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Was the financial collapse caused by free-market capitalism and deregulation run amok, as liberals claim? Not on your life, says Peter Schweizer. What we are really witnessing is a massive failure of social engineering by liberals.
Architects of Ruin, bestselling author Peter Schweizer describes in riveting detail how a coalition of left-wing activists, liberal politicians, and "do-good capitalists" on Wall Street leveraged government power to achieve their goal of broadening homeownership among minorities and the poor. The results were not only devastating to the economy, but hurt the very people they were supposedly trying to help.
The story begins in the 1960s with Saul Alinsky, the legendary Chicago rabble-rouser who trained his acolytes in highly aggressive techniques of community activism. Alinsky's disciples—along with race-baiting activists like Jesse Jackson—seized on the "redlining" controversy of those years to argue that banks were guilty of racial discrimination. In the 1970s, with the help of liberal senators like Ted Kennedy and William Proxmire, legislation was passed that put bankers under the thumb of local activists.
In the Clinton years, a new generation of liberal technocrats came to power in Washington and on Wall Street. Schweizer describes how a powerful phalanx of elite liberals, including Bill Clinton, Robert Rubin, Andrew Cuomo, Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, Janet Reno, Deval Patrick, Henry Cisneros, Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Ted Kennedy, Charles Schumer, and many others, aggressively pushed banks to make trillions of dollars in loans to individuals who should never have received them.
Meanwhile, Clinton forged a new form of state capitalism in which the big Wall Street financial companies were repeatedly bailed out—with their profits intact—from a series of costly errors, leading them to take ever larger risks. Both financial policies had profoundly distorting effects. The result was the bursting of twin bubbles in mortgages and mortgage-backed derivatives, in turn leading to a global economic collapse.
This tale of liberal "Robin Hood capitalism run wild" has never been told. But more than just a story about the past, it is also an urgent warning about the future. For today, the very same people who planted the seeds of the collapse are back in Washington, tasked with cleaning up the mess and determined to use the crisis they caused as cover for a massive overhaul of the American economic system.
These people have learned nothing from their past mistakes and are busy applying the same methods to other sectors of the economy—health care, the auto industry, real estate (again!), and above all the promotion of "green" technologies—inflating bubbles that are sure to bring about another crisis. Ordinary Americans who foot the bill for the last state-capit alist bubble have reason to be afraid—very afraid—of the inevitable result.
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Biography
Peter is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. A former consultant to NBC News, he also served as a member of the Ultraterrorism Study Group at the U.S. Government’s Sandia National Laboratory.
His books have been translated into eleven languages. His most recent work is DO AS I SAY (NOT AS I DO): PROFILES IN LIBERAL HYPOCRISY (Doubleday, October 2005). The book spent eight weeks on the New York Times bestsellers list. The Economist magazine called it the ninth biggest selling political book on the entire planet in November 2005.
Other books include THE BUSHES: PORTRAIT OF A DYNASTY(Doubleday, 2004/Anchor, 2005) which the New York Times called “the best” of the books on the Bush family, and REAGAN'S WAR: THE EPIC STORY OF HIS FORTY YEAR STRUGGLE AND FINAL TRIUMPH OVER COMMUNISM (Doubleday, 2002/Anchor 2003). "A rousing and compelling case that Reagan's personal and political odyssey...was central to bringing down the 'evil empire,'" said the Los Angeles Times in its review.
His first novel, CHAIN OF COMMAND (co-authored with Caspar Weinberger), was released by Simon and Schuster in June 2005. Publisher’s Weekly, in a starred review, called it a “ debut political thriller crackling with a chilling authenticity and riveting dirty dealing…Weinberger and Schweizer have delivered a superbly paced, tightly plowed winner.”
Peter is Executive Producer of “In the Face of Evil” an epic documentary based on his book Reagan’s War. The New York Post declared it “The must-see movie of the season…disturbing and deeply moving.” Winner of the 2004 Liberty Film Festival, the movie is now available of DVD.
His written work has appeared in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, National Review, Foreign Affairs, and elsewhere. He has spoken before dozens of corporate audiences including Amoco, Arthur Anderson, the Independent Petroleum Association of America, as well as numerous student groups including Young America’s Foundation, University of Virginia, and Florida State University.
He has appeared on ABC News, NBC News, CBS News, Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, CNBC and the BBC.
Peter received his M.Phil. from Oxford University and his B.A. from George Washington University. He lives in Florida with his wife Rochelle and their son and daughter.