I am a white guy. This book disgusted me.

I emphatically disagreed with the premise AND the conclusion. First, it is the breathtaking speed of technological development and the extraordinary INDUSTRIOUSNESS of Americans that led to the loss of jobs here. 

So jobs are gone partly BECAUSE of the record productivity – NOT FOR THE LACK OF IT! And NOT because whites have lost ‘their’ ethics (what a false dichotomy and conflation by the way!) but because most Americans of all races prefer cheap goods no matter what the consequences. 

Second, when you speak of “the decline of America” there is much more to debate than your poorly chosen statistics. The fact that there was an election of a black American to the presidency is precisely a level of possibility that most other countries would consider a breathtaking strength. 

Unseen in your narrow statistics are such things as the extraordinary new found sense many American minorities have about their future – that they are, for the first time, fully invested in America themselves and in their communities in new, urgent ways.

And last, Whites benefit from all of these trends in more ways than any other group whether they LIKE IT OR NOT.

America is getting better not worse. Stop whining about the reasons why and get on board.

I havn’t read the book.�
I’m white, upper- middle class and Catholic.  I’m familiar with Murry’s work.  He seems to imagine that a biological
difference between people exists- those who “have it’ an d those who “don’t”.
Those who have it tend to biologically be a bit more like me.  While this is all flattering, I hate to think
about what would have come of me is my father didn’t have such marketable
skills.  My mother was  (and still is) a sweet heart who holds down
the home front, but what of those less fortunate? 

Mister Charles Murray what are the cultures of white Americans?

One must ask one’s self, is the tree of humankind about to sprout a new branch? A branch of mankind composed of those more successful over those who are not. We may ponder the reasons for this all that we wish however, evolutionary forces occur without conscience. There is simply cause and effect as in good by Neanderthal hello Cro-Magnum. Is this simply evolution in slow motion happening before our eyes?

U.S. -military occupiers- in Afghanistan said on Monday they had …killed a group of CHILDREN in an air strike.
                              _________
�
Afghan officials showed gruesome photos of 8 DEAD BOYS, who HAD BEEN(past tense) between 6 and 14 yrs old. They were bombed TWICE! while herding sheep in heavy snow and lighting a fire to keep warm.
�
“Where were the rights for these children who have been violated? Did they have rights or not? Did they have rights to live as part of the world community?” said Mohammad Safi, an MP sent by President Karzai to investigate.
�
…the Kapisa attack, and another air strike that KILLED 7 CIVILIANS, had Afghans in both provinces demanding curbs on NATO operations…
�
The UN said the number of CIVILIANS KILLED by U.S. weapons of mass destruction in the Afghan war had rose 9% in 2011. for the fifth year in a row

Air strikes were the main reason behind civilian deaths.
�
-The Globe and Mail

“ Airstrikes have -not caused a huge number of civilian casualties- it is -important for everybody to understand that this thing is kept on a very tight leash.”

-His Excellency Barry Hussein Obama Junior
January 31, 2012

Martha Coakley is on C-span as we speak.

I wonder where white America would be without black America picking its cotton, yellow America building its railroads, and brown America harvesting its food. 

I heard Murray a few days ago on Charlie Rose explaining that the essence of the “Coming Apart” situation was insularity, that the top doesn’t understand what the bottom is putting up with (so he makes sure his younger set of children go to school where there is integration of all sorts of people).  I saw a political cartoon making the same point last week; “Romney seals the hole in the safety net,” it says.  And little people are mending the leak that allows for communication, travel, exchange between those above this sort of glass ceiling or floor, and those below it.  This reminds me of Brzezinski’s assertions (from his new book, Strategic Vision, I think) that Americans are not informed enough about the world to be democratically useful.   Americans broadly supported the Iraq War, he said.  (Who was he listening to.)  And he says stringent sanctions will control the Iranian regime without drawing Iranian “nationalism into its fundamentalism” (its modern populace into its extremist leadership).  I am wondering if there is a sealed net between Iranian reality and us, just as between those for whom “free time” means the thoughts one has while washing one’s hair, versus the time one fills up with carpooling and commuting.  Again, the ones segregated from our awareness are sometimes segregated by the Media with their Grand Ideas about the Product-Buying public (people with time and money) and what turns them on.

