I just finished reading, Unscripted, a new book by New York Times reporters James B. Stewart and Rachel Abrams about the recent scandal and battle for control of the Paramount/CBS/Viacom empire centered on the Sumner Redstone family, but which spills over to the corporate boardroom, Les Moonves and the #MeToo movement.  Non-fiction books about big business and Wall Street machinations are, for reasons I can’t quite explain, among my favorite reading.  I’ve read two books by Pulitzer Prizer-winner James B. Stewart (DisneyWar about the Eisner/Katzenberg years, and Den of Thieves on the insider trading scandal in the 1980s involving Ivan Boesky, Michael Milliken and others), and Rachel Abrams was on the New York Times team that won the Pulitzer Prize for its #MeToo reporting.  So, I was anxiously awaiting this one ever since I read about its pending publication months earlier.
 
And it was worth the wait, really wonderful.  A fascinating story, seriously impressive meticulous research, and as readable as a good novel. 

(It was also just optioned to be adapted for a limited series, which should give you some idea of how wide-ranging and involving the story is.  And it’s a natural for that, as HBO's Succession showed.  This, on the other hand, is real life and actually happened, stunning as at times it seems.)

​This is where the disclaimer comes in. I wasn’t anxious to read it for the corporate subject matter or being a fan of James B. Stewart.  (Though I would have read the book for either of those reasons.)  My being anxious to read it was Rachel Abrams, whose work I’ve admired, but far more to the point – I’ve been friends with her father Ian Abrams for decades, and we were even business partners in a “bulletin board service” (a precursor of chat rooms) for professional writers, called the PAGE BBS.  (Among our other partners was the inveterate Chris Dunn.)
 
So, in full disclosure, Ian and I were movie publicists together, and both survived to get into screenwriting.  In fact, among his credits, Ian wrote the movie, Undercover Blues that starred Dennis Quaid and Kathleen Turner, and co-created the CBS series Early Edition that starred Kyle Chandler and Fisher Stevens as his sort of sidekick buddy, and was on the air for four seasons.
 
So, I knew Rachel from when she was around 10 years old, although not well, a very nice, smart, quiet kid – and then the family moved to Philadelphia because Ian hated Hollywood and decided to teach at Drexel University, where he created their screenwriting program.
 
Rachel eventually grew up, as such things happen, and got into journalism, where she later worked for the Hollywood Reporter, and took on the #MeToo beat, doggedly covering Harvey Weinstein and more.  Her topnotch work caught the eye of the New York Times, which wisely hired her.  And she’s become a powerhouse, fearless journalist.
 
It’s no small thing that she partnered with the long-respected James B. Stewart.  In fact, it is seriously impressive.  After all, as he notes himself in the afterward, he had never worked with a co-author before in his long career.  In fact, they hardly even knew on another at the Times, but were working on a similar story and overlapped.  As he writes in the acknowledgements, “She was a dream collaborator:  incredibly hard-working, resourceful, ethical, considerate and brimming with enthusiasm for every discovery.  Working with her was both inspiring and fun.”  Not shabby.  And her words for Stewart were as glowing and moving, among them – his “reputation is belied by his grace and humility.  Working with him has made me a better journalist, and I am very grateful to have had him as a partner.”
 
So, yes, I’m biased.  But that doesn’t mean I’m wrong.  In fact, I’m right.  It was a New York Times bestseller, has 4.1 stars on Amazon, and among its reviews are –
 
“Jaw-dropping...an epic tale of toxic wealth and greed populated by connivers and manipulators.” — The New York Times Book Review, Editors’ Choice
 
“A deeply reported account... The story, whose contours would be familiar to fans of the HBO series Succession, stands as a real-life warning to other family dynasties led by powerful founders….a masterful job.” -- Financial Times

“The book is a page-turner — an over-the-top tale of money, power, sex, and relentless scheming to wrest billions away from an old man who in his final years seems to have lost the capacity for just about anything except sex.” -- Fortune

“A must-read... A bombshell new book from two Pulitzer winners reveals some truly shocking storylines within the real-life Succession drama that is the Paramount media empire... Abrams, a New York Times investigative reporter, and Stewart, a Times business columnist have written a jaw-dropping yarn.” -- Daily Beast

There’s more, but we’ll leave it at that.  I just wanted to make it clear that my praise wasn’t purely subjective.
 
