Book Description
This book represents a considerable revision and expansion of Public Choice II (1989). As in the previous editions, all of the major topics of public choice are covered. These include: why the state exists, voting rules, federalism, the theory of clubs, two-party and multiparty electoral systems, rent seeking, bureaucracy, interest groups, dictatorship, the size of government, voter participation, and political business cycles. Normative issues in public choice are also examined. The book is suitable for upper level courses in economics dealing with politics, and political science courses emphasizing rational actor models.
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This book represents a considerable revision and expansion of Public Choice II (1989). As in the previous editions, all of the major topics of public choice are covered. These include: why the state exists, voting rules, federalism, the theory of clubs, two-party and multiparty electoral systems, rent seeking, bureaucracy, interest groups, dictatorship, the size of government, voter participation, and political business cycles. Normative issues in public choice are also examined. The book is suitable for upper level courses in economics dealing with politics, and political science courses emphasizing rational actor models.
Customer Reviews:
Good Review Text on Rat-Choice Politics and Public Choice.......2003-05-22
This is a great book! As a political-science graduate student I've been exposed to a great deal of game-theory and rat-choice in my seminar classes, but, unfortunately, it has come in the form of numerous papers, piles of books, and several classes that did not build off of one another. I was left with the feeling that it was a very, very important subject, but it was presented in a manner that left me, as a student, with an incomplete picture of the topic and the breadth of work that has gone on in this field.
Mueller's achievements in this volume have been three:
1. Coherent presentation of the theory of public choice / rational politics.
2. Discussion of the most important empirical work that has gone on in this field in a unified fashion that leads one naturally into further inquiry in this area.
3. Logically organizes and presents the material in a way that reinforces concepts, logic, and thinking in the book.
These three things make this book a great review or introductory text to the field of public choice / rational politics that should be on the "must have" list of every serious student of politics and economics. Moreover, not being terribly skilled at mathematics myself, the material is presented both through intuitive written discussions, fairly simplistic "example" equations that are pretty easy to follow if you've had a "principles" microecon course with calculus, and, which I greatly appreciate, a fair amount of graphs. Moreover, the bibliography that the book draws on is very, very extensive...meaning that it has the additional utility of being a handy jumping off point if you're doing research in this area.
My only complaint, and this is a minor one, is that I would like a bit more math in the book either at the end of each chapter or in an appendix that works out, step-by-step, some of the additional concepts he runs over that aren't dealt with mathematically in the main text of the chapters themselves.
This, at least in my opinion, is an excellent book for the graduate student interested in learning about public choice / rational politics.
Book Description
This book argues that the dramatic post-1970 rise in international capital mobility has not systematically contributed to the retrenchment of developed welfare states as many claim. Nor has globalization directly reduced the revenue-raising capacities of governments and undercut the political institutions that support the welfare state. Rather, institutional features of the polity and the welfare state determine the extent to which the economic and political pressures associated with globalization produce Welfare state retrenchment.
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This book argues that the post-1970 rise in international capital mobility has not contributed to the retrenchment of developed welfare states. Nor has globalization reduced the revenue-raising capacities of governments and undercut the political institutions that support the welfare state. Rather, institutional features of the polity and the welfare state determine the extent to which the economic and political pressures associated with globalization produce welfare state retrenchment. In systems characterized by electoral institutions, social corporatist interest representation and policy-making, centralized political authority, and social insurance-based program structures, pro-welfare state interests are favored. In nations characterized by majoritarian electoral institutions, pluralist interest representation and policy-making, decentralization of policy-making authority, and liberal program structure, the economic and political pressures attendant on globalization are translated into rollbacks of social protection. Globalization has had least impact on large welfare states of Northern Europe and most effect on small welfare states of Anglo nations.
Book Description
With her analysis of the thirty-year campaign to reform and ultimately to end welfare, Gwendolyn Mink levels a searing indictment of anti-welfare politicians' assault on poor mothers. She charges that the basic elements of the new welfare policy subordinate poor single mothers in a separate system of law. Mink points to the racial, class, and gender biases of both liberals and conservatives to explain the odd but sturdy consensus behind welfare reforms that force the poor single mother to relinquish basic rights and compel her to find economic security in work outside the home.
