As Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” has worked its way up in the ratings and seen poll after poll conclude that many people rely on it as a substitute for the real news (and that these people are better educated on current events than those who watch other news commentary programs), regular viewers have seen the programming shift more and more towards the political issues.
It could be the impending election, or it could be that these are the areas that they have had the most success with. But this focus has now made the transition to another medium. From the writers of “The Daily Show” comes a new textbook that combines the wit we’ve come to expect with the principles and history of American government.
Like The Onion’s book (Our Dumb Century), America (The Book): A Citizen’s Guide to Democracy Inaction relies on facts to provide the medium for hilarious and sometimes sobering observations on the American political system.
With chapters like “Congress: Quagmire of Freedom” and “The Future of Democracy: Four Score and Seven Years From Now,” it seeks to educate its readers on how to keep “a profoundly excellent form of government supple, evolving, and relevant.” But while that is its stated goal, it does it in a way that is hilarious from start to finish.
Though only a few weeks from its first printing, the book has already generated some controversy. Because it’s framed as a civics textbook, it features classroom activities, and among these is an exercise in dressing the naked Supreme Court justices. With cut-outs of judicial robes, students are told to “restore their dignity by matching each justice with his or her respective robe.” Naturally, this has irked some businesses, and Wal-Mart has already cancelled their order for the book.
But despite this cancellation and others, spokesmen for the book have said that they had anticipated far more controversy and banning than they have already seen, and as a result, interested readers should be able to find it in most bookstores.
Like most textbooks, the chapters include extra content in the form of regular features like “Would You Mind If I Told You How We Do It In Canada?” along with chapter-specific content like infographs on the founding fathers (and founding mothers) and “The Five Most Interesting Moments in Senate History.” It also has full page spreads of relevant pictures like a look at “The Campaign Bus” and a graveyard for third parties with a grave already being dug for the Democratic party.
This is where the sobering political commentary comes in. Though usually looking for a laugh, the book does have some serious remarks in it, such as in an infographic on “The Ages of Democracy” that hints at predictions for America’s future.
In the “Middle Age” stage, it says a nation “will have to decide whether to quietly make peace with [its] declining power, or to go out in a blaze of glory, taking Mideast peace/world fish stocks/the ozone layer with [it].” Those looking for a cheap laugh shouldn’t be deterred by these more complicated ones, though. They’re few and far between and always framed in jokes.
America (The Book) is one of the funniest things I’ve read in a long time. Throughout the few weeks I was reading it, I was constantly bothering my roommate with quotes, and recommending it to everyone I ran into, as I will now do with you.
The book retails for $24.95 and can probably be found in most major bookstores. It will educate and amuse those who don’t know much about the American system of government, and amuse those who couldn’t care less. As Albert Gallatin, Secretary of the Treasury (May 12, 1801 – February 8, 1814) says on the back cover, America (The Book) is “So informative, I even found out who I was.”
