American Manifesto, Bob Garfield
American Manifesto, Bob Garfield
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American Manifesto
Saving Democracy from Villains, Vandals, and Ourselves

Author: Bob Garfield

Narrator: Bob Garfield

Unabridged: 6 hr 12 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Kalorama

Published: 01/14/2020


Synopsis

As is often observed, Trump is a symptom of a virus that has been incubating for at least fifty years. But not often observed is where the virus is imbedded: in the psychic core of our identity. In American Manifesto: Saving Democracy from Villains, Vandals, and Ourselves, Bob Garfield examines the tragic confluence of the American preoccupation with identity and the catastrophic disintegration of the mass media. Garfield investigates how we've gotten to this moment when our identity is threatened by both the left and the right, when e pluribus unum is no longer a source of national pride, and why, when looking through this lens of identity, the rise of Trumpism is no surprise. Overlaying that crisis is the rise of the Facebook-Google duopoly and the filter-bubble archipelago where identity is tribal and immutable.

But fear not! WNYC's On the Media cohost Garfield has ideas about how we may counter the forces of fragmentation—the manifesto itself: six steps for citizens to take to reassemble our fractured society. A quick, fascinating listen, American Manifesto offers not only a vision "of a country in extremis," but also a plan for how to address the ways in which our democracy is imperiled. American Manifesto is a call to action, unmistakable and provocative.

About Bob Garfield

Bob Garfield is the cohost of WNYC's Peabody Award-winning On the Media. Garfield has been a columnist/contributing editor for the Washington Post Magazine, the Guardian, and USA Today, as well as an author, lecturer, podcaster, and broadcast personality on ABC, CBS, CNBC, PBS, and NPR. He lives in suburban Washington, DC.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Paul on February 05, 2020

A fine extended essay on the current state of political and civil dialogue in the United States. I liked his perceptive criticisms. The introduction to the Purple Project for Democracy merits attention. A good read.......more

Goodreads review by Pamela on April 24, 2020

"If American identity hinges on somehow or another getting ahead, give some thought to the agony of losing ground. How are you supposed to pursue happiness, to be a better version of yourself, when powerful forces are aligned to piss on who you are to begin with? Does our current crisis force us to......more

Goodreads review by Carl on April 29, 2020

If the proposed solutions were half as convincing as the description of the problems, I'd easily give this 5 stars. It's an excellent analysis of the effects of social fragmentation, caused by identity politics, the internet, & the rise of disinformational news sources and the failure to provide an......more