Book Summary:

Americans in the twenty-first century are becoming increasingly untethered from both reality and the essential principles and traditions that have shaped the nation’s historic success. A big part of why America isn’t working is because far too many Americans neither know nor care how it’s supposed to work.

Cooper explains key aspects of recent US political history to give the background to recent, dangerous developments, including how political groups have reshaped since the 1964 Civil Rights Act; the rise of Newt Gingrich and the Tea Party; the profound impact of the internet and social media; and the threats posed to the electoral system by the growth of extreme polarization and growing irrationality.

Cooper shows how these recent developments have their roots in the deeper past, with the establishment of the political system in the first place and all the knocks and tweaks to it along the way. He also reveals how, as a result of increasing politicisation, the US Supreme Court is now exacerbating polarization instead of acting as an effective check on executive power.

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Word from the Author:

“America is in decline in the 21st century in measure after measure, from numerous public-policy failures, to increasingly dysfunctional politics, to an epidemic of mental health issues among young people.

This predicament raises two essential questions: Is America’s downturn merely another dip in a long arc of non-linear, yet essentially upward, progress? Or is it, rather, the first phase of steep and irreversible national decline?

The answer lies with the American people. Like all nations, America is, above all, the hearts and minds of its people. And the trend line is moving hard in the wrong direction: Things are getting worse, not better. Tribalism is intensifying. Social-media platforms are getting smarter at manipulating human cognition. The political system’s defects are worsening. And America’s public-policy failures are deepening…”

Newsweek Opinion, William Cooper

About the Author:

William Cooper is an attorney, national columnist, and award-winning author. His writings have appeared in hundreds of publications around the world including the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, Newsweek, San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Sun-Times, Huffington Post, Toronto Star, and Jerusalem Post. Publishers Weekly calls his commentary about American politics “a compelling rallying cry for democratic institutions under threat in America.”