and flamboyant lifestyles associated with the world of organized crime--an entity whose existence J. Edgar Hoover denied for 30 years. Sifakis's research is thorough, and his subjects are nefarious and riveting. It's his feel for storytelling, however, that makes his encyclopedia so enjoyable. He writes about infamous characters such as Al Capone (who felt his bootlegging was merely a public service) and John Gotti (a.k.a. the Teflon Don, who's now serving a life sentence) as well as the Mafia Social Clubs, Donnie Brasco (the FBI agent who infiltrated the mob and sent more than 100 mobsters to prison), and the importance of slot machines to the post-Prohibition welfare of organized crime.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 7:29pm CET
M. Lyons, "The Russian Imperial Army - A Bibliography of Regimental Histories and Related Works"The Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace | 1968 | ISBN: none | 188 pgs. | PDF | 36MB
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 7:03pm CET
Floya Anthias, "Racialized Boundaries: Race, Nation, Gender, Colour and Class and the Anti-Racist Struggle"
Publisher: Routledge | 1993 | ISBN 0415103886 | PDF | 178 pages | 10.2 MB
Racialized Boundaries offers an innovative approach to an analysis of the constructs of race and racism. The authors maintain that the concept of race has to be understood within the wider category of "ethnos" or ethnicity, which they define as a primarily political rather than a cultural phenomenon.
The authors explore the ways in which race and racism serve as structuring principles for the processes of defining national boundaries and constituting national identities. They examine the ways in which the phenomenon of race and racism relate to other social divisions, such as class and gender and the way "blackness" can play a part in the racialization process. Finally the authors consider some of the ideologies that have influenced the "race relations industry" as well as some of the racial struggles surrounding this entity. In particular they look at what they term, "community
ideology," which underlies in different ways both multi-culturalist and anti-racist schools of thoughtand apply this ideology to a critical examination of identity politics.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 7:01pm CET
David Satter, "Darkness at Dawn: The Rise of the Russian Criminal State"
Publisher: Yale University Press | 2003 | ISBN 0300098928 | PDF | 327 pages | 10.2 MB
Anticipating a new dawn of freedom and democracy after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Russians could hardly have foreseen the reality of their future a decade later: a country mired in poverty and controlled at every level by organized crime. This compelling book tells the story of reform in Russia through the real experiences of individual citizens. Describing in details the birth of a new era of repression, David Satter analyzes the changes that have swept Russia and their effect on Russia's age-old way of thinking. Through the stories of people at all levels of Russian society, Satter shows the contrast during the reform period between the desperation of the many and the insatiability of the few. Wish insights derived from more than twenty years of writing and reporting on Russia, he considers why the individual human being there has historically counted for so little. And he offers an illuminating analysis of how Russia's post-Soviet fate was decided when a new morality failed to fill the vast moral vacuum that communism left in its wake.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 7:00pm CET
Mord Bogie, "Churchill's Horses and the Myths of American Corporations: Power, Stakeholders, and Governance"
Publisher: Quorum Books | 1998 | ISBN 1567200737 | PDF | 232 pages | 10.2 MB
The large public corporations powering the U.S. economy--Churchill's Horses, in Bogie's metaphor--are underachievers, and all of us are paying the price. Why? The reasons are shrouded in the myths that these corporations use to mask their great power and disguise the interests it serves. Myth: the shareholders who own a public corporation control it by electing the directors who govern it. Anti-Myth (fact): shareholders of a public corporation don't elect the directors, and the directors don't govern the corporation. Shareholders don't even own the corporation in any meaningful sense of the word. Yet Churchill's Horses spend billions propping up the current price of their shares rather than invest the money in their (and our) future prosperity. Using many voices from current and recent business literature, Bogie leads you through myths and anti-myths to understand how public corporations have lost focus and ignored their most important stakeholders. Few readers will emerge with all their assumptions and beliefs intact.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 6:57pm CET
R. Ross Holloway, "Constantine and Rome"
Publisher: Yale University Press | 2004 | ISBN 0300100434 | PDF | 208 pages | 10.4 MB
Constantine the Great (285–337) played a crucial role in mediating between the pagan, imperial past of the city of Rome, which he conquered in 312, and its future as a Christian capital. In this learned and highly readable book, R. Ross Holloway examines Constantine’s remarkable building program in Rome. Holloway begins by examining the Christian Church in the period before the Peace of 313, when Constantine and his co-emperor Licinius ended the persecution of the Christians. He then focuses on the structure, style, and significance of important monuments: the Arch of Constantine and the two great Christian basilicas, St. John’s in the Lateran and St. Peter’s, as well as the imperial mausoleum at Tor Pignatara. In a final chapter Holloway advances a new interpretation of the archaeology of the Tomb of St. Peter beneath the high altar of St. Peter’s Basilica. The tomb, he concludes, was not the original resting place of the remains venerated as those of the Apostle but was created only in 251 by Pope Cornelius. Drawing on the most up-to-date archaeological evidence, he describes a cityscape that was at once Christian and pagan, mirroring the personality of its ruler.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 6:55pm CET
