Reaching for a New Deal: Ambitious Governance, Economic Meltdown, and Polarized Politics in Obama's First Two Years

Reaching for a New Deal: Ambitious Governance, Economic Meltdown, and Polarized Politics in Obama's First Two Years Review

During his winning presidential campaign, Barack Obama promised to counter rising economic inequality and revitalize America's middle-class through a series of wide-ranging reforms. His transformational agenda sought to ensure affordable healthcare; reform the nation's schools and make college more affordable; promote clean and renewable energy; reform labor laws and immigration; and redistribute the tax burden from the middle class to wealthier citizens. The Wall Street crisis and economic downturn that erupted as Obama took office also put U.S. financial regulation on the agenda. By the middle of President Obama's first term in office, he had succeeding in advancing major reforms by legislative and administrative means. But a sluggish economic recovery from the deep recession of 2009, accompanied by polarized politics and governmental deadlock in Washington DC, have raised questions about how far Obama's promised transformations can go. Reaching for a New Deal analyzes both the ambitious domestic policy of Obama's first two years and the consequent political backlash up to and including the 2010 midterm elections.
Reaching for a New Deal situates Obama's efforts in the context of previous efforts to fundamentally reshape U.S. domestic policies, from the New Deal through the Great Society to the Reagan era. The book opens by assessing how the Obama administration overcame intense partisan struggles to achieve legislative victories in three areas health care reform, federal higher education loans and grants, and financial regulation. Lawrence Jacobs and Theda Skocpol examine the landmark health care bill, signed into law in spring 2010, which extended affordable health benefits to millions of uninsured Americans after nearly 100 years of failed legislative attempts to do so. The book also examines the domains in which Obama has used administrative action to further reforms in schools and labor law. Lorraine McDonnell describes the acceleration of state and local K-12 educational reforms through federal stimulus funding and the Race to the Top program sponsored by this administration's Education Department. The book concludes with examinations of three areas energy, immigration, and taxes where Obama's efforts at legislative compromises made little headway. Judith Layzer shows how economic crisis and intra-Democratic Party divisions undercut Obama's hope to forge comprehensive, environmentally friendly energy reforms.
Reaching for a New Deal combines probing analyses of Obama's domestic policy achievements with a big picture look at his change-oriented presidency. The book uses struggles over policy changes as a window into the larger dynamics of American politics and situates the current political era in relation to earlier pivotal junctures in U.S government and public policy. It offers invaluable lessons about unfolding political transformations in the United States.

Passion, Craft, and Method in Comparative Politics

Passion, Craft, and Method in Comparative Politics Review

In the first collection of interviews with the most prominent scholars in comparative politics since World War II, Gerardo L. Munck and Richard Snyder trace key developments in the field during the twentieth century.

Organized around a broad set of themes—intellectual formation and training; major works and ideas; the craft and tools of research; colleagues, collaborators, and students; and the past and future of comparative politics—these in-depth interviews offer unique and candid reflections that bring the research process to life and shed light on the human dimension of scholarship.

Giving voice to scholars who practice their craft in different ways yet share a passion for knowledge about global politics, Passion, Craft, and Method in Comparative Politics offers a wealth of insights into contemporary debates about the state of knowledge in comparative politics and the future of the field.

Health Of Nations: An International Perspective On Us Health Care Reform, 3d Edition

Health Of Nations: An International Perspective On Us Health Care Reform, 3d Edition Review

"Health of Nations" provides detailed overviews of the health care systems of the United States, Canada, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom and compares and contrasts the health care systems of these five other with the United States. In this thoroughly revised third edition, author Laurene Graig analyzes the health care delivery systems in each of these countries and makes expert and insightful assessments about what works...what doesn't work...and what promising new ideas are now being tested. "Health of Nations" provides an excellent cross-national comparison of the major healthcare systems in existence today. The book is an excellent reference guide for students of international policy or anyone seeking information on U.S. Health care reform.

Votes and Violence: Electoral Competition and Ethnic Riots in India (Cambridge Studies in Comparative Politics)

Votes and Violence: Electoral Competition and Ethnic Riots in India (Cambridge Studies in Comparative Politics) Review

Revealing why Hindu-Muslim riots in India break out when and where they do, Steven Wilkinson demonstrates why some state governments in India prevent Hindu-Muslim riots while others do not or even help to incite violence. Wilkinson asserts that riots are manipulated to help win elections, and that state governments decide whether to stop them--depending on electoral calculations concerning the loss or gain of votes. He tests this claim using a dataset on riots and their causes as well as case studies of several Indian states.

