Billie Holiday By Johann Hari Summary
The Hunting of Billie Holiday, Johann Hari, Politico Magazine
In the early days of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, a racist, hateful man called Harry Anslinger led the agency. He faced the daunting task of proving the agency’s importance and relevance in the post-Prohibition age. And what better way to do that than by targeting high profile individuals who partake in the use of drugs? And even better if you can demonstrate to the extremely racist men leading government at the time that the agency can be used to target African-Americans. Johann Hari’s “The Hunting of Billie Holiday” for Politico Magazine looks into the persecution of Billie Holiday, the renowned African-American female jazz singer, for her addiction to cocaine and other drugs. The article follows the later …show more content…
life of Lady Day and looks into the lives of three other individuals involved in the agency’s investigation. They were Harry Anslinger, the head of the agency; Jimmy Fletcher, an agent sent to bust Lady Day who falls in love with her; and Colonel George White, a sadist who praised the Bureau for being a place where a “red-blooded American boy” could “lie, kill, cheat, steal, rape and pillage with the sanction and blessing of the All-Highest.” The article ends with Holiday’s death in a run-down hospital, chained to the bed, and surrounded by narcotics agents who bent or outright broke every rule to make her suffer. Harry Anslinger cheerfully wrote, “For her, there would be no more ‘Good Morning Heartache.’”
To me, this article helped to expose even more of the racism and cruelty you often hear about happening in the first five or six decades of the 1900s. Having the article focus on one individual, instead of using broad statistics about the police abuse, the governmental persecution, and Jim Crow laws, really helped humanize the cruelty towards African-Americans and their suffering.
“The personality test given to all applicants on Anslinger’s orders found that he was a sadist. He quickly rose through the bureau’s ranks.” I loved these lines. The short, straight-to-the-point second sentence bluntly makes a subtle point about the cruelty of the Bureau towards Holiday, and towards African-Americans in general.
The author switches between narratives from Holiday’s life to a narrative from the lives of the other individuals involved in her persecution in a way that makes the article move rather quickly and keeps your interest. Each section builds on the previous one and leads to the conclusion. It is also a very fast, very short read (at only twelve or so pages). Fair warning, it does contain a modicum of vulgarity, in both language and topic.
How a Pillar of German Banking Lost Its Way; Ullrich Fichtner, Hauke Goos & Martin Hesse; Der Spiegel International
The article, compiled from interviews, public documents, and other materials over the course of the last two decades, goes over the changes made to Deutsche Bank, its personnel, and organization from the 1980s to the present day. In the 1980s, Deutsche Bank primarily functioned as a normal bank focused on German companies and German accounts. It owned parts of essentially every major German company and embodied the German ethos of modesty, ethics, duty, and hard work. However, with the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the euphoric rise of extreme capitalism, Deutsche Bank made a serious of grievous and tragically misguided moves in order to expand into the international markets, especially as an investment bank. These serious changes led to not only the destruction of the ethos of the company, but a currently sketchy and increasingly infirm future due to pending litigation (numbering in the thousands) and the complete and total failure of the company to readdress their tactics in the aftermath of the Great Recession and the partial demise of investment banking.
I knew, before reading this article, of the importance of Deutsche Bank in the German economy and the European market, and I knew they were involved in the unethical and outright moronic lead up to the Great Recession, but I was astounded to see how little they learned and how little they have changed. One would think the bank would have changed substantially after the recession, yet Deutsche Bank seems to have minimally altered its organization and methods.
“They [the bank’s old leaders] simply watched, lazily and cowardly.
And so the work of generations went down the drain. And we are told that no one is to blame.” I think these sentences summarized the article quite well. The bank’s failure really did occur because those who knew better, the wise and the experience, stayed silent. The last sentence I found particularly delightful because it ties back to the very start of the article where the authors refuted the idea that no one is to blame, or that the fall of the bank is due only to a few “black sheep.”
