They drove around with a tank full of waste cooking oil in back and Dean looked out the passenger window at all the restaurants. There must have been three or four in every strip mall. And if you thought about the hospital, the university, the football stadium—Lord have mercy.
“Dadgummit, they’re everywhere,” he said. “Look at all that oil. We’ll get it, man. We’ll get it.”
“Humble beginnings,” Stephan said. “We’ll appreciate it someday.”
“This is how you’re going to make your fortune, hoss!”
Dean knew exactly what he was going to do with his fortune, once he made it. He had known for years, though he had told only a couple of people, always saving it up as his last thought at night before falling asleep. First, he would build a great big house, a mansion, just like the one Moses Cone, the nineteenth-century denim baron of Greensboro, built looking out over the Blue Ridge Mountains, with gables and dormers and huge front porches all painted white. Dean’s would be off the grid, with geothermal heat and air-conditioning, and solar panels on the roof.
Then he would fill this sprawling house with abandoned children. The house would sit on a farm, a working farm, so that he could teach these children whom no one else wanted the skills and the ethic of that life—teach them to be Jefferson’s cultivators of the earth, the most valuable citizens, the most vigorous, the most independent, the most virtuous.
And he knew where the house would be: on the Price tobacco farm, right there on the hill near the graveyard where four generations of Prices lay buried, the last his father, “Just a sinner saved by grace.” Dean would be buried there, too, one day. He had misgivings about putting the house on that land. His poverty thinking came from there, from that family. He had tried to pull the weeds and water the seeds, but when he got around those graves they brought the thinking back. But wasn’t that the very reason to build the house there? Wasn’t it where he would finally get his freedom? And even though he was going to lose his piece of the family farm to a foreclosure sale, because his bankruptcy case had been reopened, and his nemesis, the oil man, was going after the only asset Dean had left, which was the land—none of that mattered. He still had a dream of building a big white house and filling it with children. He would get the land back.
NOTE
Wall Street
1. Not his real name.
A NOTE ON SOURCES
This book is based on hundreds of hours of interviews with the people whose stories it tells, and with others who shared information and insight, supplemented by written sources, the most significant of which are listed below. The biographical sketches of famous people are drawn entirely from secondary sources, most usefully those listed below; the sketches sometimes paraphrase or quote the subjects’ own words as found in books, articles, and songs. The collages of individual years draw on a variety of sources—newspapers, magazines, books, speeches, songs, advertisements, poems, movies, television programs—all of which were written, published, recorded, or shown in the given year. (A list can be found at www.fsgbooks.com/theunwinding.) Though this book is a work of nonfiction throughout, it owes a literary debt to the novels of John Dos Passos’s great U.S.A. trilogy, published in the 1930s and overdue for a revival.
NARRATIVES
DEAN PRICE AND THE PIEDMONT
Allen Tullos, Habits of Industry: White Culture and the Transformation of the Carolina Piedmont (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1989).
JEFF CONNAUGHTON AND WASHINGTON, D.C.
Joe Biden, Promises to Keep (New York: Random House, 2008).
Jeff Connaughton, The Payoff: Why Wall Street Always Wins (Prospecta Press, 2012). The author generously shared an early draft.
Robert G. Kaiser, So Damn Much Money: The Triumph of Lobbying and the Corrosion of American Government (New York: Vintage Books, 2010).
TAMMY THOMAS AND YOUNGSTOWN
Barry Bluestone and Bennett Harrison, The Deindustrialization of America: Plant Closings, Community Abandonment, and the Dismantling of Basic Industry (New York: Basic Books, 1982).
Terry F. Buss and F. Stevens Redburn, Shutdown at Youngstown: Public Policy for Mass Unemployment (Albany: SUNY Press, 1983).
Stephen F. Diamond, “The Delphi ‘Bankruptcy’: The Continuation of Class War by Other Means,” Dissent (Spring 2006).
David M. Kennedy, Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929–1945 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999).
Sherry Lee Linkon and John Russo, Steeltown U.S.A.: Work and Memory in Youngstown (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2002).
John Russo, “Integrated Production or Systematic Disinvestment: The Restructuring of Packard Electric” (unpublished paper, 1994).
Sean Safford, Why the Garden Club Couldn’t Save Youngstown: The Transformation of the Rust Belt (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2009).
PETER THIEL AND SILICON VALLEY
Sonia Arrison, 100 Plus: How the Coming Age of Longevity Will Change Everything, from Careers and Relationships to Family and Faith, with a foreword by Peter Thiel (New York: Basic Books, 2011).
Eric M. Jackson, The PayPal Wars: Battles with eBay, the Media, the Mafia and the Rest of Planet Earth (Los Angeles: World Ahead Publishing, 2010).
David Kirkpatrick, The Facebook Effect: The Inside Story of the Company That Is Connecting the World (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011).
Jessica Livingston, “Max Levchin,” in Founders at Work: Stories of Startups’ Early Days (New York: Apress, 2008).
Ben Mezrich, The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook (New York: Anchor, 2010).
