American Politics Audiobooks | Politics

The Punitive Turn in American Life: How the United States Learned to Fight Crime Like a War

In 1965, President Lyndon Johnson insisted that 'the policeman is the frontline soldier in our war against crime,' and police forces, arms makers, policy makers, and crime experts heeded this call to arms, bringing weapons and practices from the arena of war back home. The Punitive Turn in American Life offers a political and cultural history of the ways in which punishment and surveillance have moved to the center of American life and become imbued with militarized language and policies. Michael S. Sherry argues that, by the 1990s, the 'war on crime' had been successfully broadcast to millions of Americans at an enormous cost and that the currents of vengeance that ran through the punitive turn, underwriting torture at home and abroad, found a new voice with the election of Donald J. Trump. By 2020, the connections between war-fighting and crime-fighting remained powerful, evident in campaigns against undocumented immigrants and the militarized police response to the nationwide uprisings after George Floyd's murder. From the racist system of mass incarceration and the militarization of criminal justice to gated communities, public schools patrolled by police, and armies of private security, Sherry chronicles the United States' slide into becoming a meaner, punishment-obsessed nation.

Michael S. Sherry (Author), Rick Adamson (Narrator)

Audiobook

What the Founding Fathers were Really Like (and What We can Learn from Them Today)

One Day University presents a series of audio lectures recorded in real-time from some of the top minds in the United States. Given by award-winning professors and experts in their field, these recorded lectures dive deep into the worlds of religion, government, literature, and social justice.Most of us know that America's Founding Fathers attended the Constitutional Convention of 1787 in Philadelphia and drafted the Constitution of the United States. The delegates decided to replace the Articles of Confederation with a document that strengthened the federal government, with the most contentious issue being legislative representation. Eventually, a compromise established the bicameral Congress to ensure both equal and proportional representation. But a lot more happened as well-much of it underreported or misunderstood. That's the focus of this insider's look at the birth of American government as we know it today. The fact is, the Founding Fathers were ambitious. Also grouchy, scared, and hopeful. They told jokes. They fought. They schemed. They gossiped. They improvised. Occasionally, they killed each other (sorry, Alexander Hamilton). Only by seeing the Founders as real people-not icons-can we appreciate the full story of the nation's founding with all of its drama, humor, and significance intact.This audio lecture includes a supplemental PDF.

Carol Berkin (Author), Carol Berkin (Narrator)

Audiobook

What's Luck Got To Do With It?: How Smarter Government Can Rescue the American Dream

The American dream of equal opportunity is in peril. America's economic inequality is shocking, poverty threatens to become a heritable condition, and our healthcare system is crumbling despite ever increasing costs. In this thought-provoking book, Edward D. Kleinbard demonstrates how the failure to acknowledge the force of brute luck in our material lives exacerbates these crises leading to warped policy choices that impede genuine equality of opportunity for many Americans. What's Luck Got To Do With It? combines insights from economics, philosophy, and social psychology to argue for government's proper role in addressing the inequity of brute luck. Kleinbard shows how well-designed public investment can blunt the worst effects of existential bad luck that private insurance cannot reach and mitigate inequality by sharing the costs across the entire risk pool, which is to say, all of us. The benefits, as Kleinbard shares in a wealth of data, are economic as well as social: a more inclusive economy, higher national income, and greater life satisfaction for millions of Americans. Like it or not, our lives and opportunities are determined largely by luck. Kleinbard shows that while we can't undo every instance of misfortune, we can offer a path to not just a fairer America, but greater economic growth, more broadly shared.

Edward D. Kleinbard (Author), Matthew Josdal (Narrator)

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They Never Let a Crisis Go to Waste: The Truth About Disaster Liberalism

