UDM Libraries Book of the Week

by George C. Browder

The abbreviation “Nazi,” the acronym “Gestapo,” and the initials “SS” have become resonant elements of our vocabulary. Less known is “SD,” and hardly anyone recognizes the combination “Sipo and SD.” Although Sipo and SD formed the heart of the National Socialist police state, the phrase carries none of the ominous impact that it should.
Although no single organization carries full responsibility for the evils of the Third Reich, the SS-police system was the executor of terrorism and “population policy” in the same way the military carried out the Reich’s imperialistic aggression. Within the police state, even the concentration camps could not rival the impact of Sipo and SD. It was the source not only of the “desk murderers” who administered terror and genocide by assigning victims to the camps, but also of the police executives for identification and arrest, and of the command and staff for a major instrument of execution, the Einsatzgruppen.
Foundations of the Nazi Police State offers the narrative and analysis of the external struggle that created Sipo and SD. This book is the author’s preface to his discussion of the internal evolution of these organizations in Hitler’s Enforcers: The Gestapo and the SS Security Service in the Nazi Revolution.

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by Mehrsa Baradaran

The United States has two separate banking systems today―one serving the well-to-do and another exploiting everyone else. How the Other Half Banks contributes to the growing conversation on American inequality by highlighting one of its prime causes: unequal credit. Mehrsa Baradaran examines how a significant portion of the population, deserted by banks, is forced to wander through a Wild West of payday lenders and check-cashing services to cover emergency expenses and pay for necessities―all thanks to deregulation that began in the 1970s and continues decades later.

In an age of corporate megabanks with trillions of dollars in assets, it is easy to forget that America’s banking system was originally created as a public service. Banks have always relied on credit from the federal government, provided on favorable terms so that they could issue low-interest loans. But as banks grew in size and political influence, they shed their social contract with the American people, demanding to be treated as a private industry free from any public-serving responsibility. They abandoned less profitable, low-income customers in favor of wealthier clients and high-yield investments. Fringe lenders stepped in to fill the void. This two-tier banking system has become even more unequal since the 2008 financial crisis.

Baradaran proposes a solution: reenlisting the U.S. Post Office in its historic function of providing bank services. The post office played an important but largely forgotten role in the creation of American democracy, and it could be deployed again to level the field of financial opportunity.

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by Russ Shafer-Landau

In The Fundamentals of Ethics, Third Edition, author Russ Shafer-Landau employs a uniquely engaging writing style to introduce students to the essential ideas of moral philosophy. Offering more comprehensive coverage of the good life, normative ethics, and metaethics than any other text of its kind, this book also addresses issues that are often omitted from other texts, such as the doctrine of doing and allowing, the doctrine of double effect, ethical particularism, the desire-satisfaction theory of well-being, and moral error theory. Shafer-Landau carefully reconstructs and analyzes dozens of arguments in depth, at a level that is understandable to students with no prior philosophical background. The text is supplemented by an online Instructor’s Manual and Computerized Test Bank and a Companion Website with student self-quizzes and additional resources.

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Irwin Kirsch; Henry Braun

Across the country, our children are beginning life from very different starting points. Some have aspirations and believe they can be achieved. For too many others, aspirations are tempered, if not dashed, by the sobering realities of everyday life. These different starting points place children on distinctly different trajectories of growth and development, ultimately leading to vastly different adult outcomes.