Mink explores how and why we should cure the unique inequality of poor single mothers by reorienting the emphasis of welfare policy away from regulating mothers to rewarding the work they do. Every mother is a working mother, the bumper sticker proclaims, but the work mothers do pays no wages. Mink argues that women's equality depends on economic support for caregivers' work.
Welfare's End challenges the ways in which policymakers define the problem they seek to cure. While legislators assume that something is wrong with poor single mothers, Mink insists that something is wrong with a system that invades their rights and negates their work. Showing how welfare reform harms women, Mink invites the design of policies to promote gender justice.
Customer Reviews:
Not a good case against welfare reform.......1999-06-05
Seizing the polemic language of the welfare "reform"ers, Mink uses this same crude style in trying to oppose any type of reform. Was the welfare system in America not working too well? Yes. Was it in need of reform? Yes. Did the 1996 effort by Clinton and the Republicans help remove some of the problems? Yes. The welfare advocates do not recognize any of these facts. They simply point out the false stereotypes employed by the anti-welfare crowd and the problems of this law, which forces women to work rather than care for their kids. Mink, like many other self-styled feminists, does not care for the moral groundings of true feminism or of the original welfare legislation. Instead, she seems to advocate a libertine lifestyle wherein rights take precedence over responsibilities. This kind of polemical work only works when it falls back on statistics - the rest of the time it fails to make a convincing case against a terribly flawed "reform" policy that is simple to refute. Gary Bryner's "Politics and Public Morality" is a much better assessment of this legislation and much more highly recommended by this reader.
a thorough look at the real "welfare" system.......1998-05-19
Mink addresses the topic in a small but powerful volume, analyzing the so-called welfare system as it truly is; an intentional labyrinthian trap, designed to keep vulnerable members of society, men, as well as women and children in a state of economic siege.
Amazon.com
James C. Scott's research for this book began with an examination of the tensions between state authorities and various "unstable" individuals throughout history, from hunter-gatherer tribes to Gypsies to the homeless. He soon became fascinated, however, by the recurring patterns of failure and authoritarianism in certain social engineering programs aimed at bringing such people fully into the state's fold. Soviet collectivization, the Maoist Great Leap Forward, the precisely planned city of Brasilia--these and other projects around the world, while deeply ambitious, extracted immeasurable tolls on the people they were designed to help.
One of the most important common factors that Scott found in these schemes is what he refers to as a high modernist ideology. In simplest terms, it is an extremely firm belief that progress can and will make the world a better place. But "scientific" theories about the betterment of life often fail to take into account "the indispensable role of practical knowledge, informal processes, and improvisation in the face of unpredictability" that Scott views as essential to an effective society. What high modernism lacks is metis, a Greek word which Scott translates as "the knowledge that can only come from practical experience." Although metis is closely related to the concept of "mutuality" found in the anarchist writings of, among others, Kropotkin and Bakunin, Scott is careful to emphasize that he is not advocating the abolition of the state or championing a complete reliance on natural "truth." He merely recognizes that some types of states can initiate programs which jeopardize the well-being of all their subjects.
Although the collapse of most socialist governments might lead one to believe that Seeing Like a State is old news, Scott's analysis should prove extremely useful to those considering the effects of global capitalism on local communities.
Book Description
Why have large-scale schemes to improve the human condition in the twentieth century so often gone awry? James C. Scott analyzes diverse failures in high-modernist, authoritarian state planning-collectivization in Russia, the building of Brasilia, compulsory ujamaa villages in Tanzania, and others-and uncovers conditions common to all such planning disasters. What these failures teach us, he argues, is that any centrally managed social plan must recognize the importance of local customs and practical knowledge if it hopes to succeed.
Customer Reviews:
A fascinating must read.......2007-09-25
I've found this book useful, breathtakingly so, in so many ways these days; Scott raises a question at the heart of almost all our current civic debates, even in my own micro-field of schooling and education. I find myself saying, time and again, "she's thinking like a state", and it fits and helps me resort out the arguments. Thank you thank you, Prof. Scott.
Seeing Like a State.......2007-03-29
I got this book because it was recommended as background reading for a local debate about CAFOs. I like the meticulous detail in this treatment of social engineering by governments. That is not a liberal/conservative issue, but one which is worth looking at wherever there is a risk of social control that can lead to inequality and injustice.
