This Week - October 20
October 18th, 2006
Our guests are Sasha Abramsky, author of CONNED: How Millions Went to Prison, Lost the Vote, and Helped Send George W. Bush to the White House. Also we talk with Jan Whitaker about SERVICE AND STYLE: How the American Department Store Fashioned the Middle Class.
How does denying ex-prisoners of the right to vote affect ALL voters? That’s a question Sasha Abramsky set out to answer by taking a road-trip through America to talk to citizens who had lost the vote — or been led to think they had — because they had once been felons. His literal journey took him through the eroding landscape of America’s democracy, as Abramsky discovered that the voting power of all citizens is weakened when some citizens are disenfranchised.
And social historian Jan Whitaker moves from the tea room (her previous book is Tea at the Blue Lantern Inn: A Social History of the Tea Room Craze in America) to the fitting room in SERVICE AND STYLE. The book examines how America’s late great downtown department stores changed consumer tastes.
Tags: consumer_tastes democracy department_store disenfranchised disenfranchisement Election Season Election Season felons jan_whitaker Latest Latest right_to_vote sasha_abramsky social_historian social_history tea_at_the_blue_lantern_inn tea_room This Week This Week voter_ID voting voting_power