If Deutsche Bank falls, the Euro weakens, the German economy weakens, and Germany itself weakens. A weaker Euro and a weaker Germany (plus the political chaos it would cause, further endangering Angela Merkel’s reelection chances) would lead to an even weaker and more destabilized European Union. No one who actually knows what they are talking about (looking at you Marine Le Pen) wants the fall of the European Union. So, this article might be interesting as a means to stay informed. Be warned, it is somewhat esoteric and thick to read.
How a Confused Mom Drove Through a White House Checkpoint and Ended Up Dead, Jennifer Gonnerman, Mother
Jones
It is a sad day when Alex Jones represents the voice of reason. Jennifer Gonnerman’s article for Mother Jones describes the final days of Miriam Carey’s life. She was a working mother from Connecticut diagnosed with post-partum depression with psychosis, which manifested itself in the form of severe paranoia, including at one point the belief that President Obama had put the “state of Connecticut … on a security lock down” after speaking to her, the “Prophet of Stamford.” She took her medication and visited with her doctor regularly, and everything seemed well on October 2, 2013. The following day, she was shot dead by the Secret Service and Capitol Police after a bizarre and inexplicable incident involving an overaggressive cop, a potentially panicked and mentally infirm mother, and a potential wrong turn into a White House checkpoint. The article also discussed the media’s depiction of the events of the day and contrasts it with the depiction of the, shall we say, less mainstream right media, which took her up as a symbol of an oppressive and overbearing government. Alex Jones ranted for six minutes, depicting the situation as “A woman drove around a roundabout not knowing how to get out of there, so they killed her!” which, could ultimately be what happened. Uncertainty still remains as to why she was in Washington or what exactly happened that day.
It was very interesting to see a different, more complete perspective than the ones depicted in the news during and after the event. The article spoke substantially on the power of the media, either to get things done or to cover things up.
“A year after her death, her condo appeared unoccupied, … her daughter … had moved in with her father. And Miriam's bullet-marked body lay buried … sealed inside an orchid-gray steel casket.” I think this quotation really illustrated how tragic her situation was and how little has happened after her death. No protests, no investigation, no release of information. She’s dead. That’s it. Nothing more.
The article is not very long and it reads very quickly. The topic itself is also relevant to many current national debates, including race relations, police over-aggression, and the media itself.
In the early days of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, a racist, hateful man called Harry Anslinger led the agency. He faced the daunting task of proving the agency’s importance and relevance in the post-Prohibition age. And what better way to do that than by targeting high profile individuals who partake in the use of drugs? And even better if you can demonstrate to the extremely racist men leading government at the time that the agency can be used to target African-Americans. Johann Hari’s “The Hunting of Billie Holiday” for Politico Magazine looks into the persecution of Billie Holiday, the renowned African-American female jazz singer, for her addiction to cocaine and other drugs. The article follows the later …show more content…
life of Lady Day and looks into the lives of three other individuals involved in the agency’s investigation. They were Harry Anslinger, the head of the agency; Jimmy Fletcher, an agent sent to bust Lady Day who falls in love with her; and Colonel George White, a sadist who praised the Bureau for being a place where a “red-blooded American boy” could “lie, kill, cheat, steal, rape and pillage with the sanction and blessing of the All-Highest.” The article ends with Holiday’s death in a run-down hospital, chained to the bed, and surrounded by narcotics agents who bent or outright broke every rule to make her suffer. Harry Anslinger cheerfully wrote, “For her, there would be no more ‘Good Morning Heartache.’”
To me, this article helped to expose even more of the racism and cruelty you often hear about happening in the first five or six decades of the 1900s. Having the article focus on one individual, instead of using broad statistics about the police abuse, the governmental persecution, and Jim Crow laws, really helped humanize the cruelty towards African-Americans and their suffering.
“The personality test given to all applicants on Anslinger’s orders found that he was a sadist. He quickly rose through the bureau’s ranks.” I loved these lines. The short, straight-to-the-point second sentence bluntly makes a subtle point about the cruelty of the Bureau towards Holiday, and towards African-Americans in general.
The author switches between narratives from Holiday’s life to a narrative from the lives of the other individuals involved in her persecution in a way that makes the article move rather quickly and keeps your interest. Each section builds on the previous one and leads to the conclusion. It is also a very fast, very short read (at only twelve or so pages). Fair warning, it does contain a modicum of vulgarity, in both language and topic.
