Reprint. Originally published: New York: Random House, c1984.

When FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover reported to the Nixon White House in 1972 about the Bureau's surveillance of John Lennon, he began by explaining that Lennon was a "former member of the Beatles singing group." When a copy of this letter arrived in response to Jon Wiener's 1981 Freedom of Information request, the entire text was withheld--along with almost 200 other pages--on the grounds that releasing it would endanger national security. This book tells the story of the author's remarkable fourteen-year court battle to win release of the Lennon files under the Freedom of Information Act in a...

Michael Moore mocks George Bush and Al Franken ridicules Rush Limbaugh, but the mixing of play and politics today is polite and respectful compared to the carnival of contempt known as the Chicago Eight trial.
Opening at the end of 1969, the trial brought Yippies, antiwar activists, and Black Panthers to face conspiracy charges arising from the massive protests at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. The defendants openly lampooned the proceedings, with Abbie Hoffman blowing kisses to the jury and the defense bringing a Viet Cong flag into the courtroom. The judge ordered Bobby Seale...

Available for the first time in paperback after being widely reviewed and discussed upon its hardcover publication, Historians in Trouble is investigative journalist and historian Jon Wiener's "incisive and entertaining" (New Statesman) account of several of the most notorious history scandals of the last few years.

Focusing on a dozen key controversies ranging across the political spectrum and representing a wide array of charges, Wiener seeks to understand why some cases make the headlines and end careers, while others do not. He looks at the well publicized cases of...

"I exist to say, 'No, that isn't the way it is, ' or 'What you believe to be true is not true for the following reasons.' I am a master of the obvious. I mean, if there's a hole in the road, I will, viciously, outrageously, say there's a hole in the road and if you don't fill it in you'll break the axle of your car. One is not loved for being helpful."

Gore Vidal, one of America's foremost essayists, screenwriters, and novelists, died July 31, 2012. He was, in addition, a terrific conversationalist. Dick Cavett once described him as "the best talker since Oscar Wilde." And Vidal was never...

Hours after the USSR collapsed in 1991, Congress began making plans to establish the official memory of the Cold War. Conservatives dominated the proceedings, spending millions to portray the conflict as a triumph of good over evil and a defeat of totalitarianism equal in significance to World War II. In this provocative book, historian Jon Wiener visits Cold War monuments, museums, and memorials across the United States to find out how the era is being remembered. The author s journey provides a history of the Cold War, one that turns many conventional notions on their heads.
In an...