The startling story of the monumental growth of lobbying in Washington, D.C., and how it undermines effective government and pollutes our politics.

A true insider, Robert G. Kaiser has monitored American politics for The Washington Post for nearly half a century. In this sometimes shocking and always riveting book, he explains how and why, over the last four decades, Washington became a dysfunctional capital. At the heart of his story is money—money made by special interests using campaign contributions and lobbyists to influence government decisions, and money demanded by congressional candidates to pay for their increasingly expensive campaigns, which can cost a staggering sum. In 1974, the average winning campaign for the Senate cost $437,000; by 2006, that number had grown to $7.92 million. The cost of winning House campaigns grew comparably: $56,500 in 1974, $1.3 million in 2006.

Politicians’ need for money and the willingness, even eagerness, of special interests and lobbyists to provide it explain much of what has gone wrong in Washington. They have created a mutually beneficial, mutually reinforcing relationship between special interests and elected representatives, and they have created a new class in Washington, wealthy lobbyists whose careers often begin in public service. Kaiser shows us how behavior by public officials that was once considered corrupt or improper became commonplace, how special interests became the principal funders of elections, and how our biggest national problems—health care, global warming, and the looming crises of Medicare and Social Security, among others—have been ignored as a result.

Kaiser illuminates this progression through the saga of Gerald S. J. Cassidy, a Jay Gatsby for modern Washington. Cassidy came to Washington in 1969 as an idealistic young lawyer determined to help feed the hungry. Over the course of thirty years, he built one of the city’s largest and most profitable lobbying firms and accumulated a personal fortune of more than $100 million. Cassidy’s story provides an unprecedented view of lobbying from within the belly of the beast.

A timely and tremendously important book that finally explains how Washington really works today, and why it works so badly.

"The life story of Washington lobbyist Gerald Cassidy is used to 'illuminate how Washington has changed over the past three decades' in this bleak but informative book. Kaiser, an associate editor at the Washington Post, traces the ascendance of Cassidy, from his rough childhood in the 1950s to the incorporation of his lobbying firm, a pioneer in winning congressional earmarks for its clients, which Cassidy cofounded with Kenneth Schlossberg in 1975. The relationship between the two partners was dissolved in 1984, but Cassidy continued to build what became one of the most powerful and wealthy firms in the industry before it slipped from its vanguard status in the last few years. The author also lays out a larger history of influence peddling in federal politics, stretching back to the Civil War era, and examines the evolution of today's 'permanent campaigns.' The author's gestures to a broader historical narrative — often in alternating chapters — sometimes distract from his nuanced examination of the rise and decline of Cassidy and Associates, but Kaiser manages to vividly elaborate the firm's history while placing it in the context of a degenerating political culture." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

"Earmarks" and "pork" have become rallying cries against the failures of our government. The Office of Management and Budget, defining an earmark as spending that members of Congress insert in bills in ways that avoid "merit-based" review, says that in 2008 there were over 11,000 earmarks costing more than $16.5 billion, a huge increase over the last few decades. And this count neglects earmarks inserted... Washington Post Book Review (read the entire Washington Post review) by the executive branch.

Robert G. Kaiser, an experienced reporter and former managing editor of The Washington Post, has written a fascinating book that explains why earmarks have become more common since the 1970s. His account draws upon his detailed history of Gerald S. J. Cassidy and the lobbying firm of Cassidy and Associates.

Cassidy, a Democrat, began 30 years ago to search for laws that might be exploited to provide benefits to potential clients. He and his associates read the Federal Register and the Congressional Record looking for government programs to which new, highly specific appropriations could be added to help somebody willing to pay Cassidy's bill. And his bill was not cheap: It began at $10,000 a month and went up from there.

The firm slowly found clients, but they were not greedy industrialists or the Indian tribes manipulated by Jack Abramoff. At first, they were universities. In 1976 Jean Mayer, president of Tufts, wanted to build a nutrition center and a veterinary school on his campus. Cassidy learned that there was a law authorizing a national nutrition center. Cassidy and his business partner at the time, Ken Schlossberg, spoke to House Speaker Tip O'Neill, a friend of Mayer. Soon Congress appropriated $27 million, not for a national center, but for one at Tufts.

Next the lobbyists put together a package for a Tufts veterinary school. To do that they also had to support a new veterinary school in the state of Washington and give some money to the University of Pennsylvania's veterinary school, which did not especially like having a competitor at Tufts.

More universities approached Cassidy: Georgetown, Boston University, Columbia, the University of California, Catholic University and on and on. Then business firms realized how skillful Cassidy was at getting Congress to direct funds to specific projects, and they became his clients, too.

Most people think that earmarks are bad, but why should anyone object to earmarks that help some university? Since my son was one of the first graduates of the Tufts veterinary school, I think the earmark that created it was a good idea. Members of Congress have done little to prevent earmarks partly because they want to bring home the bacon to their constituents and partly because it is so hard to distinguish between good and bad earmarks.

