8. The Revenge of Geography: What the Map Tells Us About Coming Conflicts and the Battle Against Fate, by Robert D. Kaplan
Globetrotting author Kaplan reminds us why geography has mattered -- and still does -- in the realm of geopolitics.
"The regimes that had
fallen soon after the Berlin Wall did -- in Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania,
Bulgaria, and elsewhere -- were ones I had known intimately through work and
travel. Up close they had seemed so impregnable, so fear-inducing. Their abrupt
unraveling was a signal lesson for me, not only about the underlying
instability of all dictatorships, but about how the present, as permanent and
overwhelming as it can seem, is fleeting. The only thing enduring is a people's
position on the map. Thus, in times of upheaval maps rise in importance. With
the political ground shifting rapidly under one's feet, the map, though not
determinitive, is the beginning of discerning a historical logic about what
might come next."
9. End This Depression Now!, by Paul Krugman
The New York Times columnist and Princeton University economist lays out his pro-stimulus prescription for economic recovery in the United States.
"We are suffering woes that, for all the differences in detail that come with seventy-five years of economic, technological, and social change, are recognizably similar to those of the 1930s. And we know what policy makers should have been doing then, both from the contemporary analysis of Keynes and others and from much subsequent research and analysis. That same analysis tells us what we should be doing in our current predicament. Unfortunately, we're not using the knowledge we have, because too many people who matter -- politicians, public officials, and the broader class of writers and talkers who define conventional wisdom -- have, for a variety of reasons, chosen to forget the lessons of history and the conclusions of several generations' worth of economic analysis, replacing that hard-won knowledge with ideologically and politically convenient prejudices."
10. It's Even Worse Than It Looks: How the American Constitutional System Collided with the New Politics of Extremism, by Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein
Two congressional experts lambaste America's legislative body for unprecedented political partisanship -- and gridlock.
"The debt limit crisis of 2011 inspired as much coverage as any political story of the year, but we believe we need to revisit it, from its genesis on, to understand its future implications. The crisis underscored for many Americans the utter dysfunction in our politics and the disdain of our elected officials for finding solutions to big problems. To be sure, prolonged and contentious negotiations over important policies are not new, and the endgames usually go right up to the deadlines, and occasionally beyond. But these negotiations were so prolonged and contentious, and involved so many threats by top leaders that they would, according to Jason Chaffezt of Utah, ‘have taken it [the debt limit and America's credit] down' unless the Republicans' inflexible demands were met. The final deal to raise the ceiling left a clear impression that the next time might well be worse."
11. From the Ruins of Empire: The Intellectuals Who Remade Asia, by Pankaj Mishra
Indian-born novelist and essayist Mishra explores the intellectual history that shaped the rise of the East.
"Today Asian societies from Turkey to China seem very vital and self-assured. This wasn't how they appeared to those who condemned the Ottoman and Qing empires as ‘sick' and ‘moribund' in the nineteenth century. The much-heralded shift of economic power from the West to the East may or may not happen, but new perspectives have certainly opened up on world history. For most people in Europe and America, the history of the twentieth century is still largely defined by the two world wars and the long nuclear stand-off with Soviet Communism. But it is now clearer that the central event of the last century for the majority of the world's population was the intellectual and political awakening of Asia and its emergence from the ruins of both Asian and European empires. TO acknowledge this is to understand the world not only as it exists today, but also how it is continuing to be remade not so much in the image of the West as in accordance with the aspirations and longings of former subject peoples."
12. Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010, by Charles Murray
Controversial author Charles Murray argues the cultural gap between rich and poor white Americans is wider than the country has ever known.
"In 1960, college
graduates were still a minority, usually a modest minority, in even the most
elite places in the United States. Only Beverly Hills had a median family
income greater than $100,000. Over the next forty years, these places, already
fashionable in 1960, were infused with new cultural resources in the form of
college graduates and more money to pay for the tastes and preferences of an
upper class. These infusions were not a matter of a few percentage points or a
few thousand dollars. The median income in these fourteen elite towns and
neighborhoods went from $84,000 to $163,000 -- almost doubling. The median
percentage of college graduates went from 26 percent to 67 percent -- much more
than doubling."
13. The New Religious Intolerance: Overcoming the Politics of Fear in an Anxious Age, by Martha Nussbaum
University of Chicago law professor Nussbaum describes the roots of the religious fear behind acts of intolerance in the post-9/11 world.
"Once, not very long ago, Americans and Europeans prided themselves on their enlightened attitudes of religious toleration and understanding. Although everyone knew that the history of the West had been characterized by intense religious animosity and violence -- including such bloody episodes as the Crusades and the Wars of Religion, but including, as well, the quieter violence of colonial religious domination by Europeans in many parts of the world, domestic anti-Semitism and anti-Catholicism, and culminating in the horrors of Nazism, which implicated not only Germany but also many other nations -- Europe until very recently liked to think that these dark times were in the past. ... Today we have many reasons to doubt this complacent self-assessment. Our situation calls urgently for searching critical self-examination, as we try to uncover the roots of ugly fears and suspicions that currently disfigure all Western societies."
14. Government Bullies: How Everyday Americans Are Being Harassed, Abused, and Imprisoned by the Feds, by Rand Paul
The Tea Party-ing junior senator from Kentucky makes the case for a smaller U.S. government, with less regulation and less foreign intervention.
"We have sent billions of dollars to Africa to authoritarian regimes that rape, pillage, and torture their own people. We continue to give them more money each year in the hope that they might one day change their ways. It hasn't worked. We need a firmer hand. We need a stronger voice. We need to say no more aid to countries that do not have democratic elections, no more aid to nations that terrorize their own people -- and no more aid to anyone who detains innocent Americans! ... America doesn't even have the money to send them. We're borrowing the money from China to aid people who don't like us. This is illogical. It's an insult. And it should end."
SUBJECTS:
