Emily Gets Her Gun: …But Obama Wants to Take Yours


Emily J. Miller - 2013
    The narrative—sometimes shocking, other times hilarious in its absurdity—gives the listener a real-life understanding of how gun-control laws only make it more difficult for honest, law-abiding people to get guns, while violent crime continues to rise. Using facts and newly uncovered research, Miller exposes the schemes politicians on Capitol Hill, in the White House, and around the country are using to deny people their Second Amendment rights. She exposes the myths that gun grabbers and liberal media use to get new laws passed that infringe on our right to keep and bear arms.

The Argument: Billionaires, Bloggers, and the Battle to Remake Democratic Politics


Matt Bai - 2007
    The New Dealers had one. So did the Goldwater conservatives. So what's the progressive argument? What new path are Democrats urging us to choose in the era of Wal-Mart, Al Qaeda, and YouTube? Matt Bai seeks answers in The Argument, a book that brings you deep inside the turbulent, confusing new world of Democratic politics, where billionaires and bloggers are battling politicians and consultants over the future of a once-great party. Beginning with the devastating election of 2004 and ending with an unexpected triumph in the 2006 congressional elections and the run-up to the 2008 campaign, Bai's book follows such memorable power brokers as Howard Dean, the billionaire George Soros, the union leader Andy Stern, the blogger Markos Moulitsas, and the leaders of moveon.org as they vie for control of the new Democratic landscape. In the pages of The Argument, we are introduced to these activists not just as political figures but as fascinating and flawed characters-ordinary people motivated by ideology or ambition or even personal tragedy. At stake is the future of the Democratic Party and, quite possibly, of American politics itself. At a time when assorted pundits offer their ownprescriptions for Democratic success in the 2008 presidential election, Bai uses rich narrative and vivid portraits to illuminate the party's challenges. In scene after scene from around the country-with union bosses in Chicago, with Dean in Alaska, with movie stars in Hollywood and financiers in New York-Bai reveals a movement that is learning how to win again, even as it struggles to articulate a compelling argument for progressive government in a confusing new century. Readers of The Argument will recognize the unsparing insight and gift for storytelling that have made Matt Bai one of the country's most widely read observers of the American political scene-and its most trusted authority on the Democratic Party.

How the Irish Became White


Noel Ignatiev - 1995
    He uncovers the roots of conflict between Irish-Americans & African-Americans & draws a powerful connection between the embracing of white supremacy & Irish "success" in 19th century American society.

Bad Sports: How Owners Are Ruining the Games We Love


Dave Zirin - 2010
    Complaints abound: from inflated ticket prices, $6 hot dogs, and $9 beers to owners endlessly demanding new multimillion-dollar stadiums funded by public tax dollars. Those sitting in the owners’ boxes are increasingly placing profit over players’ performances and fan loyalty. Bad Sports cuts through the hype and bombast to zero in on tales of abusive, dictatorial owners who move their teams thousands of miles away from their fan base, use their stadiums as religious and political platforms, or hold communities ransom for millions of dollars of taxpayer money to fund their gargantuan stadiums.As the multibillion-dollar sports-industrial complex continues to lumber along, Dave Zirin is the voice in the wilderness, speaking out for the common fan with a tough, passionate, and intelligent voice that will remind readers that there is more to sportswriting than glowing athlete profiles.

Poverty in America: A Handbook


John Iceland - 2003
    This edition has been updated and includes a new preface.

Classical Sociological Theory


Craig J. Calhoun - 2002
    It explores the pioneering minds of Marx, Durkheim, and Weber, who developed our modern idea of society; and looks at the powerful influence of the works of early the sociologists Mead, Simmel, Freud, and Du Bois.

All Together Now?: One Man's Walk in Search of His Father and a Lost England


Mike Carter - 2019
    I called work and booked some time off. Then I bought a one-way train ticket to Liverpool.'In 1981, Mike Carter's dad, Pete, organised the People's March for Jobs, which saw 300 people walk from Liverpool to London to protest as the Thatcher government's policies devastated industrial Britain and sent unemployment skyrocketing. Just before the 2016 EU referendum, Mike set off to walk the same route in a quest to better understand his dad and his country.As he walked, Mike found many echoes of the early eighties: a working class overlooked and ignored by Westminster politicans; communities hollowed out but fiercely resistant; anger and despair co-existing with hope and determination for change. And he also found that he and Pete shared more in common than he might have thought.All Together Now? maps the intricate, overlapping path of one man's journey and that of an entire country. It is a book about belonging, about whether to stay or go, and about the need to write new stories for our communities and ourselves.

Lies My Teacher Told Me: The True History of the War for Southern Independence


Clyde N. Wilson - 2016
    The entire South—its people, culture, history, customs, both past and present—has been and continues to be lied about and demonized by the unholy trinity of the American establishment: Academia, Hollywood, and the Media. In the midst of the anti-South hysteria currently infecting the American psyche—the banning of flags, charges of hate and “racism,” the removal and attempted removal of Confederate monuments, the renaming of schools, vandalism of monuments and property displaying the Confederate Battle Flag, and even physical assaults, albeit rarely at present, on people who display the symbols of the South — Shotwell Publishing offers this unapologetic, unreconstructed, pro-South book with the hope that it will reach those who are left that are not afraid to question the sanity of this cultural purge and the veracity of its narrative concerning the South.

