Coming Apart focuses on the ever-increasing differences between Murray’s “new” upper and lower classes, which developed after 1960 because of the large premium placed on intellectual ability in the workplace. The new upper class is made up of college graduates who work in managerial positions or professional occupations and belong to the top 5 percent of all income earners. Murray’s new lower class comprises working-age men who are unemployed or underemployed and don’t make enough by themselves to put a household of two above the poverty line, single mother with minor-aged children, and an ill-defined group of men and women who, as Murray puts it, are “disconnected from the matrix of community life.” This lower class comprises close to 20 percent of the American population, and they are unsurprisingly located in the poorest neighborhoods.

Murray then identifies four “founding virtues” of America incorporating marriage, industriousness, religion, and honesty. He declares the “four aspects of American life were so completely accepted as essential that, for practical purposes, you would be hard put to find an eighteenth-century founder or nineteenth-century commentator who dissented from any of them.” Charles Murray’s premise in Coming Apart is that the decline of the four founding virtues among the people of the new lower class has contributed to their socioeconomic stagnation, while the preservation of those values among the people of the new upper class produces their prosperity.

Murray’s tale about the decline of his four founding virtues digs deep into the underlying causes of socioeconomic inequality. He chose his four virtues well for the most part, although I do not think Murray should have treated them all equally. Honesty and industriousness form the weakest part of his argument because they are more abstract than marriage and religiosity. Murray does have facts and figures to support his claim that honesty and industriousness are in decline, but he cannot make many concrete observations because it is difficult to quantify them. The institutions of marriage and religion are much more important because it is easier to cede that their decline precipitated the deterioration in honesty and industriousness.

Murray’s argument concerning marriage is a revelation because he takes many different statistics that seem relatively harmless on their own and shows how disastrous their combined effect has been for the United States. Marriage rates have fallen in everywhere in our society, but while the rate seems to have stabilized among the upper class, it has continued to decline in the lower class. The number of people in the lower class who are divorced or have never been married has skyrocketed since 1960, and thus many children are born and raised in single-parent households. There are those who argue that single parents can be just as effective at raising a child as a two parents, but even they cannot deny that lower class children raised by single mothers generally have access to fewer resources and opportunities as their peers with two parents. This is an enormous problem because children do not learn vital lessons that helped preceding generations get ahead. The decline of marriage also ties in well with the decline of religiosity because they both began their deterioration at around the same time. In fact, it could be argued that declining religiousness of the American population contributed to the decline in marriage because people felt it was less necessary to get married as the taboo against having children out of wedlock disappeared.

Murray provides a refutation of the commonly held misconception that poorer working class whites are more religious than their upper class counterparts. Citing evidence gathered in the General Social Survey distributed since the 1970s, Murray shows that while the amount of people in the upper and lower classes who consider themselves to be either religious or secular is about the same, the percentage of people in the upper class who regularly attend a worship service is about 15 percent higher than in the lower class. Since organized religion provides a weekly refresher course on the importance of good behavior to followers, the particularly sharp decline in religiosity in both classes might help explain the increase in all types of crimes. The situation in the lower class is worse because there has been a correspondingly larger decrease in religiosity.

American society has changed greatly in the last several decades due to the decline of Murray’s founding virtues. The decline disproportionately affected the lower class, and the upper class is understandably drifting apart from the rest of society. The members of both classes tend to live in clusters of communities with people similar to them. Murray succinctly points out the problem with this when he says “It is not a problem if truck drivers cannot empathize with the priorities of Yale professors. It is a problem if Yale professors, or producers of network news programs, or CEOs of great corporations, or presidential advisors cannot empathize with the priorities of truck drivers.” Members of the upper class tend to make far-reaching decisions that affect members of all other classes, but how can they make decisions that benefit people they do not understand? Unless members of the new upper class make a conscious effort to address their increasing separation from the lower class, no amount of welfare or social programs will be able to resolve the issue of income inequality.

Component 1: The Volunteers

Many campaigns advertise themselves as volunteer-driven, but few campaigns have integrated volunteers as well as the Obama campaign. Plouffe describes how their approach consisted of giving more to and expecting more from their volunteers. Their philosophy is embodied in the motto, “Respect. Empower. Include.” Since the beginning of the Democratic Primary in Iowa, Obama strove to develop a system of volunteer leaders and coordinators. He wanted to include these volunteers not only in phone banks and canvasses, but also in high-level strategy planning sessions. Especially poignant is the scene in which a victorious Obama on the night of the Iowa primary chooses to spend time alone with his young Iowa volunteer leaders and emerges from the room with tear-laden eyes. This incident epitomizes the depth of involvement and connection between the campaign and its volunteers. Today, the campaign strives to hold itself to a very high standard of volunteer leadership. Obama for America Massachusetts has only one paid staff member, state director Carl Nilsson. All other positions from regional leaders to volunteer captains are not only unpaid, but can demand up to 15 hours a week part time or 40 hours a week full time. The Obama campaign is unafraid to ask more of its volunteers and to trust its volunteers to carry the campaign. This will enable it to sends its campaign deep into communities in this cycle.

