Books from Guests on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart 8
Explore compelling reads featured on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, from Al Gore’s The Assault on Reason to Christopher Hitchens' God is Not Great and Walter Isaacson's Einstein.
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China Road
by Rob Gifford
Route 312 is the Chinese Route 66. It flows three thousand miles from east to west, passing through the factory towns of the coastal areas, through the rural heart of China, then up into the Gobi Desert, where it merges with the Old Silk Road. The highway witnesses every part of the social and economic revolution that is turning China upside down. In this utterly surprising and deeply personal book, acclaimed National Public Radio reporter Rob Gifford, a fluent Mandarin speaker, takes the dramatic journey along Route 312 from its start in the boomtown of Shanghai to its end on the border with Kazakhstan. Gifford reveals the rich mosaic of modern Chinese life in all its contradictions, as he poses the crucial questions that all of us are asking about China: Will it really be the next global superpower? Is it as solid and as powerful as it looks from the outside? And who are the ordinary Chinese people, to whom the twenty-first century is supposed to belong? Gifford is not alone on his journey. The largest migration in human history is taking place along highways such as Route 312, as tens of millions of people leave their homes in search of work. He sees signs of the booming urban economy everywhere, but he also uncovers many of the country’s frailties, and some of the deep-seated problems that could derail China’s rise. The whole compelling adventure is told through the cast of colorful characters Gifford meets: garrulous talk-show hosts and ambitious yuppies, impoverished peasants and tragic prostitutes, cell-phone salesmen, AIDS patients, and Tibetan monks. He rides with members of a Shanghai jeep club, hitchhikes across the Gobi desert, and sings karaoke with migrant workers at truck stops along the way. As he recounts his travels along Route 312, Rob Gifford gives a face to what has historically, for Westerners, been a faceless country and breathes life into a nation that is so often reduced to economic statistics. Finally, he sounds a warning that all is not well in the Chinese heartlands, that serious problems lie ahead, and that the future of the West has become inextricably linked with the fate of 1.3 billion Chinese people. “Informative, delightful, and powerfully moving . . . Rob Gifford’s acute powers of observation, his sense of humor and adventure, and his determination to explore the wrenching dilemmas of China’s explosive development open readers’ eyes and reward their minds.” –Robert A. Kapp, president, U.S.-China Business Council, 1994-2004
Book
The Assault on Reason
by Al Gore
Now with a New Preface and Conclusion: “Post-Truth: On Donald Trump and the 2016 Election” “This book shows a fiery, throw-caution-to-the winds Al Gore, who . . . has decided to lay it all on the line with a blistering assessment of the Bush administration and the state of public discourse in America.” —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times “Gore’s faith in human nature is braver and sharper than (the cynics). . . . This book isn’t about him; it’s about the republic whose freedoms depend on increasing reasoned debate and reducing intimidating noise.” —The Boston Globe What has happened to our country and how can we fix it? We are in the midst of a deepening crisis for our democracy. After the strangest election cycle in modern American history it is important that we address the grave threats to our way of life that were glaringly revealed in this campaign. In The Assault on Reason, Nobel Peace Prize winner and former Vice President Al Gore examines how faith in the power of reason—the idea that citizens can govern themselves through rational debate—is in peril. Our democracy depends on a well-informed citizenry and a two-way conversation about ideas, but our public sphere has been degraded by fake news and the politics of fear, partisanship, and blind faith. Now updated to investigate the rise of Trump and post-truth politics, The Assault on Reason is a call to rebuild the vitality of American democracy by restoring the nation’s information ecosystem so that we can start making good decisions again.
Book
No God But God
by Reza Aslan
In this compelling--and profoundly hopeful--book, Aslan demonstrates that Islam has much in common with Christianity and Judaism, and bears seeds of egalitarianism and social reform at its core.
Book
God is Not Great
by Christopher Hitchens
"A case against religion and a description of the ways in which religion is man-made"--Provided by the publisher.
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Einstein
by Walter Isaacson
From Isaacson, the bestselling author of "Benjamin Franklin," comes the first full biography of Albert Einstein since all his papers have become available--a fully realized portrait of a premier icon of his era.
