William 'Bill' Mott came from generations of farmers/graziers who never wanted anything else but to own their own land. Hard work, family and the sense of community were pitted against the harsh reality of this ancient land and its climate of drought and flooding rain. Overseas wars had taken many of their own, but they had to believe it was for the greater good, for the safety of the land they worked and the preservation of a history and culture they held dear. But then rural Australia was hit by a tsunami of institutional dishonesty, greed and corruption, poor bureaucratic legislation, and conflicted and complicit governments. Bill Mott had trusted his bank and lost everything: his land, his home, his livelihood, his future, his children's inheritance and his marriage. But giving up was not in Bill Mott's DNA. Australians were unaware of how much Australian-owned agriculture had been lost; how many farming families and their communities had perished; and how Australia's food and water security was endangered. For Bill Mott, it was a seven-year battle before he beat the bank, but the fight was about more than that; because 'the Bureaucracy, Bankers and Bastards' should never be allowed to win.

Argues that blind faith in reason has resulted in problems in every phase of social life, suggests reason is an administrative method rather than a moral force, and proposes some solutions.

A chat over coffee describing what happened to the banking world in Australia and some tid-bits on how to beat the banks by understanding how they work. In the main I wrote this book to expose how banks went from a customer service industry to that of a sales industry. Would you like fries with that?

This book sets out the creation and spread of the new economic technology of explosive economic development from its beginnings in Frank Delano Roosevelt's USA from 1938-1944 and its subsequent adoption by Japan from 1946-1985 and its spread to the China sea economies of South Korea, Taiwan and China. The book also covers the reaction of British politicians, businessmen and bankers to this new development and the circumstances around the adoption of the neoclassical economics which is resulting in the continual relative failure of the Western economies. This book sets out a more useful economics which is currently being practiced by all of the China Sea economies.

The host of the eponymous MSNBC show, Dylan Ratigan offers a bold and original post-partisan program to resuscitate the American Dream. At a time of deep concern with the state of America’s economy and government, it seems that all the media can give us is talking (or screaming) heads who revel in partisan brinkmanship. Then there’s Dylan Ratigan—an award-winning journalist respected and admired across the political spectrum. In Greedy Bastards, he rips the lid off of our deeply crooked system—and offers a way out. Employing the nuanced reporting and critical analysis that have earned him so much respect, Ratigan describes the five “vampires” that are sucking the nation dry, including an educational system that values mediocrity above all else; a healthcare system that is among the priciest and least-effective infrastructures in the industrialized world; a political system in which lobbyists write legislation; a “master-slave” relationship with our Chinese bankers; and an addiction to foreign oil that has sapped our willingness to innovate. In offering solutions to these formidable and entrenched obstacles, he does nothing less than lay the groundwork for a political movement dedicated to tackling the rot at the heart of the country. In its desperation, America needs more than just endless stock tips and Wall Street navel-gazing. It needs passionate debate and smart policy—and a hero to take on the establishment. Dylan Ratigan is that hero, and this is the book that will rally people behind him.

With a new Introduction by the author, this “erudite and brilliantly readable book” (The Observer, London) expertly dissects the political, economic, and social origins of Western civilization to reveal a culture cripplingly enslaved to crude notions of rationality and expertise. With a new introduction by the author, this “erudite and brilliantly readable book” (The Observer, London) astutely dissects the political, economic and social origins of Western civilization to reveal a culture cripplingly enslaved to crude notions of rationality and expertise. The Western world is full of paradoxes. We talk endlessly of individual freedom, yet we’ve never been under more pressure to conform. Our business leaders describe themselves as capitalists, yet most are corporate employees and financial speculators. We call our governments democracies, yet few of us participate in politics. We complain about invasive government, yet our legal, educational, financial, social, cultural and legislative systems are deteriorating. All these problems, John Ralston Saul argues, are largely the result of our blind faith in the value of reason. Over the past 400 years, our “rational elites” have turned the modern West into a vast, incomprehensible, directionless machine, run by process-minded experts—“Voltaire’s bastards”—whose cult of scientific management is empty of both sense and morality. Whether in politics, art, business, the military, entertain­ment, science, finance, academia or journalism, these experts share the same outlook and methods. The result, Saul maintains, is a civilization of immense technological power whose ordinary citizens are increasingly excluded from the decision-making process. In this wide-ranging anatomy of modern society and its origins—whose “pages explode with insight, style and intellectual rigor” (Camille Paglia, The Washington Post)—Saul presents a shattering critique of the political, economic and cultural estab­lishments of the West.