A wounded right-wing yelp against companies that make moral as well as commercial decisions.
Hobby Lobby good, Patagonia bad: a plaintive denunciation of the movement toward socially responsible corporations.
That Ramaswamy considers Rand Paul to be “one of the greatest advocates for social liberties of Americans” tells you all you need to know about what side of the fence his political shadow falls on, and every word in this book should be read against that knowledge. The author is angry that the Milton Friedman school of predatory corporatism—capitalism in which the only duty of the firm is to maximize shareholder return—has turned into “stakeholder capitalism,” in which corporations advance causes for the social good. By Ramaswamy’s account, it’s wrong that Delta Airlines, headquartered in Atlanta, should denounce Georgia’s recent attempts at voter suppression while “failing to explain why Americans should care whether a voting law matches the values of an airline company.” The author scores a point or two: He’s right that there’s a disconnect between people’s decrying the corporate personhood enshrined in Citizens United while demanding that corporations take a role in socially progressive causes. He’s also right to note that corporate leaders love to take companies public in order to dilute the power of governing boards, since “the more people you are accountable to, the more powerful you become.” In the face of all this, Ramaswamy wrings his hands about what will happen to, say, the Trump supporters inside Google and demands that conservatives be accorded protected-class status under the terms of civil rights law, since he holds that the “Church of Diversity” is a civil religion whose tenets are to be questioned only at one’s peril. Here he waxes hyperbolic: “According to corporate America it’s anti-semitic to compare liberals to Nazis, but praiseworthy to compare conservatives to them.”
A wounded right-wing yelp against companies that make moral as well as commercial decisions.Pub Date: Aug. 17, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5460-9078-6
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Center Street/Hachette
Review Posted Online: Sept. 16, 2021
Well-told and admonitory.
Young-rags-to-mature-riches memoir by broker and motivational speaker Gardner.
Born and raised in the Milwaukee ghetto, the author pulled himself up from considerable disadvantage. He was fatherless, and his adored mother wasn’t always around; once, as a child, he spied her at a family funeral accompanied by a prison guard. When beautiful, evanescent Moms was there, Chris also had to deal with Freddie “I ain’t your goddamn daddy!” Triplett, one of the meanest stepfathers in recent literature. Chris did “the dozens” with the homies, boosted a bit and in the course of youthful adventure was raped. His heroes were Miles Davis, James Brown and Muhammad Ali. Meanwhile, at the behest of Moms, he developed a fondness for reading. He joined the Navy and became a medic (preparing badass Marines for proctology), and a proficient lab technician. Moving up in San Francisco, married and then divorced, he sold medical supplies. He was recruited as a trainee at Dean Witter just around the time he became a homeless single father. All his belongings in a shopping cart, Gardner sometimes slept with his young son at the office (apparently undiscovered by the night cleaning crew). The two also frequently bedded down in a public restroom. After Gardner’s talents were finally appreciated by the firm of Bear Stearns, his American Dream became real. He got the cool duds, hot car and fine ladies so coveted from afar back in the day. He even had a meeting with Nelson Mandela. Through it all, he remained a prideful parent. His own no-daddy blues are gone now.
Well-told and admonitory.Pub Date: June 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-074486-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Amistad/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2006
The choir is sure to enjoy this impassioned preaching on familiar progressive themes.
Essays on current political topics by a high-profile actor and activist.
Milano explains in an introduction that she began writing this uneven collection while dealing with a severe case of Covid-19 and suffering from "persistent brain fog.” In the first essay, "On Being Unapologetically Fucked Up,” the author begins by fuming over a February 2019 incident in which she compared MAGA caps worn by high school kids to KKK hoods. She then runs through a grab bag of flash-point news items (police shootings, border crimes, sexual predators in government), deploying the F-bomb with abandon and concluding, "What I know is that fucked up is as fundamental a state of the world as night and day. But I know there is better. I know that ‘less fucked up’ is a state we can live in.” The second essay, "Believe Women," discusses Milano’s seminal role in the MeToo movement; unfortunately, it is similarly conversational in tone and predictable in content. One of the few truly personal essays, "David," about the author's marriage, refutes the old saw about love meaning never having to say you're sorry, replacing it with "Love means you can suggest a national sex strike and your husband doesn't run away screaming." Milano assumes, perhaps rightly, that her audience is composed of followers and fans; perhaps these readers will know what she is talking about in the seemingly allegorical "By Any Other Name," about her bad experience with a certain rosebush. "Holy shit, giving birth sucked," begins one essay. "Words are weird, right?" begins the next. "Welp, this is going to piss some of you off. Hang in there," opens a screed about cancel culture—though she’s entirely correct that “it’s childish, divisive, conceited, and Trumpian to its core.” By the end, however, Milano's intelligence, compassion, integrity, and endurance somewhat compensate for her lack of literary polish.
The choir is sure to enjoy this impassioned preaching on familiar progressive themes.Pub Date: Oct. 26, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-18329-8
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: Aug. 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
