The Wrecking Crew

Video Killed the Literary Star

Rick Perlstein — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 22:36:56 -0400

The part of Tom Frank's argument in The Wrecking Crew that really sticks to the ribs is geographical: how the wrecking of good government is written on the very face of the Washington D.C. metropolitan area. Here, he makes the argument visually, complete with a nifty Michael Moore moment:

Tom Frank Quote of the Day (morning)

Rick Perlstein — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 11:25:28 -0400

"To try to understand conservatism without taking into account its grounding in business though—to depict it as, say, the political style of an unusually pious nation or an extreme dedication to the principle of freedom—is like setting off to war with maps of the wrong country."

—The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule

Tom Frank Quote of the Day: Brownie's Law

Rick Perlstein — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 18:13:00 -0400

All this week I'll be featuring Tom Frank's new book The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule, which comes out next week and I've had the privilege to read. I'll start out with one of his most stunning finds, "A Plea for Inefficiency in Goverment," , a same-as-it-ever-as masterpiece published in 1928 by the magazine of the Chamber of Commerce. The speaker is Homer Ferguson, a military contractor and former head of the organization:

The best public servant is the worst one. A thoroughly first-rate man in public service is corrosive. He eats holes in our liberties. The better he is and the longer he stays the greater the danger. If he i an enthusiast—a birhgt-eyed madman who is frantic to make this the finiest government in the world—the black plague is a housepet by comparison.

Here was Lyn Nofziger's version of same from 1981: "We have told members of the Cabinet we expect them to help us place people who are competnent. As far as I'm concerned, anyone who supported Reagan is competent."