Hayek meets Heidegger.......2006-11-28
Brad DeLong's featured review is basically correct - Scott is treading ground remarkably similar to Hayek's. But I don't think that Scott is ignorant of Hayek. Rather, Scott is attempting to explore the same territory, but without coming to the same political conclusions. Early in this book, Scott makes clear that he is not advocating libertarianism (I am told that Scott calls himself an anarchist). He is aiming at a deeper critique of planning, one which is not merely about prices or information, but about metaphysics, epistemology and phenomenology. Scott never makes it explicit, but throughout this book, I got the sense that he is doing continental philosophy. This is a Heideggerian critique of planning - one that just happens to cover some of the same ground as Hayek.
Scott's focus is on "seeing" like a (high modernist) state; the question this book asks is: how does such a state see, and what does state-like perception systematically miss? Scott argues the state's vision is limited to the conscious, the rational, and the abstract - it cannot see beyond what Nassim Nicholas Taleb has called "the Platonic fold." This vision is identical to what continental philosophers refer to as the "objective gaze." The unconscious, the organic, the ecological and the folk-wise are invisible to the modernist bureaucracy. To make these invisible elements rationally "legible," the state reaches out and actively reduces them to known quantities. This allows the state some limited control over them, but in the process any emergent systematic properties are destroyed.
It is tempting to conclude that this book is a generalized critique of government. It is not. The mistakes Scott identifies are characteristic only of a certain type of regime, the high modernist state. High modernism, as Scott identifies it, is a sort of irrational confidence in objective rationality. It becomes possible on a large scale only after the Enlightenment, and especially after the advent of "scientific" management. It is epitomized not only by Stalin, but by Robert McNamara's Department of Defense, and the US Bureau of Reclamations. Nor is it limited to states. Systematic flaws exist in the perception of any large hierarchical organization that makes decisions on the basis of abstract calculative rationality. As such, this is ultimately a much more profound critique than Hayek's.
DeLong is right that this book is not as well-written or organized as it could have been, but the synthesis of Hayek and Heidegger is absolute genius. It makes the book a classic in my view.
Got the gist, gets lost in the details.......2006-08-31
Scott's book gets off to a very good start, arguing that the roots of "high modernism" run deep in a particular world view that grew with scientific culture, but lacks its elements of ruthless self-criticism. What impressed me was his grasp of this ideology as a culture, albeit a culture of a few. Science too is a culture, and this phenomenon is the mentality of the technicians, the engineers, the planners...once they gain power. As one who works in this milieu, although not with the power elite, it rang very true.
He also does a wonderful job of skewering the cultural and aesthetic pretensions of people like Le Corbusier, although this has been done very well by others as well. But Scott does a very good job of showing how the aesthetic was the political, although nobody would admit it.
Unfortunately, after the first two chapters or so, Scott's writing loses its force and wonders about, making no very impressive points, and relating interesting annecdotes, providing intriguing descriptions of bad situations, but not advancing or deepening his argument.
the negative nature of government.......2006-07-29
James Scott argues that the formal rules of social-engineering design inevitably leave out elements essential to their actual function. He expounds cases both in America and abroad, current and historic, that reinforce this theme. Whether planning ecosystems, cities or societies, authoritative, Scott not only hypothesizes but demonstrates that centralized plans which fail to account for local idiosyncracies will themselves fail.
I find Scott so convincing that I finished the book with a sense of dismal foreboding. Neither major political party in the U.S. listens to this message. Even conservatives, traditional advocates for smaller, less centralized government, propose strategies that violate the principles Scott delineates.
This book should be required reading for anyone in public office or on a planning commission. Then it should be read by everyone who votes for those offices so we can see the dangers of voting for people who see like a state rather than like a human being.
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Modernity and the State: East, West (Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought)
Claus Offe
Manufacturer: The MIT Press
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A Brief History of Neoliberalism
ASIN: 0262650479 |
Book Description
Clause Offe, one of the most insightful contemporary theorists of society and politics, has contributed greatly to our understanding of social policy and the odyssey of advanced capitalism in the late twentieth century. Modernity and the State, a dozen essays written over the last decade, develops his earlier lines of interest and extends them to the new societies emerging in Central-Eastern Europe.
Offe frames the essays by suggesting that the key question for analyzing present-day Western democracies is, Who is in charge? He traces the recent problems of almost all political leaders to four factors: the end of the Cold War, borders that are increasingly porous, "postmodern" social and political trends that make it increasingly difficult to form long-standing coalitions, and the loss of clear-cut work categories of the sort that once made collective action feasible.
