I'm The Front Man, I'm

Charity Depends On The Vicissitudes Of Whim And Personal Wealth; Justice Depends On Commitment Instead Of Circumstance. Faith-based Charity Provides Crumbs From The Table; Faith-based Justice Offers A Place At The Table.

The Corporate Right And The Political Right Declared Class Warfare On Working People A Quarter Of A Century Ago And They've Won. Take The Paradox Of Rush Limbaugh, Ensconced In A Palm Beach Mansion Massaging The Resentments Across The Country Of White-knuckled Wage Earners, Who Are Barely Making Ends Meet In No Small Part Because Of The Corporate And Ideological Forces For Whom Rush Has Been A Hero.

The Most Important Thing The Giant Philanthropies Could Do - Gates, Rockefeller, Ford, Open Society Institute, And New Ones Emerging - Would Be To Create A $2-to-$3 Billion Trust For Independent Journalism. They Wouldn't Miss The Money, And Democracy Would Still Have A Fighting Chance Because Of Their Investment.

It's Very Difficult To Measure The Impact On Policy Of Any Investigative Journalism. You Hope It Matters To Let A Little More Truth Loose In The World, But You Can't Always Be Sure It Does. You Do It Because There's A Story To Be Told. I Can Tell You That The Job Of Trying To Tell The Truth About People Whose Job It Is To Hide The Truth Is About As Complicated And Difficult As Trying To Hide It In The First Place.

A Free Press Is One Where It's Okay To State The Conclusion You're Led To By The Evidence. One Reason I'm In Hot Water Is Because My Colleagues And I At Now Didn't Play By The Conventional Rules Of Beltway Journalism. Those Rules Divide The World Into Democrats And Republicans, Liberals And Conservatives, And Allow Journalists To Pretend They Have Done Their Job If Instead Of Reporting The Truth Behind The News, They Merely Give Each Side An Opportunity To Spin The News.