American Breakdown

Why We No Longer Trust Our Leaders and Institutions and How We Can Rebuild Confidence

By: Gerard Baker

Narrated by: Ian Russell

Length: 8 hrs and 53 mins

Publisher's summary

From the former editor-in-chief of the Wall Street Journal, a must-hear account of how America suffers from a “trust deficit” that has weakened its cornerstone institutions and divided our society.

AMERICAN BREAKDOWN dissects how, in the space of a generation, the pillars that sustained the once-dominant superpower have been dangerously eroded. From government to business, from media to medicine—the strength and security of the American experiment have been weakened by a widening gap between the elites who control these institutions and the public.

At the root of this breakdown is a precipitous fall in Americans’ trust in their political, business and cultural leaders. As Baker writes, “This pathology of distrust across American society is eating the country away from the inside.” Millions of Americans say they have little faith in their country's future, and no longer seem to have trust in their leaders, in their important social and civil institutions, even in their common values and ideals, or ultimately in each other.

America in fact hasn’t failed. Americans have been failed—misled by inept and deceitful political leaders, deserted by predatory and cynical corporate chiefs, and, above all, betrayed by a cultural elite that has exploited the very freedom this country provided in order to destroy it.

AMERICAN BREAKDOWN is a deep analysis and thought-provoking account that explores the ways in which Americans have been let down and offers solutions for how we rebuild trust and reclaim purpose for a better future.

©2022 Gerard Baker (P)2022 Twelve

Critic reviews

“America in fact hasn’t failed. Americans have been failed—by lying politicians, phony executives, woke academics, and activist scientists. That's the argument of Gerry Baker’s AMERICAN BREAKDOWN, an immigrant journalist’s passionate J’accuse against this country’s elites. It’s a book about two decades of declining public trust in just about every institution. But it has a hopeful message. The extremists in the culture war have fewer followers than social media might suggest. Like past periods of polarization and distrust, this breakdown, too, shall pass.”—Niall Ferguson, Milbank Family Senior Fellow, the Hoover Institution, Stanford, and author of Doom: The Politics of Catastrophe

“Baker masterfully unpacks Americans’ growing distrust in their institutions with a compelling breakdown of the many ways societal leaders have destroyed their credibility—and the continued threat from today’s Davos Men and Little Maoists. AMERICAN BREAKDOWN makes the persuasive case that distrust is at the heart of so much U.S. dysfunction, even as it offers a critical guide to how we rebuild that social capital.”—Kimberley Strassel, Wall Street Journal columnist and author of The Biden Malaise

“Well, this is the one I’ve been waiting for: a truly fresh and compelling account of what’s gone wrong in America over the past twenty years from someone who knows what he’s talking about when it comes to the failures of the people in charge—because he’s seen it from the inside, as editor of the Wall Street Journal and now the masterful chronicler of the arrogance, hubris, and sheer incompetence of our ruling class. Baker vividly explains how collapsing trust in the key institutions of American life is at the root of the nation’s political and social turbulence. Only when the elites who have led the country astray through ideological extremism and reckless mismanagement acknowledge the vast gulf between themselves and the people can trust be restored. If you want to understand how America recovers its soul, you need this book. Not least because it’s also a brilliant read.”—Steve Hilton, Fox News contributor

One-sided view of life-not wrong but dishonest

This book reminds me of Tucker Carlson's Ship of Fools.

While I cannot disagree with most of what he says, he is mostly describing why republicans have lost faith in their country and institutions, without really addressing the issues that have caused independents and democrats to also lose faith in their country and institutions. He basically puts everything down to progressive "wokeism", with minimal discussion of the influence of big money and transnational corporations on the nation beyond their obvious corruption of the political process, what RFK, Jr, calls 'agency capture'. His final prescriptions for improvement are basically right on, but they seem to come out of nowhere because he doesn't discuss the underlying reasons for his prescriptions in the rest of the book. He isn't honest with readers in the end is the feeling one is left with, no matter what political angle one is coming from.

For example, he doesn't ever discuss the effect of the coordinated lies of the likes of big tobacco, big agriculture, big pharma, big insurance or big food on the current mistrust of science and medicine, in their efforts to avoid responsibility for the endless harm their products have caused, the results of which taxpayers are paying for in terms of medical costs, lost land values, superfund cleanup and other costs that these corporations have been allowed to avoid and foist on taxpayers. Never mentions the role of endless mergers and acquisitions in the destruction of local media, small to even relatively large businesses and rural communities. Never mentions the role of big oil and coal in destruction of land and communities or in our endless, pointless and unnecessary military operations/wars that have siphoned off trillions of dollars that cost American lives, betrayed overseas allies on the ground that helped our military stay safe when in country, and that were needed for domestic security; policies by both parties that weakened national security overall by making millions of people overseas hate America and Americans. All for the sake of supporting the donor class at the expense of the American people.

it's good as far as it goes, but leaves out more than half the story. Better to read Liz Cheney's new book or Stuart Stevens new book if you are looking for conservative truth. They are true American patriots who are willing to speak the truth and give up power in order to stand up for the constitution and American democracy and freedom.