Double Standard; Social Policy In Europe And The United States

By James W. Russell
"Analyzes how and why social policy and welfare evolved differently in Western Europe and the United States, in a new edition that includes the most recent statistical information, an analysis of the 2010 health-care reform in the United States and a discussion of the social consequences of the recent recession in the U.S. and Europe. "  (Publisher Description)  Check Our Catalog

American Plastic; Boob Jobs, Credit Cards And The Quest For Perfection

By Laurie Essig
"Essig (Sociology/Middlebury Coll.; Queer in Russia: A Story of Sex, Self, and the Other, 1999) looks at the American obsession with plastic surgery and the cultural and economic forces that drive it.
"In the first decade of the twenty-first century," writes the author, "Americans had more than 10 million surgical and nonsurgical cosmetic procedures"—at a cost of around $12.5 billion annually. Few Americans, it seems, especially aging women who make up the bulk of cosmetic-procedure customers, have not at least contemplated breast implants, liposuction, face-lifts, Botox injections and even vaginal rejuvenation. Plastic surgery is no longer seen as a luxury but a necessity. The reasons for this are complex and interconnected, writes Essig. As photography, the beauty industry, advertising and celebrity culture developed, an unreal and unobtainable image of (white) female beauty was internalized and thus sought after by most American women. While improvements in medical technology made plastic surgery safer and cheaper, two seminal events from the Reagan era contributed greatly to its mass popularity—allowing doctors to advertise their services and the deregulation of credit. Suddenly, plastic surgery was more visible to potential customers, who could pay for their plastic procedures with credit cards. Massive consumer debt ensued, not only for plastic surgery but for any consumer product that might make us happy. As the American economy declined in the late-'90s, many searched for personal solutions to problems that were essentially structural. If we could not remake the economy, we could remake ourselves, a line of logic that followed the quintessential American ethic of the endless possibility of personal reinvention. Thus, we have become trapped in an endless cycle of debt. The author suggests that we should resist the endless demands for perfect beauty and demand the regulation of banking and medical industries.
Will likely be controversial, but Essig offers fascinating and troubling insights into the American psyche."   (Kirkus Reviews)  Check Our Catalog

After The Ice; Life, Death and Geopolitics In the New Arctic

By Alun Anderson
The goal of this book is to present an analysis and synthesis of the probable impacts of current climate change in the Arctic. In particular, this involves a drastic reduction in both the area and thickness of the sea ice; such changes affect the inhabitants of the Arctic, including humans, as well as raise a number of important geopolitical and economic issues. Anderson is a biologist by training with considerable experience in the Arctic and in editing scientific literature. His 17-chapter book is divided into six main sections: "People," "Ice," "Borders," "Animals," "Oil and Ships," and "Finale." The decreasing amount of sea ice (discussed in chapters 4-6) has raised the possibility that commercial vessels could transit the Arctic and link the Pacific and Atlantic oceans; this raises the question of ownership of the Arctic (addressed in chapters 7-8) and the dangers of shipping (chapter 14). The reduction in sea ice also increases the prospects of drilling for oil (chapters 12-13). This clearly written work raises in a single source many critical problems about the future of the Arctic. Includes 38 pages of reference materials and a small number of black-and-white maps."  (Choice Reviews)  Check Our Catalog

India Calling: An Intimate Portrait of a Nation's Remaking

By Anand Giridharadas
"Giridharadas (columnist, International Herald Tribune) is a first-generation American whose parents migrated from India in the 1970s to "beat the odds of a bad system" in their native country. In a reverse migration, the author now reports on the way in which that system has changed. He argues that there has been a psychological change in India and a revolution in private life as well. Like a morality play, each chapter reflects a different inner quality, while woven together in the narrative are bits of the author's family history. The portraits—a Mumbai migrant worker, a lower-caste entrepreneur who owns finishing schools, the industrialist Mukesh Ambani, a septuagenarian Marxist poet, single working women, and the saga of two brothers—show the myriad ways in which India has changed and yet remains the same."  (LJ Reviews)  Check Our Catalog

Tabloid Medicine; How The Internet Is Being Used To Hijack Medical Science for Fear and Profit

By Robert Goldberg
"Goldberg offers a 21st-century spin on Mark Twain's warning: "Beware of health books. You may die of a misprint." The late humorist's advice especially applies to the Internet, asserts Goldberg, a former fellow at the conservative Manhattan Institute and cofounder of the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest. Assigning blame in part to Americans who insist on getting their information "fast, hassle-free, and on their own terms," Goldberg argues that biased Web sources influence patients' responses to drugs like the arthritis pain reliever Vioxx and cholesterol-lowering statin Crestor. In the case of the diabetes drug Avandia, an article written in 2007 by Dr. Steven Nissan criticizing the FDA for its slow response to risks of the drug drove down sales and continues to unfairly dog and "dominate the online environment." He also criticizes the "never-ending vaccine debate" about the disproven link between the MMR shot and autism in children--specifically, the group SafeMinds, which continues to promote the debunked theory. Online alternative-medicine advocates and bloggers aside, there's no arguing Goldberg's fundamental message: better to research drugs, diseases, and medical care the old-fashioned way--honest discussion with a doctor." (PW Reviews) Check Our Catalog

No More Dirty Looks; The Truth About Your Beauty Products

By Siobhan O'Connor
"It started with a harmless quest for perfect wash-and-go hair. Every girl wants it, and Siobhan O’Connor and Alexandra Spunt finally found it in a fancy salon treatment. They were thrilled—until they discovered that the magic ingredient was formaldehyde.Shocked, O’Connor and Spunt left no bottle unturned. If it went on their body (and thus, was absorbed into their skin and bloodstream), they researched it. As it turns out, many of those unpronounceable ingredients in your self-tanner and leave-in conditioner are not regulated and the “natural” on your face wash doesn’t mean what you think it does.
Now, with the help of top scientists, dermatologists, and makeup artists, the authors share their compelling findings and the easy way to detoxify your beauty regimen. No More Dirty Looks also reveals the safest, most effective products on the market and time-tested home recipes. Finally, you don’t need to sacrifice health for beauty—because coming clean is the best look yet."  (Publisher Description)  Check Our Catalog