I live in Belmont,Ma..He’s on the right track,but should have used Newton,Ma,where I was raised.

The more things change, the more they stay the same… the pendulum has swung to the extreme right as the result of systematic campaign to unburden the wealthy of taxes and regulation: the end result is neo-feudalism: cost of living is slowly ratcheted up and wealth sharing (wages) are driven down as means to extract ever greater wealth from the population all the while trying to maintain a fine balance between maximum wealth production and crippling the population and infrastructure that facilitates that wealth production.

Even now we witness the struggle of enraged fringe extremists jockeying to define what is truly Right, all the while failing to perceive that they are merely tools of neo-feudal lords who fuel their anger to divide us and enrich themselves.

In the end, the privation of this long winter will drive the peasants to grab their pitchforks and unite against their suffrage. The pitchforks in this case will be smart phones and the gatherings will be organized in social networking sites.

Why does this show feature an endless string of pseudo intellectuals from far right institutions like AEI, the “Cato Institute” etc? They have nothing to say. I’m sick of hearing the endless repetition of their sophomoric theories, which amount to nothing more than camouflage for class warfare.

Yes we’re coming apart, because of economics. Duh. The aim of Reagan voodoo economics is redistributing all the wealth to the top, and its working. Tax cuts at the top, corporate deregulation, union busting, phony free trade, “starve the beast”, we’ve adopted the whole righty class warfare agenda. Now when GDP rises it is not shared but goes to the top, and we’re heading rapidly toward oligarchy. Why would anyone be surprised that the former middle class is behaving like an “underclass”, when that is what it has become?

Murray is earning his large paycheck by claiming that our decline is about something other than economics. That provides a smokescreen for the wealth grabbing by the elites who fund the AEI. Good boy, Charlie. Now go write something about how wealth diverted to the top by tax cuts trickles town.

So some men have decided their time is worth more than the minimum wage. Maybe they’re staying home to care for kids or old folks while their wives work. People are finally  rebelling against the idea that we all should work at least 8 hours a day for the man. Having a person at home in the center of the family–man or woman–is what might really make a difference in the lives of the working poor.

Wall Street isn’t criminal and immoral according to Charles Murray. Americans know that is a lie.

Nice try though CHarles. Shilling for the elite.

She didn’t say her mission was to move up, because she and her husband were more concerned about true family values, instead of GREED, and social climbing?

Picking 1960 as the referrrence point for marriage is somewhat misleading as this was the year when marriage rates were the highest in U.S. history according to the Census Bureau.  For example, fewer people were married in 1890 than now.  Post WW II we had a more homogenous culture with a common war experience and a fast growing economy - perfect conditions for settling down and raising a family.

I have 3 sons all in their twenties.  None are making enough money to support themselves (all college graduates).  They all agree that they need enough income to support themselves before they can even consider marrying and supporting a wife and (maybe) children. 

Smooth talking conservatives who want to attribute America’s failings to a lack of marriage make me extremely nervous.

why does tom keep trying to paint this guest into a corner?

      “Is my boyfriend sleeping with both my sisters and my mom?” This is the graphic I saw on my television screen this morning after stumbling upon that piece of drek, the “Maury” show. This epitomizes what has gone wrong in this country over the last several decades and why we are mired in an inescapable downward spiral. The viewership of this kind of brain dead garbage says all we need to know about the state of intellectual discourse in this country. I’ve been around for a while. I think I’ve been a keen observer of national trends over the years, and what things have been important in many people’s lives. The zeitgeist of the nation has changed many times. Today it tends towards ignorance, intellectual laziness, and plain old stupidity. Sure, there are many Americans who keep themselves informed. We vote. We stay abreast of current events. We READ. But, for every one of us there are far more who understand nothing of world events, economic issues, or anything that requires thoughtfulness, attention to detail, or effort. Tomorrow, when you go to work, or school, or wherever you find yourselves, ask some random people to name the three branches of the Federal government of the United States of America. If you’re lucky enough to find some folks who can actually answer this daunting question, ask them to then describe the responsibilities of each branch. Ask them to name just two of the nine justices to the Supreme Court. Ask them when World War II was. Ask them what the Constitution is, when it was it written, and what is it’s purpose. Be prepared for the sad responses you’ll receive.                                                      In a country that values sports and stupid T.V. more than it values intellectual vigor and civic awareness, it’s folly to expect any useful understanding of the complicated and divisive issue of race. It’s folly to expect a useful understanding of anything. The populace of a nation IS that nation. When the populace becomes lazy and stupid, the nation becomes what it deserves to be.