The essays are divided into four parts. "Modernity and Self-Limitation" explores the contradictory relationship between modernity and liberty and the possibilities of renewing civil society so as to alleviate this contradiction. "State Theory: Continuities and Reorientation" applies the concepts and categories developed in the first part to recent policy debates over deregulation, market orthodoxy, and the most effective forms of democratic practice. "The Politics of Social Welfare," the heart of the book, explores the extent to which market outcomes must be accepted (in the name of efficiency) or corrected (in the name of justice and equity). "The New East" argues that the issue of balancing and correcting market outcomes is as central and contested in the new market economies of Central-Eastern Europe as it has always been in the West, and that the success of democratization will depend on the extent to which the operation of the labor market is mitigated by appropriate structures of social security.
Book Description
When and why have employers supported the development of institutions of social insurance that provide benefits to workers for various employment-related risks? What factors explain the variation in the social policy preferences of employers? This book provides a systematic evaluation of the role played by business in the development of the modern welfare state. Isabela Mares studies these critical questions and demonstrates that major social policies were adopted by cross-class alliances comprising labor-based organizations and key sectors of the business community.
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Welfare and the State: Critical Concepts in Political Science
N. Deakin
Manufacturer: Routledge
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Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 0415262879 |
Book Description
One of the major contested issues in contemporary social policy is that of welfare--how it should be available, to whom, on what terms and by what means. The debate on welfare has taken place across the developed world, and has spread to developing nations: it encompasses a wide range of ideological positions and consumes a large proportion of the resources of states that provide it. This collection reprints the essential scholarship exploring the ramifications of welfare and the state over the course of the twentieth-century, drawing material from a range of disciplines and with a geographical coverage across all major developed countries.
Customer Reviews:
Outstanding yet ultimately incomplete treatise.......2003-05-28
De Jasay presents us with a problem: Constitutions are the highest law of the land and intended to chain down Leviathan, but the constituion is just a document - a government document at that. Constitutions are tantamount to giving all the guns to one person and making them promise not to use them. They are like chastity belts on government growth - and government has the key.
This book is a tour-de-force critique of constitutions. It recognizes them for what they are and nothing more. The book could have been a bit longer, with more specific examples: but perhaps the author would feel it would expose the inherent weakness in his argument. Some countries are more free than others - why? Does it have anything to do with written constitutions? Moral constitutions and cultural restrictions? The force of the people? De Jasay's analysis could have been complemented with an in-depth Public Choice analysis of how politics actually works, rather than a blanket statement denying any effect of constitutions. Even if de Jasay is right about all his points, his lack of perspectives makes the book seem like shoddy scholarship and philosophical ranting at times.
Read this book if you want to understand some of the inherent problems with the idea of constitutional government, then ask yourself why de Jasay is wrong if you think he is. The writing in this book can be pessimistic and nearly lifeless, but several arguments are strong and insightful. It is an important piece of anarchist/libertarian literature and should not be overlooked.
Customer Reviews:
...and the blind shall lead.......2007-10-09
In his previous work, A CONFLICT OF VISIONS, Thomas Sowell explored the issue of why people often tend to agree with the same people on seemingly distinct social and political issues. If a woman advocates generous welfare benefits, abortion on demand and preferential policies for blacks to compensate for the legacy of slavery, where do you think she stands on gun control? Yeah, maybe you will be wrong if you say she advocates strict gun control, but probably not.
As Sowell explained, the reason for this is because of the visions that people have about the world in which they live. Those with the constrained vision view humans as inherently very limited in what we can do and accomplish and advocate those social structures that allow us to best cope with such limitations. Those with the unconstrained vision view people as far more capable of achieving certain favorable ideals and goals, if only such limitations were not imposed upon us preventing us from doing so.
In THE VISION OF THE ANOINTED, Sowell explores the unconstrained vision further. This vision is predominant in the intellectual and political elite and often involves attitudes and opinions that are simply taken for granted. Whereas A CONFLICT OF VISIONS is more academic in tone (if one did not know Sowell himself was one with the constrained vision, one probably would not have gleaned it from the text), THE VISION OF THE ANOINTED is more polemical and ideological. Although that makes for a more fun read for the red meat crowd, it makes for a work of lesser importance in Sowell's oeuvre on ideas.
