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Title:
Days of destruction, days of revolt / Chris Hedges and Joe Sacco.
Author:
Hedges, Chris.

Sacco, Joe.
Publication Information:
New York : Nation Books, ©2012.
Call Number:
HC110 .P6 H43 2012
Abstract:
"In the vein of Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, Pulitzer Prize winner and bestselling author Chris Hedges and American Book Award winning cartoonist Joe Sacco bring us a searing on-the-ground report on the crisis gripping underclass America and crime-ridden poverty enclaves--in prisons, urban slums, and rural communities--metastasizing around the nation"-- Provided by publisher.

Two years ago, Pulitzer Prize winner Chris Hedges and award-winning cartoonist and journalist Joe Sacco set out to take a look at the sacrifice zones, areas that have been offered up for exploitation in the name of profit, progress, and technological advancement. They wanted to show in words and drawings what life looks like in places where the marketplace rules without constraints, where human beings and the natural world are used and then discarded to maximize earnings. The book starts in the western plains, where Native Americans were sacrificed for land and empire. It moves to the old manufacturing centers and coal fields that fueled the Industrial Revolution, but now lie in decay. It follows the steady downward spiral of American labor into the nation's produce fields and ends in Zuccotti Park where a new generation is revolting against a corporate state that has handed the young an economic, political, cultural, and environmental catastrophe.--From publisher description.

"Camden, New Jersey, with a population of 70,390, is per capita the poorest city in the nation. It is also the most dangerous. The city's real unemployment - hard to estimate, since many residents have been severed from the formal economy for generations - is probably 30 to 40 percent. The median household income is $24,600. There is a 70 percent high school dropout rate, with only 13 percent of students managing to pass the state's proficiency exams in math. The city is planning $28 million in draconian budget cuts, with officials talking about cutting 25 percent from every department, including layoffs of nearly half the police force. The proposed slashing of the public library budget by almost two-thirds has left the viability of the library system in doubt. There are perhaps a hundred open-air drug markets, most run by gangs like the Bloods, the Latin Kings, and MS-13. Camden is awash in guns, easily purchased across the river in Pennsylvania, where gun laws are lax. Camden, like America, was once an industrial giant. It employed some 36,000 workers in its shipyards during World War II and built some of the nation's largest warships. It was the home to major industries, from RCA Victor to Campbell's Soup. It was a destination for immigrants and upwardly mobile lower middle class families. Camden now resembles a penal colony. In Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Chris Hedges and American Book Award winning cartoonist Joe Sacco show how places like Camden, a poster child of postindustrial decay, stand as a warning of what huge pockets of the United States will turn into if we cement in place a permanent underclass. In addition to Camden, Hedges and Sacco report from the coal fields of West Virginia, Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota and undocumented farm worker colonies in California. With unemployment and underemployment combined at far over ten percent, as Congress proposes to slash Medicare and Medicaid, Food Stamps, Pell Grants, Social Security, and other social services, Hedges and Sacco warn of a bleak near future-where cities and states fall easily into bankruptcy, neofeudalism reigns, and the nation's working and middle classes are decimated. A shocking report from the frontlines of poverty in America, Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt is a clarion call for reform"-- Provided by publisher.
ISBN:
9781568586434

9781568588247
Physical Description:
xv, 302 pages : illustrations ; 27 cm
Contents:
Days of theft : Pine Ridge, South Dakota -- Days of siege : Camden, New Jersey -- Days of devastation : Welch, West Virginia -- Days of slavery : Immokalee, Florida -- Days of revolt : Liberty Square, New York City.
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