The book really is terrific.  And if one is a fan of Succession, this is the real thing.  (In fact, I suspect that as much as the series is inspired by the Murdochs and Trumps, the Redstone story has to have played a part in there, too.)  Billionaire Sumner Redstone is a Shakesperean character, triumphant, towering, profoundly flawed, and ultimately a tragic figure.  Then add in the turbulent family drama, boardroom maneuverings, sexual lavishness, lawsuits flying all over the place with tens of millions of dollars regularly thrown around like pocket change, and twists and turns every step of the way, notably a daughter thrown into the middle of it all against her best inclination.
 
All that, and a quote from Nell Minow.  (Hey, I said I was biased.  But again, I’m not wrong – her warning is incredibly prescient.)
 
It’s really well-written on top of everything, wonderfully readable for all the detail.  If you’re interested, you can find it here. 
 
And as a bonus, here are James B. Stewart and Rachel Abrams being interviewed on the Today show.

​On this week’s ‘Not My Job’ segment of the NPR quiz show Wait, Wait…Don’t Tell Me!, the guest is literary fiction writer George Saunders, recipient of a MacArthur Genius Grant and the Man Booker Prize.  He has a fun conversation with host Peter Sagal about the odd jobs he did before getting into writing, including working in a slaughterhouse to get enough money to get to Chicago and later as a roofer in Chicago after arriving.  And a funny tale about his first novel, a 700-page effort that was so terrible he saw his wife in agony by page six.
 
This the full Wait, Wait… broadcast, but you can jump directly to the “Not My Job” segment, it starts around the 18:30 mark.

I recently finished reading the January 6 Select Committee report.  First things first: 
 
For anyone trying to figure out when you have the time to read it, know that it is not remotely as long as they keep saying.  The figure that gets repeated is that it’s around 850 pages.  It’s not close to that.  The edition I have (the Harper-Collins one with Ari Melber’s introduction) is 691 pages – that’s a lot, but it’s a lot less than 850.  And more to the point, that number also includes 260 pages of endnotes.  So, the text is only around 430 pages.  (Melber’s introduction is separate from that page count, and about 30 pages.)  Furthermore, there are a lot of photos interspersed throughout, so it’s even less.  And perhaps most importantly, that includes the 130-page summary, all of which is repeated in the main text, just with more details.  In other words, the report is only 300 pages – including a great many photos.  So, maybe it’s around 250 pages of text.  That’s all.
 
Moreover, it’s as well-written as its reputation and so, reads fast.  And it reads all the quicker since I suspect most people diving in are generally familiar with what the overall view of what it’s saying.
 
I read both the summary and the main report, so it was in the 400-page range.  But you can skip the summary, since all of that is in the report.  But then, honestly, if you really didn’t want to read the whole thing – you could just read the 130-page summary which is extremely comprehensive.  Though I said the main report has more details, there are plenty of details in a 130-page summary.  I just liked reading both, because it gave me more familiarity once I got to the final report.  It seemed to read smoother.  But the summary is not necessary.  There’s only one thing that I recall which is in the summary, but not the report.  (I’ll get to that in a moment.)  So, you won’t miss anything by skipping it.  I don’t mean metaphorically, I mean other than this one chart, there is literally nothing in the summary that is not in the final report.  And since the chart is easy to spot – it goes on for six  pages! – so, you can just flip to it.  And to make things even easier, I'll mention that in my copy it starts around page 22.
 
Having now finished it all, I must tell you that I’ve come to the conclusion that I think this Trump guy is really guilty. 
 
