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Washington is big business. The era of civic-minded captains of industry and serious think-tanks has given way to the heyday of K Street, home to the lobbyists who now spend $2.4 million a year on each member of Congress. John B. Judis, a senior editor for the New Republic, conducts an instructive tour through this corridor of money and power in "The Paradox of American Democracy"-with eye-opening results. For example: Former foreign policy advisers now become lobbyists for foreign businesses. Former Senators call for privatizing social security while sitting on boards of investment banks that would benefit from the conversion. The bankers, lawyers, and business people who once devoted time to public service now confine their activity to lobbying for their firms. "The Paradox of American Democracy" turns the conventional view of democracy on it's head. Judis shows that it's never been enough to have active political participation; American democracy has always depended on an enlightened political establishment-with only the nation's best interest in mind-to shape public opinion. Our political system suffers today because the lawyers, professors and former government officials who once made up of the establishment have put their minds and reputations at the service of moneyed special interests. Rather than balancing the interests of business and populists, the elites-and their money-are now firmly on the side of business. With widespread cynicism so completely undermining our institutions, "The Paradox of American Democracy" cuts to the heart of today's debate on why our systems is broken, and what we can do to fix it.
