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It is often postulated that the reintroduction of credit controls would be neither effective nor politically possible. Major changes have been implemented over the last eight years both in the way that financial markets work (domestically and internationally) and in the conduct of monetary policy. Controls over either the size of the balance sheets of financial institutions or the terms under which customers can obtain loans would seem to run totally counter to these developments. Does this rule them out completely?

"Will they do so again in 2020? Looking for answers, Muravchik and Shields lived in three such "flipped" blue communities, finding that these voters still like the Democratic Party, but it's not the party many of this book's readers will recognize. In these communities, some of the most beloved and longest-serving Democratic leaders are themselves Trumpian-grandiose, combative, thin-skinned, nepotistic. Indifferent to ideology, they promise to take care of "their people" by cutting deals-and corners if needed. Stressing loyalty, they often turn to family to fill critical political roles. Trump strikes a familiar figure to these communities, resembling an old-style Democratic boss. Although Trump's Democrats have often been pictured as racists, Muravchik and Shields find that their primary political allegiances are to their town or county-not racial identity. They will spend an extra dollar to patronize local businesses, and they think local jobs should go to their neighbors, not "foreigners" from neighboring counties-who are just as likely to be white and native-born. When these citizens turn their attention to the nation and their place in it, their thinking is informed by their sense of belonging in their town. Thus, America first reflects a way of imagining political community that resonates by analogy to the social and political life in the places they live. The good news for Democrats is that the appeal of Trump does not yet extend to the rest of the GOP. The Democratic Party can reclaim its historic place as the home of working and lower-middle-class Americans. The first step is to gain a better understanding of Trump's Democrats"--

The Christian Right is frequently accused of threatening democratic values. But in The Democratic Virtues of the Christian Right, Jon Shields argues that religious conservatives have in fact dramatically increased and improved democratic participation and that they are far more civil and reasonable than is commonly believed. Shields interviewed leaders of more than thirty Christian Right organizations, observed movement activists in six American cities, and analyzed a wide variety of survey data and movement media. His conclusions are surprising: the Christian Right has reinvigorated Americ

The Policy Conflict over allegations of sexual assault on college campuses has become a battle over rights. Conservatives worry about the rights of the accused in the hands of overzealous administrators, while liberals fear that those same officials might ignore the rights of victims by focusing on due process and thereby adding to the trauma of those who say they were assaulted. In broad legal terms, conservatives say that evidence against the accused should be 'clear and convincing,' while liberals favor a less demanding standard. This conflict is driven by radically different views of the rape problem itself. Conservatives are concerned that scarred and angry women might be leveling assault charges in the regretful wake of drunken hook-ups, while liberals insist that in such encounters, consent is rarely ii ever actually granted. Any successful approach to reducing sexual assault on campus will require the reconsideration of these very notions. Adapted from the source document.

Federal policies have made great progress protecting the environment. But the policies sometimes have imposed inordinate costs on local governments. Managing Green Mandates describes how various federal environmental directives do not suit diverse conditions at the local level, and compel local communities to spend their revenues on reducing relatively minor risks to the public health. While policymakers have thrown far-reaching requirements at the feet of local authorities, the federal government is providing them less aid to comply with the increasingly stringent standards. The burden of these underfunded mandates can further disadvantage many overtaxed municipalities. Pietro Nivola is a senior fellow in the Governmental Studies program at the Brookings Institution. He is the author of The Laws of the Landscape: How Politics Shape Cities in Europe and America (Brookings 1999). Jon Shields is a graduate student in the Department of Government and Foreign Affairs at the University of Virginia