David O. Sacks and Peter A. Thiel, The Diversity Myth: Multiculturalism and Political Intolerance on Campus (Oakland, CA: The Independent Institute, 1998).
TAMPA
Richard Florida, The Great Reset: How New Ways of Living and Working Drive Post-Crash Prosperity (New York: HarperCollins, 2010).
Alyssa Katz, Our Lot: How Real Estate Came to Own Us (New York: Bloomsbury, 2010).
Robert J. Kerstein, Politics and Growth in Twentieth-Century Tampa (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2001).
Paul Reyes, Exiles in Eden: Life Among the Ruins of Florida’s Great Recession (New York: Henry Holt, 2010).
BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES
NEWT GINGRICH
Adam Clymer, “The Teacher of the ‘Rules of Civilization’ Gets a Scolding,” New York Times (January 26, 1997).
Steven M. Gillon, The Pact: Bill Clinton, Newt Gingrich, and the Rivalry That Defined a Generation (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008).
Newt Gingrich, Lessons Learned the Hard Way (New York: HarperCollins, 1998).
Newt Gingrich, To Renew America (New York: HarperCollins, 1999).
Newt Gingrich with David Drake and Marianne Gingrich, Window of Opportunity: A Blueprint for the Future (New York: Tor Books, 1984).
John H. Richardson, “Newt Gingrich: The Indispensable Republican,” Esquire (September 2010).
Gail Sheehy, “The Inner Quest of Newt Gingrich,” Vanity Fair (September 1995).
OPRAH WINFREY
Barbara Grizzuti Harrison, “The Importance of Being Oprah,” New York Times Magazine (June 11, 1989).
Kitty Kelley, Oprah: A Biography (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2011).
Ken Lawrence, The World According to Oprah: An Unauthorized Portrait in Her Own Words (Kansas City, MO: Andrews McMeel, 2005).
RAYMOND CARVER
Raymond Carver, Fires: Essays, Poems, Stories (New York: Vintage Books, 1984).
Raymond Carver, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love: Stories (New York: Vintage Books, 1989).
Raymond Carver, Where I’m Calling From: Stories (New York: Vintage Contemporaries, 1989).
Conversations with Raymond Carver, Marshall Bruce Gentry and William L. Stull, eds. (Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1990).
Carol Sklenicka, Raymond Carver: A Writer’s Life (New York: Scribner, 2010).
SAM WALTON
Bob Ortega, In Sam We Trust: The Untold Story of Sam Walton and How Wal-Mart Is Devouring America (New York: Crown Business, 1998).
Sam Walton with John Huey, Sam Walton, Made in America: My Story (New York: Doubleday, 1992).
COLIN POWELL
Karen DeYoung, Soldier: The Life of Colin Powell (New York: Knopf, 2006).
John B. Judis, The Paradox of American Democracy: Elites, Special Interests, and the Betrayal of Public Trust (New York: Routledge, 2001).
Colin L. Powell with Joseph E. Persico, My American Journey (New York: Ballantine, 1996).
ALICE WATERS
Thomas McNamee, Alice Waters and Chez Panisse: The Romantic, Impractical, Often Eccentric, Ultimately Brilliant Making of a Food Revolution (New York: Penguin, 2008).
Alice Waters with Daniel Duane, Edible Schoolyard: A Universal Idea (San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2008).
ROBERT RUBIN
William D. Cohan, Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World (New York: Doubleday, 2011).
William D. Cohan, “Rethinking Robert Rubin,” Bloomberg Businessweek (September 30, 2012).
Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson, Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer—And Turned Its Back on the Middle Class (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010).
Bethany McLean and Joe Nocera, All the Devils Are Here: The Hidden History of the Financial Crisis (New York: Portfolio/Penguin, 2010).
Robert B. Reich, Locked in the Cabinet (New York: Vintage Books, 1998).
Robert E. Rubin and Jacob Weisberg, In an Uncertain World: Tough Choices from Wall Street to Washington (New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2004).
JAY-Z
Zack O’Malley Greenburg, Empire State of Mind: How Jay-Z Went from Street Corner to Corner Office (New York: Portfolio/Penguin, 2011).
Jay-Z, Decoded (New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2011).
Jay-Z, “December 4th,” The Black Album (Roc-A-Fella/Def Jam, 2003).
Jay-Z, “Empire State of Mind,” The Blueprint 3 (Roc Nation, 2009).
Jay-Z, “Rap Game/Crack Game,” “Streets Is Watching,” “You Must Love Me,” In My Lifetime Vol. 1 (Roc-A-Fella/Def Jam, 1997).
Jay-Z, “Can I Live,” “Dead Presidents II,” “D’Evils,” “Regrets,” “22 Two’s,” Reasonable Doubt (Roc-A-Fella, 1996).
Jay-Z, “Brooklyn Go Hard” (Roc-A-Fella/Def Jam, 2008), “Glory” (Roc Nation, 2012).
Kelefa Sanneh, “Gettin’ Paid,” New Yorker (August 20, 2001).
Touré, “The Book of Jay,” Rolling Stone (December 15, 2005).
Kanye West, “Diamonds from Sierra Leone,” Late Registration (Roc-A-Fella/Def Jam, 2005).
