#never read

Let's talk about those books you never read. Even though you told yourself you would.

Today I wanted to talk about books I’ve never read. You know the ones. They sit on your shelf untouched, covered in dust while those around you can’t stop talking about them. Or they are the ones recommended to you by everyone else but you just can’t seem to get past the first page. And it’s not that you think less of them they just don’t suit you. At all. Here are a few books I’ve never read:…

Eisenhower remained firm but calm. He played down the Soviet missile threat (which he knew was probably exaggerated—America’s new secret spy plane, the U-2, was not finding Soviet intercontinental missile sites). He let Secretary of State Foster Dulles play the heavy at brinksmanship, warning of “massive retaliation” against communist incursions around the world. But once he had gotten America out of the Korean War (partly by bluffing with nuclear weapons), Eisenhower never committed American combat troops abroad. Significantly, he refused to send American ground troops to Vietnam when the French effort there collapsed in 1954. As historian Campbell Craig wrote in his perceptive book Destroying the Village . Ike understood from his own experience and from reading Clausewitz’s On War that war is not something that politicians can limit or “manage.” Small wars have a way of becoming big wars, and Ike was determined to keep America out of any war.

“As a teenager I was mystified by the audacity of the grand inquisitor. I’d never read such a succint indictment of faith. As I got to my twenties I read the whole book, but in my late twenties I began to appreciate it. I’ve never read a more powerful and realistic testament to faith in my life, and as I’ve grown, my reading of the book has grown with me.” — Don

“I like hearing that you are thinking long term with my son. You two are very good for one another.”