I've just started reading Testing Treatments by a whole variety of authors. It basically talks about why it's so important that anything we do in medicine is tested rigorously before we do it, and discusses some of the reasons why this doesn't happen properly. Unfortunately, it's fairly sad how many treatments in medicine persist without an evidence based.
Was reading A Silent Invasion before that (which you might remember was a book that almost didn't get published for fear of defamation suits). Basically, it's a book about the Chinese government's influence on Australian politics. The author, Clive Hamilton, originally had a publisher but their legal team decided to can it because they were worried that Chinese government proxies in Australia would sue the publisher and the author out of existence. A few publishers subsequently rejected it for the same reason. Our government was poised to intervene, when finally a publisher agreed.
I think the book discusses a really important issue. There's little doubt that the Chinese government is pursuing a policy of soft power, whereby they're actively trying to infiltrate, for want of a better word, democracies the world over to change decisions made by those governments. We see that play out in the timidity with which our government often approaches questions about China. I expected the book would be quite good because it's written by an academic of some renown and, critically, who was once a Greens candidate (so you'd expect that he'd be pandering to that audience, and would be really sensitive about making a strong case). It was absolutely dreadful though. Some of the most boring, one-track and thoughtless writing I've read in a long time.
I just finished a book called To the Bitter End by Peter Hartcher, and I really, really enjoyed it.
It's a book on the fall of the Howard Government and the rise of the Rudd Government. This was interesting to me for a few reasons:
* I wrote my Honours thesis on media representations of the Rudd/Gillard Governments.
* Peter Hartcher penned some of the articles that I analysed.
* The book started out with development of the Howard/Costello/Downer/Turnbull/Andrews/Abbott etc. relationships, which I knew less about.
I found the whole thing fascinating from cover to cover, and am hoping Hartcher has written other books more recently (I think this one went up to 2008 only).
How about you? What are you reading at the moment?
He has written some books since! I read one of his books (I think it was called the Sweet Spot) some time ago. Basically about how Australia managed to survive the GFC and the policies that have made this country successful, with the classic warning for the future attached.