The Second American Revolution - Hardcover

Patterson, James; Kim, Peter

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0688117309 ISBN 13: 9780688117306

Publisher: William Morrow & Co, 1994

Synopsis

The authors show how public solutions to current issues differ from political practices

About this title

About the Author

James Patterson is Chairman of J. Walter Thompson, North America.

Reviews

Based on a sampling of 1000 adult Americans--Patterson and Kim listen to "voices, not numbers"--this survey by the two advertising executives who coauthored The Day America Told the Truth is perforce superficial. In defining popular concerns they break no new ground: the dearth of leaders, declining schools, unsafe neighborhoods, poor health care, ailing economy and scourge of drugs. The authors assert that the public backs supply-side economics and that a vast majority of Americans want school choice, including a voucher plan, and a national curriculum. Although the survey respondents support abortion and gun control, they also favor mandatory prison sentences and capital punishment. Author tour.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Imagine this: The American People (whoever they are) require the assistance and good will of a couple of advertising honchos to tell them how to take back the government. Patterson and Kim, co- authors of The Day America Told the Truth, (not reviewed) employ polling, focus groups, town meetings, and other ``advanced sampling and research-design techniques'' (What? Doesn't anybody just listen anymore?) to unfetter the repressed inner child of the American body politic. The book has chapters on AIDS, crime, education, health care, and other issues, but all that's just prologue. The big bonus is a surprise: Patterson and Kim have conducted some sort of election by mail, and on the book's pub date, they'll tell us who the ``voters'' elected (that is, should elect) president-- Disney CEO Michael Eisner, Gen. Colin Powell, Texas govenor Ann Richards, or any of 15 other ``candidates.'' (Author tour) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Forget elections: two top admen--Patterson is chairman of J. Walter Thompson and best-selling author of Along Came a Spider (1992); Kim, vice chairman of McCann-Erickson Worldwide--will tell us what the American people really want. The authors' previous survey-and-focus-group concoction, The Day America Told the Truth (1991), was more scattershot; here, they focus on leadership and public policy issues with the tools their agencies would use to test the appeal of a new soft drink: simulations of local and national town halls and national referenda--and an executive search firm to spot potential "leaders." (Media attention is likely here: the search firm reduced the field from nearly 1,000 to 90 to 18 candidates; 1,067 respondents to a survey (sent to 3,000) chose a "winner," to be announced when the book is published.) Since "he who asks the questions determines the answers," attentive readers will be disturbed by the narrowness of the authors' sources on critical issues and by the na‹vet‚ of their "optimism" about aspects of "the People's Agenda." Still, thanks to heavy promotion, expect plenty of interest and requests. Mary Carroll

Edition details

• Publisher: William Morrow & Co
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 0688117309
• ISBN 13: 9780688117306
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 285