Pragmatic, optimistic proposals for an informed and active electorate. Will anyone listen?
An outspoken political analyst offers concrete suggestions to revive democracy, heal culture wars, and prevent a Trump victory in 2020.
CNN political contributor Jones (Rebuild the Dream, 2012, etc.), founder of the social justice organization the Dream Corps, laments the dissension and polarization blighting politics today. Both Democrats and Republicans, he asserts, “have been letting down the American people for a long time,” even before “an erratic egomaniac” came to power. “Since both parties are responsible,” he writes, “both parties need to look within.” Searching for a way forward, Jones aims “to reach out and build some bridges” between liberals like himself and conservatives, whose views he respects. Part manifesto, part manual for activism, the book is enlivened by case histories and personal anecdotes that serve as support for the author’s assertions. He believes that the progressive movement, having lost connection to mainstream Americans, “needs to reignite the fight for cross-racial unity among working people.” Trump’s rhetoric fomented bigotry, causing what Jones terms a “whitelash” against changing demographics and particularly against a black president. But although he recognizes racism within Trump’s coalition, Jones does not believe that alone led to his election. He faults Democrats, as well, for Hillary Clinton’s defeat, calling for “a pro-democracy movement that can inspire” and not merely critique. The author proposes common projects that may bring opposing sides together: fixing the justice system, ending the opioid addiction crisis, opening up the technology sector to all, and transitioning to a greener economy. In two appendices, Jones offers suggestions of books and videos that can serve as bridge-building resources and a long list of political organizations to help people get involved in change. Although most are liberal and progressive—e.g., Black Lives Matter, Center for Community Change, Planned Parenthood—Jones does include conservative groups, such as the American Enterprise Institute and Compilation: Conservative and Libertarian News Sources. “I am interested in the moral center, not the political center,” he writes.
Pragmatic, optimistic proposals for an informed and active electorate. Will anyone listen?Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-399-18002-6
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Aug. 28, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
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
PERSPECTIVES
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
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