When A Billion Chinese Jump: How China Will Save Mankind...Or Destroy It

By Jonathon Watts
"Traversing all of China, beginning in the mountainous northern Himalayan regions and ending in tropical southern Guangdong Province, Watts, (Asia environment correspondent, Guardian) explores a country mired in deep environmental crisis. A country that is on the brink of superpower status, the Chinese state is at the same time delicately balancing economic growth with environmental sustainability. With an accumulation of more than 300 interviews with residents across the country, Watts meticulously examines case studies of horrendous environmental degradation of wildlife refuges, industrial wastelands, greenhouse gases, water exploitation, melting glaciers, cancer villages, science parks, and coal-liquefaction mines. Whether well-intentioned or not, the Chinese government's experiments with alternative energy sources and biodiversity have had far greater adverse effects, as decision making is often at the mercy of local developers and bureaucracies more interested in profits than environmental protection. VERDICT Recommended for those interested in Chinese current affairs, travel memoir, or environmental policy."  (LJ Reviews)   Check Our Catalog

C Street: The Fundamentalist Threat To Democracy

By Jeff Sharlett
"Even after the sexual affairs of several congressmen brought the Fellowship (and its D.C. residence on C Street) into the light, most Americans have still never heard of this elitist fundamentalist organization. Even those who have will have trouble getting their heads around a mostly faceless organization whose goal is to convert the world to a trickle-down Christianity, as Sharlet calls it, where God has chosen the leaders (them) and everyone else follows. With our leaders somehow prechosen, it makes it easier to forgive their transgressions (the Fellowship, for example, has no problem working with heads of state like Haiti's Papa Doc Duvalier and those in present-day Uganda, who advocate the death penalty for homosexuals).That this heavily financed, multilayered organization has been operating for decades—and today is actively implanted within the U.S. military—makes this well-documented, probing investigation even more mind-bending. Mostly, those in the Fellowship don't talk. Maybe now the discussion will start. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: When the affairs of Fellowship members Senator John Ensign R-Nev. and South Carolina governor Mark Sanford broke, Sharlet's book The Family became a best-seller. His follow-up is sure to attract similar attention."  (Booklist Reviews)   Check Our Catalog

How To Understand Israel In 60 Days Or Less

By Sarah Glidden
"Glidden, a progressive American Jew who is sharply critical of Israeli policies vis-à-vis the Occupied Territories, went on an all-expense-paid "birthright" trip to Israel in an attempt to discover some grand truths at the heart of the Arab-Israeli conflict. This graphic memoir tells the touching and often funny story of her utter failure to do so. As the tour group moves from the Golan Heights to Tel Aviv, Glidden's struggles with propaganda and perspective lead only to a morass of deepening questions and self-doubt. Her neurotic need for objective truths and struggle to reconcile historical perspectives is hugely gratifying for the reader. This is especially true when the group visits Masada, the site of an epic confrontation between a sect of Jewish rebels and a Roman siege army that culminated in mass suicide. Gruesome fanaticism or a stirring clarion call for the burgeoning Zionism movement? You be the judge. As befits a travelogue, Glidden's drawings have the look of something jotted down on the fly; if it weren't for a haircut here or a pair of glasses there, many of the characters would be indistinguishable. Yet the simplicity of the drawing is offset by bright, delicate watercolors that belie our heroine's unresolved struggle with history and heritage."   (PW Reviews)  Check Our Catalog

The Longest War: Inside The Enduring Conflict Between America and Al Qaeda

By Peter Bergen
"CNN national security analyst and journalist Bergen (The Osama bin Laden I Know: An Oral History of al Qaeda's Leader, 2006, etc.) takes a critical look at all phases of the conflict between the West and al-Qaeda. Drawing on an impressive range of both Western and Islamic sources, the author examines the historical and philosophical underpinnings of the jihadist movement, most importantly as exemplified by Osama bin Laden.......... Bergen looks at the lessons learned on both sides of the war, notably the U.S. military's rediscovery of one of the lessons of Vietnam: Small units working closely with the indigenous population can achieve what large concentrations of conventional force cannot. The author concludes that, simply by surviving so long, bin Laden has created a movement likely to carry on his brand of anti-Americanism for the foreseeable future.
One of the deepest and most disturbing investigations of one of the defining issues of our era."   (Kirkus Reviews)   Check Our Catalog

The Frugal Superpower: America's Global Leadership In A Cash-Strapped Era

By Michael Mandelbaum
"The Era Marked by an expansive American foreign policy is now coming to an end. During the seven decades from the nation's entry into World War II in 1941 to the present, economic constraints rarely limited what the United States did in the world. That has now changed. The country's soaring deficits, fueled by the huge costs of the financial crash and of its entitlement programs---Social Security, Medicare, and the new health care legislation-will compel a more modest American international agenda. This change will have major effects in every part of the world, as well as in the United States.

