States of Neglect: How Red-State Leaders Have Failed Their Citizens and Undermined America

by William Kleinknecht

Overview

As America continues down its path of polarization, a celebrated journalist tells us the deep story of the red-state/blue-state divide

In the wake of Trump’s presidency, Republican-led states have joined in an alarming assault on our democratic system. But the drift toward authoritarianism in red states has far deeper roots. We now have a country where tens of millions of people live under regimes that have spent years starving education and health care, empowering polluters, engaging in voter suppression, and neglecting their citizens’ well-being in the interest of cutting taxes for the wealthy.

In States of Neglect, journalist William Kleinknecht surveys the landscape of neglect in states including Texas, Florida, and Arizona through the experiences of a rich cast of characters. He visits environmental dead zones in the Texas Gulf region. He investigates Arizona’s abandonment of public education and its corrupt charter school industry. He shows how Mississippi’s denuded health care system has made the Magnolia State the sickest in the nation. And he explains how North Carolina allows its people to sink into poverty while catering to the needs of corporations.

As a postscript, Kleinknecht proposes how progressive states on either coast might join in a compact of “progressive federalism” that uses their superior economic and cultural resources to counter the influence of the far right.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781620976418
Publisher:	New Press, The
Publication date:	02/21/2023
Pages:	320
Sales rank:	631,418
Product dimensions:	5.60(w) x 8.60(h) x 1.40(d)

About the Author

William Kleinknecht is a longtime newspaper reporter who covered politics, government, criminal justice, and the environment for the Detroit Free Press, New York Daily News, and Newark Star-Ledger. The author of The Man Who Sold the World: Ronald Reagan and the Betrayal of Main Street America, The New Ethnic Mobs: The Changing Face of Organized Crime in America, and States of Neglect: How Red-State Leaders Have Failed Their Citizens and Undermined America (The New Press), he lives in Ridgewood, New Jersey.

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

Part I Laboratories of Democracy?

1 Dead Last in Everything: Profile of a Failed State 29

2 "A Good, Honest, Christian Man": The Decline of Ethical Norms and the Erosion of Democracy 59

3 The Mirage of Success: Sun Belt States and the Future of America 83

Part II Portraits of Failure

4 The Dead Zones: Surrendering to Polluters in Texas 115

5 Code Red: The Shame of Health Care in the Red States 147

6 Defund the Children: The Attack on Public Schools 172

Part III The Road Ahead

7 Clearing the Waters: Progress in the Blue States, at Long Last 197

8 Which Model-California or Texas? 218

9 Progressive Federalism 254

Acknowledgments 267

Notes 269

Index 329

Editorial Reviews

09/12/2022

Journalist Kleinknecht (The Man Who Sold the World) delivers a scathing rebuke of Republican politicians who have created financial opportunities for companies at the expense of the health and safety of their constituents. Contending that conservative governors and state legislators, in conjunction with their “corporate allies,” have made working-class people in red states “poorer, sicker, less educated” than their counterparts in blue states, Kleinknecht writes that “only by fully understanding the trend toward autocracy and corporate dominion in the red states” will progressives be able to “wrest control of the narrative from the far right and begin to alter the course of American politics.” His evidence includes the gutting of environmental enforcement efforts in Texas and the 2014 Elk River chemical spill in West Virginia, “one of the worst cases of contaminated drinking water in American history.” Meanwhile, Kleinknecht claims, “evacuation orders, poisoned drinking water, red tides, beaches with no-swimming signs, bays with fishing bans, cancer hotspots... have either disappeared or become rarities in the blue states.” Kleinknecht also tackles disparities in education and healthcare funding and highlights innovative welfare programs such as Connecticut’s “Baby Bonds” initiative. Copious evidence, impassioned prose, and astute political analysis make this a must-read for progressive policymakers and activists. (Nov.)

Publishers Weekly

Praise for States of Neglect:
“Copious evidence, impassioned prose, and astute political analysis make this a must-read for progressive policymakers and activists.”
—Publishers Weekly

“An impassioned critique of Republican state officials for the harm they cause their most vulnerable residents.”
—Kirkus Reviews

“States of Neglect examines how a myriad of initiatives under Republican governors have negatively impacted citizens in red states and beyond.”
—Library Journal

From the Publisher

12/01/2022

In this collection of troublesome legislative outcomes, seasoned Detroit Free Press reporter Kleinknecht (The Man Who Sold the World: Ronald Reagan and the Betrayal of Main Street America) examines how a myriad of initiatives under Republican governors have negatively impacted citizens in red states and beyond. The author begins each chapter by humanizing an issue, and he highlights the states and governors deemed responsible for the harmful decisions and legislation. This is done by analyzing the topics—a lack of ethics, pollution, and education, to name a few—from a blue perspective. Most notably, the work offers no mention of any positive Republican policies. In the end, the author concludes that federal progressivism might be a solution to future red-state actions, which pulls the content together. VERDICT Public libraries might have an interest in the book.—James Rhoades

Library Journal