Rose Aguilar reads from "Red Highways"

Tired of simplistic media stereotypes and speaking only to like-minded people, San Francisco radio journalist Rose Aguilar quit her job, bought a Toyota van, and took off on a six-month road trip through southern and mountain states. There she interviewed a wide array of people who rarely, if ever, appear in the national media. They include a former Republican evangelical pastor who now preaches inclusion in Tulsa; anti-war, pro-choice, and green Republicans; and a Montana hunter planning to leave his job as a conservationist to fight for gay rights. This political travelogue challenges stereotypes and goes far beyond the sound bites and statistics to reveal what "red-state" voters really care about and what they expect from their political leaders.

Sections include:

*Domestic Violence Changed My Politics
*The Last Abortion Clinic in Mississippi
*Conflicted Christians
*Who Supports the Troops?
*Segregated Sundays
*Overworked and Underpaid
*Off the Front Lines and Forgotten
*Green Republicans
*From Poverty to Politics

About the author:

Rose Aguilar is a radio host and journalist from San Francisco. She is a contributor to the book Red State Rebels: Tales of Grassroots Resistance in the Heartland. She hosts Your Call, a daily public affairs radio show on NPR-affiliate KALW 91.7 FM, writes for Alternet.org, and offers political analysis for the BBC.

Your Call airs weekdays from 11 am – noon PST on KALW 91.7 FM in San Francisco and KUSP 88.9 FM in Santa Cruz:
http://www.yourcallradio.org/

“Red Highways is riveting -- I could not put it down. Alive with the voices of real people, it is both heartening and heart wrenching, both enraging and inspiring, full of insights and information. If you want to understand our country, and care about its future, read this book!”
-Riane Eisler, author of The Real Wealth of Nations and The Chalice and The Blade

“Red Highways takes us out of our personal 'Green Zones' to taste the diverse complexity of so-called conservative states, and challenges stereotypes reinforced by the corporate media. For mindless drivel from a pundit, watch CNN; for a clear view of what people of various political ideologies in the U.S. want, think, and believe, read this book.”
-Dahr Jamail, author of Beyond the Green Zone: Dispatches from an Unembedded Journalist in Occupied Iraq

“Straight-ahead reporting on a road trip into the heart of Red State America for urban liberals who cannot (or dare not) make the tour themselves. Full of surprises.”
-Joe Bageant, author of Deer Hunting with Jesus: Dispatches from America’s Class War

“The ‘red’ state of Idaho is a hotbed of opposition to the Patriot Act. The ‘blue’ state of Connecticut sends ardent backers of the war in Iraq to Congress. America is neither so red as Republicans would imagine, nor so blue as Democrats hope. It is, in fact, a rich, complicated, at times frightening, at times reassuring shade of purple that Rose Aguilar captures not with the jaundiced eye of a political commentator but with the nuance of a novelist.”
-John Nichols, political writer, The Nation

“Red Highways is a trip through the USA’s byways, far beyond what the author calls “the media’s obsession with stereotypes.” Rose Aguilar takes us along as the rubber meets the road—and guides us through a remarkable quest for human substance instead of media clichés.”
-Norman Solomon, author of Made Love, Got War: Close Encounters with America’s Warfare State

“Rose Aguilar brings curiosity and compassion to this beautiful story of a diehard liberal’s journey into the soul of middle America.”
-Harvard University Professor Linda Bilmes, co-author of The Three Trillion Dollar War