Words of Fire: Independent Journalists who Challenge Dictators, Drug Lords, and Other Enemies of a Free Press

Words of Fire: Independent Journalists who Challenge Dictators, Drug Lords, and Other Enemies of a Free Press Review

If journalism is the first draft of history, then independent journalists are surely its most daring composers.

Along such celebrated and high-profile figures as Christiane Amanpour and Wolf Blitzer, there exists a stratum of journalistsself-employed, working under dire conditions, and with minimal resourceswho often place themselves at ground zero of world events. In this gripping account, Anthony Collings takes us into the world of independent journalists, and the daily challenges they face confronting dictators, hostile military, and narcoterrorists. Unfettered by any ties to those in positions of power, these guerrilla journalists are often the first on a storywhether reporting on corruption in Mexico, organized crime in Russia, or sexual scandal in the Middle Eastand accordingly face the brunt of their subject's wrath.

Collings, who has himself been held captive while on assignment, here focuses less on those nations in which the press is either largely free (such as the U.S. or Western European democracies) or aggressively restricted (as in China), and more on those "battleground countries" where the eventual outcome of the struggle between state and fourth estate remains unclear. Relying on interviews, professional contacts, and his own experiences, Collings explores the dilemmas and strategies of journalists who persevere in the face of war, repressive governments, and criminal aggression, with particular emphasis on the role of the Internet.

At a time when journalism is increasingly a profession under siege, Words of Fire forces into the spotlight a more positive side of the profession, those who pursue journalism not for profit or fame but as a personal crusade.

Multiculturalism and Political Theory

Multiculturalism and Political Theory Review

Over the past twenty years debate surrounding cultural diversity has become one of the most active areas of contemporary political theory and philosophy. The impact of taking cultural diversity seriously in modern political societies has led to challenges to the dominance of liberal theory and to a more serious engagement of political theory with actual political struggles. This volume of essays by leading political theorists reviews the development of multiculturalism, surveys the major approaches, addresses the critical questions posed and highlights new directions in research. Multiculturalism and Political Theory provides a 'state of the art' overview for both students and researchers.

Popular Protest in China (Harvard Contemporary China)

Popular Protest in China (Harvard Contemporary China) Review

Do our ideas about social movements travel successfully beyond the democratic West? Unrest in China, from the dramatic events of 1989 to more recent stirrings, offers a rare opportunity to explore this question and to consider how popular contention unfolds in places where speech and assembly are tightly controlled. The contributors to this volume, all prominent scholars of Chinese politics and society, argue that ideas inspired by social movements elsewhere can help explain popular protest in China.

Drawing on fieldwork in China, the authors consider topics as varied as student movements, protests by angry workers and taxi drivers, recruitment to Protestant house churches, cyberprotests, and anti-dam campaigns. Their work relies on familiar concepts—such as political opportunity, framing, and mobilizing structures—while interrogating the usefulness of these concepts in a country with a vastly different history of class and state formation than the capitalist West. The volume also speaks to “silences” in the study of contentious politics (for example, protest leadership, the role of grievances, and unconventional forms of organization), and shows that well-known concepts must at times be modified to square with the reality of an authoritarian, non-western state.

(20090601)

Global AIDS: Myths & Facts

Global AIDS: Myths & Facts Review

AIDS is the most devastating communicable disease in history, and structures of poverty and injustice are magnifying the crisis in underresourced countries.

More than 36 million people are infected with HIV/AIDS—the vast majority of them in the poor world, or in poor and marginalized communities within wealthy countries. And since AIDS was first recognized in the early 1980s, 13 million children have been orphaned and 22 million people have died from the disease.

Irwin and Millen, co-authors of the critically praised Dying for Growth: Global Inequality and the Health of the Poor, demonstrate that it is morally imperative and practically feasible to control the spread of AIDS by overturning common myths about treatment and prevention.

