Daily Show: Wilmore – Mark Twain Controversy

Instead of replacing the n-word in “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” Larry Wilmore believes it should be emphasized. You?

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Does removing the n-word make Huckleberry Finn more palatable for school kids? Or is it censorship?

Ralph Nader will always be remembered by his critics as the man whose bid for the White House in 2000 gave us eight years of George W. Bush. The disdain many liberals have for Nader still runs deep nearly a decade later. I wrote a version of this story for Gambit Weekly back when under the headline: Testing the Environment.

But according to my friend Jason Leopold, there’s no denying the positive impact Nader’s activism has had on this country over the past half-century. Without Ralph Nader there wouldn’t be an Environmental Protection Agency, an Occupational Safety and Health Administration, a Consumer Product Safety Commission, a Safe Drinking Water Act and so on. He has a new novel out called Only the Rich Can Save Us.

Jason Leopold interviews Ralph Nader about his new book…

There’s a new book out called Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future, coauthored by a young marine scientist named Sheril Kirshenbaum. You can find much more info at the book website.
In Unscientific America we explain how religious ideologues,
science-phobic politicians, a profit-driven media, and
hyperspecialized scientists have all helped create a dangerous state
of affairs–one in which we find a vast gap between the world of
science and the U.S. public.

Some alarming facts: For every five hours of cable news, less than a
minute is devoted to science; 46 percent of Americans reject evolution and think the Earth is less than 10,000 years old; the number of newspapers with weekly science sections has shrunken by two-thirds in recent years. The public is polarized over climate change and in dangerous retreat from childhood vaccinations. Meanwhile, only 18 percent of Americans know a scientist personally; more than half can’t name a living scientist role model.

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Malcolm Gladwell’s goal is to adjust our understanding of how people get to where they are. It is a fascinating account of a question I have pondered myself as a journalist and academic. Instead of the Horatio Alger story of success – a gifted child who through heroic striving within a meritocratic system becomes a successful (rich, famous, fill in your life goal here) adult – Outliers tells a story about the context in which success takes place: family, culture, friendship, childhood, accidents of birth and history and geography.

Here’s Time magazine’s review:
Outliers: Malcolm Gladwell’s Success Story