Component 2: The Metrics

The campaign’s strategy is driven by metrics. In The Audacity to Win, Plouffe’s passion for numbers and statistics shines through the pages. He repeatedly describes field data, delegate math, and methods for tracking volunteers and donations. In 2012, the love for data has evolved into a phrase that every Organizing Fellow hears from the team leader at least once a week: “If it isn’t in VAN [the Democratic database], then it didn’t happen.” “What are your numbers?” a phrase used equally often, also highlights the campaign’s commitment to monitoring number of contacts, meetings, or new volunteers added. While Ron Paul’s campaigns have succeeded in attracting a dedicated core of volunteers, they fail to reach a broader base. Obama’s system enables a focus on quantity as well as quality of outreach.  Simply increasing the number of supporters is just as important an indicator of success as building commitment and enthusiasm among these supporters.

Component 3: Discipline

The essential component of Obama’s 2008 campaign was its discipline. Plouffe credits the discipline to the President’s personality, saying, “one of the President’s greatest strengths, and therefore his organization’s strength, is his discipline: once a course is set, he is determined not to let a chorus of critics alter that game plan.” Without this discipline, the campaign would have abandoned the ultimately successful technique of expanding the electorate by registering new voters. Without this discipline, they would have stopped courting the youth vote. Without this discipline, their victory would have been unlikely as they responded to the media’s and Democratic establishment’s criticisms and waffled between methods. Even when pundits like Democratic strategist Peter Fenn warn, “It is it is very difficult for the Obama campaign to duplicate the groundswell of enthusiasm and commitment to Change You Can Believe In,” and claim that the energy and passion no longer exist, the campaign’s focus will continue to be on volunteers, on youth, and on speaking to one voter at a time. The clear and consistent strategy represents a significant advantage. It will enable the campaign to concentrate on execution and action rather than decision-making and debates over strategy.

The Greek word "atheoi" on a 3rd-century papyrus.

From a cursory empirical analysis it seems as if in most of the world, with the exceptions of North Africa and the Middle East, secularism has firmly taken root. The Western world and developing nations have been moving away from God and more towards science and reason. Religion is on its way out—secularism is here to stay. Right?

Wrong, according to The Economist editor-in-chief John Mickelthwait and his colleague Adrian Wooldridge. In their latest book, God is Back: How the Global Revival of Faith Is Changing the World, the authors argue the opposite case to the one outlined above. Religion is coming back with vengeance: Christianity in Chinese homes, Buddhism as a fashion all over the United States, and Islam spreading slowly across Europe. What does that mean for atheists, who looked happily towards a world full of likeminded individuals?

Fortunately, the times of physical persecution, of the guillotine and auto-da-fé, are long gone. Thus it is now possible for atheists not only to try to advance their own cause, but to build a whole new discipline branching out from their beliefs—or lack of beliefs, to be more precise. That is how New Atheism was born just a few years ago, the first outspoken revolution against religion and the idea of God in the 21^st century. And while many atheists before this movement tried to keep it quiet, showing how tolerance and moral judgment can exist devoid of God and eternal punishment, New Atheists prefer a different tactic: brutal logic against faith, proof against belief, and ridicule against total devotion.

New Atheism is about nature and science above all. It started off around 2004, when author Sam Harris published his bestselling The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason. The book was just the match igniting a more powerful fire. Soon, scores of books followed from scientists like Daniel Dennett and Richard Dawkins, and prominent writers like Christopher Hitchens, all with inflammatory titles including The God Delusion and Atheist Manifesto. These were clearly declarations against both religion and faith. The “four horsemen,” as Harris, Dennett, Dawkins, and Hitchens came to be known, grew quite popular in academic and intellectual circles. And though I think their popularity seems to have diminished in recent years, their ideas still linger. The matter is, to what end?

New Atheism seems to be the verbally violent response of atheists against centuries of oppression. Now that they can talk, they are talking. Yet as proud as they could make their fellow atheists feel, this kind of relentless bashing and clear hatred towards dogmatic beliefs is not necessarily a positive trend. While one can concede that religious doctrine formed the root of many vicious disputes and even wars, the New Atheists attack elements of religion that might actually prove useful to humanity—tenets we have no good reason to dogmatically reject.

In fact, in his TED Talk “Atheism 2.0,” philosopher and author Alain de Botton defends the most practical and fulfilling parts of religion, and endorses the idea that atheism and religion can coexist. He goes even further, arguing atheists should actually try to encompass elements of religion that might foster a happier life. Though he never explicitly addresses “New Atheism,” Botton touches on the elements of religion that should be viewed positively—not maligned.

