So Damn Much Money (eBook)
$13.99
Description
With a New Foreword
In So Damn Much Money, veteran Washington Post editor and correspondent Robert Kaiser gives a detailed account of how the boom in political lobbying since the 1970s has shaped American politics by empowering special interests, undermining effective legislation, and discouraging the country’s best citizens from serving in office. Kaiser traces this dramatic change in our political system through the colorful story of Gerald S. J. Cassidy, one of Washington’s most successful lobbyists. Superbly told, it’s an illuminating dissection of a political system badly in need of reform.
From the Trade Paperback edition.
About the Author
Robert G. Kaiser, with The Washington Post since 1963, has covered Congress, the White House, and national politics; reported from abroad as the Post’s correspondent in Saigon and Moscow; served as the paper’s national editor and managing editor; and is now associate editor and senior correspondent. He has written for Esquire, Foreign Affairs, and The New York Review of Books, and is the author or coauthor of six books, including Russia: The People and the Power.He has received awards from both the Overseas Press Club and the National Press Club. He lives in the town where he was born: Washington, D.C.
Praise for So Damn Much Money…
“With bold insight and telling detail, Robert G. Kaiser raises the curtain on Washington to reveal a tragic drama in which money triumphs over principle. Here, in a single book, is the reason why our politics must be transformed.”
-Robert B. Reich, former secretary of labor
“Bob Kaiser has written the real story of the breakdown of our political system. In the pages of this enormously important book, we can also glimpse a path toward reform–as a new president and Congress take office.”
-Carl Bernstein
“With the keen eye of a novelist and the precision of a social anthropologist, Bob Kaiser ventures deep into the alluring if soulless world of the archetypal Washington lobbyist and returns with a vivid and unforgettable story. In some ways, So Damn Much Money is the book Kaiser has prepared his entire career to write, and we are all the better for it.”
-David Maraniss, author, First in His Class
“So Damn Much Money tells you how Washington, D.C., really works. After over 40 years in Washington, Kaiser knows that if leaders lead from convictions and the people wake up to their power as citizens, we can still do great things in America.”
-Senator Bill Bradley
“So Much Damn Money is an accurate and frank description of how lobbyists and money have come to run Washington. It is very much in the spirit of the great muckraking books at the turn of the 20th century.”
-Representative Leon E. Panetta
"A colorful and well-reported saga of one superlobbyist and the web he was able to weave. A very timely book."
-Walter Isaacson, author, Kissinger: A Biography
“Bob Kaiser takes the reader past the clichés and caricatures of Washington, and tells a very human story. He leaves the reader with an understanding of how it is possible that American government has reached a point where it now struggles to meet our most basic challenges. Kaiser calls upon a deep understanding of Washington and a writer’s gift for telling a fascinating but true story. This is an important and compelling book.”
-Senator Chuck Hagel
“So Damn Much Money tells the story of how lobbyists and lobbying have hijacked American government and made Washington into an unexpected venue for getting rich. Well documented and fascinating.”
-Kevin Phillips, author, Bad Money
“Illuminating . . . Kaiser’s narrative skills are formidable. He can make a suspenseful story out of a twenty-five or thirty-year-old dustup over academic earmarks . . . But where So Damn Much Money really stands out is in the chapters that trace the broader trends that Cassidy’s rise represented . . . If the outlines of this squalid story are familiar, the details . . . still have the power to shock, and the corrosive influence of high-powered lobbying is clear.”
-Michael Tomasky, The New York Review of Books
“A timely and important read . . . The American people may not be pushing for reform of the appropriations method or the campaign finance system, but So Damn Much Money will at least show its readers why they should care. Kaiser brilliantly succeeds in illuminating the little-known ways that American policy is made, and how well-placed and well-connected people are able to profit from the holes in the American system.”
-Joshua Spivak, San Francisco Chronicle
“Fascinating . . . This book will help us understand national politics.”
-James Q. Wilson, The Washington Post
“Penetrating . . . Kaiser is right, and so is Barack Obama in his attempt to attenuate the corrosive links between lobbying and government.”
-Norman Ornstein, The New Republic
“Robert G. Kaiser’s new book could not be timelier . . . fascinating and well told.”
-John W. Dean, The Boston Globe
“The biography of Mr. Cassidy is a delight . . . The twists and turns in Mr. Cassidy’s career make for engrossing reading . . . Mr. Kaiser enlightens us when he shares the secrets behind a lobbyist’s success.”
-Matthew Continetti, The Wall Street Journal
“Kaiser knows the terrain . . . His portrayal of the lobbying boom will confirm what you probably already suspect: The craft’s practitioners operate just this side of bribery.”