In assessing the consequences of this new, less costly foreign policy, Mandelbaum, one of America's leading foreign policy experts, describes the policies the United States will have to discontinue; assesses the potential threats from China, Russia, and Iran; and recommends a new policy, centered on reducing the nation's dependence on foreign oil, which can do for America and the world in the twenty-first century what the successful policy of containment of the Soviet Union did in the twentieth."  (Publisher Description)   Check Our Catalog

All The Devils Are Here: The Hidden History Of The Financial Crisis

By Bethany McLean
"A closely written account of the late financial meltdown, when, in the words of one analyst, "we went from a collective belief in soundness to a collective belief in insolvency."
That change of attitude is entirely understandable, inasmuch as the financial system was predicated on abstractions. The origins of the meltdown and the subsequent Great Recession, write former Fortune and current Vanity Fair contributor McLean (co-author: The Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron, 2003) and New York Times reporter Nocera (A Piece of the Action : How the Middle Class Joined the Money Class, 1994), largely lie in the speculator's dream called the mortgage-backed security, which "allowed Wall Street to scoop up loans made to people who were buying homes, bundle them together by the thousands, and then resell the bundle, in bits and pieces, to investors." This innovation netted fortunes for the players at the top, undoing the former bond between buyer and seller and leading directly to the rise of the subprime industry and its toxic holdings. Ironically, write the authors, the securitizing of mortgages was not an invention of Wall Street but of government, with the federal agencies Ginnie Mae and then Freddie Mac selling securities 40 years ago. Scrupulously fair, McLean and Nocera look inside the closed doors of agencies, some now extinct, such as Bear Stearns and Countrywide, which took the official rhetoric, shared by George Bush and Bill Clinton alike, that there is something near-sacred about homeownership and ran with it. Interestingly, the authors attribute the failed policing of the subprime industry, whose criminal business practices were the engine of the meltdown, to a very real fear on the part of the government that cracking down would harm the people who most needed help. Those little fish were soon swallowed up by the Wall Street sharks, who sagely played the odds to the end, when it finally became apparent that the system was being hit by a perfect storm far beyond the worst of worst-case scenarios.
Hard-hitting reporting and fluent writing bring the utter devastation of the Great Recession to life—with John Cassidy's How Markets Fail (2009) an essential aid to understanding where all the money went, and who benefited."  (Publisher Description)  Check Our Catalog

Stay Of Execution: Saving The Death Penalty From Itself

By Charles Lane
"In his debut, Lane puts himself squarely in the camp of the "pro-death penalty American majority," yet believes that its application reveals "troubling flaws." Addressing the lack of a standards in sentencing that allows counties to act autonomously, Lane says that "There is no ‘American criminal justice system,' but rather 3,141 criminal justice systems." He studies the use and abuse of capital punishment, and uncovers statistical evidence of racism (until 1967, Southern courts defined the rape of a white woman by a black man as a capital crime.) Lane dismisses claims that the penalty is a deterrent, comparing the homicide rate in Canada, where the death penalty was abolished in 1967, with that of the U.S. Lane feels that the death penalty should be used sparingly, not as retribution but as a "special penalty" for "special crimes" in order to affirm the sanctity of human life, and breaking with the European Union's definition of capital punishment as a human-rights issue ("everyone has an absolute right not to be put to death by the state"). A member of the Washington Post's editorial board, Lane has produced a careful, considered examination of a divisive issue." (PW Annex Reviews)  Check Our Catalog

As China Goes, So Goes The World; How Chinese Consumers Are Transforming Everything

By Karl Gerth
"Sharply observed account of what happens, both good and bad, when a group of more than a billion people start seriously shopping.
While China is often thought of as a major producer of goods, it is as a consumer, writes Gerth (Modern Chinese History/Oxford Univ.; China Made: Consumer Culture and the Creation of the Nation, 2003), that the Chinese population is transforming itself and the world. Deliberate government policies aimed at reducing the country's overreliance on exports have transformed China from a country of scarcity and frugality to one in which the consumer ethos rules. "Chinese have already become the world's largest consumers of everything from mobile phones to beer," writes the author, and it is the largest market in the world for automobiles and is becoming one of the world's largest manufacturers of cars. As at least part of the population reaches middle-class status, they are afforded easy access to a variety of quality goods that rival anything available in Japan or the United States. The Chinese have also learned that their status and identity are often tied to their possessions. Gerth makes clear there are many downsides to the new Chinese consumer culture, from the massive manufacture of counterfeit goods to the creation of extreme markets in such things as babies, sex slaves, human organs and endangered species. Perhaps most serious is pollution. Each year in China, millions of trees are cut down in order to produce tens of billions of disposable chopsticks, thus creating millions of tons of waste and also adding greatly to the problem of desertification through deforestation. The author emphasizes, however, that many consumer-driven environmental problems in China are ones of scale rather than kind. These problems are not unique to China, but exacerbated by the sheer size of the population. The rest of the world can learn much as China attempts to solve the problem of "how to enjoy modern consumer lifestyles without exacerbating their many downsides."  (Kirkus Reviews)   Check Our Catalog

Living Large: From SUV's To Double D's; Why Going Bigger Isn't Going Better

By Sarah Wexler

"A sociological exploration of America's obsession with the supersized lifestyle.
"There's nothing wrong with our living large, nor anything particularly new about it," writes journalist and debut author Wexler, citing Manifest Destiny as historical proof of America's longtime tradition of consumption. Yet being the biggest comes with a price: "We have the largest gross domestic product and the largest gold reserves, but also the largest national debt," With size comes responsibility, and as the author recounts throughout her examination of the "largeness" of America, that responsibility is often lacking. Americans live in McMansions, attend mega-churches and demand the most plastic surgery and the largest engagement rings, all while openly celebrating their gluttony. The juxtaposition of the McMansion phenomenon alongside mega-churches offers a unique perspective on America's psyche. While McMansions are "a tangible way to show yourself and everyone else...that you're movin' on up," the appeal of mega-churches is the safety of anonymity. Wexler argues that the average American desires to stand out while simultaneously remaining unnoticed, a fascinating and unexplainable contradiction. Why do Americans prefer the anonymity of a mega-church while demanding the flashiest engagement rings? Attention is "part of why we consume big," writes the author. "A Hummer will draw more attention than a common Corolla, a McMansion more than a town house. Extra-large breast implants are a way to wordlessly, constantly shout, 'Look at me!' It's like peacocks unfurling their flashy tails." But bigger isn't necessarily better. Wexler reminds us that Americans have completely lost perspective, both literally and figuratively. Throughout the book, the author's message remains clear: In the 21st century, standing out is just another way of fitting in.
Amusing and timely."  (Kirkus Reviews)
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Griftopia; Bubble Machines, Vampire Squids and The Long Con That Is Breaking America