Steven T. Usdin, "Engineering Communism: How Two Americans Spied for Stalin and Founded the Soviet Silicon Valley"
Publisher: Yale University Press | 2005 | ISBN 0300108745 | PDF | 346 pages | 10.4 MB
Engineering Communism is the fascinating story of Joel Barr and Alfred Sarant, dedicated Communists and members of the Rosenberg spy ring, who stole information from the United States during World War II that proved crucial to building the first advanced weapons systems in the USSR. On the brink of arrest, they escaped with KGB’s help and eluded American intelligence for decades. Drawing on extensive interviews with Barr and new archival evidence, Steve Usdin explains why Barr and Sarant became spies, how they obtained military secrets, and how FBI blunders led to their escape. He chronicles their pioneering role in the Soviet computer industry, including their success in convincing Nikita Khrushchev to build a secret Silicon Valley. The book is rich with details of Barr’s and Sarant’s intriguing andexciting personal lives, their families, as well as their integration into Russian society. Engineering Communism follows the two spies through Sarant’s death and Barr’s unbelievable return to the United States.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 6:53pm CET
Peter M. Lencsis, "Insurance Regulation in the United States: An Overview for Business and Government"
Publisher: Quorum Books | 1997 | ISBN 1567200850 | PDF | 158 pages | 10.5 MB
Insurance attorney Peter Lencsis provides a unique, objective description of the insurance regulatory system as it exists today in the United States. Concise but comprehensive, it provides an easily grasped, immediately useful explanation of how the regulatory system works. Because of the federal McCarran-Ferguson Act, most insurance regulation is left to the individual states, and is thus non-uniform. But there is still a common pattern to state regulation, explains Lencsis, due in large part to the activities of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners and its own uniform standards. Lencsis covers the formation and licensing of insurance companies and the regulation of their underwriting and investment activities, as well as the insurance insolvency laws and guaranty funds, assigned risk plans, reinsurance, holding companies, and the regulation of agents and brokers. An important resource for insurance industry professionals, and others in regulatory agencies of the public sector.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 6:52pm CET
Bryan Cassidy, "European Lobbying Guide (Hawksmere Report)"
Publisher: Thorogood Publishing | 2003 | ISBN 1854181440 | PDF | 193 pages | 10.5 MB
The appointment of a new team of European Commissioners--many new to their briefs and all keen to display a more listening attitude than their predecessors--is a golden opportunity for those with a message to deliver, be they from the private sector, trade associations, trade unions, local authorities, other public sector bodies, charities or other non-governmental organizations. But how to make the most of these opportunities? How to focus your energies on those parts of the system most likely to respond favorably? How to deal with so much change all at once? And, with the rapid growth of the lobbying industry in Brussels, how to make your voice heard amidst the rising clamor?
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 6:50pm CET
Carnes Lord, "The Modern Prince: What Leaders Need to Know Now"
Publisher: Yale University Press | 2003 | ISBN 0300100078 | PDF | 296 pages | 10.6 MB
The role of leaders is never more crucial than during times of war. The ability to inspire confidence and communicate resolution is essential to the national interest. The requirements of leadership are not limited to military affairs: citizens look to leaders to guide the economy, protect the laws, and safeguard national values. Leadership has never been simple, but it is even more complicated in the age of mass democracy: globalization, the power of the media, and the constraints of bureaucracy are among the many challenges facing leaders at the beginning of the twenty-first century. What do leaders need to know in order to be effective? Carnes Lord-an eminent political scientist who has held a number of high-level positions in the United States government-here offers witty and trenchant counsel to both leaders and the citizens who elect them. Exploring such issues as leadership in war and crises, diplomacy, the use of secret intelligence, the role of political advisors, and the media, Lord enumerates the major challenges confronting modern leaders and offers practical advice on how leaders can deal with them effectively.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 6:48pm CET
Loyd E. Lee, "World War II in Asia and the Pacific and the War's Aftermath, with General Themes: A Handbook of Literature and Research"
Publisher: Greenwood Press | 1998 | ISBN 0313293260 | PDF | 530 pages | 10.9 MB
A companion to World War II in Europe, Africa, and the Americas, this volume reevaluates the most enduring literature on basic aspects of the war in Asia and the Pacific. It also covers themes pertaining to societies at war, culture, the arts, and science and technology as well as international relations and the postwar world. Included are not only grand strategy, military and naval campaigns, and matters of diplomacy, but also resistance, collaboration, prisoners of war, and broad topics of the "home front," including chapters on gender issues, film, literature, popular culture, and propaganda. This volume and its companion provide the first comprehensive historiographic reference work on the war. Each chapter describes the state of knowledge on the topic, relating each bibliographic reference to the chapter's themes and issues, and concludes with a bibliography. Recent original scholarship is included when it aids new understanding, and older works of enduring value also find a place. The essays in this volume will interest scholars and college teachers as well as advanced students and serious amateurs seeking insight into the history of the war and its literature.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 6:46pm CET
