Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
A decade of fraud, exploitation, and hypocrisy gets mercilessly dissected in these caustic essays. Journalist and historian Frank (Listen, Liberal) gathers pieces published in Harper's, the Guardian, and elsewhere since 2011, surveying the cultural camouflage that disguises the predatory workings of capitalism. He attacks many juicy targets, including the callous interpersonal psychology of rich people; the faux-folksiness of fast-food restaurants that pay starvation wages; journalism's plunge, led by conservative media mogul Andrew Breitbart, into fake news and mindless caricature; the defunding of the humanities at universities and academics' defense of those fields as incubators of business acumen; reactions to Steven Spielberg's film Lincoln that lionized its depiction of political corruption as bipartisan "compromise" to which real-life politicians should aspire; and the George W. Bush Presidential Library's efforts to gloss over war, Hurricane Katrina, and economic collapse with an exhibit on "Laura and the twins and all the fun they had." In several trenchant pieces probing Donald Trump's rise, Frank avoids simplistic claims of voter bigotry and instead emphasizes issues of trade, economic decline, and the Democrats' abandonment of the working class for a politics of centrist neoliberalism. Frank's combination of insightful analysis, moral passion, and keen satirical wit make these essays both entertaining and an important commentary on the times. (June) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Frank (What's the Matter with Kansas?) has selected several pieces written for various publications over the last decade for his latest book. The essays included here all point toward the political but are not exclusively so. The overriding sociological theme seems to investigate where did it all go so wrong and how can we get it back? The economic climate of our country is the backdrop for Frank's essays, whether discussing suburbia, art, architecture, or the state of journalism. Frank's writing is refreshing in that he is solidly independent and gives no quarter to anyone in his sights, whether on the right or left. In fact, his most stinging criticisms are for the left. In that the essays are from the years leading up to the 2016 election, the things he wrote about the Democrats then have proven prescient. VERDICT Frank's old-school, punching-up liberal style is much welcomed. There is no better introduction to his work than this easily consumed volume suitable for all readers.-Brett Rohlwing, Milwaukee P.L. © Copyright 2018. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A liberal commentator offers his scathing take on contemporary American politics and culture.One of the results of the shocking election of Donald Trump has been the political commentariat's reassessment of the state of the nation. In that vein, Frank (Listen, Liberal, 2016, etc.), a former columnist for the Wall Street Journal and Harper's and founding editor of the Baffler, assembles a series of essays that originally appeared in various publications from 2011 to 2018. The essays, asserts the author in his introduction, "all aim to tell one essential story": the dissolution of the common bonds of American society as the rich and powerful accumulate more power and the rest of the citizenry is forgotten. Frank proceeds to paint a dystopian picture of struggling fast-food workers, greedy colleges and universities, and politicians' disregard for the common folk, all culminating in the election of Trump, "the very personification of this low, dishonest age." To his credit, the liberal author (he supported Bernie Sanders in 2016) acknowledges Trump's appeal to the working-class and rural voters whom Democratic Party elites have all but abandoned. Moreover, several of his arguments should resonate with Americans of all political stripes. Is there any doubt, for example, that a factor in the skyrocketing cost of a college education is "the insane proliferation of university administrators"? Yet Frank's analysis is occasionally faulty, as when he writes that Barack Obama, whose administration added as much as $9 trillion to the national debt, made a "turn to austerity" following a "brief experiment with deficit spending." While the author's essay on modern colleges and universities is mostly spot-on, he doesn't acknowledge the role that federal student loans have played in the outrageous rise in tuition he so rightly laments.Flaws aside, the book is worth perusing, primarily for its keen analysis of why the Democrats have come up short in recent election cycles. The party's powers that be would be wise to read up. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