ANDREW BREITBART
Christopher Beam, “Media Is Everything. It’s Everything,” Slate (March 15, 2010).
Andrew Breitbart, Righteous Indignation: Excuse Me While I Save the World! (New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2011).
Chris K. Daley, Becoming Breitbart (Claremont, CA: Chris Daley Publishing, 2012).
Rebecca Mead, “Rage Machine,” New Yorker (May 24, 2010).
ELIZABETH WARREN
Suzanna Andrews, “The Woman Who Knew Too Much,” Vanity Fair (November 2011).
Noah Bierman, “A Girl Who Soared, but Longed to Belong,” Boston Globe (February 12, 2012).
Harry Kreisler, Political Awakenings: Conversations with History (New York: The New Press, 2010).
Teresa A. Sullivan, Elizabeth Warren, and Jay Lawrence Westbrook, As We Forgive Our Debtors: Bankruptcy and Consumer Credit in America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989).
Teresa A. Sullivan, Elizabeth Warren, and Jay Lawrence Westbrook, The Fragile Middle Class: Americans in Debt (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2000).
Jeffrey Toobin, “The Professor,” New Yorker (September 17, 2012).
Elizabeth Warren, interview by Jon Stewart, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, Comedy Central, April 15, 2009, and January 26, 2010.
Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi, The Two-Income Trap: Why Middle-Class Mothers and Fathers Are Going Broke (New York: Basic Books, 2003).
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I am grateful to the people whose lives compose the heart of this book.
For assistance on the road, I thank George and Page Gilliam of Charlottesville; Sherry Lee Linkon and John Russo of Youngstown; Barbara Price of Stokesdale, North Carolina; the reporters and editors of the Tampa Bay Times; and especially Pancho Sanchez of Tampa and his family. Thanks also to Gary Smith and the American Academy in Berlin for a 2009 Holtzbrinck Fellowship, and to Jean Strouse and the Cullman Center at the New York Public Library for their invitation to give the 2011 Joanna Jackson Goldman Memorial Lectures in American Civilization and Government.
For expert help of different kinds, I thank Nancy Aaron, Kathleen Anderson, Neil Belton, Julia Botero, Lila Byock, Peter Canby, Ray Chipault, Rodrigo Corral, Tom Ehrlich, Jiayang Fan, Tim Farrell, Amy Hanauer, Stephen Heintz, Henry Kaufman, Alissa Levin, Jonathan Lippincott, Rebecca Mead, Ellie Perkins, Chris Peterson, Chris Richards, Nandi Rodrigo, Ridge Schuyler, Jeff Seroy, Michael Spies, Scott Staton, Julie Tate, Matthew Taylor, Sarita Varma, Jacob Weisberg, Dorothy Wickenden, Laura Young, and Avi Zenilman. I am especially grateful to Sarah Chalfant, Jonathan Galassi, David Remnick, Alex Star, and Daniel Zalewski—there are none better.
I can never repay my debt to those friends and family members whose insight and enthusiasm sustained me through the years of work—Daniel Bergner, Tom Casciato, Bill Finnegan, Kathy Hughes, Carol Jack, Michael Janeway, Ann Packer, Nancy Packer, Eyal Press, Becky Saletan, Bob Secor, Marie Secor, and especially Dexter Filkins; and most of all to Laura Secor, who makes everything possible.
ALSO BY GEORGE PACKER
NONFICTION
The Village of Waiting
Blood of the Liberals
The Assassins’ Gate: America in Iraq
Interesting Times: Writings from a Turbulent Decade
FICTION
The Half Man
Central Square
PLAYS
Betrayed
AS EDITOR
The Fight Is for Democracy: Winning the War of Ideas in America and the World
Facing Unpleasant Facts: Narrative Essays by George Orwell
All Art Is Propaganda: Critical Essays by George Orwell
A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR
George Packer is a staff writer for The New Yorker and the author of The Assassins’ Gate: America in Iraq, which received several prizes and was named one of the ten best books of 2005 by The New York Times Book Review. He is also the author of two novels, The Half Man and Central Square, and two other works of nonfiction, Blood of the Liberals, which won the 2001 Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, and The Village of Waiting. His play, Betrayed, ran off-Broadway for five months in 2008 and won the Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Play. His most recent book is Interesting Times: Writings from a Turbulent Decade. He lives in Brooklyn.
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
18 West 18th Street, New York 10011
Copyright © 2013 by George Packer
All rights reserved
First edition, 2013
Portions of this work originally appeared, in different form, in The New Yorker.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Packer, George, 1960–
The unwinding: an inner history of the new America / George Packer. — First edition.
pages cm
ISBN 978-0-374-10241-8 (hardcover)
1. United States—History—1969– 2. United States—Social conditions—1980– 3. United States—Biography. 4. Social problems—United States. 5. Crises—United States. 6. United States—Politics and government—1989– 7. Politicians—United States—Biography. 8. Celebrities—United States—Biography. I. Title.
E839 .P28 2013
973.924—dc23
2013004431
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eISBN 9781466836952
The Unwinding Page 51