By Mark Taibbi
"Rolling Stone contributing editor Taibbi delivers a blistering examination of the upheaval that has roiled the American economic system over the past several years. At the heart of the upheaval, he says, is a vein of greed running up and down the real-estate industry, from mortgage brokers who falsified customer loan applications to banks that parceled out mortgages to second and third parties to rating agencies that signed off on highly suspect loans. Taibbi saves a good deal of venom for former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, arguing that Greenspan's philosophy of easy cash, limited government oversight of markets, and bailing out "too big to fail" financial institutions all fueled the recent economic meltdown. And Taibbi profiles a recently passed health-care bill severely compromised by an all-powerful insurance lobby. As critical as he is of the process—a process not likely to get fixed any time soon—he doesn't seem to carry an agenda; instead, like any good investigative reporter, he mostly follows his nose."  (Booklist Reviews)
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Broke; The Plan To Restore Our Trust, Truth and Treasure

By Glenn Beck
"Briefly surveys more than two centures of American political history to describe how the country has been "broken"--spiritually, politically, and financially--and advocates a return to core values to restore America's economic and spiritual health."   (Publisher Description)
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Pitchforks and Torches; The Worst Of The Worst; From Beck, Bill and Bush To Palin...

By Keith Olbermann
"Collects the best bits from the author's MSNBC show "Countdown with Keith Olbermann," in which he skewers politicians, celebrities, and other people behaving badly, from Glenn Beck and Bill O'Reilly to John Edwards and Sarah Palin."   (Publisher Description)
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Bought And Paid For; The Unholy Alliance Between Barack Obama and Wall Street

By Charles Gasparino
"An award-winning investigative reporter reveals the ties between the Obama administration and the big banks at the center of current economic problems, contending that the President has made compromising deals with Wall Street CEOs to gain support for big-government agendas."
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Death Of The Liberal Class

By Chris Hedges

"The Death of the Liberal Class examines the failure of the liberal class to confront the rise of the corporate state and the consequences of a liberalism that has become profoundly bankrupted. Hedges argues there are five pillars of the liberal establishment – the press, liberal religious institutions, labor unions, universities and the Democratic Party— and that each of these institutions, more concerned with status and privilege than justice and progress, sold out the constituents they represented. In doing so, the liberal class has become irrelevant to society at large and ultimately the corporate power elite they once served."  (Publisher Description) Check Our Catalog

Tears of A Clown: Glenn Beck and The Tea Bagging Of America

By Dana Milbank
"A critical assessment of the rise of Fox News host Glenn Beck considers how he reflects modern political culture, arguing that Beck's penchant for discrediting, emotionally-charged right-wing spins on otherwise illegitimate topics have gained him popularity as an anti-government conservative."  (Publisher Description)
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American Grace; How Religion Divides and Unites Us

By Robert Putnam
"This massive book eschews the narrow, monographic approach to sociological study in favor of an older, more useful model: the sweeping chronicle of national change over time. Harvard professor Putnam (Bowling Alone) and his University of Notre Dame coauthor Campbell (Why We Vote) argue two apparently contradictory theses persuasively: first, that a "new religious fault line" exists in America, a deep political polarization that has transcended denominationalism as the greatest chasm in religious life; and second, that the culture (especially its younger generation) is becoming so much more accepting of diversity that thesis #1 will not tear America apart. The bulk of the book explores in detail cultural developments--the boom of evangelicals in the 1970s and 1980s, largely concluded in the early 1990s; the rise of feminism in the pews; the liberalization of attitudes about premarital sex and homosexuality, especially among the youngest generations; and what may prove to be the most seismic shift of all: the dramatic increase of "nones," or people claiming no institutional religious affiliation. Putnam and Campbell (with their researcher, Garrett) have done the public a great service in not only producing their own mammoth survey of American religion but also drawing from many prior statistical studies, enabling readers to track mostly gradual change over time.(PW Reviews)
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Big Girls Don't Cry; The Election That Changed Everything For American Women

By Rebecca Traister
"Who would have figured that the women who would benefit most from the 2008 presidential campaign would be the comediennes? Sarah Palin and Hillary Clinton may have lost in their respective campaigns, but Amy Poehler and Tina Fey both gained in cultural stature for their biting imitations. According to Traister, staff writer at Salon.com, the rollercoaster ride of 2008 exposed an entrenched chauvinism in the media and a lesson for anyone who might assume that a female candidate would hold a monopoly on women's votes. The author bludgeons conventional political wisdom by trenchantly exposing Palin's strange triangulation of mainstream feminism, Clinton's need to appear vulnerable in order to appeal to women, and the precarious position of black women--some of whom were conflicted between supporting candidates who mirrored their gender or their race. Rising to the occasion, however, were women in the media, from Katie Couric, who--depending on your perspective--ruined or sainted Sarah Palin, to the sofa-bound political discourse of The View. Traister does a fine job in showing that progress does not proceed in straight lines, and, sometimes, it's the unlikeliest of individuals who initiate real change."  (PW Reviews)  Check Our Catalog

