Evil Geniuses

Evil Geniuses is the secret history of how, over the last half century, America has sharply swerved away from its dream of progress for the many to a system of unfettered profit and self-interest for the few.

As the social liberation of the 1960s finally ended in the chaos of Vietnam and Watergate, a faction of rich industrialists, business chiefs, wide-eyed libertarians and right-wing economic radicals were waiting, determined to claw back everything they saw as rightfully theirs. Reaching back into the dangerous powers of nostalgia, they emulated the unchecked robber barons of the past – veiling their actions as a return to the good old days, and winning over the people in the name of traditional American values.