The Magic Christian was a 1969 movie starring Peter Sellers and Ringo Starr. Sir Guy Grand (played by Sellers) adopts a homeless bum named Youngman (played by Starr) to be heir to his obscene wealth, and introduces him into the intricacies of the family business, which is to prey upon people’s greed by use of his vast wealth. One of the more notable scenes involved corporate executives diving into a large vat of sewage mixed with 100-dollar bills; this was Guy Grand’s proof that white-collar types would do anything for money.
Forty years later, Ken Silverstein shows that time has not changed this fundamental human flaw. Turkmeniscam: How Washington Lobbyists Fought to Flack for a Stalinist Dictatorship, is his recently released book in which he explores this “only in Washington” phenomenon, proving that art does in fact imitate life but rather badly. The movie was a cynical but funny bit of fiction. Silverstein’s account is a real-life tragedy where ethically challenged Washington insiders profit from tyrants, murders, kleptocrats and scoundrels of other varieties. [click to continue...]
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