For example, it is often argued that ordinary citizens in rich countries can do little to fight AIDS in poor counties. But Irwin and Millen show how individual activists, students, health providers, and members of international health organizations have helped to play pivotal roles in lowering drug prices and securing increased funding for vaccine development. Activism and education by groups like ACT UP, Student Global AIDS Campaign, and various religious organizations is forcing national and international leaders to take greater responsibility for the global AIDS crisis.

Features a comprehensive resource guide. Illustrated with photographs. Alexander Irwin is an assistant professor of religious studies at Amherst College. Joyce Millen is Director of Research for the Institute for Health and Social Justice. Irwin and Millen are co-authors of Dying for Growth: Global Inequality and the Health of the Poor. James Orbinski, president of Doctors Without Borders, called Dying for Growth "deeply intelligent, thoroughly researched—a must-read for all citizens and activists committed to meaningful change."

Measuring the Performance of the Hollow State (Public Management and Change)

Measuring the Performance of the Hollow State (Public Management and Change) Review

This book provides the first in-depth analysis of a major federal management reform under the most difficult conditions for measuring performance and accountability: when government functions are contracted out to third parties. The authors systematically examine the workings of the Government Performance and Results Act (GPRA) of 1993, with consideration of the later Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART) of 2002 in five agencies in U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. These programs represent much of the range of federal government organizational structures and a diverse array of third-party arrangements, including states, native American tribal leaderships, scientists, medical schools, and commercial and non-profit health intermediaries and carriers. The authors explore the development of performance measures in light of the mandates of each program, conflicting statutes, political considerations and obstacles, and conditions of intergovernmental relations (where applicable). Their findings illuminate two major questions in public management today: the uses and limitations of performance measurement as a policy and management tool in government and the management of third-party government.

Introduction to the New Testament, Vol. 1: History, Culture, and Religion of the Hellenistic Age (2nd edition)

Introduction to the New Testament, Vol. 1: History, Culture, and Religion of the Hellenistic Age (2nd edition) Review

Among the striking features that distinguish this comprehensive two-volume work, now complete in its second edition, from other books of similar title are its wide historical scope, its tretment of early Christian literature in the chronological sequence, and the inclusion of over sixty noncanonical Christian documents.

Volume 2, after considering problems related to the interpretation of early Christian writings - transmission, canon, text, form criticism, literary criticism, and narrative and rhetorical criticism - unfolds the story of the early Christian communities and their literature from John the Baptist and Jesus to Justin Martyr, Valentinus, and Polycarp.

This narrative has been written in a readable, nontechnical style, supplemented by current bibliographies for each selection that include listings of the best editions of original texts as well as the most accessible English translations. An essential work for students, teachers, and clergy, this set will also appeal to the educated layperson looking for a scholary treatment of the New Testament and its background in the world of Jewish and Greco-Roman antiquity.

The Evolution of International Society: A Comparative Historical Analysis Reissue with a new introduction by Barry Buzan and Richard Little

The Evolution of International Society: A Comparative Historical Analysis Reissue with a new introduction by Barry Buzan and Richard Little Review

This uniquely comprehensive historical study analyses and explains how international societies function. The author examines ancient city states and then looks in more detail at European society and worldwide contemporary society.

Homeland Security: An Introduction to Principles and Practice

Homeland Security: An Introduction to Principles and Practice Review

Since its formation in 2002—the largest government reorganization since FDR’s "New Deal"—the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has focused on a broad range of public policy, safety, and security issues. From responsible intelligence gathering and combating global terrorism to securing critical infrastructure and disaster planning and response, mounting risks and ever-changing threats have created the need for a timely resource that outlines the recent organizational changes and strategic initiatives that have emerged within DHS.

Homeland Security: An Introduction to Principles and Practice provides students and practitioners alike with the latest developments on the make-up, organization, and strategic mission of DHS. Homeland security involves a complex network of government agencies and private organizations collaborating to ensure the safety and security of the United States, its domestic and global interests, and its citizens. As such, this book offers valuable insights into the roles of multi-jurisdictional agencies and various stakeholders at all levels of government including law enforcement, the military, the intelligence community, emergency managers, and the private sector.