Our Patchwork Nation; The Surprising Truth About The Real America

By Dante Chinni
"The astounding diversity among the 300 million citizens of the U.S. defies easy labels of red and blue states, Republicans or Democrats. Journalist Chinni and scholar Gimpel draw on two years of research and interviews to offer regional portraits of the U.S. that drill down to a deeper look at political, social, economic, and cultural perspectives than the red and blue labels. Using data from the nation's 3,141 counties to get a flavor of local perspectives, they looked at typical demographics of race, education, income, religion, and politics and identified 12 different community types based on "common experiences and shared realities." Their categories: boomtowns, campus and careers, emptying nests, Evangelical epicenters, immigration nation, industrial metropolis, military bastions, minority central, monied burbs, Mormon outposts, service-worker centers, and tractor country. The first part of the book examines the characteristics of each type of county, while the second compares the types and how their characteristics drive economics, politics, and culture. The authors' data is almost as fascinating as their conversations with people living within the defined regions."  (Booklist Reviews)  Check Our Catalog

The Shadow Market; How A Group of Wealthy Nations and Powerful Investors Secretly Dominate The World

By Eric J. Weiner
"Acclaimed financial journalist Eric J. Weiner reveals how foreign countries and private investors are increasingly controlling the global economy and secretly wresting power from the United States in ways that our government cannot reverse and about which the average American knows nothing. The most potent force in global commerce today is not the Federal Reserve, not the international banks, not the governments of the G7 countries, and certainly not the European Union. Rather, it is the multi-trillion-dollar network of super-rich, secretive, and largely unregulated investment vehicles—foreign sovereign wealth funds, government-run corporations, private equity funds, and hedge funds—that are quietly buying up the world, piece by valuable piece.As Weiner’s groundbreaking account shows, the shadow market doesn’t have a physical headquarters such as Wall Street. It doesn’t have a formal leadership or an index to track or a single zone of exchange. Rather, it comprises an invisible and ever-shifting global nexus where money mixes with geopolitical power, often with great speed and secrecy. Led by cash-flush nations such as China, Kuwait, Abu Dhabi, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, and even Norway, the shadow market is hiring the brightest international financial talent money can buy and is now assembling the gigantic investment portfolios that will form the power structure of tomorrow’s economy. "  (Publisher Description)  Check Our Catalog

Obama's Wars

By Bob Woodward
"A master journalist turns his scrutinizing eye on President Obama's administration, especially how the president has dealt with the war in Afghanistan."  (Publisher Description)
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Power down : options and actions for a post-carbon world

 by Richard Heinberg. Heinberg presents an extraordinary assessment of the stark realities that will confront people in a post-fossil-fuel world. He claims that grave problems of energy depletion, environmental degradation, and overpopulation loom over the horizon and should be urgently addressed. The book begins with an overview of oil and gas depletion. The next four chapters focus on four major options available to industrial societies over the next four decades. Chapter 2 discusses the path of competition for remaining resources, while chapter 3 examines the path of cooperation, conservation, and sharing. In chapter 4 Heinberg emphasizes that it is unrealistic to wait for a magic elixir that will facilitate a painless transition in which market forces come to the rescue and avert a catastrophic collapse. The fourth option is explained in chapter 5, as the author urges economies to be "relocalized" so as to build community lifeboats. In the final chapter, Heinberg explores how important groups within global society--decision-making elites of government, finance and industry, the antiwar and antiglobalization movements, and ordinary people--are likely to choose among these four options. An exceptionally well-written volume. ^BSumming Up: Recommended. Particularly useful to senior undergraduate and graduate audiences. --Choice (Check Catalog)

Baby, we were meant for each other : in praise of adoption

 by Scott Simon. Simon, host of NPR's Weekend Edition and author (Pretty Birds), shares an entertaining and affecting narrative about his experience adopting two daughters from China and his take on what it means to be a father. While he doesn't go into personal whys and wherefores, he animatedly relates the journey that he and his wife, Caroline Richard, took to parenthood: falling in love with the thumbnail photo of the infant who became their daughter, Elise; meeting her in Nanchang; bringing her home to join a French-Irish-Catholic-Jewish extended family in Chicago; and returning to China to adopt Paulina, their second daughter. Almost a prerequisite in any book about adoption is the question of attachment after abandonment, and Simon nimbly acknowledges and dispels Nancy Verrier's concept (from The Primal Wound: Understanding the Adopted Child) while guiding adoptive parents toward compassionate awareness. Simon's answer to "Can I love someone's else's child as much as my own?" is a resounding "Yes! Yes! At least as much and more!" - which echoes the tone of his lively, openhearted book. This adoptive parenting memoir is a standout among books on the subject, with Simon on the page much the same as Simon on the radio - informative, enlightening, and enjoyable. --Library Journal (Check Catalog)

Brain Gain: Rethinking U.S. Immigration Policy

By Darrell M. West
"Despite the appealing image of the Statue of Liberty welcoming immigrants to the shores of the U.S., the actual history of immigration is far more complex and fraught with contradictions. Four years before the statue was dedicated, Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. West offers a historical overview of immigration policy, legislation, border patrols, quotas, and other restrictions on immigrants as the nation has needed labor infusion or fretted over the loss of jobs and national security. The 9/11 terrorist attacks ratcheted up worries about immigration, and Arizona’s tough immigration law accents heightened concerns about the nation’s borders. West draws on opinion surveys, analysis of media coverage, and research on legislative actions to analyze how we have come to the present expensive and highly bureaucratic process of legal immigration and the emotionally charged and explosive issues surrounding undocumented workers. He also highlights the contributions of immigrants€"the “brain gain” in commerce, technology, culture, arts, and education€"that should be taken into account when considering immigration policy."  (Booklist Reviews)   Check Our Catalog

The Crisis Caravan; What's Wrong With Humanitarian Aid?

