This gathering of essays by the maverick social observer Bruce Jackson

        will stir memories, give insights, and provoke strong reactions. Selections

        range freely over a wide spectrum of American social conditions, public

        policy, and crime and punishment issues from the mid-1960s to the present.

        The essays remain remarkably fresh and crucially central to issues in

        contemporary American society. They will appeal to the general reader

        as well as to readers with more specialized interests in the criminal

        justice system and social policy.