Conventional wisdom about the 1953 coup in Iran rests on the myth that the CIA toppled the country's democratically elected prime minister. In reality, the coup was primarily a domestic Iranian affair, and the CIA's impact was ultimately insignificant.

The 1973 coup in Chile is often included in indictments of U.S. covert action during the Cold War, during which the United States, at the direction of a number of presidents, sometimes took actions of questionable wisdom to prevent or reverse the rise of leftists who Washington feared might lead their countries into the Soviet orbit. In truth, the CIA did not plot with the Chilean military to overthrow Allende.

Machines are substituting for more types of human labor than ever before. This means that the real winners of the future will be neither the providers of cheap labor nor the owners of ordinary capital, but rather those who can innovate and create new products, services, and business models.