My review of "The Shock Doctrine"

A must-read!, review originally written on April 12, 2008

"The Shock Doctrine", by Naomi Klein, is a must-read for anyone who wants to get a clearer picture about what the US has done in Iraq relating to the 2003 invasion, from an economic perspective. The book begins decades before, from the lens of Milton Friedman and his advocates' approach to laissez faire, free-trade corporatist economics and government's role in making it happen.

She does seem to come from a viewpoint as seeing free trade, etc mostly just punishing the less fortunate. It should be noted that Milton Friedman did advocate a negative income tax to replace welfare. So, it is not that he and some of his advocates are either totally misguided or heartless. However, there are indeed excesses by many in powerful positions who really are either misguided or heartless or both.

From tsunamis to Hurricane Katrina to changes in government in Chile, the Soviet Union, Argentina, etc and the 'shock and awe' in Iraq, there are people with power who either wait for or effect some cataclysm to panic everyday people to accept what is really not in their best interest and looks to reward the well-connected.

I'll just mention a few things from the book which come to mind and I feel noteworthy:

1. The author uses the term, 'useful crisis', like with the Canadian debt crisis in the 90's, to create a sense of panic to justify potential cuts to social programs. This term is appropriate in generalizing what has happened around the world in different situations.

2. Donald Rumsfeld was a board member of ASEA Brown Boveri, the Swiss firm that sold nuclear technology to North Korea. Interesting!

3. Rumsfeld was Chairman of the Board of Gilead Sciences, maker of Tamiflu, the preferred treatment for bird flu, setting up Gilead to make tons of money as the government which he became a part of, then stockpiled the drug while Americans were warned of a possible mass outbreak of the disease. When Rumsfeld left the government, the value of the Gilead stock he still owned had gone up 807%. Interesting!

4. The 2006 Defense Authorization Act grants the president the power to employ the armed forces, overriding the wishes of state governments during a 'public emergency' which could include hurricane, mass protest or public health situation. Previously, the president could only invoke martial law in case of insurrection.

5. US orchestrated foreign coups seeking to protect corporate favorites, can sometimes try to sell the coup because the country is being alien to Americans simply because it is alien to an American company and thereby trying to undermine the US.

6. Paul Bremer, given the responsibility to remake Iraq, enacted a 15% flat tax and allowed foreign companies to own 100% of the profits in Iraq, not re-invest in Iraq and not be taxed. Plus, 40 year leases for foreign investors so any future Iraqi governments would be stuck with the deals.

7. The author reminds the reader of what the political scientist, Michael Wolf, had to say that conservatives never govern well because they believe that government, itself, is bad. Surely not always true, but it is certainly a thought to keep in mind when evaluating a conservative candidate for office.

8. The White House ignored most of the Iraq Study Group's recommendations except to now allow companies like Shell and BP to get long oil leases and keep most of the profits, effectively keeping millions of Iraqis in perpetual poverty.

This book is well documented with references and definitely a must-read.