Fragile Things, Talking Right, In China's Shadow

I recently received copies of Neil Gaiman's Fragile Things, Geoffrey Nunberg's Talking Right, and Reed Hundt's In China's Shadow.

Fragile Things is an excellent collection of short stories, and not having read Gaiman before, I was impressed by his ability to draw me into the stories in a small number of words. The stories (and poems) were quite entertaining, and I definitely need to read some of his earlier work (I was also very impressed by the movie MirrorMask, which he co-wrote).

Talking Right is an airing of the issues that the Democratic party faces with regards to language. The "Right" has managed to claim ownership over certain terms over the past thirty years, and uses those terms to shape the way that the general electorate interprets messages from both sides. Nunberg details a variety of ways that liberals fail to understand language, tactics that conservatives have used to modify the emotional definitions of words, and how liberals can respond. Of course, before liberals can try to show people what they stand for, they need to figure out what they do actually stand for.

In China's Shadow raises the issue of Chinese entrepreneurship and how America needs to respond by becoming substantially more entrepreneural. Hundt lays out the problem: China has a huge population and that population is starting lots of businesses while America is not starting as many businesses as it did at the height the 90s. To encourage people to take the risk of going out on their own, Hundt details a variety of measures the government should take, most of which struck me as heading in the direction that Europe has taken in terms of socializing healthcare, education, retirement, etc. In between his constant criticism of the Bush administration, he makes a number of good points regarding the static nature of big businesses and how government should not be used to protect the status quo.

Hundt also refers frequently to Schumpeter's concept of "creative destruction" and Nunberg mentions it as well, and it sounds like an interesting idea that I should read more about.