Early in the book Sowell makes it clear that the anointed vision is predominant not because it is empirically correct, but because it provides its visionaries with a sense of being on the moral high ground compared to the benighted others. The most important feature of the book, the one that has certainly stayed with me the longest and made the deepest impression, is Sowell's analysis of the irrelevance of evidence to those with this vision. As Sowell correctly points out, history is filled with people screaming from the sidelines that a society is about to hit the wall. Yet some mechanism within the vision itself prevents negative feedback from entering the ideological loop.
A comparison of the anointed vision with the benighted vision is provided as a refresher on the subject and example after example is provided as to how a vision of society in desperate need of the anointed's special insight leads to a worsening of the situation. The crusades of the anointed cover a wide ground, from protecting everyone from themselves with strict safety measures imposed on society, to eradication of racism and sexism, to seeking the root causes of crime. In each case, we can, so the vision goes, do so much more to help and even change our fellow man. In each case, however, more people are ultimately harmed, either directly through the recidivism of criminals or more indirectly, such as through the slow erosion of our ability to govern ourselves rather than have a non-elected judiciary impose its will on us.
Sowell seems to letting off a lot of personal steam in this book, again making it a more enjoyable but less substantive work than A CONFLICT OF VISIONS. But that is all relative. A lesser work by Sowell is still head and shoulders above almost anything else out there, except better books by Sowell himself. Any dispassionate reader will get an awful lot of insight out of THE VISION OF THE ANOINTED.
In the great tradition.......2007-08-06
I have never read a book that taught me so much. It teaches how to think clearly about law, economics and social policy. It is worthy to be spoken of in the same tradition as Adam Smith and Edmund Burke: a classic.
Great Data based book.......2007-06-12
I read this book several years ago and have bought several copies for friends and relatives. Dr. Sowell takes a data based rational look at many of our cultural problems that plague us today and things that "Great Society" thinkers have done and the impact on the basic problem. I find myself reviewing Dr. Sowell's conclusions and data several times a year. I have read many of his books and am a great admirer of his work- instead of platitudes and bumper sticker messages- he looks critically at issues and what the data tells us.
If you are reading a book to confirm your "opinions" Dr. Sowell may disappoint you, especially if you have a "liberal" world view. However, if you are willing to examine your beliefs and see what the data says he is a great resource. Unlike many current culture books, I find him insightful, entertaining and very rational. I haven't been bored by any of his works.
Explaining Common Sense.......2007-05-23
Do you ever get the feeling, while listening to experts, pundits, and talking heads, that reality has left the discussion? Looking for a gut check? Look no further.
This well founded book explains how the self appointed elite weave a fabric of intellectual fallacy for the purpose of acquisition of power and self congratulations.
-Cheers
Government, Explained. .......2007-03-25
I have read Thomas Sowell's columns for many years, but was not prepared for the full brilliance of his mind which is emphatically on display throughout the pages of The Vision of the Anointed. The four stages of his "Pattern of Failure" are timeless. Certainly they apply to our current situation as Al Gore, in his speech before Congress the other day, embodies it in its strictest sense. Here Sowell enlightens us as to the true nature of the self-righteous leftist; a person who believes himself "anointed" while all the rest of us are inferiors by comparison. Those who disagree with our self-proclaimed elites are not only dupes, they are evil. Theirs is a shallow, theatrical world of Manichean "truth." They despise statistics and any level of proof unless they find a way to manipulate it in the name of misguided social engineering. The Residual Fallacy is something that I have never seen explained as well as it is here and I thank Mr. Sowell for taking the time to flesh it out. Our polity is much better off due to his formulating his thoughts and publishing them.
Book Description
Decaying values. Sexually transmitted diseases.
Fatherless homes. Rampant drug use.
These aren't just problems for today's inner cities.
It's the plight of all America.
Much has been said about Bill Cosby's incendiary remarks about urban black culture and its "dirty laundry." But in this provocative book, Star Parker, one of today's most controversial commentators,
Customer Reviews:
Personal Responsibility Helps But This Book Does Not.......2007-08-18
This is a book with some important ideas, but it is so badly done that I fear it will
not be effective at changing behaviors.