The lessons for New Atheism are clear. First, in their bashing of the idea of God, New Atheists tend to forget one of the more humane aspects of religion that has helped it survive for so long: its sense of community. Though there are definitely instances where isolation and meditation are put at the theological forefront, religion is primarily a communal experience. Going to church, or mosques; praying in groups; holidays with the families—these facets are all about the idea of community and a sense of belonging. Human beings tend to like groups and the possibility of companionship with those who tend to live the same lifestyle. As long it is not overtly dangerous, or ruinous of one’s chances to expand their worldview, there is nothing wrong with the idea of a faith-based community. Religion enforces communities, giving people a sense of specific identity and belonging. This is something we cannot and should not argue away.

Further, religious texts are not only moral texts; they are histories and myths. What’s more, they can also be entertaining. The stories we get out of these books can be as interesting as a Disney movie and as intriguing and mystic as any other work of literature. The traditions inherited from the Bible or the Quran can be cherished, while telling centuries of cultural history. Such texts can be sources of artistic and even scientific inspiration.

And while faith probably knows little or no science, it would be unfair to say that science knows no faith. Many theories are accepted because they look probable, even though they are not actually proven. Sometimes theories that have been accepted for a long time are discarded for the sake of better assumptions. It takes a lot of faith and belief to build up theories into a science.

Of course, one must remember that religion it is not really concerned with science in the first place—something the New Atheists seem to have missed. Religion is about that part of the human being that might be extremely atheist, but still questions his or her role in the world. It is about those moments of need where one brings her eyes to the sky, because she believes there might be something bigger than mere individuals. There are difficult and complex parts of the human experience that neither science nor even the most basic comforts can address. Faith is irrational, but it does not have to be evil. Indeed, sometimes it may even be essential.

A Red Guard accuses Shou-Yu of betraying the Communist Party in a recent A.R.T. production of "Wild Swans".

She opens a bottle of ink and pours it on the man’s face. It traces a black finger down his forehead, splitting like the two prongs of a Manchu mustache and dribbling like baby food onto his suit. She laughs. He does not. His arms are jet-planed behind him, his wife kneels on a floor of broken glass, his daughter shrinks into the corner, pale. Still, the Red Guard looks a lot like his daughter – long braids, energetic face, her voice carrying easily over the slogan-shouting crowd in his living room. “Kowtow!” she screams, holding high over him a tiny red object. “Traitor!” It is a book. He doesn’t need to squint through his ink-stained lids to know what it says on its cover: Quotations from Chairman Mao.

George Orwell may have conjured up giant posters of a menacing Big Brother glaring down from every stairwell, but for Mao, what really mattered in his era was much smaller. It was the things his people carried: his one-inch portrait on the Little Red Book or badges bearing his likeness. Mao didn’t need a Hitler mustache or a reputation for dolphin-shooting to control his nation’s every move. He may have been round and chronically constipated, womanish and a womanizer, but in the realms of politics, war, rhetoric and even poetry, he was a god.

So it is that Mao, looking out from the breast badges of marching Red Guards in the 60’s, staring from a raised red book down at the face of an ink-stained traitor of the 70’s, wobbling in plastic form on the dashes of Beijing cab drivers, and, just this past March, peering out from another raised red book at an elderly audience at the American Repertory Theater, becomes witness to the re-enacted destruction of a family.

The world premier stage adaptation of Jung Chang’s powerful memoir, Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China, tells the story of a family that is raised, fractured, and finally reunited by the forces that have buffeted China over the past hundred years.

“It was a century of horror, struggle, courage, and bravery,” says audience member Esther Almgren. “A century of the Chinese people’s struggle to find political stability, from the early days of Imperial China, through the Japanese occupation, the Nationalist movement, the Civil War, Communism, Mao Ze Dong’s Great Leap Forward, and the Cultural Revolution.”

“Why was there no one or no group within the Chinese culture to challenge the power and structure of evil?” Almgren asks. Wild Swans is the story of one man who tried just that, and failed. When we first meet the author’s father, Shou-Yu, he’s a Communist officer and an idealist. To a crowd of farmers that his army has just liberated, he promises a bright future, where they’ll have pork to eat every day. Plow in hand, he works side by side with the farmers to prove his sincerity.

Fast forward ten years. Shou-Yu watches as a famine kills one in every seven people around him. A man in rags comes up to him, desperate, “You promised! Where’s the food you promised us?” Troubled, but still an idealist, he writes a letter to Chairman Mao, calling for change. He is promptly condemned. During the Cultural Revolution, a Red Guard pours ink on his face. The Party breaks his family apart and sends them to work in the rice paddies. When they are finally reunited years later, he can’t stand straight anymore — he has spent too much time stooping in the fields.