By Linda Polman
"In a narrative that is impassioned, gripping, and even darkly absurd, journalist Linda Polman takes us to war zones around the globe—from the NGO-dense operations in "Afghaniscam" to the floating clinics of Texas Mercy Ships proselytizing off the shores of West Africa—to show the often compromised results of aid workers' best intentions. It is time, Polman argues, to impose ethical boundaries, to question whether doing something is always better than doing nothing, and to hold humanitarians responsible for the consequences of their deeds."  (Publisher Description)   Check Our Catalog

Boiling Mad; Inside Tea Party America

By Kate Zernicke
"Boiling Mad is Kate Zernike’s eye-opening look inside the Tea Party, introducing us to a cast of unlikely activists and the philosophy that animates them. It is a movement full of color and contradiction: the Tea Partiers loathe big government, but many are on Medicare; they push fiscal responsibility, yet some have declared bankruptcy. They have energized the electorate, but further polarized it, too.
Far from a fringe movement, the Tea Party reflects longstanding discontent among Americans who might otherwise share little in common. We have to understand it if we are to understand politics in 2010 and in the future. Boiling Mad will dispel the myths and reveal the truth about the Tea Party and what it means for our country."  (Publisher Description)   Check Our Catalog

The Polluters; The Making Of Our Chemically Altered Environment

By Benjamin Ross
"The engrossing, infuriating history of American pollution.
In their first book, environmental scientists Ross and Amter point out that King Edward I of England prohibited coal burning in London in 1306. This first antipollution law was largely ignored, a foretaste of things to come. As the authors summarize America's pollution history from 1860 to the 1960s, readers will squirm as offending industries routinely brush off feeble local and state efforts and commiserate with sympathetic officials of the Bureau of Mines (the only federal office with pollution oversight). When pressure grew, industry leaders warned that "so-called" pollution might not be harmful, adding that "drastic" government action would cost jobs, so scientists should first determine the facts. Unfortunately, this tactic—"spill, study, and stall"—worked superbly. Early researchers revealed the dangers of leaded gas (1921) and DDT (1939), but proponents had no trouble finding spokesmen who disagreed. Studies proved that chromium, uranium and asbestos caused cancer long before industries agreed to do anything besides fund studies. Everyone credits Rachel Carson's Silent Spring (1962) for jump-starting environmental-protection efforts, but only after 1970 did the burgeoning conservation movement acquire the clout to pass relatively effective laws. Despite all their evidence, the authors don't embark on a mere antibusiness screed. In fact, one mildly sympathetic chapter recounts DuPont's positive efforts. From the 1930s, top executives considered pollution a serious problem. However, their policy statements and exhortations to division managers had some effect but never fully persuaded them that clean-up expenses took priority over profits...because they didn't.
An important, disheartening account of widespread willful ignorance."   (Kirkus Reviews)   Check Our Catalog

Exiles In Eden; Life Among The Ruins Of Florida's Great Recession

By Paul Reyes

"Floridian Reyes works “trashing out” foreclosed houses€"emptying the houses and cleaning them for resale. With Florida being, arguably, ground zero for the country’s ongoing economic disaster, Reyes has plenty of work; thinking as a writer, he dubs his melancholy labors a kind of “moody archaeology,” piecing together the stories of ousted home owners from the items they abandoned. Some are victims of predatory mortgage originators, thousands of whom have been convicted of financial crimes. Others have lost their jobs and then their homes. Some are simply fools, “an absurdity,” he writes, “that seems indigenous to Florida.” Exiles in Eden is engaging, insightful, compassionate, and often charmingly idiosyncratic. His portrayals of foreclosure’s victims are uniformly sad, but he tempers the mood a bit with perceptive analysis of the state’s history, socioeconomics, and odd allure: “For most of its history, through today, Florida was the weird backyard of the American imagination, as deadly as it was salubrious.” Boom, he notes, is the “backbone” of the state’s economy, and constant development and change leave residents “little sense of feeling anchored.” Recommend this one both to followers of the economic crisis and to anyone who feels Florida’s “odd allure.” ( Booklist Reviews).   Check Our Catalog

Cultures Of War: Pearl Harbor, Hiroshima, 911, Iraq

By John W. Dower
"This somber tome compares Japan's decision to attack Pearl Harbor in 1941 and that of America's to attack Iraq in 2003. In addition to assessing what planners were thinking, Dower analyzes how they came to believe their war would be both short and victorious. Indicting a range of intelligence deficiencies and bureaucratic breakdowns in each case, Dower critiques most cogently the cultural and even emotional mind-sets of the strategists. In both cases, he argues, a sense of injured innocence, an apocalyptic fear of the consequences of inaction, and contempt for the opponent prevailed, reinforced by selective appropriations of history. Dower particularly indicts proponents of invading Iraq for the analogy made to the American occupation of Japan—Dower is an expert on the subject (Embracing Defeat, 1999). In extended corollaries to his main subject, Dower also discusses the firebombing of Japanese cities, the atomic attacks of 1945, and the destruction of the World Trade Center in terms of psychology, symbolism, and morality. A forceful indictment of warlike attitudes, Dower's work will spark debate about history and the Iraq War." (Booklist Reviews)   Check Our Catalog

Somebody Else's Century: East and West In A Post Western World

By Patrick Smith
"Written explicitly for a Western audience, this searching and philosophical text eschews the demographic and statistics-driven approach to the rise of Asia, opting instead for an essayistic and existential meditation on modernity and modernization. Smith (The Nippon Challenge) focuses on China, India, and Japan and skips nimbly between topics as varied as raids on an Indian temple dating back a millennium, the impact of the Opium Wars on China's development, and Nietzsche's reflections on travel and "the foreign." The author examines each country's relationship to economic transformation and to their pasts, describing the new century as a "post-Western" era, one in which Westerners will confront the challenge that this book suggests has largely defined the contemporary Asian experience, the sense of living in an era that does not belong "to us." This demanding, rich book provides few answers, but offers a valuable intellectual frame for approaching the evolving relationship between the East and the West. "(PW Reviews)   Check Our Catalog