The subtitle is "How Middle Class America Reflects Inner City Decay." Parker claims the
problems of the ghetto, broken families, drug abuse, sexually transmitted diseases, bad
schools, crime, you name it, are increasing in "middle America" and we can expect the
slide to continue unless we repent and change out ways. She supports her claim with various
statistics. The first problem is "claim". There are no specific sources in the text, but
usually the name of the source of the data. There is a 17 entry bibliography, with no
cross references to the text, but all are on the web, so some might be still available.
There is also no index. The table of contents is fairly detailed, but many of the titles
will not help you find what you are looking for.
I did not try to check any of the claims; some, perhaps most, seemed right but some seemed
wrong. There were enough other mistakes in the book to make me suspect the statistics.
Some mistakes seemed like sloppy word processing, missing words or changing the wording but
not completely eliminating the old wording. Others seemed more serious, mis-attributing a
quote, or getting it wrong. In some cases she got the facts of government wrong. Judges do
not seek search warrants, they authorize them.
Here is more of her analysis. The cause of many of the problems is a victim attitude, a
lack of individual responsibility. That is caused by government and other handouts, such as
admission to schools too tough to succeed in. Along the way she attacks homosexuality,
abortion, liberals, homosexuality, abortion, the Kelo decision, the ACLU, homosexuality,
evolution, abortion, voters (for allowing all this), and homosexuality and abortion. The
cure is religion, preferably Christianity. Late in the book, the possibility of a society
without the problems she deplores, and with a strong sense of individual responsibility,
is dismissed as impossible without religion. The solution is for Christians to
stand up for their real beliefs and not treat tolerance as the greatest good and
judgment as the worst evil.
Other reviewers have noted that the book seems rambling and disjointed. I suspect that some
of the material was originally intended for an opinion column.
There are lots of shades of gray in the world, but there is still black and white. I fear
the good in this book will be ignored because of the weaknesses. I expect that much of the
criticism will be of the form, "How dare a black person think for herself and even be a
conservative."
Deceptive.......2007-07-13
Not knowing anything about the author, I picked up this book thinking it would be an interesting sociological study in the parallels between two opposite American cultures. Rather all I found was at best, a statement of obvious observations and moral presumptions made by the author on behalf of the reader, and at times based off of clearly distorted facts or quotes. Furthermore it's unfortunate that it appears to use Christianity as its base of morality, when now more than ever both the middle class and the inner city exemplify a much greater religious diversity. Sadly, the book was no where near what I was looking for. Spending half a chapter on sexuality bashing homosexuals deals nothing with suburban or urban culture. Luckily the library will take this book back!
One Star for Star.......2007-01-19
Wow! This book is utterly ri-donk-ulous. Mistress Parker perpetrates yet another volume of sensationalist punditry upon our poor, brainwashed souls. You know, if her crazy rants weren't so boring, I could at least write this off as feelgood toilet reading. I mean, at least Rosie O'Donnel makes crazy-and-stupid entertaining for the masses. Even Nancy Grace manages to conduct this type of circus act with a little dignity and humor. Honestly, Madame Parker's points and topics are all very compelling, but she's about as convincing and about as appropriate as Al Jolsen in blackface.
An Awesome Book!!!.......2006-11-03
I grew up conservative, but going to college, watching lots of TV and working with teens, I slowly began to wonder if "liberals" could be right in some areas. Isn't helping the poor a good thing, and don't we want to be free to make choices?
Star Parker clearly and boldly shatered the lies that I had begun to believe and has helped me to be more sure than ever of the biblical principles of hard work and Biblical morality. These fondations are the only way for "middle America" to help the poor and at the same time stop our own slide toward imorality and socialism!
Con Game.......2006-05-23
Star Parker's latest rant shows marked improvement in literary composition compared to her earlier attempts. Despite being a little rambling, it is awash in the current right-wing hot-buttons and assuredly helps her quest for funds from the "better" half of society. Perhaps she had some help in writing this, because I did not find an Ebonic faux pas, such as appeared in "Pimps, Whores and Welfare Brats", i.e. "You kiddin, right?".
She's now heavy into the homophobia so dear to fundamentalists. Perhaps gays are taking the bread right off her table, but I'm 73 years old and never witnessed any problems with gay people, or witnessed any gays at all other than a friend's daughter and her partner. According to Star, they are everywhere, and they're nothing but trouble. Moreover, Star claims homosexuality is merely a choice, but I don't recall ever making a CHOICE . . . I liked women from day one. Interestingly, she did not claim homosexual activity among her youthful indiscretions, so Star perhaps didn't need to choose either.
