The Real State Of The Union: From The Best Minds In America, Bold Solutions To The Problems Politicians Dare Not Address - Softcover

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9780465050529: The Real State Of The Union: From The Best Minds In America, Bold Solutions To The Problems Politicians Dare Not Address

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0465050522 ISBN 13: 9780465050529

Publisher: Basic Books, 2004

Resulting from a collaboration between The Atlantic Monthly magazine and the New America Foundation, The Real State of the Union features 18 original essays on the most important facets of our national well-being. Written by many of our nation's most insightful observers, the essays provide an objective and penetrating analysis of the most critical challenges facing America as well as innovative solutions to many of them.The State of the Union Address is among the nation's oldest rituals, but one that has deviated from its original purpose: Rather than a candid assessment of the country or a meaningful self-evaluation by the current administration, it has become a political spectacle marked by self-congratulation and spin. The Real State of the Union seeks to turn an empty exercise into a more meaningful national dialogue about the social, political, and economic health of our country. Rejecting the political correctness of both parties, this volume tells the American public what it needs to know about the real problems that plague the country and why the political solutions that are offered too often fail to address the real nature of those problems.

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About the Author:

Ted Halstead is President of the New America Foundation and is the author (with Michael Lind) of the Radical Center: The Future of American Politics. He lives in Washington, D.C.

From Booklist:

A wordy title for a wordy volume, and a title that broaches the difficulty of the book itself: that is, that many of the solutions found in these essays, though thoughtful, would never be deemed politic in our current political discourse. This book stems from the Atlantic Monthly's now seemingly annual January "State of the Union" issue, with a few original essays thrown in on the impending 2004 presidential election. Essayists includes James Fallows, Michael Lind, Fareed Zakaria, Jedediah Purdy, and Margaret Talbot, who, together with others, tackle such issues as reform of public education, a system of fairer taxation, and improving health care. Other essays look into America's "mestizo future," as intermarriage among members of ethnic and racial groups increases; reforming prisons to rehabilitate and not just punish criminals; and the creating^B a "post-agrarian heartland" peopled by technocrats and service-economy workers to counter the deterioration of the interior of the nation into a vast poverty belt. In sum, this is a volume that offers original solutions for tough times. Allen Weakland
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