Reading Time: 1 minute In our fourth episode of Russcast, WhoWhatWhy founder and editor-in-chief Russ Baker discusses the release of 676 additional JFK assassination files by the National Archives — many of which are heavily redacted — and the mainstream media’s predilection for the “lone-nutter” narrative — an example of what one viewer described as “coincidence theory.” Russ also Read More
Reading Time: 4 minutes Four days after my article on spiraling government and household debt appeared here, the lead story in the New York Times business section — “Living on a Borrowed Dime” — gave examples of Americans struggling with credit card debt, as well as banks earning soaring profits from their credit card businesses. It also reported that Read More
Reading Time: 1 minute In our third episode of Russcast, WhoWhatWhy founder and editor-in-chief Russ Baker discusses news of the day, including the Whitefish-Puerto Rico scandal and the cronyism and corruption that pervades government. Russ also reviews some of our featured articles, and brings you more on the JFK record release.You can watch Russ live and ask him questions Read More
Reading Time: 1 minute Last Thursday brought a long awaited event for JFK researchers: the release of some 30,000-plus previously classified documents related to the assassination. But President Donald Trump delayed the release of over 90% of the documents at the behest of executive branch agencies.To break all of this down, WhoWhatWhy founder and editor-in-chief Russ Baker recently went Read More
Reading Time: 2 minutes Lawmakers propose legislation all the time simply to make some point. The most popular example, especially for those on the left of the political spectrum, might be that of a Missouri lawmaker who wants to make buying a gun in her state as difficult as getting an abortion.Indiana state Rep. Jim Lucas (R) followed this Read More
Reading Time: 1 minute Who ordered technicians at Kennesaw State University to wipe data servers of critical information that could have determined if Georgia’s Special Election to fill a vacant House seat — and the subsequent runoff in which Republican Karen Handel defeated Democrat John Ossoff — were compromised by hackers?The servers were central to a lawsuit accusing numerous Read More
Reading Time: 2 minutes One year ahead of the next major election in North Carolina, the city of Asheville is hosting a unique race to highlight how state Republicans have redrawn district lines in their favor.The Gerrymander 5K “walk/run” is no race for the faint of heart — or the weak-ankled. That’s because its route traces the outlandish district Read More
Reading Time: 2 minutes An e-mail from Mother Jones this week carried a “sponsored message from the Progressive Turnout Project.”The message urged me to REPLY IMMEDIATELY to a “JUST IN” report: “Trump’s Budget SLASHES Social Security.”I know nothing of the Progressive Turnout Project, although following a link at the end of its message suggests that its business may be Read More
Reading Time: 1 minute A day after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened to attack Kurdish forces in Syria, social media were abuzz with reports of an impending Turkish operation against these troops, who have been the main US ally on the ground against the Islamic State.https://twitter.com/metesohtaoglu/status/923178493269237760The enclave of Afrin and the Kurdish-held city of Manbij, both in northern Read More
Reading Time: 3 minutes A lot of attention has been given recently to Sens. Bob Corker (R-TN) and Jeff Flake (R-AZ) for finally displaying acts of conscience in defiance of an increasingly erratic and reactionary White House. One former Senator who never waited around to speak out was Paul Wellstone.Wellstone was described by some as “the conscience of the Read More
Reading Time: 2 minutes A new report from the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service shows that the Trump administration has begun to adopt increasingly lax standards on the sale of arms to countries with dubious commitments to human rights. Regardless of track records on intensifying humanitarian crises, the administration has prioritized increasing the sale of weapons to the region — notably Read More
Reading Time: 4 minutes Fifty years ago today, in 1967, nearly 100,000 Americans marched on Washington, DC, to protest the Vietnam War. In those days there was a mandatory draft in place, and the risk was very real that a young man just out of high school could quickly wind up 13,000 miles away, fighting an unseen enemy in Read More
Reading Time: 2 minutes In a lightning advance, Iraqi forces captured the oil-rich city of Kirkuk from Kurdish forces on Monday, sending thousands of civilians fleeing.The fighting between two US-trained and -equipped forces that have been central to the war against the Islamic State was a slap in the face to US foreign policy. US-supplied Iraqi tank knocks over Read More
Reading Time: 5 minutes Equifax is answerable to its customers, the lending institutions — not the people of the United States. And that’s a real problem.Two problems have emerged. The first is safeguarding consumers’ private information. The second is coming up with processes to allow consumers to quickly restore or repair their private information when, not if, it is Read More
Reading Time: 3 minutes One of President Donald Trump’s associates had some good news yesterday. Felix Sater, the subject of a recent in-depth piece by WhoWhatWhy, had a tax fraud claim against him tossed out of court.Following a brief oral argument, Manhattan state court judge Justice Charles E. Ramos dismissed the $70-million tax fraud claim against Sater.Sater is in Read More
Reading Time: 1 minute As we reported last April and May, a controversial 550-mile pipeline crossing Virginia, West Virginia and North Carolina is roiling Virginia politics — right in the middle of a hotly contested gubernatorial race.The pipeline to bring natural gas from Ohio, West Virginia and Pennsylvania to consumers in Virginia and North Carolina has drawn the opposition Read More
Reading Time: 2 minutes Donald Trump’s refusal to release his tax returns has long been a subject of conjecture. To that, we’d like to add a related mystery: Why did the IRS begin auditing Donald Trump in 2002? Why that year in particular? Donald Trump’s finances were always complicated and fertile ground for the IRS, yet, it only began Read More
Reading Time: 1 minute Today marks the 10th anniversary of the last nationwide strike seen in the US, when the Union of Automobile Workers (UAW) walked out on General Motors. The previous national strike the UAW had called had been in 1970 when the unions’ power and membership was at its height. The strike in 2007 only lasted two Read More
Reading Time: 3 minutes The recent Equifax cybersecurity breach, now the worst known cyberattack to date, changes everything for a huge number of Americans. Are you worried about how this affects you? You should be. The worst-case scenario of this data breach, from identity theft to adulterated finances and more, will take years to recover from. There is no Read More
Reading Time: 3 minutes Older Americans still remember where they were when JFK was shot. For us Brits, it’s the same for the day Lady Diana died in a car crash after being chased by paparazzi.I remember that grim week in the late summer of 1997 all too well. Adult life was knocking on my door with a recent Read More