From the bestselling author of What's
the Matter With Kansas, a scathing look at the standard-bearers of liberal
politics -- a book that asks: what's the matter with Democrats?
It is a widespread belief among liberals that
if only Democrats can continue to dominate national elections, if only those
awful Republicans are beaten into submission, the country will be on the right
course.
But this is to fundamentally misunderstand the
modern Democratic Party. Drawing on years of research and first-hand reporting,
Frank points out that the Democrats have done little to advance traditional
liberal goals: expanding opportunity, fighting for social justice, and ensuring
that workers get a fair deal. Indeed, they have scarcely dented the free-market
consensus at all. This is not for lack of opportunity: Democrats have occupied
the White House for sixteen of the last twenty-four years, and yet the decline
of the middle class has only accelerated. Wall Street gets its bailouts, wages
keep falling, and the free-trade deals keep coming.
With his trademark sardonic wit and lacerating
logic, Frank's Listen, Liberal lays bare the essence of the
Democratic Party's philosophy and how it has changed over the years. A form of
corporate and cultural elitism has largely eclipsed the party's old
working-class commitment, he finds. For certain favored groups, this has meant
prosperity. But for the nation as a whole, it is a one-way ticket into the
abyss of inequality. In this critical election year, Frank recalls the
Democrats to their historic goals-the only way to reverse the ever-deepening
rift between the rich and the poor in America.
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