A Book with Shocking IMPACT

Many books have been instrumental in affecting and changing my perspective on the world and who I am. I remember fondly the early years of reading the whimsical and lyrical works of Ted “Dr. Seuss” Geisell to the canon of great literature I read in high school from Charles Dickens to Mark Twain to Kurt Vonnegut. Fiction was and continues to be part of the way I view the world since I also like tell stories through narrative fiction. It is through fiction that I can escape from the depressing realities that confront us each day, and go into a fictional world that may engage in its own set of depressing or humorous conventions, such as A Confederacy of Dunces and Catch-22.

These days, my reading habits are more focused on works of non-fiction and engaging the world I live in with information that helps me make sense of the world. Last year I heard an interview with Naomi Klein on Progressive Talk Radio on her new book: The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. This book looks at the economic philosophy of the Milton Friedman Chicago School of Laissez faire economics and Naomi Klein puts that philosophy in context to both natural and manmade disasters around the world. Milton Friedman was also a subscriber to Ayn Rand and her "Objectivist" vision regarding limited government in order to unregulate the forces of capital. While I was familiar with the manmade disasters of CIA coups in Iran in 1953, Honduras in the 50s and last year, Chile in 1973, Iraq invasion 2002, coup in Haiti 2004 and 2009, I was not familiar with a particular socio/economic model of the Chicago school. This was a real eye opener that made me understand that unstable societies that have had either political or natural disasters such as New Orleans 2005 are ripe for the privatization of land and resources by private companies. Naomi uses the metaphor of multinational corporations as “vultures” that circle the carcass of vulnerable nations. The vultures wait for the right moment to dive in and privatize the common natural resources and industries of the vulnerable nation. This is the “shock” that Naomi talks about since the citizens of the country have no idea what just hit them. The companies, whether they be AT&T, ITT, Halliburton, KBR, Dynecorp, Blackwater (XE), etc. quickly seek to reap major profits over the shocked citizens.

While The Shock Doctrine may sound like a conspiracy novel, it is completely sourced with facts and brings the reader to an understanding that while the corporate charter is “profits at any cost,” the people will continue to lose. Naomi Klein only brings this to light in the systematic approach by the purveyors of the Milton Friedman/ Ayn Rand Chicago School. While the Chicago School is the theoretical and political arm of “objectivism,” we can take that “theoretical” school and see the practice of “objectivism” through the School of the Americas (now called the Western Hemisphere Institute of Security Cooperation in Ft. Benning, Georgia). This government institution of “We the People” is a training ground for insurgent forces of torture who help the Shock Doctrine make way for private industry. While these schools of “thought” are best hidden from the consciousness of public inquiry, many poor people in developing countries continue to be victims of what should be known as the Schools of Organized Crime.

Overall, The Shock Doctrine has been a valuable resource to me in my writing and my understanding of the pathology that goes into a philosophy based upon profit driven motives at the cost of human degradation. I also recommend another great book I read called Unequal Protection: The Rise of Corporate Dominance and the Theft of Human Rights by Thom Hartmann which gets into the history of corporate "personhood."