Researching and reporting this book
presented me with a number of unique challenges. First, the
Carlyle Group has a very obvious fear of publicity and, as a
result, declined to be interviewed for the project. The company
went a step further and notified many of their friends, former
colleagues, and business partners, if contacted, not to
cooperate with the author. Some of them respected the wishes of
the folks at Carlyle, some of them did not, and some just fell
between the cracks.
But with the exception of a brave
few, most notably Stephen Norris, almost all of the sources that
still had direct contact with Carlyle either declined to be
interviewed or would do so only if their identities remained
anonymous. There is a very real fear of retribution out there.
All quotations are either from those that said them or from
those that overheard the words being spoken, unless otherwise
attributed to a newspaper or magazine article. I would like to
thank Tim Shorrock for his work with The Nation,
Michael Lewis
for his work in New Republic, and Leslie Wayne for her work in
the New York Times.
And I would have been lost without
the work of dozens of journalists from the Washington Post,
which witnessed and chronicled the birth and rise of the Carlyle
Group, understanding its impact and import every step of the
way. I would also like to thank Harper’s Magazine, the Houston
Chronicle, and Jeffrey Toobin, the author of Too Close To Call:
The Thirty-Six Day Battle to Decide the 2000 Election, from
which I gained all of my knowledge of the events that took place
in Florida following the 2000 election.
In addition, I would like to thank
my editors at Red Herring, particularly Duff McDonald, Blaise
Zerega, and Jason Pontin. I would also like to thank my editor
at John Wiley & Sons, Jeanne Glasser, for believing in this
project.
And most importantly, thank you to my family, friends, and
especially my wife Michelle, without whom I would not have been
able to complete the task at hand, or any other task for that
matter.
D. B.
Brooklyn, New York
January 2003