Ms. Parker's asserted cures for the country's economic ills, especially as those ills apply to black America, are what she categorizes under TRUTH, and she's quite willing to pad them with some distortions of economic history (e.g. Reagan cut taxes and spending???). While escaping poverty is difficult, it has a simple formula, according to Star. Regardless of race or origin, if everyone will only adhere to virtues (chastity and fidelity), have faith in Christian values (like hers) and avoid any support from government, everyone will move up from poverty to what has been called the American Dream. Don't you wonder why those blacks in New Orleans hadn't thought of that? Why didn't they simply work in better paying jobs during those intervals between sermons at the neighborhood church? Perhaps they were too busy gorging on welfare supplied caviar to let the idea sink in. Also, they probably were influenced by those nefarious liberal secularists.
As an affirmed liberal (lewd-leftist in Star's lexicon), and a secular Zeaist to boot, I have to question the moral and intellectual authority that this gal poses to us. Both she and I came from honest, decent, lower class families. I went on to higher education on the (liberal) government sponsored GI Bill, started and owned two small but successful businesses and, aside from a few traffic tickets, I never came close to breaking the law.
She, on the other hand, was caught shoplifting, blew up a couple cars owned by her teachers, beat up weaker white kids so she could steal their money, played the old Murphy game with other hoods, took sexual promiscuity to new heights, had four abortions before having a baby fathered by someone other than her boyfriend, etc, etc. She excuses all that now by saying she was a secularist in those days, and hadn't yet found religion. Besides, none of it was her fault, as she earlier wrote "If just one person had said, `Star, what you're doing is wrong.' it might have changed the destiny of my life." What??? She didn't know what she did was wrong????
The certainty with which this expert makes her assertions brings the question: Where does she get her profound wisdom? Is she really all that smart? In her first book, Star mentions that she couldn't understand why anyone would steal her bicycle, while also claiming she didn't have a clue that a shoplifting record could stay with her for the rest of her life. Such naivete is just a smidge this side of stupidity.
But Star is really good at one thing . . . shilling for the conservatives who pay her to spew their hateful and exclusionary notions. She does that by speaking before conservative groups and on radio, as well as publishing stuff like White Ghetto. Also, she formed a non-profit organization (to help others, of course), an organization that will - for a donation of a hundred bucks - send you one of her autographed books. Donations to this organization probably go 100% to and for the unfortunate, and can't possibly be used to provide Star with the luxuries she thinks she deserves.
You kiddin', right?
Books:
- Quantitative Methods for Business (with Crystal Ball Pro 2000 v7.1, CD-ROM, and InfoTrac )
- Race Against Empire: Black Americans and Anticolonialism, 1937-1957
- Rational Choice and Criminal Behavior: Recent Research and Future Challenges (Current Issues in Criminal Justice (Routledge (Firm)).)
- Real Estate Market Analysis: A Case Study Approach
- Reasoning by Mathematical Induction in Children's Arithmetic (Advances in Learning and Instruction)
- Red Mafiya: How the Russian Mob Has Invaded America
- Restaurant Franchising
- Romancing Mister Bridgerton (Bridgerton Series, Book 4)
- Rule of Experts: Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity
- Simpleology: The Simple Science of Getting What You Want
Books Index
Books Home
Recommended Books
- History: Fiction or Science
- Too Late to Say Goodbye: A True Story of Murder and Betrayal
- Jane Goodall: 40 Years at Gombe
- National Geographic Almanac of World History
- Statistical Methods in Bioinformatics: An Introduction
- Total Construction Project Management
- The Lesson of Her Death
- Jean Prouve Complete Works- Volume 1: 1917-1933
- Paffard Keatinge-Clay: Modern Architecture/Modern Masters
- Some Edible Mushrooms and How to Cook Them
The Calculus of Consent: Logical Foundations of Constitutional Democracy (Tullock, Gordon. Selections. V. 2.)
The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups, Second printing with new preface and appendix (Harvard Economic Studies)
Perspectives on Public Choice: A Handbook
Political Economics: Explaining Economic Policy (Zeuthen Lectures)
Analyzing Politics: Rationality, Behavior, and Institutions
