Kurt Andersen Explains "Evil Geniuses"

[Music] that's what kind of struck me as you just articulated as I as I went through the first several chapters I kept thinking okay what's his sort of thesis what's his argument and you got all this information coming coming at the reader or The Listener in this case I listen to it on Audible but that's what struck me was uh it seems like that's the thesis of your book isn't it that there it's it's no secret that there's a v inequality between the wealthy the uber wealthy and the rest of Americans but that didn't happen by accident that was like you say it was a plot a plan what not a conspiracy theory but it was intentional it was it was orchestrated and intentional exactly right and of course it was a it was a strange place to go with this companion book to Fantasy Land because so much of fantasy L is about like most conspiracy theories are Preposterous don't you know really don't believe even you know yes there are some conspiracies but don't believe everyone that comes along and all that and and I and I part of me realized that my temperamental uh disbelief in conspiracy theories of the traditional nutty kind had kind of blinded me to the fact that there was this orchestrated deliberate uh you know campaign by the you know big business and and and right-wing billionaires and and and and you know Earnest libertarian zealots of various kind to to change America and to roll back what had been you know a very successful prosperous America that came out of the new deal so it was it was it was funny for essentially as as somebody as more than one person has said to be like hey you write it one book saying the conspiracy theories are bunch of nonsense and here then you're spending a whole book positing The Conspiracy Theory right it's all a conspiracy well you know and and and again it it part of what I think is important is and I at the end of the book I talk about you know the the problems of non-binary or the problems of binary thinking we should be more non-binary and and and that's true of this subject too right I mean that it's not either not a conspiracy or a total conspiracy it it it didn't just happen but it wasn't like eight guys in a room for 30 years you know like Mr Burns on The Simpsons or anything but as again there were more of those eight guys in the room scenes than I ever had any knowledge of yeah maybe Mr brunes was in there with Dracula practically everybody else you know excellent I'm a huge Simpsons fan so yeah I can resonate with that well it seems like you're talking about in the book that the groundwork sort of is laid in the 70s it's kind of enacted in the 80s and then really put into place in the 90s so by the time you come around to the last what 20 20 years this system is firmly embedded and one of the things you you keep saying is America has a political economy it's not just a quote economy is it in what way is it a political economy well all all everyone H all countries have political economies the problem with talking just about the economy is that it it has this neutral character like oh you know that there aren't political choices and policy decisions made all along the way about how much the wealth should be shared how high the tax rate should be how much you know private interest versus public interest where that balance should so all of those are are political choices and and so I think it and I think it's important for all of us to think of to think about the system in that way um that it's not just oh economics is economics and and that there is only one way even to organize is a free market capitalist system I mean as I explained there are many many very distinct flavors of that from the Nordic countries to the UK to America to Canada I mean it it's done differently so I think it's just it's important to and I and I and I make that point early on at the beginning of the book to say yeah it's it's politics it's not just it's not like the economics and the free market system are not like some some you know given piece of nature you know there are choices made and in every society the governments either democratically or not create the rules by which business happens and jobs are created or not and all that so you know that that's what I mean by political economy well and it strikes me that you're arguing in the book that these people I mean not these Mr Burns in a room somewhere but but there there were people no doubt about it that met in boardrooms and wherever that put together a strategy by which they could they could enact it politically because it wouldn't have happened it seems like you're saying in the book without certain political moves and legislation that then favored big business that tax cuts for the wealthy those things don't just happen by accident do they right no it was 100% And and see what I didn't know because I I should have been being paying closer attention but you know it to some degree it takes looking back in retrospect to see it but but okay I'm I'm 25 years old Ronald Reagan is elected president oh that's a big deal that's a big change but I I hadn't realized the degree to which it the the the the groundwork was really significantly built from 1970 on you know and and that's people don't know that very much that that it wasn't just oh Reagan came along we at him and we cut taxes and everything was about dcomics yeah yeah there was this building of this of this new paradigm and this counter establishment that took a Whole Decade and what as I lay out in the story you know at first in 19771 when uh liberalism and leftism and consumer um uh rights and all the rest were were still you know liberalism was still having its moment so and these a lot of these guys the the the the billionaires the CEOs thought my God we're going to be swept away in some kind of socialist Revolution 1970 oh oh and and so at first I I mean to be fair to them I guess even though they were hysterical uh that they really it was let's save ourselves we let's let's put up barriers to prevent this uh socialist transformation of United States and then that you know in a in a fair in a short matter of time in a few years that that was no longer happening you know by the mid 70s that that was not happening and Jimmy Carter was elected as a conservative Democrat really um so that at that point they decided wow this has worked well for a few years let's just keep going let's just keep pushing it let's see how far we can get to to make the the Franklin Roosevelt New Deal you know Social Security Medicare all of that stuff that is helped make dare I say it America great um uh oh dare dare yeah let let's see if we can roll that back and make that look Obsolete and and and and and because people have all all kinds of different PE American have all kinds of different reasons to be angry at the government especially coming off the late 60s right so let's the right said the Evil Genius has said let's try to focus that to help us like if you hate gun control good you can be part of our thing if you or you know if you uh uh don't like the the the local government taxing you too much with property taxes you're on our side so by by by having a long project of undermining trust in government which had already taken a couple of big blows but from Watergate and the Vietnam War they they they they they they were all about undermining trust in government such that their program which didn't they didn't care about abortion they didn't care about gun control they didn't care about all of that stuff that so many of their new supporters did they just wanted no regulation on business and taxes as low as possible on on themselves as individuals and their businesses which which was done you know in a in a auto you know taxes were cut by half after having from where they had been since the World War II so so so that's what happened and and then as you say I mean starting in the 70s too and I was aware of it at the time but again looking back I it's clearer to me Democrats in the United States were also uh starting to to talk about like Gary har who had you know became ran for Senate became a senator in the early '70s was saying oh the new deal that's that's old and obsolute we can't think about uh things that way anymore yeah unions they're oldfashioned we don't need unions anymore all of this so so by the time you know by the 90s certainly there was no difference effectively between most democratic politicians and most Republican politicians on on what were the you know the the the axiomatic principles of of of Economics so suddenly there are plenty of people who you know working people who For Whom the Democratic party had always been the party of the working man and woman uh no longer there was there was both of them both parties were were not didn't have their backs economically both neither party was really you know uh Affiliated strongly with the Trade union movement and on and on and on or you know so so it became a a political disaster it was then it could be well which which of these parties hates the same people you hate more oh you know and and for a lot of working white working people it was the Republicans the Republicans and and and the the the Democrats aren't going to help me economically Republicans probably aren't either but at least we hate the same people and 40 years later here we are [Music]