Rodent Regatta

Craig Cantoni helps you sort through the numerous books you might otherwise select for summer reading.

Books for the fire, firelight

It’s time to escape to the cool high country with books for the campfire – books for throwing on the fire and books for reading by the fire.

Any book about hound dog Bill Clinton and his phony, calculating wife is a great substitute for firewood. This is especially true for Hillary’s new book of revisionist history, Living History. It also is true for The Clinton Wars by Clinton lapdog Sidney Blumenthal.

Books about losing weight should be set on fire and used to barbecue hot dogs and toast marshmallows. The books blabber about blubber but fail to tell the following simple truth: If you constantly consume more calories than you burn off, your butt will grow to the size of a bus.

Books that give financial advice should join the blubber books on the fire, for they also fail to tell a simple truth: If you spend more than you earn, you won’t have any money. PBS star and author Suze Orman makes millions by complicating this truism with her five laws for financial security.

A book that tells the truth about wealth is The Millionaire Next Door. It is an antidote to the class warfare and redistribution schemes of such leftists as Hillary Rodham Clinton and Ted Kennedy. The book shows that most millionaires became wealthy by starting neighborhood businesses, working long hours, saving money and living unpretentiously. Unlike Hillary, they do not become wealthy by making a killing in cattle futures and Arkansas land deals. And unlike Teddy, they do not inherit wealth and political connections from a philandering, bootlegging daddy.

Hillary and Teddy should sit by a campfire with Tom Daschle and read a wonderful book about government, The Law, by Frederic Bastiat (1801-1850). Among other gems, the 75-page book makes the point that it is immoral theft when the government ”takes from some persons what belongs to them, and gives it to other persons to whom it does not belong.” It can be ordered at www.laissezfairebooks.com.

Outside of politics, the best non-fiction book of the year is Seabiscuit: An American Legend. The meticulously researched book is about more than horse racing. It also is about perseverance, loyalty and Depression-era America.

And the best book ever written is my management book on ridding organizations of bureaucracy. Well, at least my mom thinks so.

Enjoy your campfire.

by Craig J. Cantoni, June 18, 2003, for the Arizona Republic