The must-read summary of Zell Miller's book: "A Deficit of Decency". This complete summary of "A Deficit of Decency" by Zell Miller presents a comprehensive overview of the author's reasons for switching his party allegiance from Democrat to Republican in the run-up to the 2004 presidential election. His book discusses what he feels are the increasingly distant values of the Democratic party from the traditional Christian values that form the basis of American society. The summary outlines his sentiments on the party's "smothering" secularism and his worries as to its national defense and fiscal policies. Added-value of this summary: • Save time • Understand Miller's view of the Democrats and secularism in society • Expand your knowledge of American politics and society To learn more, read "A Deficit of Decency" and discover Zell Miller's detailed reasons for his change of political allegiance and his theories on the Democratic party's increasing distance from traditional societal values.

The conservative attacks on the welfare system in the United States over the past several decades have put liberal defenders of poverty relief and social insurance programs on the defensive. In this no-holds-barred look at the reality of American social policy since World War II, William Epstein argues that this defense is not worth mounting&—that the claimed successes of American social programs are not sustained by evidence. Rather than their failure being the result of inadequate implementation or political resistance stemming from the culture wars, these programs and their built-in limitations actually do represent what the vast majority of people in this country want them to be. However much people may speak in favor of welfare, the proof of what they really want is in the pudding of the social policies that are actually legislated. The stinginess of America&’s welfare system is the product of basic American values rooted in the myth of &“heroic individualism&” and reinforced by a commitment to social efficiency, the idea that social services need to be minimal and compatible with current social arrangements.

ÒA factual record assembled in depth, this is an important contribution to the archives of integration and nondiscrimination.Ó ÑPublishers WeeklyÒ . . . well-researched and informative . . . Ó ÑJournal of Southern HistoryÒ[Reed's] book brings a fascinating band of progressive Southerners into focus, some of them for the first time, and follows them from the late thirties into the sixties. They bear following, and remembering. So does this book.Ó ÑSouthern Changes

Democracy can mean a range of concepts, covering everything from freedoms, rights, elections, governments, processes, philosophies and a panoply of abstract and concrete notions that can be mediated by power, positionality, culture, time and space. Democracy can also be translated into brute force, hegemony, docility, compliance and conformity, as in wars will be decided on the basis of the needs of elites, or major decisions about spending finite resources will be the domain of the few over the masses, or people will be divided along the lines of race, ethnicity, class, religion, etc. because it is advantageous for maintaining exploitative political systems in place to do so. Often, these frameworks are developed and reified based on the notion that elections give the right to societies, or segments of societies, to install regimes, institutions and operating systems that are then supposedly legitimated and rendered infinitely just because formal power resides in the hands of those dominating forces. This book is interested in advancing a critical analysis of the hegemonic paradigm described above, one that seeks higher levels of political literacy and consciousness, and one that makes the connection with education. What does education have to do with democracy? How does education shape, influence, impinge on, impact, negate, facilitate and/or change the context, contours and realities of democracy? How can we teach for and about democracy to alter and transform the essence of what democracy is, and, importantly, what it should be? This book advances the notion of decency in relation to democracy, and is underpinned by an analysis of meaningful, critically-engaged education. Is it enough to be kind, nice, generous and hopeful when we can also see signs of rampant, entrenched and debilitating racism, sexism, poverty, violence, injustice, war and other social inequalities? If democracy is intended to be a legitimating force for good, how does education inform democracy? What types of knowledge, experience, analysis and being are helpful to bring about newer, more meaningful and socially just forms of democracy? Throughout some twenty chapters from a range of international scholars, this book includes three sections: Constructing Meanings for Democracy and Decency; Justice for All as Praxis; and Social Justice in Action for Democracy, Decency, and Diversity: International Perspectives. The underlying thread that is interwoven through the texts is a critical reappraisal of normative, hegemonic interpretations of how power is infused into the educational realm, and, importantly, how democracy can be re-situated and re-formulated so as to more meaningfully engage society and education.

The "Gentleman's magazine" section is a digest of selections from the weekly press; the "(Trader's) monthly intelligencer" section consists of news (foreign and domestic), vital statistics, a register of the month's new publications, and a calendar of forthcoming trade fairs.