The Economic Hitmen

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A great illustration on how corporations take control of countries, and how capitalism drives the expansion of the Military Industrial Complex.

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“Confessions of an Economic Hit Man” By John Perkins

(Reviewed by Jana L. Perskie,  FEB 19, 2005)

In his former life as an economic hit man, he was on the front lines both as an observer and a perpetrator of events, once confined only to the third world, that have now sent the United States—and in fact the entire planet—spiraling toward disaster. Here, Perkins pulls back the curtain on the real cause of the current global financial meltdown. He shows how we’ve been hoodwinked by the CEOs who run the corporatocracy—those few corporations that control the vast amounts of capital, land, and resources around the globe—and the politicians they manipulate.

These corporate fat cats, Perkins explains, have sold us all on what he calls predatory capitalism, a misguided form of geopolitics and capitalism that encourages a widespread exploitation of the many to benefit a small number of the already very wealthy. Their arrogance, gluttony, and mismanagement have brought us to this perilous edge. The solution is not a “return to normal.”

But there is a way out. As Perkins makes clear, we can create a healthy economy that will encourage businesses to act responsibly, not only in the interests of their shareholders and corporate partners (and the lobbyists they have in their pockets), but in the interests of their employees, their customers, the environment, and society at large.

We can create a society that fosters a just, sustainable, and safe world for us and our children. Each one of us makes these choices every day, in ways that are clearly spelled out in this book. “We hold the power,” he says, “if only we recognize it.” Hoodwinked is a powerful polemic that shows not only how we arrived at this precarious point in our history but also what we must do to stop the global tailspin. From the Hardcover edition.

Source: http://www.kobobooks.com/

Excerpts from the Book: 

“This is what we EHMS, (economic hitmen), do best: we build a global empire. we are an elite group of men and women who utilize international financial organizations to foment conditions that make other nations subservient to the corporatocracy running our biggest corporations, our government and our banks. Like our counterparts in the mafia, EHMS provide favors. These take the form of loans to develop infrastructure, electric generating plants, highways, ports, airports, or industrial parks. a condition of such loans is that engineering and construction companies from our own country must build all these projects. in essence, most of the money never leaves the United States; it is simply transferred from banking offices in Washington to engineering offices in New York, Houston or San Francisco.”

“Despite the fact that the money is returned almost immediately to corporations who are members of the corporatocracy (the creditor), the recipient country is required to pay it all back, principle plus interest. if an EHM is completely successful, the loans are so large that the debtor is forced to default on its payments after a few years. When this happens, then like the mafia, we demand our own pound of flesh. This often includes one or more of the following: control over United Nations votes, the installation of military bases, or access to precious resources such as oil or the panama canal. of course, the debtor still owes us the money and another country is added to our global empire.”