Conflict of Private/Public Interest in the USA

Back in the command centre of free market ideology (as Klein paints the picture), the USA, there had throughout all these enforced reforms, through Friedman's growth in influence and through Reagonomics, always been a resistance to the cutting of social spending, trade barriers and subsidies, and the selling of state assets at public expense. Klein spends some time elucidating the shadier side of things in attempt to show the rise of self-interest, corruption and free market privatisation in the US.

She points out glaring conflicts of interest that Rumsfield embodied: when he became Secretary of Defence, he held shares and positions in several huge firms that would benefit from government spending; he arranged to have the government buy huge stockpiles of AIDS and Bird Flu vaccines for which his companies owned the patents; he pressured the FDA to approve Nutrasweet (aspartame) despite their misgivings, to his financial benefit. To show his broader mindset, she describes a speech he gave (on September 10, 2001, and so it wasn't much noticed in the media) about his intention to clean up the military - basically to reform and privatise it through layers of subcontracts that would mimic Nike's business model.

The examples jump to Dick Cheney, who hired Halliburton to examine possible cuts and avenues of privatisation for the military. So, effectively, the more Halliburton privatised and then built up the army, the more money Halliburton would make. Meanwhile Cheney's wife sat on the board of Lockheed Martin, who held many tech and information contracts with the government.

Another frightening example Klein brings up is Bush Jr.’s privatisation of prisons in Texas and his attempt to privatise welfare (which was fortunately shot down).
The point of all this is to demonstrate that no country or administration is free from the cycle of free market ideology, greed and corruption.