So Damn Much Money
JK 1118 .K35 2009
The life story of Washington lobbyist Gerald Cassidy is used to “illuminate how Washington has changed over the past three decades” in this bleak but informative book. Kaiser, an associate editor at the Washington Post, traces the ascendance of Cassidy, from his rough childhood in the 1950s to the incorporation of his lobbying firm, a pioneer in winning congressional earmarks for its clients, which Cassidy cofounded with Kenneth Schlossberg in 1975. The relationship between the two partners was dissolved in 1984, but Cassidy continued to build what became one of the most powerful and wealthy firms in the industry before it slipped from its vanguard status in the last few years. The author also lays out a larger history of influence peddling in federal politics, stretching back to the Civil War era, and examines the evolution of today’s “permanent campaigns.” The author’s gestures to a broader historical narrative-often in alternating chapters-sometimes distract from his nuanced examination of the rise and decline of Cassidy and Associates, but Kaiser manages to vividly elaborate the firm’s history while placing it in the context of a degenerating political culture.
©2009 Publishers Weekly.
The Great Financial Crisis: Causes and Consequences
HB 3722 .F66 2009
In this timely and thorough analysis of the current financial crisis, Foster and Magdoff explore its roots and the radical changes that might be undertaken in response. With a foray into the Great Depression of the 1930s, they move to the present situation, born out of the housing bubble, the wider explosion of debt and the problem of financialization of capital. They survey the long-term implications and the larger political-economic aspects of the crisis to propose that the crisis raises questions that are primarily political rather than economic. They suggest that society will eventually conclude that our fatally unstable political-economic structure should be replaced with one of social use rather than private gain-a more humane order geared to collective needs. This book makes a valuable contribution to the ongoing examination of our current debt crisis, one that deserves our full attention.
©2009 Publishers Weekly.