Two-time New York Times bestselling author Jason Chaffetz is back to blow the lid off the Democrats’ attempts to spend unparalleled trillions and rewrite our election laws while never letting us get back to normal. Why did the left think they could solve the pandemic with burning cities, closed beaches, blue state budget bailouts, and mail-in ballots nobody asked for? The coronavirus has been a disaster for America, but it’s been an unprecedented opportunity for the left. In They Never Let a Crisis Goes to Waste, Jason Chaffetz delves into progressive efforts to leverage crises to force their priorities into law. Whether the crisis is legitimate, fabricated, or exaggerated, the solution is always the same: more government, less individual freedom, higher spending, higher taxes. He explores how disaster liberalism subjugates individual freedoms to political expediency in times of crisis, and how Republicans need to be ready for next time. Because when we allow government power to become unlimited in a crisis, the crises will become unlimited. Across the board, Democrat leaders exploited the pandemic to achieve their agenda, invoking disaster liberalism to justify unpopular and unconstitutional power grabs. Virginia Governor Ralph Northam signed a gun control bill on April 10—three weeks into pandemic—because he wouldn’t have to put up with tens of thousands of protestors. Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers announced he was making it a criminal offense to attend church or go to work, only to see his overreach struck down by the state supreme court. Nancy Pelosi rammed through a $3 trillion liberal wish list filled with proposals unrelated to COVID-19, that immediately died in the Senate. If not for the courts and local media, many of the Democrats’ schemes would have successfully been implemented. As it was, many were—and many of the most egregious violations of Americans’ rights were celebrated across the left. In They Never Let a Crisis Go to Waste, Chaffetz uncovers Democrats’ game plan and calls upon all Americans to protect ourselves against future incursions. If we don’t pay attention, the left will use every crisis to implement its radical plan, steadily eroding the freedoms we all hold dear. Only the American people have the power to stop the left’s next power grab, as Chaffetz shows in this powerful, thoroughly-researched call to action.

Jason Chaffetz (Author), Jason Chaffetz (Narrator)

Audiobook

Dumb and Dumber: How Cuomo and de Blasio Ruined New York

Thanks to the policies of Andrew Cuomo and Bill de Blasio, the glory days of the Empire State and the Big Apple are long behind them. In America's early days, most immigrants entered America through New York. For many, New York was synonymous with America and the American dream itself-a beacon of hope for the rest of the world. Now, for the first time ever, people are fleeing New York by the millions. Plagued by high taxes, big government, excessive regulations, and other obstacles to liberty, there are few reasons for one to want to remain in the state under Governor Andrew Cuomo's leadership. And in New York City, which houses nearly half of the state's population, Mayor Bill de Blasio has been doing everything in his power to accelerate the decline and bring the city back to its pre-Rudy-Giuliani days.

Matt Palumbo (Author), Axel Bosley (Narrator)

Audiobook

Failures of the Presidents: From the Whiskey Rebellion and War of 1812 to the Bay of Pigs and War in

Everybody makes mistakes, but when an American president blunders, the results can be catastrophic. In an effort to put an end to Britain and France's policy of seizing American ships and sailors, Thomas Jefferson calls for an embargo. The result: 30,000 sailors put out of work; mercantile families bankrupted overnight; a nationwide economic depression; and the New England states, which depended heavily on international commerce, threaten to secede from the Union. In an effort to install a capitalist government in the Middle East, stabilize the region, and protect America from a possible Iraqi terrorist assault using weapons of mass destruction, George W. Bush orders the invasion of Iraq. The result: More than 4,000 American soldiers and personnel dead; estimated hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians dead; hundreds of billions of dollars spent; the torture of prisoners in the Abu Ghraib prison and the failure to find weapons of mass destruction leave American global credibility in tatters. All of these, and many more, incredible lapses in judgement are explained in this book.

Thomas J. Craughwell (Author), Jonathan Yen (Narrator)

Audiobook

America in Retreat: The Decline of US Leadership from WW2 to Covid-19

In the heady days after 1945, the authority of the United States was unrivaled and, with the founding of the UN, a new era of international co-operation seemed to have begun. But seventy-five years later, its influence has already diminished. The world has now entered a post-American era, argues Michael Pembroke, defined by a flourishing Asia and the ascendancy of China, as much as by the decline of the United States. This book is a short history of that decline; how high standards and treasured principles were ignored; how idealism was replaced by hubris and moral compromise; and how adherence to the rule of law became selective. It is also a look into the future-a future dominated by greater Asia and China in particular. We are in the midst of the third great power shift in modern history-from Europe to America to Asia. Covering wars in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan, interventions in Iran, Guatemala and Chile, and a retreat from international engagement with the UN, WHO and, increasingly, trade agreements, Pembroke sketches the history of America's retreat from universal principles to provide a clear-eyed analysis of the dangers of American exceptionalism.

Michael Pembroke (Author), Eric Jason Martin (Narrator)

Audiobook

Nothing to Lose: Unlikely Allies in the Struggle for a Better Black America

Pastor Darrell Scott demolishes entrenched stereotypes and political boundaries with his candid, revealing, and often surprising story: how a devout Christian and African American has become one of President Donald Trump's leading supporters and advisors. 'What makes you think black people will vote for you? Because the word on the street is, you're a racist.' With those blunt words to then-presidential candidate Donald Trump, Pastor Darrell Scott began a journey he never expected to take-becoming the future president's most prominent African-American supporter and advisor. In Nothing to Lose, Pastor Scott recounts how and why he boarded 'the Trump Train,' revealing the considerable difficulties he experienced along the way. As his story progresses, Pastor Scott highlights the accomplishments he, his allies, and members of the Trump administration have worked so hard to earn on behalf of the black community in the United States. Pastor Scott also provides a surprising portrait of President Donald Trump himself-his candor; his support for policies, issues, and initiatives important to the African-American community; and his little-understood relationship with Christianity.

