:39:00
avoid the comfortable idea
:39:02
that the mere form of
government can of itself
:39:05
safeguard a nation
against despotism.
:39:11
For big business despotism
was often a useful tool
:39:14
for securing foreign markets
and pursuing profits.
:39:18
One of the U. S. Marine corps
most highly decorated generals
:39:21
Smedley Darlington Butler
by his own account
:39:25
helped pacify Mexico
for American oil companies
:39:28
Haiti and Cuba
for National City Bank
:39:31
Nicaragua for the Brown
Brothers brokerage
:39:34
the Dominican Republic
for sugar interests
:39:37
Honduras for U. S.
Fruit companies
:39:39
and China
for standard oil.
:39:44
General Butlers services
were also in demand
:39:46
in the United States
in the 1930s
:39:49
as president
Franklin Delano Roosevelt
:39:51
sought to relieve
the misery
:39:53
of the depression through
public enterprise
:39:55
and to offer regulation
on corporate exploitation
:39:58
and misdeeds.
:39:59
more power to you
President Roosevelt
:40:02
The entire countrys
behind you.
:40:04
thrilled with hope
and patriotism...
:40:08
But the country
was not entirely
:40:09
behind
the populist president.
:40:11
Large parts of
the corporate elite
:40:13
despised what Roosevelts
new deal stood for.
:40:16
And so in 1934
:40:18
a group of conspirators
sought to involve
:40:20
General Butler in
a treasonous plan.
:40:24
..The plan as outlined tome
was to form an organization
:40:26
of veterans to use as a bluff
or as a club at least
:40:29
to intimidate
the government...
:40:32
but the corporate cabal
had picked the wrong man.
:40:35
Butler was fed up
being what he called
:40:37
a gangster for capitalism.
:40:44
... I appeared before
the Congressional Committee
:40:47
the highest representation
of the American people
:40:49
under subpoena to tell what
I knew of activities
:40:53
which I believed might lead
to an attempt to set up
:40:55
a fascist dictatorship.
:40:58
The upshot of the whole
thing was that I was supposed