Our economic situation, political discourse, and future prospects have gotten much worse since a guy brought a sign that said SHIT IS FUCKED UP AND BULLSHIT to the Occupy Wall Street protests at Zuccotti Park. We all knew what he meant . . . but where are we now? And how did we get here?

Malcolm Harris, one of our most exciting young cultural critics, takes on these questions, examnining everything from how we've become complicit in lowering the bar for what counts as prosperity; to how we sacrificed privacy so casually we didn't even notice; to the higher education financial bubble that is about to burst.

But these funny, voice-driven essays remind us to laugh at the absurdity of all: he cops to being the guy who tricked protestors into thinking Radiohead was playing Occupy Wall Street; he demonstrates how uncannily the Ikea catalog now reflects our worldview; and he assures us Marx saw the necessity of a crisis moment just like the one we're in.

This wide-ranging look at the mess we're in shows a versitile cultural critic at the height of his powers.