Dirty Sexy Politics

By Meghan McCain
"One of the Republican Party's most outspoken and well-known young members writes about her experiences on the campaign trail during her father's presidential bid, how the party veered so far off track, and why she is still a Republican."  (Publisher Description) Check Our Catalog

Girls On The Edge; The Four Factors Driving The New Crisis for Girls

By Leonard Sax
" According to family physician/psychologist Sax (Boys Adrift; Why Gender Matters), when parents don't teach their daughters well, the marketplace fills the vacuum with what it thinks girls should look like, do, and be—and it's all wrong. Sax clarifies his four driving factors in this new crisis: sexual identity: the concept of lifelong commitment is almost unknown, and sexual confusion results when girls don't know what to expect from boyfriends; the cyberbubble: kids are constantly in touch via technology, and girls become microcelebrities, constantly living and acting as if in front of a crowd; obsessions: without realizing it, girls are obsessed with becoming ultra thin, perfecting their grades, and abusing "fun" (alcohol, drugs, sex); and environmental toxins: early puberty is related to chemicals in plastics and phthalates in skin creams. Sax supports single-sex high schools, gender-appropriate sports for girls, and nurturing girls' spirituality to provide orientation when a crisis occurs."   (LJ Reviews)  Check Our Catalog

A Privilege to Die: Inside Hezbollah's Legions and Their Endless War Against Israel

By Thanassis Cambanis
"American journalist Cambanis has spent much of the last decade observing the Middle East from within its most intractable struggles, most notably while on the front lines of Israel's 2006 war with Hezbollah. The extremist Shi'ite organization is notorious for not granting high-level access to Western journalists and for tightly controlling whatever lower-level representatives might say, but Cambanis spent three years getting past the script "to write with humanity about reviled characters." Interviewing fighters in the field, nurses tending to the wounded, refugees on the road, and think-tank pundits enabled him to probe the real motivations, histories, and ambitions of Hezbollah's followers and better understand their devotion to "war without end" and an "ideology designed to rebound and flourish under assault." As such, Cambanis provides crucial insights to those who might hope to counter Hezbollah's increasing power and influence in the region, as well as an important reminder that in any war, one's enemies are human." (PW Reviews)  Check Our Catalog

Health Care Turning Point; Why Single Payer Won't Work

By Roger Battistella
"In this concise book Battistella (health policy & management, emeritus, Cornell Univ.) manages to take shots at most arguments made by both the left and the right in the health-care reform debate. He stresses the need for universal coverage but promotes a consumer-driven model, based on the premise that if each of us has to face the real costs of insurance and care, we will make better choices, driving costs down. Part of his ideal redesign would end employer-based coverage, but insurance companies selling to individuals mandated to buy policies would not be permitted to discriminate based on age or health status, and sliding-scale government subsidies would still be needed. Politicians, doctors and hospitals, insurance companies, and consumers all share the blame for where we are, he argues. VERDICT Battistella's book is well sourced, and he does a reasonable job of presenting arguments he disagrees with along with his own views. The controversial ideas are presented in a nonconfrontational way and clearly enough to appeal to readers trying to understand the spectrum of ideas on this topic." (LJ Reviews) Check Our Catalog

Give Us Liberty; A Tea Party Manifesto

By Dick Armey
"Unlike mainstream media accounts that observe the Tea Party movement from the outside looking in, Give Us Liberty chronicles the roots and rise of a new breed of taxpayer activism in the voices of those who were there. Discover the personalities that drove the first meetings, the unknown candidates whose principled stand earned them unlikely victories, the march that gathered more than a million activists, and the bedrock beliefs that brought them together.
In this national call to action, Armey and Kibbe provide an intimate history of the movement, explain how citizens can join the cause, and chart the future of the Tea Party—and America. Give Us Liberty also contains a battle-tested, step-by-step guide to organizing and effecting change in any community." (Publisher Description)  Check our Catalog

How to House The Homeless

By Ingrid Gould Ellen
"How to House the Homeless sharpens our thinking about how housing policy can end homelessness as we know it. Its top-flight interdisciplinary group of authors offers a fresh review of key programs and policies including Housing First, subsidized housing, and land-use regulations. It is a must read for anyone who wants to understand fundamental debates in the field, challenging us to consider why assisted housing is the answer---and why it can never be the answer." (Publisher Description)   Check Our Catalog

Five Miles Away; A World Apart; One City, Two Schools & The Story Of Educational Opportunity In America

By James E. Ryan
"Ryan (law, Univ. of Virginia Sch. of Law) tells the compelling and scrupulously researched story of two schools, one urban (Thomas Jefferson High School) and one suburban (Freeman High School), located five miles apart in Richmond. The author delves into the politics of public education and school finance reform and provides fascinating glimpses into the societal forces that keep public schools racially and economically segregated. Ryan makes the points that racial and socioeconomic isolation (in the cities, suburbs, and exurbs) prevents equal educational opportunities and that housing policy should be linked to school policy. He gives many examples from around the nation related to school choice, vouchers, charter schools, standardized testing, and funding disparities. The author makes sense of key court cases and the many acronyms that punctuate any discussion of education reform. Verdict Highly recommended for readers interested in education, public policy, political science, law, and especially the intersections among these areas.-(LJ Reviews)
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Were You Born On The Wrong Continent?

