"Follow the Money"
- Deep Throat to Bob Woodward
Shake off the cobwebs of 19th century American history and out fall today's crony-capitalists. Andrew Carnegie's biographer draws a direct line from the infamous "robber barons" to today's Republican crony-capitalists. There are Democratic crony-capitalists, too, but the lineage is different.
I've learned a lot from Andrew Carnegie, thanks to David Nasaw. Forget the rugged individualism and self-made men we've been told shaped industrial America. At least Carnegie was candid about how he got to be perhaps the richest man in the world: government contracts and high tariffs. Then, as now, politicians beholden to the richest delivered both. And the golden-age-of-free-market-capitalism? never happened. Professor Nasaw says unequivocally it's always been a myth and laissez-faire economics was never laissez-faire. I get it. Government contracts and high tariffs.
Yes, the excesses of the robber barons eventually were somewhat blunted. They receded. They did not go away. Now the crony-capitalists are back in full looter mode. Why? Because we've allowed kleptocrats to undo the legislative and regulatory constraints we, the people, finally demanded.
I want to call de-regulation and the gutting of regulatory agencies what it is. A fraud. Republicans simply re-opened -- wide -- the doors to the trough. What about all the talk about providing a level playing field? Just that. Talk. Once more: government contracts and high tariffs. Substitute "subsidies" for "high tariffs" and the model still fits.
The good news is that we are now hearing from forthright and meticulous historians like David Nasaw. They can help us understand mistakes and their consequences. Government policy often defines who gets how much of what. That policy should be set with history in full view. We know how to create a viable future. It's the will we lack.
Carnegie's experience demonstrates what happens when the fix is in. "Ike" sounded the alarm about the military-industrial complex. As an unfavorite former Senator from my home state of Illinois apocryphally said, "A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking real money." Update "billion" to "trillion" and ask yourself about the fiscal sink-hole that is Iraq. Follow the money.
We've welcomed hundreds of Guests to our Show for over a decade, people with the courage to take us places a free people need to explore to create a vibrant future. You'll find many of them, including Professor David Nasaw, author of Andrew Carnegie, at our website http://www.PaulaGordon.com.
* - from the final verse of "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?" -- words and music by Pete Seeger