Catalog Search Results
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"American society is more polarized than ever before. We are strategically being pushed apart by disinformation--the deliberate spreading of lies disguised as truth--and it comes at us from all sides: opportunists on the far right, Russian misinformed social media influencers, among others. It's endangering our democracy and causing havoc in our electoral system, schools, hospitals, workplaces, and in our Capitol. Advances in technology including...
2) Nightmare scenario: inside the Trump administration's response to the pandemic that changed history
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From two reporters for the Washington Post comes an account of the Trump administration's handling, and mishandling, of the coronavirus outbreak, a once-in-a-century pandemic that upended life across the globe that resulted in hundreds of thousands of lives lost, a cratered economy, and the remaking of the U.S. as an unwieldy pariah in the global hierarchy.
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"Comedian Kat Timpf shares how humor has kept her going during the hardest times of her life, and confronts the cancel culture that threatens modern comedy"--
In a 2019 study, 40% of people reported censoring themselves out of fear that voicing their views would alienate them from the people they care about most. Timpf shows why much of the way we talk about sensitive subjects is wrong. We push ourselves into unnecessary conflicts when we should...
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With her trademark black humor, Rachel Maddow takes us on a switchback journey around the globe, revealing the greed and incompetence of Big Oil and Gas along the way, and drawing a suprising conclusion about why the Russian government hacked the 2016 U.S. election. She deftly shows how Russia's rich reserve of crude have, paradoxically, stunted its growth, forcing Putin to maintain his power by spreading Russia's rot into its rivals, its neighbors,...
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We all come to moments when we face pivotal decisions, but many feel that they have no guidance for how to make good choices. In 'The Authoritarian Moment', Ben Shapiro lays out the seven most important decisions we'll ever make, and provides a framework for how to make those decisions with virtue and wisdom.
Shapiro knows there are totalitarians on the political Right. But statistically, they represent a fringe movement with little institutional...
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Analyzing trends in American disinformation and conspiracy, Rauch reaches back to the parallel eighteenth-century developments of liberal democracy and science to explain what he calls the "Constitution of Knowledge"--our social system for turning disagreement into truth. By explicating the Constitution of Knowledge and probing the war on reality, Rauch posits a defined understanding of truth and free inquiry, with discussion of how and why they should...
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"Too often, the public abortion debate depicts the experience of ending a pregnancy in falsely simplistic terms. Anti-abortion activists falsely contend that abortion is always emotionally damaging for the pregnant person, while pro-choice activists focus on honoring bodily autonomy and personal conscience without always giving voice to the nuances of abortion itself. In particular, the pro-choice movement fails to acknowledge that some people experience...
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As the Supreme Court continues to rule on important issues, it is essential to understand how it operates. Based on exclusive interviews with the justices themselves and other insiders, this is a timely "state of the union" about America's most elite legal institution. From Anthony Kennedy's self-importance, to Antonin Scalia's combativeness, to David Souter's eccentricity, and even Sandra Day O'Connor's fateful breach with President George W. Bush,...
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"The 2016 election left many people who are concerned about the environment fearful that progress on climate change would come screeching to a halt. But not Michael Bloomberg and Carl Pope. Bloomberg, an entrepreneur and former mayor of New York City, and Pope, a lifelong environmental leader, approach climate change from different perspectives, yet they arrive at similar conclusions. Without agreeing on every point, they share a belief that cities,...
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"For those who witnessed the global collapse of socialism, its resurrection in the twenty-first century comes as a surprise, even a shock. How can socialism work now when it has never worked before? In this pathbreaking book, bestselling author Dinesh D'Souza argues that the socialism advanced today by the likes of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Bernie Sanders, Ilhan Omar and Elizabeth Warren is very different from the socialism of Lenin, Mao and Castro....
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For millions of conservative Christians, America is their kingdom - a land set apart, a nation uniquely blessed, a people in special covenant with God. This love of country, however, has given way to right-wing nationalist fervor, a reckless blood-and-soil idolatry that trivializes the kingdom of Jesus Christ. Alberta retraces the arc of the modern evangelical movement, placing political and cultural inflection points in the context of church teachings...
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Why are some nations rich and others poor? Is it culture, the weather, geography? Perhaps ignorance of the right policies? Simply, no. None of these factors is either definitive or destiny. Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson conclusively show that it is man-made political and economic institutions that underlie economic success (or lack of it). Based on fifteen years of original research, Acemoglu and Robinson marshall historical evidence from the...
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January 17, 1961: President Eisenhower delivered a speech three days before President-elect Kennedy's inauguration: three days that were the culmination of a lifetime of service that took Eisenhower from rural Kansas to West Point, to the battlefields of World War II, and finally to the Oval Office. As president, Eisenhower--former Supreme Commander of Allied Forces during World War II--guided the U.S. out of war in Korea, through the threat of nuclear...
15) Humour
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Written by an acknowledged master of comedy, this study reflects on the nature of humour and the functions it serves. Why do we laugh? What are we to make of the sheer variety of laughter, from braying and cackling to sniggering and chortling? Is humour subversive, or can it defuse dissent? Can we define wit? Packed with illuminating ideas and a good many excellent jokes, the book critically examines various well-known theories of humour, including...
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When Oliver began work as a school librarian she felt qualified for the job. What she learned was that librarians are expected to serve as mediators and mental-health-crisis-support professionals, customer service reps and administrators of overdose treatment, fierce loyalists to institutionalized mythology and enforced silence, and arms of state surveillance. Here she highlights the national problems that have existed in library since they were founded:...
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"Michael Bennett is a Super Bowl Champion, a three-time Pro Bowl defensive end, a fearless activist, a feminist, a grassroots philanthropist, an organizer, and a change maker. He's also one of the most scathingly humorous athletes on the planet, and he wants to make you uncomfortable. Bennett adds his unmistakable voice to discussions of racism and police violence, Black athletes and their relationship to powerful institutions like the NCAA and the...
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Appears on these lists
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Senator Kamala Harris's commitment to speaking truth is informed by her upbringing. The daughter of immigrants, she was raised in an Oakland, California community that cared deeply about social justice; her parents--an esteemed economist from Jamaica and an admired cancer researcher from India--met as activists in the civil rights movement when they were graduate students at Berkeley. Growing up, Harris herself never hid her passion for justice, and...
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"One of our most important public intellectuals reveals the hidden history of our current global crisis. How can we explain the origins of the great wave of paranoid hatreds that seem inescapable in our close-knit world--from American 'shooters' and ISIS to Trump, from a rise in vengeful nationalism across the world to racism and misogyny on social media? In Age of Anger, Pankaj Mishra answers our bewilderment by casting his gaze back to the eighteenth...
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"David French examines the depths of the American ideological divide, diagnoses its core causes, and provides a hopeful path forward. Polarization. Tribalization. Division. Some look at the growing political tension in our nation and call it a "cold civil war." Others say it's nothing more than the culture war of the last three decades, amplified beyond reason by social media. David French argues that it's something else-the beginning of a national...
