From Truman to Trump, the deep corruption of our political leaders unveiled. Many critiques of the Trump era contrast it with the latter half of the twentieth century, when the United States seemed governed more by statesmen than by special interests. Without denying the extraordinary vigor of President Trump's assault on traditional ethical and legal norms, Jonathan Marshall challenges the myth of a golden age of American democracy. Drawing on a host of original archival sources, he tells a shocking story of how well-protected criminals systematically organized the corruption of American national politics after World War II. Marshall begins by tracing the extraordinary scandals of President Truman, whose political career was launched by the murderous Pendergast machine in Missouri. He goes on to highlight the role of organized crime in the rise of McCarthyism during the Cold War, the near-derailment of Vice President Johnson's political career owing to two mob-related scandals, and Nixon's career-long association with underworld figures. The book culminates with a discussion of Donald Trump's unique history of relations with the traditional American Mafia and newer transnational gangs like the Russian Mafia--and how the latter led to his historic impeachment by the House of Representatives.
Jonathan Marshall is an independent journalist who has published in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Mother Jones, National Review, California Lawyer, California Journal, American Enterprise, Stanford Magazine, Philadelphia Inquirer, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Sacramento Bee, Pacific News Service, HuffingtonPost, and ConsortiumNews.com. He has been the economics editor and technology reporter, San Francisco Chronicle, editorial page editor, Oakland Tribune, editorial writer, San Jose Mercury News, associate editor, Inquiry magazine, and a project member, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He lives in San Anselmo, California.
Acknowledgments 1. Introduction Part I: The Truman Years 2. Organized Crime and Corruption in the Truman Administration 3. Anti-Communism: Mobsters, the FBI, the China Lobby Part II: From Ike to LBJ 4. The Dominican Connection: Dictators, Mobsters, and Caribbean Intrigues 5. The Friends of LBJ - I: Bobby Baker and the Mob 6. The Friends of LBJ - II: The Murchisons 7. Henry Crown, the Chicago Outfit, and the TFX Scandal Part III: Richard Nixon 8. Nixon's Caribbean Milieu, 1950-1968 9. In the White House: Nixon and the Mob, 1969-1974 10. Nixon, Howard Hughes, the CIA, and the Mob: The Road to Watergate Part IV: Conclusion 11. From Ronald Reagan to Donald Trump Bibliography Notes
Dark Quadrant offers a unique blend of magma-deep research, dramatic revelations, and judicious conclusions. Jonathan Marshall manages to tell some frequently gob-smacking tales while steadily keeping his eye on the larger historical context. Readers will come away with an enlarged sense of the meaning and methods of corruption, and with a fresh perspective on what makes modern America tick.--David M. Kennedy, Pulitzer-Prize winning author of Freedom From Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929 -1945 Marshall has written a deeply troubling history of corruption in the United States, from Truman's presidency to Trump's. He charts the 'swamp' that Trump fatuously claimed he would drain, exposes the fetid reality, and warns that it is a cancer in the heart of democracy.--Anthony Summers, Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for History, 2012
