Showing results by author "John A. Farrell"

What is the boy crisis? It's a crisis of education. For the first time in American history, our sons will have less education than their dads. It's a crisis of mental health. As boys become young men, their suicide rates go from equal to girls to six times that of young women. It's a crisis of sexuality. Sex is a minefield for our sons. They're bombarded with mixed messages, afraid of being either too sensitive or not sensitive enough.

Richard Nixon opens with young navy lieutenant "Nick" Nixon returning from the Pacific and setting his cap at Congress, an idealistic dreamer seeking to build a better world. Yet amid the turns of that now legendary 1946 campaign, Nixon's finer attributes quickly gave way to unapologetic ruthlessness. It is a stunning overture to John A. Farrell's magisterial portrait of a man who embodied postwar American cynicism.

Clarence Darrow is the lawyer every law school student dreams of being: on the side of right, loved by many women, played by Spencer Tracy in Inherit the Wind. His days-long closing arguments delivered without notes won miraculous reprieves for men doomed to hang.

These reflections by male inmates, recorded by a prison psychologist, are brief, sometimes only a few lines, but they offer profound insights into the realities of prison life. Some of the inmates are still bewildered that they gave up good opportunities and turned to crime; some fear that they may really like being in prison; others hope they will never return after being released, although they have not kept that vow in the past. Some come from families that abused or neglected them, and others had their every whim indulged.

John Farrell takes kids on a rhyming tour of the night sky, from A to Z, with facts about the wonders of space. From distant Andromeda, a galaxy made up of billions of stars, to the constellation of the zodiac, Farrell covers the high points of outer space. How do you find Jupiter or Venus? How does the Moon cause the tides of Earth's shores? How can you find the North Star, and why do all other stars seem to go around it? The answers to these and many other questions are contained in this beautiful volume of science that will delight a young listener's imagination.

Stephen Moore and Stephen Slivinski on Cato's fiscal policy report card on America's governors; Sen. John Sununu on the false allure of protectionism; Warren Farrell on the sacrifices men make for their larger paychecks; Krista Kafer on the growing culture of dependency in higher education; Rep. John Shadegg on legalizing interstate commerce in health insurance; and in this month's featured selection, William Shipman on managing costs and risk in personal retirement accounts.