Can Shou-Yu still be the still be the idealist he was before the Revolution? In a recent interview with A.R.T., scenic designer Miriam Buether echoes a popular sentiment: “Of course Marx’s ideas are beautiful, but in practice they don’t work. His journey from enthusiasm for these ideologies to disillusionment is really interesting to me.”

Actor Orion Lee, who played Shou-Yu, doesn’t quite agree. “My character still felt that Communism is a worthy ideal,” he writes in an e-mail interview with the HPR. “Some people say Communism is a good ideal but in reality it doesn’t work. He believes that we should always work toward the ideal and reality can be changed.”

Did the failure of Communism itself cause the famine and the Cultural Revolution, as Buether would argue, or should we blame the blundering government for getting it all wrong?

For sixty years, China has lived under Mao’s gaze. For thirty years, pundits have been predicting the imminent collapse of the Communist regime. But the government has survived through Tiananmen Square, the Tibetan uprisings, and will likely glide through Bo Xilai’s fall from grace.

“I don’t see right now the ingredients for a sudden collapse,” said Elizabeth J. Perry, Henry Rosovsky Professor of Government in an after-performance discussion. “But at the same time, who would have predicted the collapse of the USSR? Or of East Germany?”

“The Cultural Revolution may happen again in China,” warned Premier Wenjia Bao in a press conference in March, if China does not reform its system. Jung Chang may be a sharp critic of the Communist Party, and Wen Jiabao may be that party’s Premier, but they’ve both spotted something critical about China’s future. Economic growth models, one-child policies, and proliferating MacDonald’s are important, but this increasingly bling, capitalist society still hasn’t forgotten the legacy of the Cultural Revolution and the man who started it.

In our new series, we will explore how the ten years of the Cultural Revolution continues to impact China today and into the future. Can the Revolution be compared to the Holocaust, or was it more like a religious revival? Our next article looks at the paradoxical stories of an imprisoned official, a young tomboy, and a woman growing up in Burma as told through the research of professors at Tufts, Duke and Harvard Universities. How do these narratives reach beyond Wild Swans to show us how the Revolution has shaped China’s new culture? And behind that giant, calm face still hanging in Tiananmen Square, what can they tell us about the real Mao? Was he a monster or a national hero?

Leon Trotsky: A Revolutionary’s Life (Yale University Press, 2011. $25. 225 pp.)

Jeffrey Kalmus: You note that Trotsky’s contemporaries portrayed him as being out of touch with reality. In fact, you yourself describe him as such. How did Trotsky view the world, and what was unrealistic about it?

Joshua Rubenstein: The first person who really says this openly was Milovan Djilas, and I picked that up from his book The New Class. So Trotsky, in spite of his brilliance, was so enamored with Marxism and Marxist theories and how history is supposed to play out, that he seemed to have lost any ironic ability to take a step or five steps back and look at history and politics independent of his theories. So, revolutions are supposed to happen in Europe! Well, they may or may not. If we have a proletarian revolution in Germany, that will resolve Hitler and Hitler’s threat, he thought. To the Jews in the 1930’s, it was a threat Trotsky recognized, very vividly recognized. And the real solution for him is a proletarian revolution. So even when the Russians under Stalin, say, invaded Finland in 1939-1940, Trotsky defends the Red Army and defends Stalin, and his followers were bewildered. He made all kinds of claims that the Red Army had come to the defense of the working class, which had nothing to do with Stalin’s intention. There are lots of examples.

JK: Referring to how he understood Stalin, you write that, as a Marxist, “Trotsky never liked to ascribe historical events to personalities.” In what ways was Trotsky’s own history due to his personality?

JR: Of course, Trotsky is one of the two most important figures in the Bolshevik Revolution, and Lenin needed him, because Lenin wasn’t such a great orator. Lenin also went into hiding; he wasn’t the public figure in those months of August, September, and October leading up to the Revolution. Trotsky himself was, and Trotsky recognized that. He says in his diary and elsewhere, if it weren’t for Lenin being there and my being there, the Revolution wouldn’t have happened. But at the same time, he thinks we are just expressions of the proletariat. He liked to write about history, too. His history of the Russian revolution is regarded as a classic, it’s wonderfully written, very vivid—it’s very convincing. But in the end, there’s this tension he can’t overcome, which is the role of Lenin and Trotsky and people like themselves in the course of history. Well, people make history. History doesn’t make history, as Trotsky believed. There’s no such thing as history independent of human action, other than natural disasters, which can intervene and disrupt history.

JK: Trotsky seems to care for the Jews only insofar as they are poor and oppressed; we saw this at the Beilis trial on the blood libel. Can you elaborate on what it means for Trotsky to sometimes “be a Jew in spite of himself”?

