Wednesday, April 4, 2018

Listen Liberal, Thomas Frank


Started:  3/12/2018
Completed: 4/3/2018
Recommended By: The New York Times and Current Affair
Recommendation: Highly Recommended

Review:

It is kind of amazing to me how many books I read recently quote Alexis de Tocqueville (his books, Democracy in America, Vol. 1 and Democracy in America, Vol. 2, are on the shelf to be read).  This particular book also quotes the Federalist Papers right up front.  What a great start to any book that hopes to address politics in the United States.

This book sheds a lot of light on the modern corportacracy that is the current political system.  I have felt things shifting to the right.  Reagan was a hard right conservative in his day and he is solidly left of center today (read his inaugural address--he wanted a representative from Canada and one from Mexico in his cabinet).  This book helps identify how far right Democrats have gone (as though you could not tell when Obama's signature Obamacare is based on a Republican system and has the poor paying money they cannot afford in order to, well, live).  Democrats have consciously and intentionally abandoned the working man.  The concept of a professional class was something new to me and the application of that concept in terms of a meritocracy and the tie between that and income inequality.

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