by Thomas Geoghegan
"Labor lawyer and Europhile, Geohegan (Which Side Are You On?) makes a passionate case for the high-tax, regulation-heavy model of life on the Continent. Using Germany as a model, he argues the middle class is the real beneficiary of European social democracy--its members reap free education, free child care, free nursing home care, guaranteed vacation time, and generous unemployment payments--while their white-collar American counterparts struggle to pay for the same. "Europe is set up for the bourgeois," writes Geohegan. "America's a great place to buy kitty litter at Wal-Mart and relatively cheap gas. But it's not set up for me, a professional without a lot of money." While he's quick to acknowledge that critics seize on labor's costs and prominence as a potential path to the collapse of the system, he's convinced of the framework in place. The narrative unspools in a chatty, anecdotal style; it's jumpy, appealingly digressive, and winning, all the more so for being such an unabashed polemic that refuses to be resigned to the rising rate of inequality in the U.S"  (PW Reviews)
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More Davids Than Goliaths; A Political Education

By Harold Ford Jr.
"Harold Ford Jr. has long distinguished himself as a charismatic, results-oriented politician with fresh ideas. His career began at age 26 after he won his father’s Congressional seat, serving his Tennessee district for ten years. He stepped into the national spotlight with his electric keynote at the 2000 Democratic National Convention, and in 2006 his reputation was further shaped during the closest Senate race in Tennessee’s history, which he lost. Ford feels passionately that our country’s best days are ahead, and in More Davids Than Goliaths, he presents his mission statement for America. "  (Publisher Comment)

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Playing Our Game; Why China's Rise Doesn't Threaten The West

By Edward Steinfeld
"Contrary to the perception that China's rise as a superpower is a threat to America, Steinfeld (political science, Massachusetts Inst. of Technology; Forging Reform in China) argues that the opposite is true: China's growth not only solidifies America's trade dominance but democratizes China, forcing the authoritarian regime to "play by the rules" of American trade diplomacy. Even though the majority of Chinese products are assembled for export to the West, elements of those products are bought from the West: American global production has increased since China's liberalization of its economy. Although both Chinese and Americans benefit from China's global integration, the implications for China's social and economic development are enormous, as the majority of its citizens earn so much less than Americans, with few luxuries or a social safety net, and the country's most talented researchers are gravitating to the West. VERDICT A superb analysis of the political economies of China and the United States, dispelling some of the myths of China's rise as a superpower. Recommended for all interested in globalization and Chinese-American global relations.-"  (LJ Reviews)
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A Short History Of Celebrity

By Fred Inglis
"With breathtaking range and panache, A Short History of Celebrity provides a keenly observed interpretation of the emergence of modern transatlantic popular culture. At once learned and accessible, Inglis's vivacious prose reveals the contradictions of icons as diverse as Joshua Reynolds and Lord Byron, the Beatles and Bob Dylan. His insights into the popular heroes of art, literature, the stage and screen (including television), as well as politics and public life, enable us to appreciate continuities that stretch across two-hundred-and-fifty years."--Richard D. Brown, professor emeritus,
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The Obama Diaries

By Laura Ingraham

Conservative talk-radio maven and bestselling author Laura Ingraham writes a satirical send-up of the first year of the Obama administration. (Publisher Description)  Check Our Catalog

Four Fish; The Future Of The Last Wild Food

By Paul Greenberg
"Journalist Greenberg focuses on bass, salmon, tuna, and cod-though not exactly in a Cod sort of way-to reveal the devastating environmental impact of commercial fishing and fish farming. What if soon there are no fish left in the sea? Read it and weep." (LJ Reviews)
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Hamlet's Blackberry: A Practical Philosophy For Building The Good Life In A Digital Age

                        By William Powers

"Our discombobulated Internet Age could learn important new tricks from some very old thinkers, according to this incisive critique of online life and its discontents. Journalist Powers bemoans the reigning dogma of "digital maximalism" that requires us to divide our attention between ever more e-mails, text messages, cellphone calls, video streams, and blinking banners, resulting, he argues, in lowered productivity and a distracted life devoid of meaning and "depth." In a nifty and refreshing turn, he looks to ideas of the past for remedies to this hyper-modern predicament: to Plato, who analyzed the transition from the ancient technology of talking to the cutting-edge gadgetry of written scrolls; to Shakespeare, who gave Hamlet the latest in Elizabethan information apps, an erasable notebook; to Thoreau, who carved out solitary spaces amid the press of telegraphs and railroads. The author sometimes lapses into mysticism—"In solitude we meet not just ourselves but all other selves"—and his solutions, like the weekend-long "Internet Sabbaths" he and his wife decreed for their family, are small-bore. But Powers deftly blends an appreciation of the advantages of information technology and a shrewd assessment of its pitfalls into a compelling call to disconnect."   ((PW Reviews)
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The Cheapskate Next Door; The Surprising Secrets Of Americans Living Happily Below Their Means

By Jeff Yeager
"Yeager (The Ultimate Cheapskate's Road Map to True Riches) is back with another energetic, likably eccentric lesson on living happily well below your means. Interviewing a variety of self-professed cheapskates, he finds—despite a diversity of lifestyles, backgrounds, and beliefs— common practices and philosophies when it came to money; their knowledge of how to live on less has insulated them from the economic crash. He presents their tips on frugal living in grocery shopping, entertainment, and sensible parenting, but the real value is in Yeager's persuasive argument that an onset of "Spending Anxiety Disorder" is good for our wallets, our communities, and the environment. If we change the way we think about "want" vs. "need," we can focus our time and attention on the truly valuable things—family, charity, passions, the early retirement that will make enjoying them longer possible—and if we consume sparingly, thoughtfully, and fully, our possessions will not consume us. Yeager and his "Miser Advisers" are proof that living more frugally isn't about sacrifice—it's about making choices every day to live a better, happier, more thoughtful life with less." (PW Reviews)
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