JR: Well, he’s a Jew in spite of himself because around him, when Jews are oppressed, Jews are threatened, Jews are physically attacked, he responds in a very vehement, and sometimes courageous ways. The way he writes about the Jews being vulnerable if Hitler were to come to power, the way he denounces the Tsar at his trial in 1906, the way he writes about the Beilis trial and recalls it many years later, after World War II has begun—it is very striking to me. So in that sense, Trotsky had certain sensitivities that he couldn’t altogether suppress, even though he downplayed what little Jewish background he had. And finally, wherever he is, he’s with Jews—in the revolutionary movement, in a restaurant in the Bronx, editing a paper in Paris—he’s surrounded by other Jews. Yet whether he understood that, whether that mattered to him, whether it was just coincidence, I’ll leave that to others to sort out. But, that’s simply a fact.

JK: Does Trotsky’s life contain any lessons for contemporary revolutionaries?

JR: I would say on the one hand the issues Trotsky was confronting are really very far removed. The particular issues—the Tsar, the Russian Empire, the Bolshevik underground movement—it’s too romantic. However, the questions of democratic values still apply. People feel oppressed and they want to protest it or overcome it. If you disavow democratic values along the way, then it’s not clear what you will accomplish even if you dislodge the government in place. This was Victor Serge’s very acute criticism of Trotsky. What was the role of democratic values in the Russian Revolution? And did the fact that Trotsky and Lenin disavowed them have tremendous impact on the fate of the revolution, or its violence? Trotsky’s logic had been, with the revolution, everything is possible. Every utopian dream was possible as long as we preserve the revolution. So to defend this revolution, nothing is forbidden. This is a very dangerous logic.

JK: In a talk you gave about the book, you said you were very careful not to romanticize Trotsky, and you just mentioned that his story could be conveyed pretty romantically. What is potentially romantic about Trotsky’s life and what are the sober realities of it?

JR: The potential, the allure let’s call it, and the romanticism is that Trotsky was one of the handful of people most responsible for this tremendous revolution in the Russian Empire—not some island in the middle of the Pacific. And he has this tremendous flair, he’s a great orator, he’s handsome, he’s charismatic, he always dresses well to create a physical impression, and then he’s exiled. And no matter where he is, he persists in writing; he persists in speaking out and exposing Stalin on his terms, on Trotsky’s terms. And all the suffering, his children dying or killed, people close to him dying, his grandchildren lost from history, it’s easy to identify with him, easy to sympathize with him and forget what he was responsible for, what he contributed to. There’s this argument about who was the better student of Lenin, Trotsky or Stalin, but you could turn it around and say, who was the better teacher of Stalin, Lenin or Trotsky? Stalin was as much a student of Trotsky, an heir of Trotsky, as he was of Lenin.

Interview has been condensed and edited.

The high point of The Obamas occurs early in Kantor’s narrative of Barack Obama’s atmospheric rise to the highest office in the country and the effects his newfound fame had on his family life. An interesting metaphor for his quick ascent is the Obamas’ two moves: from a small apartment to a brick Hyde Park mansion after then-State Senator Obama’s 2004 book deal, and just five years later into the White House. Even more notable is Michelle Obama’s reluctance to move to Washington at all – part of a broader narrative about the First Lady’s struggle to find her place in her husband’s administration. Kantor also describes Mrs. Obama’s image of the President as a Washington outsider who is above the partisanship that has plagued his presidency. The tension between the Obamas’ expectations for themselves and the reality they face is perceivable throughout the book, but is concentrated in the first few months of the administration. Although the president, his family, and his team eventually find their footing, it is not before numerous staff shake-ups.

But as Kantor’s narrative continues, she focuses more on Obama Administration infighting rather than the Obamas themselves. Kantor contrasts former Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel’s take-no-prisoners style of leadership with Michelle Obama’s desire for her husband to rise above the nastiness of politics. She particularly demonizes Valerie Jarrett, a close confidant of both Obamas, suggesting that Jarrett was too close to the First Family to give the President objective advice. “Hometown friends often fared poorly in the West Wing,” she writes. “Jarrett didn’t have a clear place in the organization, and she couldn’t be both friend and staff at once—the two roles were inherently in conflict.” But the incident that has received the most buzz is one that may have been entirely blown out of proportion. Supposedly, upon hearing from Jarrett that Carla Bruni had revealed to the French media that Mrs. Obama once told her living in the White House was “hell,” former Press Secretary Robert Gibbs shouted an expletive against the First Lady in front of senior staff. In responses to the book from the White House and Gibbs, both denied the outburst and Gibbs insisted that his anger was directed toward Jarrett.