-Andrew J. Glass, The New Leader
“Unusually good . . . [Kaiser is] an extremely fluent storyteller and an expert finder-outer . . . [So Damn Much Money] is a wonderfully complete and fair-minded account.”
-David Warsh, economicprincipals.com
“Eye-opening, and a key to understand how money works in Washington–for the most part, corruptly.”
-Kirkus
“In-depth and critical . . . Surely, Washington insiders will rush to bookstores to snatch up Kaiser’s detailed book . . . Let’s hope that some of those insiders in the brand-new administration pick upSo Damn Much Money and start addressing the problem.”
-Harry Levins, St. Louis Post-Dispatch
-Robert B. Reich, former secretary of labor
“Bob Kaiser has written the real story of the breakdown of our political system. In the pages of this enormously important book, we can also glimpse a path toward reform–as a new president and Congress take office.”
-Carl Bernstein
“With the keen eye of a novelist and the precision of a social anthropologist, Bob Kaiser ventures deep into the alluring if soulless world of the archetypal Washington lobbyist and returns with a vivid and unforgettable story. In some ways, So Damn Much Money is the book Kaiser has prepared his entire career to write, and we are all the better for it.”
-David Maraniss, author, First in His Class
“So Damn Much Money tells you how Washington, D.C., really works. After over 40 years in Washington, Kaiser knows that if leaders lead from convictions and the people wake up to their power as citizens, we can still do great things in America.”
-Senator Bill Bradley
“So Much Damn Money is an accurate and frank description of how lobbyists and money have come to run Washington. It is very much in the spirit of the great muckraking books at the turn of the 20th century.”
-Representative Leon E. Panetta
"A colorful and well-reported saga of one superlobbyist and the web he was able to weave. A very timely book."
-Walter Isaacson, author, Kissinger: A Biography
“Bob Kaiser takes the reader past the clichés and caricatures of Washington, and tells a very human story. He leaves the reader with an understanding of how it is possible that American government has reached a point where it now struggles to meet our most basic challenges. Kaiser calls upon a deep understanding of Washington and a writer’s gift for telling a fascinating but true story. This is an important and compelling book.”
-Senator Chuck Hagel
“So Damn Much Money tells the story of how lobbyists and lobbying have hijacked American government and made Washington into an unexpected venue for getting rich. Well documented and fascinating.”
-Kevin Phillips, author, Bad Money
“Illuminating . . . Kaiser’s narrative skills are formidable. He can make a suspenseful story out of a twenty-five or thirty-year-old dustup over academic earmarks . . . But where So Damn Much Money really stands out is in the chapters that trace the broader trends that Cassidy’s rise represented . . . If the outlines of this squalid story are familiar, the details . . . still have the power to shock, and the corrosive influence of high-powered lobbying is clear.”
-Michael Tomasky, The New York Review of Books
“A timely and important read . . . The American people may not be pushing for reform of the appropriations method or the campaign finance system, but So Damn Much Money will at least show its readers why they should care. Kaiser brilliantly succeeds in illuminating the little-known ways that American policy is made, and how well-placed and well-connected people are able to profit from the holes in the American system.”
-Joshua Spivak, San Francisco Chronicle
“Fascinating . . . This book will help us understand national politics.”
-James Q. Wilson, The Washington Post
“Penetrating . . . Kaiser is right, and so is Barack Obama in his attempt to attenuate the corrosive links between lobbying and government.”
-Norman Ornstein, The New Republic
“Robert G. Kaiser’s new book could not be timelier . . . fascinating and well told.”
-John W. Dean, The Boston Globe
“The biography of Mr. Cassidy is a delight . . . The twists and turns in Mr. Cassidy’s career make for engrossing reading . . . Mr. Kaiser enlightens us when he shares the secrets behind a lobbyist’s success.”
-Matthew Continetti, The Wall Street Journal
“Kaiser knows the terrain . . . His portrayal of the lobbying boom will confirm what you probably already suspect: The craft’s practitioners operate just this side of bribery.”
-Andrew J. Glass, The New Leader
“Unusually good . . . [Kaiser is] an extremely fluent storyteller and an expert finder-outer . . . [So Damn Much Money] is a wonderfully complete and fair-minded account.”
-David Warsh, economicprincipals.com
“Eye-opening, and a key to understand how money works in Washington–for the most part, corruptly.”
-Kirkus
“In-depth and critical . . . Surely, Washington insiders will rush to bookstores to snatch up Kaiser’s detailed book . . . Let’s hope that some of those insiders in the brand-new administration pick upSo Damn Much Money and start addressing the problem.”
-Harry Levins, St. Louis Post-Dispatch
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