Charles Murray says that getting the government out of private lives in the ‘answer to everything’? How glib can he be? And how absurd? I’d refer him to a long article in the Sunday NYT (an ‘elite’ publication, no doubt) that documents all the ways the working class devotees of goverment-hating Tea Party actually rely on the government. They need government support, take it, but resent it and the government that supplies it. This is an incoherent set of beliefs and principles. Would it be better if old people didn’t get Medicare? Would it better if people’s kids went hungry? They themselves don’t seem to know.

It’s the economy stupid. When you have to work full time (frequently with over time, sometimes with an additional job) just to support yourself and your family, you don’t have time and energy to participate in significant relationships, be they with a spouse, a child, a community, a school, whatever. Our personal lives have been sold for profit. Everything that Charles Murray says is deteriorating is traceable directly to Americans having to work more for less over the last 50 years.

There’s a difference between being a college grad, and having parents who were also college grads, who may be wealthy.
Your entire spectrum of life experiences is different, and your ability to build your own wealth is greatly enhanced and made much easier.
Parents pay for school, parents help with down payment on a home, etc.
Not only that but you are able to focus on what you want to do with your life, instead of struggling to get through school, or overcoming the obstacles of the environment one may have grown up in.
Last generation a college-educated man could own a home, support a family, go to Disney every year while his wife stayed home. Now, some of us have to work 2 jobs with a wife, or husband, that works as well.
So it’s much easier to focus on a wholeness and wellness way of life.
Common (the musician) said it perfect:
“While white folks focus on dogs and yoga/ my people on the low end…trying to get over”

How can you properly understand problems without talking about causes?

Mr. Murray makes less and less sense as he talks. I just can’t get over how one can make a case for how to fix something if he doesn’t talk about the causes.

Religion has always been thrust into the moral argument of what makes us a great country. We’re told the Puritans are vaunted as morally upright and deeply religious.  But they had their own version of Vegas, a high out-of-wedlock birthrate, and a problem with deadbeat dads, so much so that they had a commission to track the dad’s down and make them pay. Look at the Salem Witch Trials. That was done in the name of religion but was more of a land and power grab. 

It’s not much different today, with religious leaders preaching one thing and doing another. We’re supposed to aspire to this?

Compare Harvard and Yale to Berea College.  It is not IQ, it is opportunity.

The problem is that people are not able to manage their money wisely. why? Too many temptations to spend it, too many expectations of what American life is supposed to look like…? the problem lies with how to dicipline yourself to survive. all the degrees in the world from ivy leage colleges will not asure you will be able to feed, clothe yourself, provide shelter and be good parents.  why invite a guest on just to pick him appart. let him talk and at least do not put words in his mouth.

Cognitive elites sorting themselves into the top level.  Let anyone work in certain jobs that generally deteriorate, through air breathed, water drunk, the person’s health, in an environment where the kind of intellectual battle that sharpens the IQ does not take place daily, hourly… and you get people with lowish IQ’s without the kind of health system that is fighting to do anything about it.
     The “benefits” of health insurance have vastly contributed to severing people, battering family attachments, and diminishing the ability of those at the bottom to get where they can deploy their God-given potential.

I do not believe that the country is falling apart because of a lack of moral values.  It is not because you are poor, divorced single with children, agnostic or atheistic or other non-traditional condition that you have no moral values.  I believe that there are many married, religious people whose moral values are very questionable (one example currently very visible is Newt Gingrich to just use one example).  I happen to be married, with 3 children and agnostic and I have a great deal of moral values and I volunteer and a lot of my friends are also agnostic and they similarly volunteer and care about other people.
The problem is that most people do not earn a decent living that would allow them to pay for housing, food, and education.  So indeed if your salary is at mimimum wage and you happen to divorce you will have a very hard time economically not because you do not have moral values but because you do not make enough money.