While the First Lady did have her legitimate disagreements with her husband’s advisers, these were mostly focused on her role in the White House. “There was no consideration of how she fit in the broader Obama narrative,” an aide told Kantor. While Kantor seems to think that Mrs. Obama had this uncertainty in common with other modern first ladies, it is unclear if the Obama Administration faced a different kind of challenge with the President’s wife. Was she asking for a bigger role than was traditionally granted first ladies? Or was Obama’s staff actively attempting to keep her out of the loop? According to Kantor, it was always Jarrett’s job to advocate Mrs. Obama’s interests, leading to discomfort between Jarrett and the rest of the senior staff.

What the White House and Jodi Kantor failed to recognize was that the arguments chronicled in such detail in the book are largely irrelevant when it comes to evaluating Obama’s first term. While it is sexier to read about the spats that go on behind the scenes in the White House, what is more important for the American people to know is the manner in which the President himself interacts with his family and his staff. Kantor tries to stir up scandal in the Obama Administration mostly to capitalize on the hysteria of the political climate—she makes it seem as though the White House were in shambles.

But the most telling details about the President’s character inspire confidence. The man would rather skip a political event than family dinner: “at the end of a meeting with advisers… he would bring up a particular event on the schedule. ‘I’m really unhappy about it,’ he would say. ‘We have an agreement I’m only supposed to be out twice a week.’” He has a close relationship with his mother-in-law, who reluctantly moved into the White House in 2009 for a three-month trial and never left. Obama and his family treat the White House residence staff with utmost respect, with Kantor going so far as to describe their relations with the staff as “warm, but awkward” due to the racial history of the building and the office. And, facing several opponents who are chronic womanizers, he is refreshingly devoted to his smart, spirited wife. The more sensationalized aspects of the book, then, seem to have been added solely to generate media attention. When asked what she hoped to add to the political discourse with this work, Kantor said:

“I wrote the book to answer a question that I thought would be on a lot of voters’ minds coming up to the 2012 elections, which is how have these two people changed since the election in 2008. When the president ran in 2008 he still led in a lot of ways the life of an ordinary person from Chicago. Part of his claim in that race was that he was kind of not a part of the Washington club, that he was not part of political culture, and of course when the Obamas stepped into the White House that has changed, so the book is really about the transformative experience of being the President and First Lady, their successes and failures, and the effect that being in power has had on both on them.”

If only the entire book had focused on the transformation of the First Family—such a discussion would have been quite welcome in a year when superficial criticism takes precedence over thoughtful analysis.

Especially when defending particularly egregious personal failures, politicians and political junkies alike will say that a leader’s personal life should have no effect on his political career. I disagree. It is of utmost importance for Americans to know about the personal lives of their elected officials because, as Jodi Kantor illustrates, a politician’s private behavior is inseparable from his actions as a leader. At its core, The Obamas is the story of the President’s stable, though challenging, family life and its tremendous effect on his leadership. Where Kantor goes wrong is in emphasizing the pettiness that is a given when so many political personalities work in a high-stress environment.

In any case, Jodi Kantor succeeded in earning a large sum of the highest-valued currency in politics—media buzz in an election year.

I think people worry the Kindle will do to books what the iPod did to music. Would carrying around a hardback start to feel as ridiculous as carrying around a portable CD player? The death of my CD player did not cause as much grief as the iPod produced the same sound in a sleeker package. The Kindle, on the other hand, mechanizes reading. The experiences of balancing the spine of a book and flipping through pages are not replicable with a Kindle. Despite the sentimental attachment to physical books, e-book readers provide a powerful advantage of flexibility similar to the iPod. One Harvard student, Ian Anderson ’13 describes his conversion to using his iPad for textbooks and note taking, “The benefits just outweigh the downsides. Sometimes I wish I had the hard copy, since there’s something about the physical copy of a textbook that a screen can’t replace. But the portability is awesome and there are also a bunch of apps that enhance note taking.”

The textbook market recognizes that Anderson is not alone in preferring the convenience and have reduced the cost of textbooks on the iPad. Companies such as Kno, a web-based textbook retailer, have led the way towards offering e-textbooks. Other major players, such as Barnes & Noble, have also started trying to edge into the e-textbook market. The textbook highlights the battle between the cost and weight of hard copy against the drawbacks of reading off a screen.

In general, booksellers have chosen to invest in the technology that would have otherwise put them under. Independent bookstores have been hit hard as one in five bookstores have closed in the last two years. Booksellers have recognized consumers will continue to buy e-readers, and are combating Amazon by creating their own ways of selling e-books.

Barnes & Noble, the largest book retailer in the United States, is combating the threat of e-readers with its own e-reader, the Nook. Barnes & Noble’s Nook tablet and e-reader line controls 13 percent of the market.

