Ben Cohen reads a quote from Smedley Butler’s “War is a Racket.”

"You brought a book by Smedley Durlington Butler, the most decorated Marine of World War I. He was a Marine general. He earned two Medals of Honor and wrote a book titled War Is a Racket.

I spent 33 years and 4 months in active military service, and during that time I spent most of my time as a high-class muscle man for big business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.

I helped make Mexico safe for American oil interests. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the boys of the National City Bank to collect revenues. I helped in the rape of a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers, from 1902 to 1912. I brought “light” to the Dominican Republic for U.S. sugar interests in 1916. I helped prepare Honduras for the American fruit companies in 1903, and in China in 1927 I helped make it easier for Standard Oil to operate unmolested.

Looking back, I might have given Al Capone a few tips. The best he could do was to operate in three districts of one city. We Marines operated on three continents.

So this was a Major General of the U.S. Marine Corps, the most decorated Marine when he wrote that. And I think today he's practically forgotten. Yes."