I’ve never seen anyone exploit religion “morals” and class disparities in sevice to economic elites the way Charles Murray has done. He’s obviously racist in his thinking and gender biased twoard white males in structuring his models.It was his cronies on Wa;;st that blew up our economy, not any lack of “work ehtic” on “industriousness” on the part of average citizens.I’m a;so disappointed that Tom’s reading list didn’t go beyond the corporate media to include,say, the Nation or THe Progressive, just to name two.

I just turned off my radio.  Charles Murray knows nothing about American economic history and the history of the working class. 

I found Charles Murray very interesting and his subject right ‘on point’ regarding the Occupy Wall Street movement. Joan Walsh lost me. She obviously is anti-Libertarian as she harped on causes saying “how do you change things without government.” And unfortunately it seemed Tom took “her side.”

I am the 99%. The movement is not dead it will revive to show the world how the American middle class and the poor will be heard again. The homeless that I see everyday at Pine Street Inn, The Hispanics selling flowers on the streets of Somerville and�
Route 16. We are the 99%.When the colored middle class are discriminated with higher mortgages payments compared to the majority. We are the 99%! When the American people bailed out the American banks but the American middle class cannot even borrow money to pay off some of our debts. We are the 99%.  We need laws to prevent the banks from getting away with Greed and prosecute the people who caused the American Great Recession.We are the 99%.  The Government cannot even extend the payroll tax for another year to save American families a few almighty dollars. We are the 99%

Mr Murray,in my opinion you’re a chump.You are not only racist,but Classcist.We left Eng to get away from that stuff.All humans come from the Olduvai(?) Gorge.Leaky and Lucy the Australopithecus(1.4million years ago),Starting around 100,000 years ago the great migrations began.The Zulus moved south the rest moved into the middle east.After a hiatus some went north to Europe(honkys) and the rest headed East(Mongolians).Around 19,000 years ago the Mongolians crossed the land bridge into the Americas.The point is were all the same.

Why do you pick out Whites.The Welfare State passes it’s parthologies to all.

On Point used to be much better. It seems that the show had academics and serious thinkers and topics.  It has now become more popular and common and more like Diane Rehm or Neil Cohnen.  Anyone else notice this? why not have an academic to discuss Murray ? disappointing

both of my parents had high school & college degrees & so do I & all practicing catholics, I married a man from blue collar background, but he achieved a college degree by swimming on scholarship through college.  We owned 5 convenience stores, but have had to sell them one by one as big box stores have swept through Wa state. We have one left now and are doing fine, but we have had to be LESS INVOLVED in our kids schools, church because we’ve had to work harder to get ahead. Have you LOOKED AT THE RISE OF COLLEGE TUITIONS lately??  

Education is better funded now than at any time in our history. That’s the point – even though we spend more on social programs than at any time in our history, all it seems to be doing is creating a permanent underclass that no longer has a decent work ethic. 

The evolution of the computer and internet communication has ushered in the new age of a Knowledge based economy that is replacing the manufacturing based economy upon which our social institutions have been built. This transformation is disrupting the norms which propogated the specialization of skills the are increasing obsolete. As each social instituion/silo is threatened by transparency their proprietary practices are being guarded and defended in the interest of survival. Society evolves at a much slower pace than technology which renders the established institutions unable or unwilling to redefine their roles.

Tom Ashcroft.  Your guest Charles Murray shows that in America, we do indeed have a pluralistic society, God Bless US.  Your guest Joan Walsh shows that there are people of intellect who can speak the truth, calmly, embarrassingly, and clearly, who can cut through all the smoke and mirrors of statistics.  The guests and the callers all reinforce the beauty of America: diversity of opinion.  My only comment: if you have a marriage between a man and a woman and there are children; and everything is chosen by the expectation and hope of having a good income, money enough to provide for the essentials and education and recreation; and then the manufacturing jobs disappear, (to Japan in the ’70s and ’80s; and now to China; it is not difficult to predict that over 50 percent of those marriages will dissolve if the breadwinner loses his job.  There is no moral basis to this statistic.  Just, if you will: human nature.  And there are the 49 or so percent of couples who stay married, through thick and thin: God bless them too!  I can only add in objection to Mr. Murray using the term “White” in the subtitle of his book, that in the near future Blacks and Latinos will become the majority of registered voters: people of color will continue to rule America.  And let us not forget: money does create power. It always has.  Well look at FaceBook’s Mark Z: how much was he worth before he entered Harvard? And now?  Tom: keep up the great work. Your shows are always electric and educational.

