The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research (AEI) has been a leading member of the neoconservative advocacy community for nearly three decades. AEI’s advocacy agenda extends from free-market economics to militarist security policies. Many of its scholars were vociferous public promoters of attacking Iraq—even before the 9/11 terrorist attacks—and pushed for an expansive “war on terror.”

Ralph Nader in his article states that "the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) has a problem. It is loaded with corporate money, full of rich fellowships for Washington, D.C. influence peddlers, masquerading as conservatives, who wallow in plush offices figuring out how to assure that big corporations rule the U.S. and the rest of the world. The AEI, their nearby corporate patrons, their allied trade associations and corporate "think tanks" have, in effect, taken over the executive branch, the Congress and promoted the jud...