Russ Baker

For the aviator, seeRuss Baker (pilot).For the satirical writer, seeRussell Baker.

Baker at the Coalition on Political Assassination in 2013

Russ Baker(born 1958) is an American author andinvestigative journalist.Baker is theeditor-in-chiefand founder of the nonprofit news websiteWhoWhatWhy.Earlier in his career he wrote for a variety of publications, includingThe New York Times Magazine,The New Yorker,The Washington Post,Esquire,Vanity Fair,The Christian Science Monitor,The Nation,The Guardian,Wired,andThe Village Voice.

Baker is the author of the nearly 600 page 2008 investigative history bookFamily of Secretsthat reports a little-known backhistory to theBush political dynasty,asserts that a young future presidentGeorge H.W. Bushserved secretly in theCIAin the 1950s and 1960s and probes his network and activities in Dallas at the time of theassassination of President John F. Kennedyand later in Washington during theWatergate scandal.

Career

Baker grew up in California, received a bachelor’s degree in political science fromUCLAand a master’s degree in journalism from theGraduate School of Journalism at Columbia University.After graduation, Baker worked as a metro reporter withNewsdayinNew York City.He then reported on tribalgenocideinBurundifor the largest circulation newspaper in the Netherlands and for theSt. Louis Post-Dispatch,the fall of theBerlin WallforCBS RadioandThe Christian Science Monitor,and, for a variety of publications, the fall ofRomaniandictatorNicolae Ceausescu.

In 1989, he became a New York correspondent forThe Christian Science Monitor.He also wrote for theVillage Voice.

His articles included a report on the efforts of the controversialChurch of Scientologyto recruitMichael Jackson,produced an early critique ofNew York TimesjournalistJudith Miller’s claims that Iraq possessed“weapons of mass destruction”(which became a factor in the US’s subsequent invasion of that country), and on the West’s indifference to capturing accused Serbian war criminalRadovan Karadzic.An article inThe Nationon George W. Bush's disappearance from his US-based military unit during the Vietnam War received a 2005 award from the Deadline Club, the New York chapter of theSociety of Professional Journalists,for a web-exclusive article.

Baker has been on the adjunct faculty of theColumbia University Graduate School of Journalismand was a contributing editor to theColumbia Journalism Review.

Following the 2013Boston Marathon bombings,Baker and his team at WhoWhatWhy published dozens of articles and podcasts about inconsistencies in government statements regarding the alleged perpetrators. Among other things, they noted that theFBIhad visited with theTamerlan Tsarnaevin years prior to the bombings he was accused of, noted ties between the Tsarnaev family and people in the US national security apparatus, and pointed out that US government itself had said that the brothers were themselves unable to make the types of sophisticated bombs used at the marathon.

WhoWhatWhy

At the time that Family of Secrets was released, Baker founded an independent, nonprofit news organization,WhoWhatWhy.Board members and advisory board members have included journalism figures, among themAlicia Patterson Foundationdirector Margaret Engel, formerVillage VoiceeditorJonathan Larsen,Pulitzer PrizewinnerSydney SchanbergandSalonfounderDavid Talbot.WhoWhatWhyrelies on reader contributions and the work of "a mix of paid journalists and skilled volunteers."Its donors have includedJoan Konner,a former dean of the Columbia Journalism School, the Larsen Fund, and TV producer and activistNorman Lear.The site claims to explore "deep politics", covering stories the establishment media will not touch, and has used the slogan "We don't cover the news. We uncover the truth."

In a January 2015Bostonmagazine profile, journalistBen Schreckingersaid that over the previous decade, "Baker has abandoned the mainstream media and become a key player on the fringe, walking that murky line between conventional investigative journalist and wild-eyed conspiracy theorist."FormerCBS NewsanchorDan Rathertold Schreckinger Baker was "an indefatigable reporter who has made a specialty of digging deep into stories when most other people have left the story. And he's very good at raising the right questions."Schreckinger said "it would be a lot easier to dismiss Baker as a nut and move on if it weren't for his three decades of award-winning investigative-reporting experience", noting that Baker was among the first to raise concerns aboutColin Powell's now-infamous presentation on Iraq at the United Nations at a time whenThe New York TimesandThe Washington Postwere still praising Powell.

In a 2016Columbia Journalism Reviewprofile,Neal Gablerreported that journalistBill Moyers,who does not know Baker personally, called him an "indefatigable researcher from whom I could learn something about a subject that I hadn't known because he so often looked under the next rock, rounded the next corner, asked the next question after everyone else had gone home or to the local bar", adding that Baker seemed "unimpressed with conventional wisdom, quickly spotted and dismissed spin, and wasn't intimidated by the powers-that-be."

Baker told Gabler that in journalism, "everyone has been taught: Don't go too far. Don't dig too deep." Gabler reported that Baker's critics reject that claim, and say that "reporters are warned not to go farther than the evidence warrants, and they say that what Baker sees as audacity is just a cover for sloppy reporting."Los Angeles Timesmedia criticTim Ruttensaid that Baker once may have been a serious and talented journalist but became "mesmerized by the idea of secrets and the Great Seduction. It causes you to lose your perspective and balance."

Baker speaking at thePorcupine Freedom Festivalin 2015 on "American Deep Power Structures"

Family of Secrets

Main article:Family of Secrets

Baker's 2008 bookFamily of Secretsoutlines historical connections of members of theBush political dynasty,includingPrescott Bush,President George H.W. BushandPresident George W. Bush,to individuals in theCentral Intelligence Agency,military-industrial complexandglobal financial system.Baker asserts that George H. W. Bush was linked to theWatergate scandaland theassassination of John F. Kennedy.Family of Secretscontends that the first President Bush became anintelligence agentin his teenage years and was later at the center of aplot to assassinate Kennedythat included his father,Prescott Bush,Vice PresidentLyndon B. Johnson,CIA DirectorAllen Dulles,Cuban and Russian exiles and emigrants, and various Texas oilmen.It asserts thatBob WoodwardofThe Washington Postwas an intelligence agent who conspired withJohn Deanto remove PresidentRichard Nixonfrom office for opposing theoil depletion allowance.

In his 2015 profile of Baker, Schreckinger observed that the book was "trounced by the mainstream media".Lev GrossmanofTimemagazine said that Baker "connects the dots between the Bushes and Watergate, which he far-fetchedly describes not as a ham-handed act of political espionage but as a carefully orchestrated farce designed to take down President Richard Nixon."Washington Postreviewer Jamie Malanowski contended that Baker "overplayed his hand" and "stretches evidence," using rhetorical devices to do so. Malanowski opined that "there are more crutches in these pages than in thegrotto at Lourdes.In aLos Angeles Timesreview, Rutten called the book "preposterous" and said that it was "singularly offensive" because it "recklessly impugns, in the most disgusting possible way," the reputations of living and dead people.

Salonpublished excerpts from the book in 2018 upon the occasion of Bush's death.A 2019Salonarticle by Jefferson Morley noted that a "handful of declassified records suggest that Bush’s relationship to the agency might have run deeper than his overt roles as director, vice president, and president. The records, which I believe were first reported in Russ Baker’s 2009 book, 'Family of Secrets,' went unmentioned in the recent media coverage of Bush’s death."

Personal life

Baker says that because of his work as an investigative journalist, he prefers not to discuss his family or details on his location.

External links

• RussBaker.com,Russ Baker website
• WhoWhatWhy.orgwebsite
• ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer listing for Real News Project, Inc.