For smaller, independent bookstores, the solution has been to sell e-books for all devices. Local indie bookstore, The Harvard Bookstore, will begin a big selling push of e-books soon. Marketing Manager Rachel Cass said, “After we’re done training staff, we’re going to make a big marketing effort to make our customers aware that we sell e-books. We hope that our customers recognize we provide them with a place to browse and buy hardcopy, and feel loyalty to buy e-books through us rather than through alternate sources.” Since publishers standardize the price of their e-books, the Harvard Bookstore just needs to make its customers aware of its offer.

Though e-readers damage and challenge retailers, they also offer immense possibilities for new writers. The e-reader market has spawned numerous new writers who cater to exclusively online markets. Since the bar to publishing a digital book is so low since costs associated with printing and paying publishers are largely removed, independent writers have been able to draw an audience. Harvard Freshman Ben Martin said that although he still values the printed book. But he also added, “I think my Kindle has allowed me to read a lot more and more conveniently than I would otherwise be able to. Also the ability to access public domain books for free has definitely exposed me to some classics that I probably would never have bought or rented in print.” For the adventurous and avid reader and the emerging writer, the e-reader is an empowering device.

And ultimately, the fact that e-readers grant greater access to readers, thereby encouraging greater literary consumption (without great environmental impact), may be the most rewarding feature. People buy e-readers because they want to read more. Whether an e-reader allows them to read on a plane or just buy more books, greater access to literature has never been a bad thing in my mind. That a survey conducted by the National Foundation for the Arts found half of people aged 18 to 24 read no books for pleasure confirms that e-reader trendiness isn’t a bad thing. I am going utilitarian: if more books are being read, it shouldn’t matter if it means fewer physical copies are being sold.

Death Cab for Cutie in 2001

For anyone who has ever said “I listened to that band before they got big,” a personal tale of music snobbery and a reminder of the purpose of music.

I remember being wholly disappointed when Death Cab for Cutie’s fourth studio album Transatlanticism received very positive reviews from critics. I had been a Death Cab fan since their We Have the Facts and We’re Voting Yes days back in 2000 and loved the “coolness” of listening to a band whose four-word moniker was nonsense to outsiders. Jamming to a CD with a sentence long name by a Washington-based indie label signed band. What could get more hipster than that? (I was hipster even before being hipster was cool.) While my classmates argued the merits of Christina Aguilera vs. Britney Spears, I sat silently proudly thinking about the limited edition alternative rock EP I had been grooving to a day earlier. My music was a source of pride. “Oh you don’t know them,” I smugly answered whenever anyone asked me what I was listening to. When friends looked through my iPod, I was charmed by their reactions to the unrecognizable artist names. But then my worst fear had been realized: Death Cab for Cutie, my pride and joy, was beginning to garner attention from people who were not me.

Wait a second. People don’t review Death Cab for Cutie—let alone like it. I was appalled. What do you mean, “It charted?” That’s impossible. But yes, Transatlanticism made “Best Of” lists. Its songs began to be featured in advertisements. Fictional characters in television shows began to groove to my band. When I found out the male lead in the teen drama The O.C. liked Death Cab for Cutie, I nearly fainted.

And the worst part was that I liked Transatlanticism. Death Cab’s style had evolved from their third studio album, The Photo Album, into a richer, more mature sound. Lyrics were more poignant, melodies more complex. The album played on loop for weeks, and I was prouder than ever. “I love Transatlanticism!” I would spontaneously proclaim in a fit of joy despite the fact that I’m pretty sure that I had no idea what the word meant. It was my coolest-sounding secret, and that’s all I cared about.

When “The Sound of Settling,” the album’s second single, began receiving radio play and other mainstream exposure, I insisted that it was of lower quality than the other tracks on the album. Even worse, whenever a friend claimed he liked Death Cab for Cutie, I would proceed to quiz him. “Really? You do? What, ‘The Sound of Settling?’” I stopped listening to Transatlanticism; it was a betrayal as far as I was concerned. Death Cab for Cutie’s growing popularity was a personal insult. I stacked on every unfair judgment possible on my former favorite band. They were “sell-outs,” “mainstream,” and worst: “pop.” Their next album Plans also became commercially successful, further supporting my assumption that it was not worth listening to.

Why did I experience such an absurd reaction when Death Cab for Cutie got big? Am I a cultural snob? It is true that there are cases in which artists change in order to garner more commercial attention, but even this isn’t something deserving of being burned at the stake. Moreover, an increase in popularity does not automatically translate into lower quality art. Laying a claim to music before its emergence into the limelight undoubtedly gives a sense of ownership. An unknown band is a piece of property owned by a small number of people. This exclusivity makes it special. Anything popular is foolish and mindless, and any art that is mainstream is just “pandering to the masses.” Funnily enough, these sentiments themselves are popular and unreasonable. Artists create music for people’s enjoyment. The greatest appreciation a fan can express to his admired artist is the wish that the music he so loves may also affect other people in a similar way. A fan should crusade for the artist’s cause not against it for mere egotistical reasons.

