Free Republic

The coronavirus is bringing about a strange revival of neighborhood life, which has been atrophying for a half-century. We should pay attention. Something unexpected has happened to neighborhoods across the country in the wake of coronavirus lockdowns and business closures: they’re coming to life.With schools and restaurants closed, and a huge swath of the workforce stuck at home either working remotely or not working at all, usually quiet and empty neighborhoods are suddenly bustling. Patterns of life and work that have become entrenched in American society over the past half-decade—kids in school and both parents away at jobs during...

Who: “Bowling Alone” author, Robert D. Putnam, When: yesterday, May 14th, 2015 Where: at a T.B. Fordham (education think tank) event promoting his latest book, “The American Dream in Crisis,” What: stated the following, “There’s a presidential candidate who yesterday quoted me as saying that therefore, he’s quoting me as saying, all black men are sexual predators. I’m not going to say who it is…” http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpsfmR2uHvU 23:06 This morning, May 15, 2015, at 6:30 PDT, a Bing search on “Robert Putnam all black men are sexual predators” returns at the top a Newsmax article (http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Rick-Santorum-sexual-predators-father-children/2015/05/13/id/644450/), “Santorum Slams Men Having Kids...

<p>My hometown — Port Clinton, Ohio, population 6,050 — was in the 1950s a passable embodiment of the American dream, a place that offered decent opportunity for the children of bankers and factory workers alike.</p> <p>But a half-century later, wealthy kids park BMW convertibles in the Port Clinton High School lot next to decrepit “junkers” in which homeless classmates live. The American dream has morphed into a split-screen American nightmare. And the story of this small town, and the divergent destinies of its children, turns out to be sadly representative of America.</p>

Americans worked a median of 52 hours last year without pay. They’re called volunteers. Many organizations can’t survive without unpaid labor, and many people are glad to provide it. Sadly, though, data released Wednesday by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics show that both the number of volunteers and the volunteer rate — the percentage of the population that volunteers — declined in 2007 from 2006. Volunteering also had fallen in 2006 from 2005. About 60.8 million Americans, age 16 and up, volunteered in 2007, compared with a high of 65.3 million in 2005. The proportion of that population that...

Ethnic diversity's rocky road http://www.summitdaily.com/article/20070827/COLUMNS/70827008 BY MORGAN LIDDICK And On the Right August 27, 2007 If you’re a damn-the-torpedoes Multiculturalist, better fasten your seat belt. Things are about to get bumpy. A few weeks ago Robert Putnam, the Harvard researcher who wrote “Bowling Alone,” a book about the weakening social fabric of the United States, released the results of his new research on the effects of multiculturalism, a doctrine which he had long promoted. They aren’t encouraging. Putnam has been working on his new project for about five years, and hesitated to bring his results into the public eye, so...

… That is not as catastrophic as it sounds When Robert Putnam, a Harvard University sociologist, visited Downing Street three years ago, he said exactly what the government wanted to hear. In his influential book “Bowling Alone”, Mr Putnam had argued that communities were getting more fragmented and mistrustful — in the jargon, they were haemorrhaging social capital. Happily, though, a committed government could staunch the flow with clever social initiatives. People could be persuaded to trust one another, which would make them healthier, happier and less criminal to boot. Less back-slapping will occur during Mr Putnam's return visit next...