Robinson is a sharp storyteller, jarring and fascinating as he goes, which makes his message of personal responsibility, of...
The story of a man who is making a significant difference to young African-Americans, told within the framework of a general condemnation of African-American circumstances in today's America, from activist Robinson (The Debt, 2000, etc.).
What can be done for today’s young black men—a truly endangered generation—in America today? Two years back, Robinson suggested that America ought to make some financial reparations to African-Americans for the legacy of dysfunctional families, poor education and health acre, poverty, and prospects not worth a dime, the modern day pain and hopelessness engendered by old policies as well as the institutionalization of racism, that have been that have been the African-American life for the past few hundred years. But reparations, even if understood an act of national survival, will not have an impact on the people in jeopardy now, says Robinson. That will be the task of African-Americans themselves, and they better get started. Certainly the nurturing experience starts with children at home, where the elemental demands on personal responsibility are first posed. But there is a lot of wreckage out there and a lot of salvaging to be done. As an example, Robinson unfurls the life story of Peewee Kirkland, a man who now runs a center delivering love and caring for African-American youths, and a decent shot of political, social, and cultural awareness. The tumultuous life he led prior to his current work gives him a credibility demonstrated by his effect upon New Child Lynch, another man destined to wreak havoc on his society rather than be a valuable contribution to its betterment. Robinson takes particular care to explain the workings of the correctional system that housed Kirkland for seven years and was likely to take in Lynch as well, as a “catch-and-cage rural-development juggernaut,” a grotesque pork-barrel scheme that profits vastly by the incarceration of African-Americans.
Robinson is a sharp storyteller, jarring and fascinating as he goes, which makes his message of personal responsibility, of the kind of sacrifice and vision that have always been in short supply, a welcome obligation.Pub Date: Jan. 14, 2002
ISBN: 0-525-94625-X
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2001
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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