A convincing argument for the influence of Jesus on modern liberals, but a work in need of more objectivity.
An argument that the liberal tradition owes its existence to a carpenter from Nazareth.
Altman (Journalism/University of Kentucky) provides a nonreligious overview of the life and teachings of Jesus, explaining how his influence has touched the modern liberal tradition. He points out that no matter what one’s personal religious leanings, Jesus has made an impact on the life of everyone on Earth and thus has an abiding secular legacy. After setting the historical stage, Altman offers his own reading of the gospels, without pretense. “Jesus appeared as a bumpkin,” he writes, and yet Jesus’ influence grew and people flocked to hear his teachings. The author discusses the famed cleansing of the temple by Jesus as a misreporting of events, and believes that in reality Jesus led, or at least influenced, a mob action that led to his eventual arrest and crucifixion. Rushing ahead 17 centuries, the author introduces the modern influence of Jesus by discussing Thomas Jefferson’s selective reading of the New Testament as a work of ethics. He lists a wide range of modern figures influenced by Jesus, all described by the author as “Liberalism’s Heroes,” as diverse as Voltaire and Harriet Tubman. Altman describes “love thy neighbor” as the essence of Jesus’ liberal teachings, and provides a detailed explanation of what liberals believe. Going further, he also discusses what liberals want for America. Though the political ramifications of Jesus’ teachings have been the grist for many books in recent decades, the author takes an unusually direct and partisan approach. Too often, however, he falls into the straw-man trap by uncritically espousing the views of American liberals while providing an overarching, umbrella condemnation of conservatives: “Conservative Americans are probably the most provincial and prudish people of any in the industrialized countries.” In fact, an entire chapter is devoted to defining and describing seven types of American conservatives, from bad to worst. At the bottom of the list are “Southern Rural Conservatives,” whom the author describes as “the dupes of the voting system.” Altman’s tone can actually embarrass the very liberals he supports.
A convincing argument for the influence of Jesus on modern liberals, but a work in need of more objectivity.Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0595430536
Page Count: 203
Publisher: iUniverse
Review Posted Online: Sept. 8, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular...
A neurosurgeon with a passion for literature tragically finds his perfect subject after his diagnosis of terminal lung cancer.
Writing isn’t brain surgery, but it’s rare when someone adept at the latter is also so accomplished at the former. Searching for meaning and purpose in his life, Kalanithi pursued a doctorate in literature and had felt certain that he wouldn’t enter the field of medicine, in which his father and other members of his family excelled. “But I couldn’t let go of the question,” he writes, after realizing that his goals “didn’t quite fit in an English department.” “Where did biology, morality, literature and philosophy intersect?” So he decided to set aside his doctoral dissertation and belatedly prepare for medical school, which “would allow me a chance to find answers that are not in books, to find a different sort of sublime, to forge relationships with the suffering, and to keep following the question of what makes human life meaningful, even in the face of death and decay.” The author’s empathy undoubtedly made him an exceptional doctor, and the precision of his prose—as well as the moral purpose underscoring it—suggests that he could have written a good book on any subject he chose. Part of what makes this book so essential is the fact that it was written under a death sentence following the diagnosis that upended his life, just as he was preparing to end his residency and attract offers at the top of his profession. Kalanithi learned he might have 10 years to live or perhaps five. Should he return to neurosurgery (he could and did), or should he write (he also did)? Should he and his wife have a baby? They did, eight months before he died, which was less than two years after the original diagnosis. “The fact of death is unsettling,” he understates. “Yet there is no other way to live.”
A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity.Pub Date: Jan. 19, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-8129-8840-6
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Sept. 29, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.
“Quality of life means more than just consumption”: Two MIT economists urge that a smarter, more politically aware economics be brought to bear on social issues.
It’s no secret, write Banerjee and Duflo (co-authors: Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way To Fight Global Poverty, 2011), that “we seem to have fallen on hard times.” Immigration, trade, inequality, and taxation problems present themselves daily, and they seem to be intractable. Economics can be put to use in figuring out these big-issue questions. Data can be adduced, for example, to answer the question of whether immigration tends to suppress wages. The answer: “There is no evidence low-skilled migration to rich countries drives wage and employment down for the natives.” In fact, it opens up opportunities for those natives by freeing them to look for better work. The problem becomes thornier when it comes to the matter of free trade; as the authors observe, “left-behind people live in left-behind places,” which explains why regional poverty descended on Appalachia when so many manufacturing jobs left for China in the age of globalism, leaving behind not just left-behind people but also people ripe for exploitation by nationalist politicians. The authors add, interestingly, that the same thing occurred in parts of Germany, Spain, and Norway that fell victim to the “China shock.” In what they call a “slightly technical aside,” they build a case for addressing trade issues not with trade wars but with consumption taxes: “It makes no sense to ask agricultural workers to lose their jobs just so steelworkers can keep theirs, which is what tariffs accomplish.” Policymakers might want to consider such counsel, especially when it is coupled with the observation that free trade benefits workers in poor countries but punishes workers in rich ones.
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-61039-950-0
Page Count: 432
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: Aug. 28, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
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