Many of the books currently available offer a skewed or unbalanced examination of DHS, emphasizing certain elements over others. This is the first book to provide objective and equal treatment of each of the core components that encompass DHS’s mission including: border security, immigration and naturalization, emergency management, transportation security, critical infrastructure protection, information security, public health, and intelligence and counterterrorism efforts. Each chapter includes extensive pedagogy—learning objectives, informative boxed sidebars, summaries, end-of-chapter questions, Web links, and references—for ease of comprehension and retention.

Authored by Charles Nemeth, a respected expert in homeland security and leader in homeland security education, Homeland Security provides the most complete and up-to-date overview available on the organizational and strategic initiatives of DHS, the challenges facing federal and state government agencies, and new and emerging ideas on the future of DHS and the role it should play in national and domestic security.

An instructor's manual with exam questions, lesson plans, and chapter PowerPoint^® slides are available upon qualified course adoption.

The Breeders' Cup: great fields, huge stakes--is this the coolest event in horse racing? Bet on it.(WHAT'S THE DEAL WITH ...): An article from: The Sporting News

The Breeders' Cup: great fields, huge stakes--is this the coolest event in horse racing? Bet on it.(WHAT'S THE DEAL WITH ...): An article from: The Sporting News Review

This digital document is an article from The Sporting News, published by Thomson Gale on October 28, 2005. The length of the article is 588 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: The Breeders' Cup: great fields, huge stakes--is this the coolest event in horse racing? Bet on it.(WHAT'S THE DEAL WITH ...)
Author: Noah Liberman
Publication:The Sporting News (Magazine/Journal)
Date: October 28, 2005
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 229 Issue: 43 Page: 14(1)

Distributed by Thomson Gale

Military, State and Society in Pakistan

Military, State and Society in Pakistan Review

This book offers a comprehensive study of the dynamics of civil-military relations in Pakistan. It asks how and why the Pakistan military has acquired such a salience in the polity and how it continues to influence decision-making on foreign and security policies and key domestic political, social and economic issues. It also examines the changes within the military, the impact of these changes on its disposition towards the state and society, and the implications for peace and security in nuclearized South Asia.

Practical Aviation Security: Predicting and Preventing Future Threats (Butterworth-Heinemann Homeland Security)

Practical Aviation Security: Predicting and Preventing Future Threats (Butterworth-Heinemann Homeland Security) Review

Practical Aviation Security is a complete guide to the aviation security system, from crucial historical events, to the policies and policy makers and the major terrorist and criminal acts that have shaped the procedures in use today, to the tip-of-the-spear technologies that are shaping the future.

This text enables the reader to enter airport security or other aviation management roles with the proper knowledge to immediately implement the necessary security programs, to meet international guidelines and to responsibly protect their facility or organization, no matter how large or small.

Using case studies and practical security measures in use at airports all over the world, readers learn the effective methods and the fundamental principles involved in designing and implementing a security system. This text covers commercial airport security, general aviation and cargo operations, threats and threat detection and response systems as well as international security issues.

While not perfect, the aviation security system is comprehensive and requires continual focus and attention to be able to stay a step ahead of the next attack. This text provides the tools necessary to prepare practitioners to enter the industry, and if they are already in the industry to better understand it so they can prevent the next tragedy.


* Understand the principles that underlie a topic of enduring importance in global commerce
* Apply real-world aviation experience to the task of deflecting current and future threats
* Reduce the vulnerabilities of cargo carriers and corporate jets as well as commercial airlines

New Deal Planning: The National Resources Planning Board (RFF Library Collection: Natural Resource Management Set)

New Deal Planning: The National Resources Planning Board (RFF Library Collection: Natural Resource Management Set) Review

Originally published in 1981

The Dynamics of Nuclear Proliferation

The Dynamics of Nuclear Proliferation Review

Stephen M. Meyer steps back from the emotions and rhetoric surrounding the nuclear arms debates to provide a systematic examination of the underlying determinants of nuclear weapons proliferation. Looking at current theories of nuclear proliferation, he asks: Must a nation that acquires the technical capability to manufacture nuclear weapons eventually do so? In an analysis, remarkable for its rigor and accessibility, Meyer provides the first empirical, statistical model explaining why particular countries became nuclear powers when they did. His findings clearly contradict the notion that the pace of nuclear proliferation is controlled by a technological imperative and show that political and military factors account for the past decisions of nations to acquire or forgo the development of nuclear weapons.