Editor Reviews:

Product Description:
The bestselling author reveals how the U.S. financial sector has hijacked our economy and put America’s global future at risk

In American Theocracy, Kevin Phillips warned us of the perilous interaction of debt, financial recklessness, and the increasing cost of scarce oil. The current housing and mortgage debacle is proof once more of Phillips’s prescience, and only the first harbinger of a national crisis. In Bad Money, Phillips describes the consequences of our misguided economic policies, our mounting debt, our collapsing housing market, our threatened oil, and the end of American domination of world markets. America’s current challenges (and failures) run striking parallels to the decline of previous leading world economic powers—especially the Dutch and British. Global overreach, worn-out politics, excessive debt, and exhausted energy regimes are all chilling signals that the United States is crumbling as the world superpower.

“Bad money” refers to a new phenomenon in wayward megafinance—the emergence of a U.S. economy that is globally dependent and dominated by hubris-driven financial services. Also “bad” are the risk miscalculations and strategic abuses of new multitrillion-dollar products such as asset-backed securities and the lure of buccaneering vehicles like hedge funds. Finally, the U.S. dollar has been turned into bad money as it has weakened and become vulnerable to the world’s other currencies. In all these ways, “bad” finance has failed the American people and pointed U.S. capitalism toward a global crisis. Bad Money is the perfect follow- up to Phillips’s last book, whose dire warnings are now proving frighteningly accurate.

Rating : - Good But Could Have Been Better
According to Kevin Phillips' bio page on Wikipedia he has reliably cranked out a book every 2-3 years or so since 1969. And while there are exceptions for the most part they have been either the-sky-is-falling screeds about the American economy, faux populist rants about social class and ad hominem attacks against people he doesn't like.

And says Phillips, the American elite's belief in "market triumphalism" [sic] [p.180] leads to a blind arrogance and that this all shows what becomes of an economic superpower that leaves its destiny to the vicissitudes of the marketplace [p.181-2]. And leading this charge of the lemmings is an entrenched but dissipated class of elites who clog up Washington, D.C. lobbying after their own interests [p.156]. Phillips also hates religion, conservatism, unearned wealth, the wealthy in general and the Bush family (or Dynasty) in particular [p.72].

The thesis statement for Bad Money: In modern America wealth can be increased without creating or manufacturing anything, just by "moving paper (e.g., debt instruments) around" [p.96].

The only thing that really gives Phillips any credibility at all is his extensive research and documentation complete with original graphs and charts that purport to prove his points. So far so good. However another look at Mr. Phillips' bio page shows that he went to a fancy East Coast prep school, Colgate University and Harvard Law so who is he to point fingers about entrenched elites in American politics and commerce? Takes one to know one I guess.

Phillips' reformist critique would be very persuasive indeed (or at least more plausible) if he could refrain from expressing his views in such a caustic manner and refrain from the ad hominem attacks and paranoid conspiracy theories which don't seem very believable no matter Phillips' excellent research complete with graphs, charts, footnotes and appendices.