Spring Reading Challenge

I love reading. I don't read for pleasure nearly enough any more--much of the time that I used to spend reading books has been replaced by reading job-related articles, and when I think about how I used to read about a book a week I get a little sad.

Starting today, though, things are going to change.

Doctor Monkey Von Monkerstein invited me to join the Spring Reading Challenge. What you do is you list all the books you're reading this spring, and reviews of the ones you've read. And you get to see the reading lists of other book lovers, including six of the bloggers you see linked along the right side of this page (I won't tell you which ones--you'll have to visit Spring Reading Challenge and find out for yourself.)

I've just recently finished Careless Love: The Unmaking of Elvis Presley, as well as 1 Dead in Attic. Going from a detailed (and not unsympathetic) account of Elvis' decade-long decline, to Chris Rose's vivid accounts of Katrina, has given me enough heartbreak for a while. Right now I'm on New Orleans, Mon Amour, a collection of New Orleans-themed writing by Andrei Codrescu. So far it's humane and funny.

So, go check out Spring Reading Challenge. And treat yourself to a nice book.

Let's talk stupider

A few more thoughts on our national dumbing down.

My friend Bawb the Revelator sent me an editorial by my new hero Susan Jacoby the other day. (By the way--Bawb is new to blogging, so go check out his place.) The piece appeared in the Washington Post on Sunday:

The Dumbing of America

Here's a taste:

The mind of this country, taught to aim at low objects, eats upon itself." Ralph Waldo Emerson offered that observation in 1837, but his words echo with painful prescience in today's very different United States. Americans are in serious intellectual trouble -- in danger of losing our hard-won cultural capital to a virulent mixture of anti-intellectualism, anti-rationalism and low expectations.

This is the last subject that any candidate would dare raise on the long and winding road to the White House. It is almost impossible to talk about the manner in which public ignorance contributes to grave national problems without being labeled an "elitist," one of the most powerful pejoratives that can be applied to anyone aspiring to high office. Instead, our politicians repeatedly assure Americans that they are just "folks," a patronizing term that you will search for in vain in important presidential speeches before 1980. (Just imagine: "We here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain . . . and that government of the folks, by the folks, for the folks, shall not perish from the earth.") Such exaltations of ordinariness are among the distinguishing traits of anti-intellectualism in any era. (*Note from Bubs: Think of Ms. Pickler's performance on Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?)

She identifies three issues:

• The decline of reading and the rise of video
• The erosion of general knowledge
• Arrogance about our lack of knowledge

There's a lot to work with in Jacoby's opinion piece. Did you know that, between 1968 and 1988, the average sound bite for a presidential candidate declined from 42.3 seconds to 9.8 seconds? And by 2000 it dropped even more, to an average 7.8 seconds! There's a sad contrast between the presidencies (and the citizenry who elected them) of "I'm the decider" Bush and FDR, who encouraged Americans to buy maps so that they could understand the geography of war in the early, frightening days of WWII.

Go read this thing.

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Speaking of George W. Bush, did you know he's explained why our economy is a little rocky right now? My mom called me yesterday to tell me about this and asked if I could find the clip on the interwebs.

During an interview with Ann Curry on the Today Show, Bush was asked about the economy. The first thing that got me was his dismissive "yeah, well" when Curry said some Americans believe they're suffering economically because of the war. It's right at the beginning of the video.

The POTUS goes on to say that he thinks war spending is creating jobs. So, Mr. President, what's wrong with the economy?

"I think this economy is down because we built too many houses."

Yep. That's what he said: