DO SPIES TURNED NOVELISTS USE THEIR OLD SOURCES? ON WHAT ESPIONAGE FICTION CAN TEACH US ABOUT THIS GEOPOLITICAL MESS By Steve Matteo, Literary Hub, August 1, 2017   In early January of this year, a London-based literary agent appeared on the BBC to discuss a long-forgotten espionage novelist named Ted Allbeury, and his book The Twentieth of […]

Ezra Klein of Vox posted this piece two hours before the Senate’s post-midnight vote on the health care bill, in which John McCain, along with Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins, courageously saved their party from a law no one wanted. The final vote and McCain’s role aside, Klein says here what must be said: the […]

When To Trust A Story That Uses Unnamed Sources   By Perry Bacon Jr., FiveThirtyEight, Filed under The Media, Published July 18, 2017   The various investigations into the Trump administration and its alleged ties to Russia are hard to follow. The allegations are sometimes muddled, the probes are still ongoing, and all sides in the […]

Trump’s Mistake at the Boy Scout Jamboree The president addressed the quadrennial gathering like a campaign rally—talking to a group devoted to service as if it valued self interest. Carlos Barria / Reuters By Yoni Appelbaum, The Atlantic, July 24, 2017 Donald Trump continued his ongoing tour of cherished American institutions on Monday night, delivering yet […]

Some journalists celebrate Press Freedom Day in prisons, courtrooms and exile Can Dündar is the 2017 laureate of the Golden Pen of Freedom, the annual award of the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers By CAN DÜNDAR Special to The Globe and Mail, Toronto Published Monday, Jul. 24, 2017 8:00AM EDT   The police came […]

How can Trump become a dictator if he can’t accomplish anything? President Trump points to supporters from a glass enclosure at the U.S. Women’s Open golf tournament at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)   By Christian Caryl, The Washington Post, July 21 at 12:44 PM President Trump can’t get a health-care law […]

Trump’s breathtaking surrender to Russia By Michael Gerson, Opinion writer, The Washington Post, July 20, 2017 In the normal course of events, the revelation of attempted collusion with Russia to determine the outcome of a presidential election might cause an administration to overcorrect in the other direction. A president might find ways to confront the […]

The latest Trump interview once again reveals total disregard for the rule of law He can’t see anything other than naked self-interest. By Matthew Yglesias,Vox, Jul 20, 2017, 8:00am EDT At his confirmation hearings, Christopher Wray promised over and over again that he would run the FBI independently from the White House — just the way […]

A new interview reveals Trump’s ignorance to be surprisingly wide-ranging He doesn’t know what he doesn’t know. By Matthew Yglesias, Vox, Jul 20, 2017, 12:30pm EDT Nobody knows everything, and certainly nobody who’s ever sat in the Oval Office has entered with a complete mastery of all the varied issues that land on the desk of […]

Trump’s Russian Laundromat How to use Trump Tower and other luxury high-rises to clean dirty money, run an international crime syndicate, and propel a failed real estate developer into the White House. BY CRAIG UNGER, The New Republic, July 13, 2017   In 1984, a Russian émigré named David Bogatin went shopping for apartments in New […]