But let's assume we want to end them. There are only a few ways, and none seems likely to work. Kaiser wants public financing of campaigns, but that creates problems (how do you fund primary challenges?) and leaves the door open for gifts. Congress has tried to ban gifts from lobbyists, but then these firms can hire former legislators. One can make them wait two years before being hired, but that deprives honest ex-legislators of legitimate work.

Alternatively, one could amend the Constitution to create a parliamentary system in which (as in England) there are weak committees, almost no floor amendments to bills and little opportunity to insert an earmark beyond those that the prime minister has proposed. I doubt anyone wants to go this far.

Or one could do what would make the greatest difference: reduce federal spending programs of the sort that create incentives for lobbyists to expand them. The central reason earmarks developed in the 1970s is that by then Washington was trying to solve so many problems that it appropriated money for virtually everything. Universities and businesses could not have gotten federal money unless Congress first wanted to support nutrition centers, veterinary schools, nuclear medicine centers, fiber optics systems, agricultural programs and the acquisition of strategic materials for national defense. To each of these efforts, Cassidy and others added earmarks.

Kaiser acknowledges that this is the key problem. He notes that politicians, both liberal and conservative, have produced "a more intrusive government, more important to the well-being of more Americans," which has given "great impetus to the astounding growth of the lobbying business." The more groups saw "their own fate at stake in Washington's debates on public policy, the better the market for lobbyists," he writes.

But reducing the extent of government activity is only slightly more likely than amending the Constitution. It may be better to step back and ask, "Do American voters dislike Washington because it is corrupt, or do they dislike it because it is ineffective in solving the problems (some real, some only imagined) that it has embraced?"

When the federal agenda did not include agriculture, the environment, drug abuse, gun control, academic research, mortgages, homelessness and school quality — and that was during Kaiser's lifetime and mine — it was hard to have an earmark because there were few programs to which they could be attached. And that was also the time when the great majority of Americans thought national officials were doing a good job. In the mid-1960s, between two-thirds and three-quarters of Americans thought you could trust Washington "most of the time" and that politicians listened to the people. Since the mid-70s, that support has collapsed; less than a quarter of Americans now trust Washington, according to National Election Studies poll data.

As Washington did more, people became less satisfied with it, because it was not making schools good, ending drug abuse or banishing homelessness. And it lost the war in Vietnam. Moreover, Congress became increasingly polarized along ideological lines as it tried to cope with these matters. Kaiser rightly recalls a time when there was comity in the House and senators dealt with one another as individuals. Today the House is bitterly divided, and senators deal with one another through their greatly expanded staffs — expanded because there are so many more things to worry about.

When Kaiser writes that "money builds bulwarks that defend the status quo," he is largely mistaken. Our problems with Medicare, Social Security and national defense do not exist because rich people have paid off legislators. They exist because legislators cannot reconcile either their ideology or their re-election prospects with the changes that must be made.

This book will help us understand national politics by giving us a close-up look at a key lobbying firm that pioneered the expansion of earmarks. But it ought to be read together with books (such as "Red and Blue Nation?," edited by Pietro Nivola and David Brady) that explain the rise of ideological politics, the extreme polarization of Congress and the institutional weakness of many government structures, such as those that deal with funding Medicare and Social Security and those that buy up our (weak) mortgages. Lobbyists' money is important, but so are other, deeper issues.

James Q. Wilson has taught at Harvard, UCLA and Pepperdine and is the author of "Bureaucracy" and the co-author of "American Government."

Reviewed by James Q. Wilson, Washington Post Book World (Copyright 2006 Washington Post Book World Service/Washington Post Writers Group)
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“So Damn Much Money tells you how Washington, D.C., really works. After over 40 years in Washington, Kaiser knows that if leaders lead from convictions and the people wake up to their power as citizens, we can still do great things in America.”

Senator Bill Bradley

“Bob Kaiser has written the real story of the breakdown of our political system. In the pages of this enormously important book, we can also glimpse a path toward reform–as a new president and Congress take office.”

Carl Bernstein

“Kaiser . . . offers a detailed, matter-of-fact perspective that explores many facets of the influence-peddling industry.”

Booklist

“Bob Kaiser takes the reader past the clichés and caricatures of Washington, and tells a very human story. He leaves the reader with an understanding of how it is possible that American government has reached a point where it now struggles to meet our most basic challenges. Kaiser calls upon a deep understanding of Washington and a writer’s gift for telling a fascinating but true story. This is an important and compelling book.”

Senator Chuck Hagel

“With bold insight and telling detail, Robert G. Kaiser raises the curtain on Washington to reveal a tragic drama in which money triumphs over principle. Here, in a single book, is the reason why our politics must be transformed.”

Robert B. Reich, former secretary of labor

“Eye-opening, and a key to understand how money works in Washington–for the most part, corruptly.”

Kirkus

Robert G. Kaiser has been with The Washington Post since 1963 and is now associate editor and senior correspondent. His books include Russia: The People and the Power and, with Leonard Downie Jr., The News About the News. He has received awards from both the Overseas Press Club and the National Press Club. He lives in Washington, D.C.