So many totally on-the-mark reviews have already been published on Palast’s monumental exposé of religious, political, and corporate corruption that I chose to react rather than review - I was so inspired by the courage of the man and what he is teaching us and how he is empowering a dying branch of the government: the people and their right to know the truth.

To read Palast’s writing is to be Diomedes in book 5 of Homer’s Iliad; to have the veil pulled off what seems, or what is supposed to be happening, or what the press wants us to think is happening, and be revealed what actually is occurring. His credibility is impeccable, his efforts tireless and incessant. He is a truth-monger who offers causes, effects, impeccably researched, but no solutions. He is an investigative reporter with eagle-eyed insights. He demands ethical behavior and accountability. Beyond that, we can only guess at the world he could construct for us, given that option. I have asked him about it and received only enigmas back. Journalists by definition, even those with viewpoints, must be cautious and reticent when it comes to that “other” dimension, alternatives. One finds some optimism, however, in the author’s tireless and frenetic moto perpetuo and his generous donation of all book proceeds to causes like Danny Schechter’s upcoming film Counting on Democracy and further investigative reporting. In his segment on Pinochet’s Chile also (“Pat Robertson, Pinochet, Pepsi-Cola and the Anti-Christ…,”) his discussion of the Keynes/Marx alternative to the destructiveness activated by Milton Friedman’s economics and brief mention of the success of Nobel Prize winner Amartya Sen’s economics in the state of Kerala, India, offers room for hope (pp. 72-74). Further cause for optimism, by the way, is the total absence of footnotes and/or bibliography, with a one line-reference instead at the beginning of the book directing us to the web page gregpalast.com. An academic editor should be critical, but the reason for these absences is that most of the sources must remain anonymous, because they are sending Palast, in droves, all sorts of classified information we, the public, are not supposed to know about [but have the right to know about]. Thank heavens for the courage and trust of these sources and Palast’s ability to publicize them to us.

Another image occurs to me out of my childhood: turning over a large rock and discovering not only gruesome fauna and mangled flora but the effects of air, water, and soil pollution in day-glow colors and contra-naturam textures.

Carissimi, we are the children and Palast the Scout leader showing us the truth about the wilderness of lies we inhabit.

Palast amuses us in the process of shocking us - at every level from the lexical to the slapstick of oxymoron: hypocrisy at the highest levels of religion and government - we expect it from corporations anyway. Nothing is as it seems, he keeps reminding us. But we must pretend that face values are meaningful. Too

much paranoia loosens the ground we stand on, as does too little. How can we most effectively inhabit the realities GP has revealed and continues to dissect? Democracy is a constant battleground to maintain peace, not passivity: the two concepts vastly differ.

To get the truth out to us despite the U.S. media, having transplanted himself overseas to achieve this, GP challenges us to self-govern as we are guaranteed in

the U.S. Constitution - and we can. We are constrained only by our lack of free time (i.e., the sort born of opulence, not unemployment) to achieve this. And the Right Wing is doing its best to hang on to most of the world’s wealth to maintain its plutocracy and our subjugation. Of course, avarice is human, as is power hunger. Too many innocent people are suffering, though. It is our job, through various forms of protest, not only to protect the innocent but to keep them innocent, or at least good. What is it about Western culture that breeds all these monsters GP has so vividly unearthed and described to us? Power hunger and avarice - that in our shrunken universe can now unite likeminded souls all over with such ease?

A high point among the essays (“Lobbygate: The Real Story of Blair and the Sale of Britain”) recalls the DOJ’s Abscam sting of the late 1970s (along with its predecessor Watergate) - though in Great Britain and this time with positive intentions and outcome. Paying his dues for employment in the UK and all he is able to divulge to us and the world from there, Palast disguised himself as an American businessman (and his disguise is parodic in itself, but they bought it there, though GP was a well-known figure) and convinced some of Tony Blair’s people that he wanted to build some smelly, polluting generators that would generate lots of income along with pollution. He got them to offer (proudly) all the necessary loopholes for circumventing the environmental regulations and then exposed them all in a scandal later called “Lobbygate.” The chagrined Blair blasted our hero in Parliament, the first time in British history a journalist (let alone an award-winning journalist) was censured in that august setting.

In delving so deeply into the various layers of hypocrisy and corruption, GP, I venture to conclude, deep down yearns for a righteous utopia that would have no need for investigative reporting. His skills could be diverted to publicizing social and civic events, if not designing peaceful creations and enlightened economics to further enhance a cleaned-up world.

That the media renamed Attack on America 9/11 indicates (perhaps unwittingly) our real concern with the real emergency - dearth of leadership if not treason. We are all being bombarded, not governed, by the present administration. 9/11 was just a manifestation of what is subtly occurring all

around us every day (witness the explosion of acetone canisters in Manhattan just this morning [4/25] on W. 19^{th St. in the Chelsea district - I was just four blocks away at a meeting last night). I look forward to the time, which I hope is soon, when GP becomes convinced that there was crucial evidence our country would be attacked - manifold evidence in the months that preceded 9/11 (read Thierry Meyssan's bestseller [in Europe] on 9-11 The Frightening Fraud, e.g., if not the poll in progress on truthout.com of those in favor of including the White House in a 9/11 investigation: 4,635 pro to 65 con as of April 29, 2002). Because when that day comes, we can be sure the facts will be explored, divulged, and maybe this time properly publicized. Too many people are reading GP’s work and becoming angry. Let them all be able to express this anger effectively come this November and at every election thereafter. I look forward to his coverage (and monitoring) of the Florida elections this November. Let us hope for a very different scenario this time: namely, ethics.}

April 25, 2002; rev. 4/29/02