Democracy Café

I had the great pleasure and honor of picking the brain of the celebrated, award-winning journalist and author James Fallows, who with his wife Deborah co-scribed Our Towns: A 100,000 Mile Journey into the Heart of America. It is a sumptuous read, as sweeping as it is intimate. I can't recommend it highly enough; it is that absorbing and insightful. As Jim eloquently shares with me, the American affinity for affiliation, for organization, for association still thrives "more than we expected and more than many would expect." Tocqueville himself likely would be most pleased that "the agglutinative nature of the American people," as Jim puts it, remains as singularly distinctive and inventive as ever, at least among the communities that he and Deborah visited. Be sure also to visit the website OurTownsBook.com Now, listen in as Jim recounts their fascinating years-long journey via prop plane that Jim piloted across an America that still 'works.' [And I apologize that it's a bit echo-y on my end, but I