A useful look at the current makeup and mood of America’s voters.
The silent majority is neither Democratic nor Republican—and it’s ticked off.
If you feel disconnected from national politics, the chances are that you vote independent—which puts you in the majority, if the unheard one. So posits political analyst Killian (The Freshmen: What Happened to the Republican Revolution?, 1998) in this look at the current electorate. These independent and swing voters, she argues, are “the centrist voters who decide elections and represent more voters than those at the conservative and liberal ends of the spectrum.” Given the state of ideological gridlock, it is small wonder that these centrists, who are “fiscally conservative and socially tolerant,” might feel overlooked and ignored. Killian examines some of the curiosities of the political system: Why, for instance, does New Hampshire’s primary count so much, given that state’s relative lack of influence? The author proffers a couple of answers, one local (New Hampshire law requires its primary to be the first in the nation, so it gets perhaps undue attention) and one national (the New Hampshire primary is no longer a bellwether, given that the last three presidents all finished second). Why do candidates appeal to rural and small-town values when so few voters live in such places? How is it that the Tea Party electoral sweep of 2010 was able to occur? Killian also examines some well-worn notions and discovers them to obtain today: Voters may distrust and dislike Congress, for instance, but they tend to think their own representative is OK. In passing, the author also observes that whereas President Obama made political hay of a promise to heal the partisan rift in Washington, he has done little to act on it, such that independent voters in particular have been “disappointed in Obama’s presidential leadership”—with obvious implications for the upcoming election.
A useful look at the current makeup and mood of America’s voters.Pub Date: Jan. 17, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-312-58177-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Nov. 27, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
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
SEEN & HEARD
A forceful, necessarily provocative call to action for the preservation and protection of American Jewish freedom.
Known for her often contentious perspectives, New York Times opinion writer Weiss battles societal Jewish intolerance through lucid prose and a linear playbook of remedies.
While she was vividly aware of anti-Semitism throughout her life, the reality of the problem hit home when an active shooter stormed a Pittsburgh synagogue where her family regularly met for morning services and where she became a bat mitzvah years earlier. The massacre that ensued there further spurred her outrage and passionate activism. She writes that European Jews face a three-pronged threat in contemporary society, where physical, moral, and political fears of mounting violence are putting their general safety in jeopardy. She believes that Americans live in an era when “the lunatic fringe has gone mainstream” and Jews have been forced to become “a people apart.” With palpable frustration, she adroitly assesses the origins of anti-Semitism and how its prevalence is increasing through more discreet portals such as internet self-radicalization. Furthermore, the erosion of civility and tolerance and the demonization of minorities continue via the “casual racism” of political figures like Donald Trump. Following densely political discourses on Zionism and radical Islam, the author offers a list of bullet-point solutions focused on using behavioral and personal action items—individual accountability, active involvement, building community, loving neighbors, etc.—to help stem the tide of anti-Semitism. Weiss sounds a clarion call to Jewish readers who share her growing angst as well as non-Jewish Americans who wish to arm themselves with the knowledge and intellectual tools to combat marginalization and defuse and disavow trends of dehumanizing behavior. “Call it out,” she writes. “Especially when it’s hard.” At the core of the text is the author’s concern for the health and safety of American citizens, and she encourages anyone “who loves freedom and seeks to protect it” to join with her in vigorous activism.
A forceful, necessarily provocative call to action for the preservation and protection of American Jewish freedom.Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-593-13605-8
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 22, 2019
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