I do not pretend that these suggestions are easily followed. I have been guilty of this type of musical snobbery on more occasions than I would like to admit, and I still wince when I hear gushing about Plans and Transatlanticism, but falling into the automatic “pop sucks” reaction is unfair to all art. Not all pop is worthy of acclaim, but backlash against any music simply because it is popular is irrational and wrongly discredits the success it nevertheless achieved. In 2008, Death Cab for Cutie released its biggest album to date, Narrow Stairs, which eventually reached the top of the Billboard 200. As much as it is difficult to swallow, I accept (and am glad) that my little quartet from Bellingham, Washington is now a nationally-recognized, Grammy-nominated, alternative rock band.

And that’s ok because “Cath…” is insanely catchy.

Niccolò Machiavelli’s Discorsi may have become one of the seminal texts of modern political theory, but it was originally a gift to his close friends Zanobi Buondelmonti and Cosimo Rucellai. The three of them would talk politics in the Oricellari gardens of Florence and in their equally fertile letters. Prefacing his work in the third person, the author notes how he considers his Discorsi to be “unquestionably the most valuable thing Niccolò Machiavelli could send you. For in it I have put in words all that I know and all have learned from an extensive experience of the affairs of the world and endless reading about them.”

To those only familiar with Studio Ghibli’s more famous work such as the charming My Neighbor Totoro, Grave of the Fireflies will be especially jarring. There is no magic in this world, and precious little whimsy; the distinctive Studio Ghibli style of animation is present, and as beautiful as ever, but here it portrays corpses and burning homes rather than lovable woodland critters. The film is set in 1945 Japan, and follows two children made orphans by World War II: Seita, 14, and his 4-year-old sister Setsuko. Fire bombs dropped by American planes have taken everything from them but each other, and the movie chronicles their efforts to survive. Food is scarce, and humanity scarcer. There is no moralizing in Grave of the Fireflies, no demonization or pandering: there is simply a big brother trying to keep his little sister from starvation. I won’t spoil the plot for you, and you should watch it at your earliest possible convenience—twice, if you can handle the emotional strain. Long story short, it is an unflinching, earnest, and artful take on the heartbreaking realities of war. Which got me thinking, 24 years after its release: what on earth has happened to war movies?

In the late 20^th century, thanks to masterful epics such 1978′s The Deer Hunter and 1979′s Apocalypse Now, it seemed as though mass-market pop culture finally “got” war. Glorification, ignorance, and propaganda appeared to be overwhelmed by the awful images that people were seeing on TV and in the cinema; Vietnam would not be denied. Inspired by gut-wrenching tragedies such as the Mai Lai massacre, films like Apocalypse Now showed the public exactly how demented the battlefield could be. Cut to 2012, with Act of Valor on big screens everywhere and Call of Duty rapidly becoming the most successful entertainment franchise of all time, and you can understand why I wonder what is happening to war’s portrayal in modern media.

Grave of the Fireflies and Apocalypse Now showed malnourished toddlers and heads on stakes; Call of Duty shows badass special ops troopers shooting terrorists and riding snowmobiles. Despite the best efforts of great films such as 2008′s The Hurt Locker and the 2007 documentary Taxi to the Dark Side, war is becoming sexy all over again. Meanwhile Act of Valor, a recently released film using footage of real Navy SEALs, makes war look almost as cool as Call of Duty.(I would be less bothered if Call of Duty were instead titled something like F**k Yeah Guns Are Awesome, but that level of honesty might hurt sales.) These new action extravaganzas are not without moments of truth and sorrow; in Act of Valor, one Marine is killed and leaves his infant child fatherless. But in their trailers, certainly, these movies and games aim to make war seem as fun as they possibly can. While Call of Duty does feature sequences depicting the horrors of nuclear war, and has its fair share of reverence for the sacrifices that soldiers make, the game’s most recent trailer blares AC/DC’s timeless line: “I shoot to thrill, and I’m ready to kill.” I don’t mean to demonize Call of Duty, or come off as shrieky—irresponsible or not, the game is a lot of fun. But I am concerned that less bombastic depictions of war, as found in Grave of the Fireflies, are being drowned out.

I have no easy explanation for this pendulum swing back towards war-as-entertainment. One would think that Iraq and Afghanistan have been terrible enough to steer us in a more level-headed direction. I hope that films such as Grave of the Fireflies make a resurgence; in the meanwhile, millions of young boys with PS3s nationwide are getting the impression that war is a James Bondian roller coaster ride. And yes, young boys will always play with guns; I certainly did, and make no apologies for doing so. But as Call of Duty and its ilk come to dominate the market, I fear that our popular culture may be losing its grasp on war’s hard realities.