Pastor Darrell Scott (Author), William Andrew Quinn (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Agenda: How a Republican Supreme Court is Reshaping America

From 2011, when Republicans gained control of the House of Representatives, until the present, Congress enacted hardly any major legislation outside of the tax law President Trump signed in 2017. In the same period, the Supreme Court dismantled much of America's campaign finance law, severely weakened the Voting Rights Act, permitted states to opt-out of the Affordable Care Act's Medicaid expansion, weakened laws protecting against age discimination and sexual and racial harassment, and held that every state must permit same-sex couples to marry. This powerful unelected body, now controlled by six very conservative Republicans, has and will become the locus of policymaking in the United States. Ian Millhiser, Vox's Supreme Court correspondent, tells the story of what those six justices are likely to do with their power. It is true that the right to abortion is in its final days, as is affirmative action. But Millhiser shows that it is in the most arcane decisions that the Court will fundamentally reshape America, transforming it into something far less democratic, by attacking voting rights, dismantling and vetoing the federal administrative state, ignoring the separation of church and state, and putting corporations above the law. The Agenda exposes a radically altered Supreme Court whose powers extend far beyond transforming any individual right--its agenda is to shape the very nature of America's government, redefining who gets to have legal rights, who is beyond the reach of the law, and who chooses the people who make our laws.

Ian Millhiser (Author), D.H. Lawrence, David H. Lawrence (Narrator)

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George Washington: The Political Rise of America's Founding Father

A fascinating and illuminating account of how George Washington became the single most dominant force in the creation of the United States of America, from award-winning author David O. Stewart Washington's rise constitutes one of the greatest self-reinventions in history. In his midtwenties, this third son of a modest Virginia planter had ruined his own military career thanks to an outrageous ego. But by his midforties, that headstrong, unwise young man had evolved into an unassailable leader chosen as the commander in chief of the fledgling Continental Army. By his midfifties, he was unanimously elected the nation's first president. How did Washington emerge from the wilderness to become the central founder of the United States of America? In this remarkable new portrait, award-winning historian David O. Stewart unveils the political education that made Washington a master politician-and America's most essential leader. From Virginia's House of Burgesses, where Washington learned the craft and timing of a practicing politician, to his management of local government as a justice of the Fairfax County Court to his eventual role in the Second Continental Congress and his grueling generalship in the American Revolution, Washington perfected the art of governing and service, earned trust, and built bridges. The lessons in leadership he absorbed along the way would be invaluable during the early years of the republic as he fought to unify the new nation.

David O. Stewart (Author), Arthur Morey (Narrator)

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Solemn Reverence: The Separation of Church and State in American Life

'A slender but thoroughly argued case for reinforcing the wall between church and state. . . A stern warning that those who push for the intrusion of religion into public life do so at the peril of both.' -- Kirkus Reviews The First Amendment to the US Constitution codified the principle that the government should play no role in favoring or supporting any religion, while allowing free exercise of all religions (including unbelief). More than two centuries later, the results from this experiment are overwhelming: The separation of church and state has shielded the government from religious factionalism, and the United States boasts a diverse religious culture unmatched anywhere in the world. In Solemn Reverence, Randall Balmer, one of the premier historians of religion in America, reviews both the history of the separation of church and state as well as the various attempts to undermine that wall of separation. Despite the fact that the First Amendment and the separation of church and state has served the nation remarkably well, he argues, its future is by no means assured.

Randall Balmer (Author), Randall Balmer (Narrator)

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Segregation by Design: Local Politics and Inequality in American Cities

Segregation by Design draws on more than 100 years of quantitative and qualitative data from thousands of American cities to explore how local governments generate race and class segregation. Starting in the early twentieth century, cities have used their power of land use control to determine the location and availability of housing, amenities (such as parks), and negative land uses (such as garbage dumps). The result has been segregation-first within cities and more recently between them. Documenting changing patterns of segregation and their political mechanisms, Trounstine argues that city governments have pursued these policies to enhance the wealth and resources of white property owners at the expense of people of color and the poor. Contrary to leading theories of urban politics, local democracy has not functioned to represent all residents. The result is unequal access to fundamental local services-from schools, to safe neighborhoods, to clean water.

Jessica Trounstine (Author), Rebecca Gibel (Narrator)

Audiobook

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