Thomas Jefferson once said something to the effect that the end of American democracy will come when people figure out they can use the system to vote themselves money out of other people's pockets. Today, that's precisely what the American political system has become, as political economists James T. Bennett and Thomas J. DiLorenzo make clear in this excellent book. The examples are, by now, somewhat out of date. But they outrages they report on have, if anything, only gotten worse.

In many ways, the State has become little more than an engine for the forced redistribution of money. People vote for politicians who will give them things, hoping what they get from picking their neighbors' pockets will be greater than what someone else, in turn, takes out of their own. Politicians flog the system for all it's worth, and are rewarded according to their ability to hand out loot they have no right to in the first place.

Of all the ways this is done, the most egregious, at least in Bennett and DiLorenzo's minds, is the pouring of tax dollars into organizations that then use that money to lobby for specific policy agendas. Again and again, Bennett and DiLorenzo give us chapter and verse (and dollar amounts) of how labor unions, environmental radicals, anti-market and pro-socialist, 'anti-poverty,' 'civil rights,' and other pressure groups pocket free money at taxpayer expense. Conservative, industry, and pro-business groups aren't spared their time in the spotlight either. Nor are the politicians (many of whom are still in office today) who receive hefty campaign cash from the same groups to whom they funneled those tax dollars.

George Will has written that anyone who wants to understand how American government works shouldn't read the Constitution, but rather open the Washington, D.C., phone book and observe all the organizations, associations, and lobbies with the word 'National' in their name. Bennett and DiLorenzo provide an invaluable service by exposing this racket fully. Even seventeen or more years after its first publication, 'Destroying Democracy' is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand what politics and the State are really all about.

If you are one who thinks the government had your best interest at heart when it took on the cigarette industry, you need to read this book because you'll find out here that the federal tobacco wars were only the beginning. Sugar, salt, fat, wine, beer, distilled spirits, and beef are all on the chopping block of federal nannies who want only what is best for us. And it's all "for the children." Bennett and Dilorenzo make an important contribution to the national debate over what role--if any--the federal government should play in providing for the happiness which Americans derive from their personal choices of food and drink. The authors skewer federal bureaucrats and their private sector "non-profit" cronies who use taxpayer money to try forcing their own self-righteous world views on all citizens. They show with bitter humor that prohibitions on food and drink will follow in the wake of recent success against tobacco companies. I'll put this slim, entertaining, alarming volume right up there with James Bovard's Lost Rights as a book which thoughtful Americans should read. If citizens don't start reining in their representatives in D.C., the executive branch bureaucrats will be free to continue spending our tax dollars to make us all miserable. And thin. And free of alcohol, beef, and pleasure. An important book.

This book is so badly needed. It shows the racism, elitism, paternalism, and hypocrisy that infuses the demands of those who want to run our lives and tell us what to do, what to eat, and how we should think. The authors have an incredible way with humor. Once I started the book, I could not put it down. What is very impressive is the huge list of footnotes that provides solid documentation for their research... This book is scholarship and was published by a University press. Well Done!! A must-read for everybody who is tired of the endless pontification and preaching.