Quips aside, there is so much more damning evidence in this than got presented at the hearings – there’s more testimony and a great many blunt text messages.  It’s incredibly clear why the Committee was so driven in their actions because you get the sense that all the committee members wanted to yell into the cameras, “We know SO MUCH more than we’re telling you, and it’s horrible.”
 
That one chart that’s only in the summary is fascinating and really smart of them to include.  It’s a great chart of boxes that goes on for three pages – on the left side of the pages, running vertically, each box is dated and shows what someone testified they told Trump the facts and reality were about no election fraud, no problems, everything has been investigated and is legitimate.  On the right side opposite each box are a companion boxes with the lies Trump then told the public days later that totally ignore the truth he’d just been told.  It goes on and on for three pages, and is brutal.

(Though the chart is not in the main report, all the information in the chart is.)
 
The text messages they include about what high White House officials knew about plans for “war” and for killing Congressmen that were posted on militia and white supremacist sites for Jan. 6 is sickening and damning.  And the Trump officials involved goes as high up as texts with Chief of Staff Mark Meadows.  (I have to believe the DOJ Special Counsel is honing on him to get him to flip, if Meadows hasn’t already flipped.  It’s clear he knows so much.)
 
The nuggets throughout are amazing.  For just one example, there’s the passage that dealt with what Cassidy Hutchinson testified to about Trump being out of control in the SUV wanting to go to the Capitol.  Up to now, the public likely sees this as her word (under oath) against Tony Ornato’s (not under oath).  But there’s new, subsequent insight in the report -- “The Committee has now obtained evidence from several sources about a ‘furious interaction’ in the SUV.  The vast majority of witnesses who have testified before the Select Committee about this topic, including multiple members of the Secret Service, a member of the Metropolitan police and national security and military officials in the White House described President Trump’s behavior as ‘irate,’ ‘furious, ‘ ‘insistent, ‘  ‘profane‘ and ‘heated‘.”
 
It's just one small matter and a minor passage in the summary.  But the report is full of material like that, where you sit up and go, Wow, I didn’t know that!
 
Quite a few people stand out as particularly awful.  Trump, of course, leads the pack  Being relentlessly told the truth and not only ignoring it, but consciously going out and lying about what he’s been told is contrary.  But also Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman hold a special place of deceit.  Giuliani for being relentless in trying to push lies he knows he has nothing to back them up with, and Eastman for continually pushing the legal theories and plans for Trump act on, even though he says he knows they have no validity.

One can get the report for free online as a PDF file.  I preferred to have it in book form, and ended up getting the edition with Ari Melber's preface -- not so much for that (since, good as it was, he covered it all on a special episode of his show -- but because at the time it was the least expensive version for sale.  You can get it here.
 
However, there's now a less-expensive edition for four dollars less at $11.  (Oddly, it's less than the Kindle version.)  It's from The New Yorker, and includes a prologue by a David Remnick, the Pulitzer Prize-winning editor of the magazine, and an epilogue by committee member Jamie Raskin.  That's available here.

In his new book, published yesterday, former Trump Secretary of State Mike Pompeo brings up Jamal Khashoggi, the Washington Post columnist, who was brutally murdered and then dismembered by the Saudis – an action believed to have been under the direction of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.  The horrific event galvanized the U.S. in outrage, so it’s understandable that Pompeo would address it in discussing his time in office.  What’s utterly inexplicable though is that Pompeo chose to attack, not the Crown Prince or the Saudi killers, but Jamal Khashoggi, who (to repeat) had been brutally murdered and dismembered.  That seems weird and reprehensible even by Trump administration standards.
 
Pompeo, for reasons known only to him in his fantasy quest to become U.S. President, writes about Mr. Khasghoggi that “we need to be clear about who he was -- and too many in the media were not.”  And from that, Pompeo goes on to refer to the career journalist instead as solely an “activist,” while additionally making ham-fisted suggestions that try to hint at supposed, tangential connections to the world Khashoggi wrote about, yet without any specifics to support what he wants you to believe, which is the very opposite of “a need to be clear.”  Though, in fairness, what you might expect from a former CIA director used to obfuscation.
 
