Ken Silverstein

  • Oleaginous Rex

    A July blog post at Washingtonian magazine dissected what it calls the “Washington Read”—the process “by which, through a form of intellectual osmosis, a book is absorbed into the Washington atmosphere.” The central irony here is that a best-selling book that becomes a Washington Read—typically after some Sunday-morning talking head raves about its insights and brilliance or the Post runs a prominent review—doesn’t yield many actual Washington readers. Rather, busy and self-important DC residents elect simply to buy a copy and skim the table of contents and introduction (as well as the index,

  • The Tale of the Cables

    I.

    Much of the furor over last November’s WikiLeaks release of US diplomatic cables concerned the alleged harm that the airing of sensitive American intelligence would do to the United States on the global stage. Vice President Joe Biden denounced WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange as a “high-tech terrorist,” with plenty of conservative commentators chiming in to call for Assange’s prosecution under treason, espionage, or conspiracy charges—or for, what the hell, his contract assassination by the CIA.

    True, the cables show that there was plenty of unsavory, if unsurprising, behind-the-scenes