If the point of the book was to rail against a press and organizations that Monica Benderman does not feel are doing enough, that would be something many people could get behind and the book would be extremely popular on campuses. But that kind of railing requires a call to action and there is none in this book. Instead, readers are left with the impression that the movement needs healing and a guru has stepped forward to do so with later beatitudes to follow. While psycho-babble is a mainstay on the bestseller list, decade after decade, you generally have to tell the readers they are "good" and an outside force has led them astray. Readers will be left with the impression that the authors are saved and everyone else is dirty. Only the Bendermans have been spared "original sin" and it's been a huge struggle to maintain that status in a world populated with the "great evil" of people who attempted to help them. The stand Kevin Benderman took was a personal stand and the book divorces it from all social and political dynamics leaving it only a personal stand. Follow the guru, that would be Monica Benderman, and, in a lifetime, the world will be a better place. Dead and dying Iraqis? They're not a concern of the personal mission. Issues involving the inherent problems of a standing military -- large or at all -- aren't a concern. The legality of events either revolves around Kevin Benderman's case and only his case or it's ignored except for "right to privacy" for which a legal definition with no Constitutional backing is created on a whim. The book reminds me of several aquaintences, one in particular, in fact. Regardless of the issue, poverty, war, year after year she makes a point to express her "gratitude" to those she knows who work on the "physical issues" while she is on "an interior journey to understanding" which others would call navel gazing as she moves from faith to faith, marriage to marriage and some of the worst plastic surgery in California. That's what this book reminds me of, an attempt to shore up the exterior to distract from a hollow interior. The book could have used an active editor or a ghost writer. Monica Benderman has not been a part of the peace movement because she doesn't want to be part of it. I don't remember when the book stops but the complaints about the involvement continue to this day and I got an earful over the summer. When there's no one you can work with either you are so far ahead of the rest of humanity that it will take time for the rest of us to catch up with you or your problem is that you want the spotlight but having nothing to offer when it hits you. The funniest story I heard involved comparing it to Lucy Riccardo's repeated attempts to break into show biz. Ava and I laughed at that and other stories and only shared them with Jess and Ty but Monica Benderman's elected to make it public with her book. That's not my problem, that's not Elaine's problem. You write a book, people evaluate it. Books have greater weight than magazines, newspapers or speeches. This isn't a book about ending the illegal war, it's not a book about peace, it's not a call to action. It is a cry of inaction. The book doubles back on itself repeatedly whether it's in the claim of the need to respect all points of view -- which I don't agree with, I do agree everyone has a right to speak --only to slam those who would not put Monica Benderman in charge of the peace movement or to claim the need for truth to the people only to turn around and claim that ideas and strategies need to be road tested as if the peace movement were a bake off. It's real simple, the Iraq War is illegal and it was wrong from the start and built on lies. Anyone who can't express those sentiments really isn't part of the peace movement.
-- C.I. from this edition's "1 Book, 10 Minutes" which went up Thursday morning. Mike's readers Leigh and Beau started a mini-movement Thursday to have it declared the truest statement of the week and by Sunday, countless others were e-mailing this site.