How a Pillar of German Banking Lost Its Way; Ullrich Fichtner, Hauke Goos & Martin Hesse; Der Spiegel International
The article, compiled from interviews, public documents, and other materials over the course of the last two decades, goes over the changes made to Deutsche Bank, its personnel, and organization from the 1980s to the present day. In the 1980s, Deutsche Bank primarily functioned as a normal bank focused on German companies and German accounts. It owned parts of essentially every major German company and embodied the German ethos of modesty, ethics, duty, and hard work. However, with the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the euphoric rise of extreme capitalism, Deutsche Bank made a serious of grievous and tragically misguided moves in order to expand into the international markets, especially as an investment bank. These serious changes led to not only the destruction of the ethos of the company, but a currently sketchy and increasingly infirm future due to pending litigation (numbering in the thousands) and the complete and total failure of the company to readdress their tactics in the aftermath of the Great Recession and the partial demise of investment banking.
I knew, before reading this article, of the importance of Deutsche Bank in the German economy and the European market, and I knew they were involved in the unethical and outright moronic lead up to the Great Recession, but I was astounded to see how little they learned and how little they have changed. One would think the bank would have changed substantially after the recession, yet Deutsche Bank seems to have minimally altered its organization and methods.
“They [the bank’s old leaders] simply watched, lazily and cowardly.
And so the work of generations went down the drain. And we are told that no one is to blame.” I think these sentences summarized the article quite well. The bank’s failure really did occur because those who knew better, the wise and the experience, stayed silent. The last sentence I found particularly delightful because it ties back to the very start of the article where the authors refuted the idea that no one is to blame, or that the fall of the bank is due only to a few “black sheep.”
If Deutsche Bank falls, the Euro weakens, the German economy weakens, and Germany itself weakens. A weaker Euro and a weaker Germany (plus the political chaos it would cause, further endangering Angela Merkel’s reelection chances) would lead to an even weaker and more destabilized European Union. No one who actually knows what they are talking about (looking at you Marine Le Pen) wants the fall of the European Union. So, this article might be interesting as a means to stay informed. Be warned, it is somewhat esoteric and thick to read.
How a Confused Mom Drove Through a White House Checkpoint and Ended Up Dead, Jennifer Gonnerman, Mother
Jones
It is a sad day when Alex Jones represents the voice of reason. Jennifer Gonnerman’s article for Mother Jones describes the final days of Miriam Carey’s life. She was a working mother from Connecticut diagnosed with post-partum depression with psychosis, which manifested itself in the form of severe paranoia, including at one point the belief that President Obama had put the “state of Connecticut … on a security lock down” after speaking to her, the “Prophet of Stamford.” She took her medication and visited with her doctor regularly, and everything seemed well on October 2, 2013. The following day, she was shot dead by the Secret Service and Capitol Police after a bizarre and inexplicable incident involving an overaggressive cop, a potentially panicked and mentally infirm mother, and a potential wrong turn into a White House checkpoint. The article also discussed the media’s depiction of the events of the day and contrasts it with the depiction of the, shall we say, less mainstream right media, which took her up as a symbol of an oppressive and overbearing government. Alex Jones ranted for six minutes, depicting the situation as “A woman drove around a roundabout not knowing how to get out of there, so they killed her!” which, could ultimately be what happened. Uncertainty still remains as to why she was in Washington or what exactly happened that day.
It was very interesting to see a different, more complete perspective than the ones depicted in the news during and after the event. The article spoke substantially on the power of the media, either to get things done or to cover things up.
“A year after her death, her condo appeared unoccupied, … her daughter … had moved in with her father. And Miriam's bullet-marked body lay buried … sealed inside an orchid-gray steel casket.” I think this quotation really illustrated how tragic her situation was and how little has happened after her death. No protests, no investigation, no release of information. She’s dead. That’s it. Nothing more.
The article is not very long and it reads very quickly. The topic itself is also relevant to many current national debates, including race relations, police over-aggression, and the media itself.