The New Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, 2nd Edition

CHAPTER 38Your Friendly Banker as EHM

Over the next year, as Ecuador prepared to auction off its precious forests to oil companies, I wrote several blogs condemning Correa’s decision. Among the responses I received was one, in late 2011, from an executive at a Chase bank near where I lived in South Florida.

“You rant and rage,” he wrote, “about the horrible things happening in places like Ecuador. What about here, in your own country?” His e-mail ended with an invitation to an early dinner.

I joined him on the veranda of the River House in Palm Beach Gardens. Our table had a view of the Intracoastal Waterway and the parade of multimillion-dollar ...