Wow, that was aggressive to the “guest!” Sure, I don’t like Murry’s manner either, but his points are not eugenics, and the book did not seem to be about any Libertarian points, but they made certain to attack him on that! I’m glad Tom brings on contoversial guests, but I wish they could have gotten more into some of the deeper issues instead of dismissing them as “determinism!” (especial considering that I am a philosophical determanist…)

       The constant whining of the many who love to cite the “99″ percent silliness becomes more tiresome with each passing day. The notion that determined people with a high level of self respect and a solid work ethic cannot improve their circumstances is an insult to the millions who have done that very thing. The claim that forces other than themselves are to blame for the stasis in many peoples lives is, in most cases, ridiculous.                                                                         I’m a fifty five year old, unemployed truck driver. I have no more than a high school education. Yet, I’ve been surviving very comfortably during my seven months of unemployment, without any severance or unemployment benefits. I can do this because somewhere around the age of thirty five I decided to teach myself the principles of sound investing. I spent the time necessary to learn about asset allocation, risk exposure, diversification, and rational expectation. I made a nice little bundle investing a tiny, weekly amount .  There’s nothing I did that could not have been done by anyone willing to do the work. There lies the problem. Too many Americans are unwilling to make the effort to improve their lot while claiming that some other force is holding them down.  Well, if just ONE person, a truck driver perhaps, from the ranks of the “99″ improves his economic situation through hard work and self determination, then anyone can do it, and claims to the contrary become moot.

Tom comes off sounding like a whiny child in denial after being told that Santa does not exist.  He refuses to address Murray’s thesis and instead relies on useless anecdotes and his irrelevant hopes for America.  I suppose I don’t expect Ashbrook to treat a libertarian with any intellectual respect, but kudos to Murray for putting up a good fight. 

Oh and Tom, I feel so sorry that you grew up in an underprivileged ethnic group.  The Swedes truly have it hard in this country. 

I have always worked for my living, have a college degree and I do not envy anyone else’s hard-earned wealth. I envy their power to influence Congress/Supreme Court, influence elections, and create a bubble of security for themselves while they blithely play havoc with an entire country’s economy! 

Has anyone looked at the rate of incarceration and the effect on black families?

That was the most entertaining ON POINT ever. That is all that politics and sociology are anymore. No one in this discussion is actually attempting to do anything (Murray says it explicitly: “If all of us were forbidden from talking about what got us into this mess… I think there would be a really interesting conversation”) — they are writers, reviewers, and talk show hosts. It’s just entertainment, and to confuse it with productive research and action is a mistake. It IS an interesting conversation. It is NOT actually proving, solving, doing, motivating, or even inciting anything. It’s reality TV. Like the Republican Primaries (any election). The time for problem solving is behind us. All we can do is get a good seat and watch (listen) the wreck. And, yes, have interesting conversations along the way. I get all heated about this stuff, too. Then I go to bed, go to work, and then misremember it when trying to have an interesting conversation at dinner. Anyone else think they might do the same?

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It was rather amusing to hear the kinds of things that are typically said about blacks (my people) now being directed at middle and lower income whites, albeit with far more consideration and grace.  While Mr. Murray is an unconfessed racist and white supremacist, I can at least admire his candor; long gone are the days when men could look each other in the eye and tell friend from foe.  There were quite a few befuddled folks calling in hoping to glean from their most celebrated hero-writer of the BellCurve some semblance of light at the end of the tunnel only to have those hopes dashed by the dry summation of a tired and smug intellectual now being paid to gun down his own kind.

This flood of whines, this flailing and wringing at the national scale has to stop. If people think these are bad times they have no clue what bad times are. Go back 100 years or to Bangladesh to find out what being poor means. None of the people whining in this country knows what life without electricity or automatic clothes washing machinesis is like. A lot of things could be better but please keep things in a little perspective.