William R. Hutchison, "Religious Pluralism in America: The Contentious History of a Founding Ideal"
Publisher: Yale University Press | 2003 | ISBN 0300098138 | PDF | 289 pages | 11 MB
Religious toleration is enshrined as an ideal in our Constitution, but religious diversity has had a complicated history in the United States. Although Americans have taken justifiable pride in the rich array of religious faiths that help define our nation, for two centuries we have been grappling with the question of how we can coexist. In this ambitious reappraisal of American religious history, William Hutchison chronicles the country's struggle to fulfill the promise of its founding ideals. In 1800 the United States was an overwhelmingly Protestant nation. Over the next two centuries, Catholics, Mormons, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, and others would emerge to challenge the Protestant mainstream. Although their demands were often met with resistance, Hutchison demonstrates that as a result of these conflicts we have expanded our understanding of what it means to be a religiously diverse country. No longer satisfied with mere legal toleration, we now expect that all religious groups will share in creating our national agenda. This book offers a groundbreaking and timely history of our efforts to become one nation under multiple gods.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 3:09pm CET
Duane W. Roller, "Cleopatra: A Biography"
Oxford University Press | 2010 | ISBN: 0195365534 | 256 pages | PDF | 2,2 MB
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 1:14pm CET
Star of India: The Spicy Adventures of Curry
Publisher: Wiley | ISBN: 0470091878 | edition 2004 | PDF | 296 pages | 13,2 mb
How did the curry get here and how did the Brits, a nation famed for a love of bland food, end up with Chicken Tikka Masala as their favourite dish? It is a history that took curry, via the British Empire, from its Eastern origins, around the globe. This book talks to the men and women who gambled everything to make a living, who endured indifference and racism to secure an income and those who got their relatives to pack the cardamom when they visited as there was no other way of obtaining the ingredients. This book looks at how the British love affair with curry has changed lives, not just in Britain but around the globe.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 10:06am CET
Jarosław Malinowski - Japońskie krążowniki typu "Mogami"
Wydawnictwo Okręty Wojenne | 1997 | ISBN: 8390227444 | Polish | 42 pages | PDF | 50.37 MB
Okręty Świata 4
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 9:55am CET
James R. Moore - The Transformation of Urban Liberalism: Party Politics and Urban Governance in Late Nineteenth-century England
Publisher: Ashgate Publishing | 2006-09-30 | ISBN: 0754650006 | PDF | 323 pages | 5.96 MB
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 9:02am CET
Robert Michulec - Messerschmitt Me 109 cz. 4
AJ-Press | 2002 | ISBN: 8372371083 | Polish | 120 pages | PDF | 46.36 MB
Monografie Lotnicze 45
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 8:51am CET
Kazimierz Sakowicz, "Ponary Diary, 1941-1943: A Bystander's Account of a Mass Murder"
Publisher: Yale University Press | 2005 | ISBN 0300108532 | PDF | 177 pages | 11.1 MB
About sixty thousand Jews from Wilno (Vilnius, Jewish Vilna) and surrounding townships in present-day Lithuania were murdered by the Nazis and their Lithuanian collaborators in huge pits on the outskirts of Ponary. Over a period of several years, Kazimierz Sakowicz, a Polish journalist who lived in the village of Ponary, was an eyewitness to the murder of these Jews as well as to the murders of thousands of non-Jews on an almost daily basis. He chronicled these events in a diary that he kept at great personal risk. Written as a simple account of what Sakowicz witnessed, the diary is devoid of personal involvement or identification with the victims. It is thus a unique document: testimony from a bystander, an “objective” observer without an emotional or a political agenda, to the extermination of the Jews of the city known as “the Jerusalem of Lithuania.” Sakowicz did not survive the war, but much of his diary did. Painstakingly pieced together by Rahel Margolis from scraps of paper hidden in various locations, the diary was published in Polish in 1999. It is here published in English for the first time, extensively annotated by Yitzhak Arad to guide readers through the events at Ponary.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 8:48am CET
Kumar Ramakrishna, See Seng Tan, "After Bali: The Threat of Terrorism in Southeast Asia"
Publisher: World Scientific Publishing Company | 2004 | ISBN 9812387145 | PDF | 442 pages | 11.4 MB
This book critically analyses the specific threat of terrorism in Southeast Asia since the Bali blasts of 12 October 2002 and the US-led war on Iraq. It offers a comprehensive and critical examination of the ideological, socioeconomic and political motivations, trans-regional linkages, and media representations of the terrorist threat in the region, assesses the efficacy of the regional counter-terror response and suggests a more balanced and nuanced approach to combating the terror threat in Southeast Asia. The contributors include leading scholars of political Islam in the region, renowned terrorism and regional security analysts, as well as highly regarded regional journalists and commentators. This represents a formidable and unequalled combination of expertise.
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 12:19am CET
J. Duncan Campbell and Edgar M. Howell, "Smithsonian Technical Bulletin 235 - American Military Insignia 1800-1851"Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. | 1963 | ISBN: none | 124 pgs. | PDF | 167MB
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Posted: March 23rd, 2010, 12:10am CET
Irbitis, Karlis - Of Struggle and Flight - The History of Latvian Aviation
Canadas Wings | 1986 | 118 MB | Pages: 213 | ISBN: 0920002366 | PDF/rar | English
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