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  Brazil's Economic Evolution -...

  Anya Solace

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  Brazil's economic history is a dynamic and complex tale shaped by diverse influences, from colonial exploitation to modern-day challenges and opportunities. As the largest country in South America, Brazil’s economic evolution has mirrored its political, social, and cultural transformations. This journey began with its colonial era under Portuguese rule, which laid the foundation for Brazil’s agricultural-based economy. Over the centuries, Brazil shifted from a colony dependent on sugar and gold to a rapidly industrializing nation, emerging as an economic powerhouse in Latin America. 
  The early economic landscape of Brazil was heavily reliant on natural resources, particularly agriculture. The Portuguese established vast sugar plantations along Brazil’s northeastern coast, utilizing enslaved labor from Africa. This system of exploitation became the backbone of the Brazilian economy for centuries. Later, the discovery of gold in the 18th century led to a gold rush that contributed significantly to Brazil's wealth, though it also exacerbated regional disparities and social inequalities. 
  As the 19th century unfolded, Brazil transitioned into an empire, and its economic structure shifted once again. Coffee became the dominant export, driving the expansion of the country’s agricultural economy. The development of railways and the establishment of coffee plantations in the southeastern regions played a critical role in consolidating Brazil’s position as a major global supplier. However, this period of growth was also marked by profound social and economic inequalities, particularly in the form of slavery, which continued until its abolition in 1888.

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  Smoky God The - A Voyage to the...

  Willis George Emerson

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  It may be that the true home of Apollo was not at Delphi, but in that older earth-center of which Plato speaks, where he says: "Apollo's real home is among the Hyperboreans, in a land of perpetual life, where mythology tells us two doves flying from the two opposite ends of the world met in this fair region, the home of Apollo. Indeed, according to Hecataeus, Leto, the mother of Apollo, was born on an island in the Arctic Ocean far beyond the North Wind."

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  Thoreau's God

  Richard Higgins

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  Thoreau? I know him! Well, I know the name. I’m sure I know who he is… don’t I? The nature guy, right? 
  Henry David Thoreau’s spiritual life is a riddle. Thoreau’s passionate critique of formal religion is matched only by his rapturous descriptions of encounters with the divine in nature. He fled the church only to pursue a deeper communion with a presence he felt at the heart of the universe. He called this illimitable presence many names, but he often called it God. 
  In Thoreau’s God, Richard Higgins invites seekers — religious or otherwise — to walk with the great Transcendentalist through a series of meditations on his spiritual life. Thoreau offers us no creed, but his writings encourage reflection on how to live, what to notice, and what to love. Though his quest was deeply personal, Thoreau devoted his life to communicating his experience of an infinite, wild, life-giving God. By recovering this vital thread in Thoreau’s life and work, Thoreau’s God opens the door to a new understanding of an original voice in American religion that speaks to spiritual seekers today.

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  A Conspiratorial Life - Robert...

  Edward H. Miller

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  The first full-scale biography of Robert Welch, who founded the John Birch Society and planted some of modern conservatism’s most insidious seeds. 
    
  Though you may not know his name, Robert Welch (1899-1985)—founder of the John Birch Society—is easily one of the most significant architects of our current political moment. In A Conspiratorial Life, the first full-scale biography of Welch, Edward H. Miller delves deep into the life of an overlooked figure whose ideas nevertheless reshaped the American right. 
   
  A child prodigy who entered college at age 12, Welch became an unlikely candy magnate, founding the company that created Sugar Daddies, Junior Mints, and other famed confections. In 1958, he funneled his wealth into establishing the organization that would define his legacy and change the face of American politics: the John Birch Society. Though the group’s paranoiac right-wing nativism was dismissed by conservative thinkers like William F. Buckley, its ideas gradually moved from the far-right fringe into the mainstream. By exploring the development of Welch’s political worldview, A Conspiratorial Life shows how the John Birch Society’s rabid libertarianism—and its highly effective grassroots networking—became a profound, yet often ignored or derided influence on the modern Republican Party. Miller convincingly connects the accusatory conservatism of the midcentury John Birch Society to the inflammatory rhetoric of the Tea Party, the Trump administration, Q, and more. As this book makes clear, whether or not you know his name or what he accomplished, it’s hard to deny that we’re living in Robert Welch’s America.

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  Picking Presidents - How to Make...

  Gautam Mukunda

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  Celebrated leadership expert and political scientist Gautam Mukunda provides a comprehensive, objective, and non-partisan method for answering the most important question in the world: is someone up to the job of president of the United States? 
   
   
    
  In Picking Presidents, Gautam Mukunda sets his sights on presidential candidates, proposing a tested method to assess whether they will succeed or fail if they win the White House. Combining political science, psychology, organizational behavior, and economics, Picking Presidents will enable every American to cast an informed vote. 
   
   
    
  In his 2012 book Indispensable, which all but predicted the Trump presidency, Mukunda explained how both the very best and very worst leaders are "unfiltered"—outsiders who take power without the understanding or support of traditional elites. Picking Presidents provides deep analysis of filtered and unfiltered presidents alike, from failed haberdasher and skillful president Harry Truman, to the exceptionally well-qualified—and ultimately reviled—James Buchanan; from Andrew Johnson, who set civil rights back by a century, to Theodore Roosevelt, who evaded party opposition to transform American society. Picking Presidents lays out a clear framework that anyone can use to judge a candidate and answer the all-important question: are they up to the job?

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  Torquemada - Spanish Cleric and...

  Kelly Mass

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  The Spanish inquisition was nasty in the 15th century. I am glad we don’t live in those times anymore. We have our own problems to deal with here. But back then, in some countries, primarily the Catholic-dominated ones in Europe, being called a heretic, a witch, or a sinner meant business. It could mean the end of your life. And often, you had nothing to defend yourself with. There weren’t enough fancy lawyers to stand up to the Catholic Church. And so, it is with a tragic view on the past that we see countless innocent victims being accused of something they never did, with no bad intentions or rebellious behavior, and nonetheless being executed in brutal manners. 
  One of the proponents of this system, and active executioners, was Thomas de Torquemada, a completely insane, cruel man who had become notorious for his methods of hunting down and taking out supposed anti-church offenders. Let’s study his life and acts more in this book.

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