Dark Congress

Dark Congress

Author: Christopher Golden

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2018-05-08

Total Pages: 278

ISBN-13: 1534432493

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Since the beginning of time, the demonic races have gathered every century to resolve conflicts among them and to determine the course of their future. This centennial event was called the Dark Congress. In the second century b.c., however, the Dark Congress failed to resolve their conflicts. Instead, the Congress ignited into a war that drove wedges between the various demon races from that time until now. And all of it began as a result of Kandida, the great North African river demon, being nearly killed by forces in the Congress and magically entombed in the riverbank. But now, Kandida is free, and for the first time in centuries, the Dark Congress is being called again. All demon races and other varieties of supernatural creatures have been called to gather at the Hellmouth in Providence, Rhode Island. Some gather in hopes of resolution, some in favor of war, and Kandida is tasked to broker a treaty and guide the Congress to peace, wherein everyone might simply agree to disagree. And so the demons gather under a banner of a truce. But the demons still harbor many bitter disagreements with one another. The Congress must have an arbiter of these conflicts, and that someone is Buffy Summers. Buffy is horrified and disgusted to be included. After all, she is not a demon...is she? She knows so little about her powers that she cannot say for certain where they truly spring from. How can she spend so much time wallowing in the darkness without becoming part of it? Can she possibly agree to a truce with all the horrors of the world, and allow them to come Providence without any attempt to stop them? And does she have a choice?


Legislating in the Dark

Legislating in the Dark

Author: James M. Curry

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2015-09-14

Total Pages: 288

ISBN-13: 022628185X

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Political science scholar James M. Curry explores the inner workings of Congress’s House of Representatives in this thought-provoking analysis. The 2009 financial stimulus bill ran to more than 1,100 pages, yet it wasn’t even given to Congress in its final form until thirteen hours before debate was set to begin, and it was passed twenty-eight hours later. How are representatives expected to digest so much information in such a short time? The answer? They aren’t. With Legislating in the Dark, James M. Curry reveals that the availability of information about legislation is a key tool through which Congressional leadership exercises power. Through a deft mix of legislative analysis, interviews, and participant observation, Curry shows how congresspersons—lacking the time and resources to study bills deeply themselves—are forced to rely on information and cues from their leadership. By controlling their rank-and-file’s access to information, Congressional leaders are able to emphasize or bury particular items, exploiting their information advantage to push the legislative agenda in directions that they and their party prefer. Offering an unexpected new way of thinking about party power and influence, Legislating in the Dark will spark substantial debate in political science. “Curry brings fresh insight and a breadth of evidence to bear on the role of information in lawmaking, including extensive interviews with legislators and staff and in-depth case studies of several pieces of legislation. Engagingly written, the book will enhance our understandings of congressional lawmaking and leadership and will be of interest to scholars of legislative studies and public policy.” —Tracy Sulkin, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign


Dark Money

Dark Money

Author: Jane Mayer

Publisher: Anchor

Published: 2017-01-24

Total Pages: 577

ISBN-13: 0307947904

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NATIONAL BESTSELLER ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES 10 BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR Who are the immensely wealthy right-wing ideologues shaping the fate of America today? From the bestselling author of The Dark Side, an electrifying work of investigative journalism that uncovers the agenda of this powerful group. In her new preface, Jane Mayer discusses the results of the most recent election and Donald Trump's victory, and how, despite much discussion to the contrary, this was a huge victory for the billionaires who have been pouring money in the American political system. Why is America living in an age of profound and widening economic inequality? Why have even modest attempts to address climate change been defeated again and again? Why do hedge-fund billionaires pay a far lower tax rate than middle-class workers? In a riveting and indelible feat of reporting, Jane Mayer illuminates the history of an elite cadre of plutocrats—headed by the Kochs, the Scaifes, the Olins, and the Bradleys—who have bankrolled a systematic plan to fundamentally alter the American political system. Mayer traces a byzantine trail of billions of dollars spent by the network, revealing a staggering conglomeration of think tanks, academic institutions, media groups, courthouses, and government allies that have fallen under their sphere of influence. Drawing from hundreds of exclusive interviews, as well as extensive scrutiny of public records, private papers, and court proceedings, Mayer provides vivid portraits of the secretive figures behind the new American oligarchy and a searing look at the carefully concealed agendas steering the nation. Dark Money is an essential book for anyone who cares about the future of American democracy. National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist LA Times Book Prize Finalist PEN/Jean Stein Book Award Finalist Shortlisted for the Lukas Prize


Black Faces, Black Interests

Black Faces, Black Interests

Author: Carol Miller Swain

Publisher:

Published: 2006

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780761834076

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Presented here in an enlarged edition, Black Faces, Black Interests presents persuasive evidence that challenges the notion that only African Americans can represent black interests effectively in Congress. This pivotal work argues for black and white representatives to form coalitions to better serve their constituents.


Dark Alliance

Dark Alliance

Author: Gary Webb

Publisher: Seven Stories Press

Published: 2011-01-04

Total Pages: 817

ISBN-13: 1609802020

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Major Motion Picture based on Dark Alliance and starring Jeremy Renner, "Kill the Messenger," to be be released in Fall 2014 In August 1996, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Webb stunned the world with a series of articles in the San Jose Mercury News reporting the results of his year-long investigation into the roots of the crack cocaine epidemic in America, specifically in Los Angeles. The series, titled “Dark Alliance,” revealed that for the better part of a decade, a Bay Area drug ring sold tons of cocaine to Los Angeles street gangs and funneled millions in drug profits to the CIA-backed Nicaraguan Contras. Gary Webb pushed his investigation even further in his book, Dark Alliance: The CIA, The Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion. Drawing from then newly declassified documents, undercover DEA audio and videotapes that had never been publicly released, federal court testimony, and interviews, Webb demonstrates how our government knowingly allowed massive amounts of drugs and money to change hands at the expense of our communities. Webb’s own stranger-than-fiction experience is also woven into the book. His excoriation by the media—not because of any wrongdoing on his part, but by an insidious process of innuendo and suggestion that in effect blamed Webb for the implications of the story—had been all but predicted. Webb was warned off doing a CIA expose by a former Associated Press journalist who lost his job when, years before, he had stumbled onto the germ of the “Dark Alliance” story. And though Internal investigations by both the CIA and the Justice Department eventually vindicated Webb, he had by then been pushed out of the Mercury News and gone to work for the California State Legislature Task Force on Government Oversight. He died in 2004.


Dark Days, Bright Nights

Dark Days, Bright Nights

Author: Peniel E. Joseph

Publisher: Civitas Books

Published: 2010

Total Pages: 290

ISBN-13: 046501366X

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Offers a narrative chronicle of race in the United States and the successes, failures, and stalemates of African American leaders in the past fifty years.