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Obama’s Way

To understand how air-force navigator Tyler Stark ended up in a thornbush in the Libyan desert in March 2011, one must understand what it’s like to be president of the United States—and this president in particular. Hanging around Barack Obama for six months, in the White House, aboard Air Force One, and on the basketball court, Michael Lewis learns the reality of the Nobel Peace Prize winner who sent Stark into combat.

A wealthy Russian businessman who wanted to propose to his girlfriend decided to test her love for him before popping the question — by faking his own death.

After working with a stuntman, a make-up artist, a screenwriter, and a directer to stage a phony car crash, 30-year-old Alexey Bykov of Omsk told Irina Kolokov to meet him at a certain place at a certain time so she could witness the accident.

"When I arrived there were mangled cars everywhere, ambulances, smoke, and carnage,"Kolokov told Russian media. "Then when I saw Alexey covered in blood lying in the road a paramedic told me he was dead and I just broke down in tears."