Compound W 2005 vacation reading list

According to the White House, one of three books Bush chose to read on his five-week vacation is "Salt: A World History" by Mark Kurlansky, who chronicled the rise and fall of what once was considered the world's most strategic commodity.

The other two books he reportedly brought to Crawford are "Alexander II: The Last Great Tsar" by Edvard Radzinsky and "The Great Influenza: The Epic Story of the Deadliest Plague in History" by John M. Barry.

Bush, a former oil company chief, has not said why he picked Kurlansky's 484-page saga. "The president enjoys reading and learning about history," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.

[...]

Peter Osnos, whose PublicAffairs publishing house in New York released the U.S. version of "The Case for Democracy," said that the books Bush brought with him to Crawford represented a sophisticated reading list, even for an intellectually curious chief executive.

"It's a fair bet that George W. Bush is the only person in the entire United States who chose those three books to read on vacation," Osnos said.

  Newsday article

And especially for an illiterate one. I'm absolutely sure he's going to read them all.

Kurlansky said he was surprised to hear that Bush had taken his book to the ranch: "My first reaction was, 'Oh, he reads books?' "

The author said he was a "virulent Bush opponent" who had given speeches denouncing the war in Iraq.

"What I find fascinating, and it's probably a positive thing about the White House, is they don't seem to do any research about the writers when they pick the books," Kurlansky said.

Well, he's not going to read it. Somebody may read it and make some cliff notes for him.

Bush's choice of "Alexander II" appears to reflect his interest in books about transformational political leaders. Among those he has perused since becoming president are biographies of George Washington, John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, Theodore Roosevelt, Richard the Lionheart and Peter the Great.

But Radzinsky's portrait of Alexander II may have special relevance to Bush, who obtained an advance copy of the English translation scheduled for publication in November. Alexander II, who ruled Russia from 1855 to 1881, was known as the "Czar Liberator" because he freed 23 million Russian slaves in 1861, two years before Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation.

But his governmental reforms ultimately were his undoing. On the right, they provoked a conservative backlash. On the left, they contributed to a radical political movement that used targeted violence to accomplish its aims, including a wave of killings and bombings.

When he decided to halt the reform process, the violence intensified. Alexander II became, in effect, the first world leader to declare a war on terrorism. He would not be the last.

Not to mention there's the homosexuality aspect.

Did I say that?