Passionately argued but technical and tedious.
An examination of the obstacles that independent and third-party candidates face while running for office.
“I have concluded that the laws, regulations, and barriers we have in place against political competition in the United States are only one short step removed from countries where the state itself predetermines the slate [of candidates],” writes Amato, the manager for Ralph Nader’s 2000 and 2004 presidential campaigns. After two tumultuous electoral cycles during which the Nader campaign withstood numerous lawsuits, the wrath of the Democratic Party and an alternately indifferent and hostile media, Amato came to the realization that the current political system has institutionalized discrimination against candidates who do not belong to either the Republican or Democratic parties. According to the author—and Nader, who wrote the book’s foreword—such discrimination stifles alternative voices and limits voter choice on Election Day. Despite a rich national history of upstart parties and non-mainstream candidates, the two-party system has become so entrenched in the U.S. political arena that it seems natural to citizens. Amato argues that in order to maintain their political dominance, the two parties have erected barriers that disallow independent and third-party candidates from competing on a level playing field. In detail-saturated prose, the author expounds on the ballot access laws, opaque electoral regulations and “bipartisan” commissions that thwart alternative candidates and preserve the status quo. The tone is forceful and spirited, but too often Amato provides excessive information without tethering her argument to the overarching narrative. While she makes clear that the book is not a “political memoir or a campaign tell-all,” the most engaging sections mix analysis with colorful personal anecdotes. Amato is less effective in her conclusion, where she offers a laundry list of state and federal reforms that becomes more mind-numbing than informative.
Passionately argued but technical and tedious.Pub Date: June 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-59558-394-9
Page Count: 400
Publisher: The New Press
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2009
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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