Throw Them All Out

by Schweizer, Peter

• ISBN13: 9780547970165
• ISBN10: 0547970161
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2012-08-07
• Publisher: Mariner Books

Summary

How is it that politicians often enter office with relatively modest assets, yet then, as investors, regularly beat the market and sometimes beat the most rapacious hedge funds? How is it that billionaires and hedge fund managers often make well-timed investment decisions that anticipate events in Washington? Welcome to crony capitalism. In this timely book, Peter Schweizer exposes Washington's epidemic of "honest graft." Members of Congress trade stocks based on privileged information. They insert earmarks into bills to improve their own real estate holdings. Campaign contributors receive billions in federal grants. And it's all perfectly legal. Throw Them All Out, now with a new Afterword, casts light into the darkest corners of the political system and offers ways to clean house.

Author Biography

Peter Schweizer is the William J. Casey Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He is also president of the Government Accountability Institute, an organization he launched to research and investigate crony capitalism. His books have been translated into eleven languages and include Do As I Say (Not As I Do)Reagans War, and Architects of Ruin. He lives in Florida with his wife and children.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	p. xi
Introduction	p. xiii
Congressional Cronies
The Drag Trade	p. 3
Crisis for All, Opportunity for Some	p. 23
IPOs: Invest in Politicians Often	p. 40
This Land Is My Land	p. 51
Capitalist Cronies
Spreading the Wealth … to Billionaires	p. 75
Warren Buffett: Baptist and Bootlegger	p. 105
Cronies on Parade: Hedge Funds, Defense Contractors, Colleges, Big Oil … and George Soros	p. 120
Breaking the Back of Crony Capitalism
Some Are More Equal Than Others	p. 137
Why This Matters	p. 151
What Needs to Be Done	p. 167
Notes	p. 179
Acknowledgments	p. 195
Index	p. 199
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