A major work of financial theory and practice with immediate relevance to the rebuilding of the economy, and restoring the promise of equality
When the government decides to spend money, it simply creates the necessary funds for itself--as if out of thin air. That's how we pay for interstate highways, post offices, wars, social services, and economic stimulus packages. If it's that easy to make money...can't we all get more of it? Absolutely. And we should.
So argue financial regulation expert Robert Hockett and bestselling philosopher Aaron James in this eye-opening, irreverent, and inspiring exploration of what the dollar really is. And better still, they show how we can build an economy that works for everybody without unwanted taxes and added regulations.
In the process, we learn how disingenuous the political rhetoric surrounding inflation can be, how the demonized concept of the deficit is really just another way of tallying our collective national wealth, and how a strong central bank could free us from the abuses of private banking.
With broad historical background and ambitious yet practical institutional proposals, Hockett and James offer a new vision of public finance--people's banking for a people's economy. Armed with this new outlook, we can even stop worrying debt and learn to love a strong, accountable, and transparent Federal Reserve as a cornerstone of our democracy.
Que Donald Trump es un imbécil es cosa bien sabida –incluso por sus partidarios, a los que les gusta que lo sea–. Pero ¿qué clase de imbécil es y qué tan peligrosa es –no solo para Estados Unidos sino para el mundo entero– su bufonería y majadería? Aunque preferiríamos olvidarnos de él, ya no es posible: hoy es un asunto de verdadera emergencia intelectual reflexionar sobre el vertiginoso ascenso político de Trump, y este libro lo hace con iguales dosis de rigor e irreverencia.
El filósofo Aaron James continúa en estas páginas su fascinante meditación sobre los imbéciles, esos tipos que se creen con derecho a todo, se aprovechan de todos y no piden disculpas a nadie. Además de poner a Trump en el lugar que se merece, James ofrece una original explicación sobre el éxito del candidato republicano a la presidencia de Estados Unidos y alerta sobre los severos daños que está causando ya dentro y fuera de sus fronteras.
Un ensayo para los que temen y detestan a Trump, para los que quieren entender su carrera política y para los que desean reflexionar con rigor sobre el estado de nuestras democracias.
Un libro necesario, tristemente necesario.
'James desmenuza los rasgos típicos de las personas más infames […]. Demuestra de manera convincente por qué debemos tomarnos muy en serio el problema de la imbecilidad.'
Los Ángeles Review of Books
Grabado en español ibérico (España).
From the bestselling author of Assholes: A Theory, a book that-in the tradition of Shopclass as Soulcraft, Barbarian Days and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance-uses the experience and the ethos of surfing to explore key concepts in philosophy.
The existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre once declared "the ideal limit of aquatic sports . . . is waterskiing." The avid surfer and lavishly credentialed academic philosopher Aaron James vigorously disagrees, and in Surfing with Sartre he intends to expound the thinking surfer's view of the matter, in the process elucidating such philosophical categories as freedom, being, phenomenology, morality, epistemology, and even the emerging values of what he terms "leisure capitalism." In developing his unique surfer-philosophical worldview, he draws from his own experience of surfing and from surf culture and lingo, and includes many relevant details from the lives of the philosophers, from Aristotle to Wittgenstein, with whose thought he engages. In the process, he'll speak to readers in search of personal and social meaning in our current anxious moment, by way of doing real, authentic philosophy.
That Donald Trump is an asshole is a fact widely agreed upon-even by his supporters, who actually like that about him. But his startling political rise makes the question of just what sort of asshole he is, and how his assholedom may help to explain his success, one not just of philosophical interest but of almost existential urgency.
Enter the philosopher Aaron James, author of the foundational text in the burgeoning field of Asshole Studies: the bestselling Assholes: A Theory. In this brisk and trenchant inquiry into the phenomenon that is Donald Trump, James places the man firmly in the typology of the asshole (takes every advantage, entrenched sense of entitlement, immune to criticism); considers whether, in the Hobbesian world we seem to inhabit, he might not somehow be a force for good-i.e., the Stronger Asshole; and offers a suggestion for how the bonds of our social contract, spectacularly broken by Trump's (and Ted Cruz's) disdain for democratic civility, might in time be repaired.
You will never think about Donald Trump the same way after reading this book. And, like it or not, think about him we must.
In the spirit of the mega-selling On Bullshit, philosopher Aaron James presents a theory of the asshole that is both intellectually provocative and existentially necessary.
What does it mean for someone to be an asshole? The answer is not obvious, despite the fact that we are often personally stuck dealing with people for whom there is no better name. Try as we might to avoid them, assholes are found everywhere-at work, at home, on the road, and in the public sphere. Encountering one causes great difficulty and personal strain, especially because we often cannot understand why exactly someone should be acting like that.
Asshole management begins with asshole understanding. Much as Machiavelli illuminated political strategy for princes, this book finally gives us the concepts to think or say why assholes disturb us so, and explains why such people seem part of the human social condition, especially in an age of raging narcissism and unbridled capitalism. These concepts are also practically useful, as understanding the asshole we are stuck with helps us think constructively about how to handle problems he (and they are mostly all men) presents. We get a better sense of when the asshole is best resisted, and when he is best ignored-a better sense of what is, and what is not, worth fighting for.
