Click here to read the article “Proud Nation Disconnecting”  by Mike Masterson via the Arkansas Democrat Gazette, on Robert E. Hall’s latest book This Land of Strangers.

Excerpt:

Hall penned the book This Land of Strangers: The Relationship Crisis that Imperils Home, Work, Politics and Faith, in which he documents how we have steadily become a nation adrift whose citizens aren’t anchored in much that endures. From our relationships to our jobs, families, politics and even our organized faiths, words nowadays often trump our actions.

“We speak in the poetry of relationships—home, family, friends, community, colleagues, customers, fellow citizens and even brothers and sisters in faith,” Hall explained. “But we increasingly live in the prose of divorce, single-parent families, transient community, alienated employees and customers, partisan political discourse and religious divisiveness.”

… “(E)xtreme commercialism” has led us to put intangible aspects of life such as our reputations, influence and even our word up for sale. These are things “that have no business being monetized,” he said. “A purchased reputation isn’t reputable and purchased credibility isn’t credible.”