A State of Emergency


Richard Chambers - 2021
    The electrifying behind-the-scenes account of a year that brought Ireland to the brink and back - the inside story of Ireland’s struggle to contain Covid-19.Based on a wealth of original research and over a hundred interviews with cabinet members, public health officials, frontline workers, and ordinary people on whom the crisis exacted a personal toll, A State of Emergency is the incendiary untold story of Ireland’s response to the biggest public health emergency of the past century.Ranging from the halls of Government Buildings, where conflict between the new Cabinet and its public health advisors threatened to derail the official response, to the frontlines of the containment effort itself, where doctors, nurses, and the communities they served found themselves pushed to breaking point, A State of Emergency is a landmark work of journalism and a riveting insider account of the struggle to bring Ireland back from the brink.

One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society


Herbert Marcuse - 1964
    This second edition, newly introduced by Marcuse scholar Douglas Kellner, presents Marcuse's best-selling work to another generation of readers in the context of contemporary events.

Street Politics: Poor people's Movements in Iran


Asef Bayat - 1997
    Poor people began to construct their own communities on unused urban lands, creating an infrastructure----roads, electricity, running water, garbage collection, and shelters----all their own. As the Iranian government attempted to evict these illegal settlers, they resisted----fiercely and ultimately successfully. This is the story of their economic and political strategies.

Ways of the Samurai from Ronins to Ninja


Carol Gaskin - 1990
    To the Western mind these fearsome warriors-samurai, the masterless ronin, and the assassin ninja-have always been a source of mystery and wonder, combining the idealism of chivalry with military fanaticism. The Ways Of The Samurai digs beneath the myth and reveals a truth even more amazing about the men who practiced a discipline drawn from Zen and Confucian ethics-bushido, the way of the warrior.

Two Cheers for Anarchism: Six Easy Pieces on Autonomy, Dignity and Meaningful Work and Play


James C. Scott - 2012
    Now, in his most accessible and personal book to date, the acclaimed social scientist makes the case for seeing like an anarchist. Inspired by the core anarchist faith in the possibilities of voluntary cooperation without hierarchy, Two Cheers for Anarchism is an engaging, high-spirited and often very funny defense of an anarchist way of seeing--one that provides a unique and powerful perspective on everything from everyday social and political interactions to mass protests and revolutions. Through a wide-ranging series of memorable anecdotes and examples, the book describes an anarchist sensibility that celebrates the local knowledge, common sense and creativity of ordinary people. The result is a kind of handbook on constructive anarchism that challenges us to radically reconsider the value of hierarchy in public and private life, from schools and workplaces to retirement homes and government itself.Beginning with what Scott calls "the law of anarchist calisthenics," an argument for law-breaking inspired by an East German pedestrian crossing, each chapter opens with a story that captures an essential anarchist truth. In the course of telling these stories, Scott touches on a wide variety of subjects: public disorder and riots, desertion, poaching, vernacular knowledge, assembly-line production, globalization, the petty bourgeoisie, school testing, playgrounds and the practice of historical explanation.Far from a dogmatic manifesto, Two Cheers for Anarchism celebrates the anarchist confidence in the inventiveness and judgment of people who are free to exercise their creative and moral capacities.James C. Scott is the Sterling Professor of Political Science, professor of anthropology, and codirector of the Agrarian Studies Program at Yale University. His books include Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed; Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts; and most recently, The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and part-time farmer.

Crack House


Harry Keeble - 2008
    By the end of the decade Britain's inner cities were in the midst of a crack epidemic. Narrated by the leader of the Harginey Drugs Squad, 'Crack House' describes a series of breathtaking raids as well as arrests, beatings, stabbings and shootings.

The Impossible State: North Korea, Past and Future


Victor Cha - 2012
    He illuminates the repressive regime's complex economy and culture, its appalling record of human-rights abuses, and its belligerent relationship with the United States, and analyzes the regime's major security issues—from the seemingly endless war with its southern neighbor to its frightening nuclear ambitions—all in light of the destabilizing effects of Kim Jong-il's recent death.How this enigmatic nation-state—one that regularly violates its own citizens' inalienable rights and has suffered famine, global economic sanctions, a collapsed economy, and near total isolation from the rest of the world—has continued to survive has long been a question that preoccupies the West. Cha reveals a land of contradictions, one facing a pivotal and disquieting transition of power from tyrannical father to inexperienced son, and delves into the ideology that leads an oppressed, starving populace to cling so fiercely to its failed leadership.With rare personal anecdotes from the author's time in Pyongyang and his tenure as an adviser in the White House, this engagingly written, authoritative, and highly accessible history offers much-needed answers to the most pressing questions about North Korea and ultimately warns of a regime that might be closer to its end than many might think—a political collapse for which America and its allies may be woefully unprepared.