Even more deplorable is that Pompeo not only tries to redefine who he wants you to believe Jamal Khashoggi is, taking victim-shaming to a new low, but he wants to eradicate who the journalist was and make you think he wasn't even a journalist, suggesting instead that Khashoggi (who wrote for the Washington Post) was not "a Saudi Arabian Bob Woodward martyred for bravely criticizing the Saudi royal family through his opinion articles in the Washington Post."  Never mind that Mohammed bin Salman was so angry at Khashoggi's work that he told an aide -- in a conversation intercepted by intelligence sources -- that he would go after Khashoggi "with a bullet."  (Which by most standards, when you're brutally murdered and dismembered, qualifies as being martyred for bravely criticizing the Saudi royal family.)  But going even further, what Pompeo bizarrely tries to say even more is that Mr. Khashoggi was a journalist only “to the extent that I, and many other public figures are journalists. We sometimes get our writing published, but we also do other things.”

Mike Pompeo is a journalist the same way that Kermit the Frog is an actual, real-life amphibian.
 
Since Pompeo says he has a burning “need to be clear” in reprehensibly demeaning a man who was brutally murdered and dismembered, let’s take a moment to point out that Jamal Khashoggi was a career journalist for 33 years.  He began as a correspondent for the Saudi Gazette in 1985, and then worked for a variety of Arab newspapers from 1987 to 1990, including Asharq Al-Awsat, Al Majalla and Al Muslimoon. In 1991, he became managing editor of Al Madina where he worked for eight years, later becoming acting editor-in-chief – while at the same time working as a foreign correspondent. He then was hired as deputy editor-in-chief of Arab News. And eventually, as his journalistic career progressed, he moved to the United States, where he become a legal U.S. resident, and in 2017 was hired to be a columnist for the Washington Post.  (Where Bob Woodward also works as an associate editor.)

It's like Mike Pompeo wants to do to Jamal Khashoggi's legacy almost the same as what the Saudis did to his body.
 
So, yeah, to serve his face-saving purposes, Mike Pompeo wants you to believe that Jamal Khashoggi only “sometimes” got his writing published.  In reality, Jamal Khashoggi got his writing published “sometimes” only if you define “sometimes” as “Not every day of his life.”  And Mike Pompeo wants to make you think he himself and Jamal Khashoggi were exactly the same in their writing careers by flim-flamming inattentive readers with the overly-generous, disingenuous use of the words “we” and “our.” 
 
But don’t take my word for it.  Here is what Washington Post publisher and CEO Fred Ryan wrote yesterday in blunt and scathing response to Pompeo about journalist Kamal Khashoggi who was under contract to write for Ryan’s Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper as a journalist --
 
"It is shocking and disappointing to see Mike Pompeo's book so outrageously misrepresent the life and work of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi. As the CIA — which Pompeo once directed — concluded, Jamal was brutally murdered on the orders of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman. His only offense was exposing corruption and oppression among those in power -- work that good journalists around the world do every day.  Jamal dedicated himself to the values of free speech and a free press and held himself to the highest professional standards.  For this devotion, he paid the ultimate price.  It is shameful that Pompeo would spread vile falsehoods to dishonor a courageous man's life and service — and his commitment to principles Americans hold dear — as a ploy to sell books."
 
For utterly inexplicable reason, in trying to undermine a man brutally murdered and dismembered (something that can’t be repeated enough), former Trump official Mike Pompeo wants to wipe out from existence Jamal Khashoggi’s long and involved career as nothing more than an “activist.”
 
So, again, in the “need to be clear,” what Jamal Khashoggi was…was a legal U.S. resident, with a wife, living in the United States.  Who worked for an American newspaper as a journalist, a profession protected in the Constitution by the First Amendment.  A man who was brutally murdered and dismembered. Because he spoke out against a repressive, savage regime. 

Which raises the question, bending over backwards to be fair to Mike Pompeo, a concept he doesn’t employ, so what if Jamal Khashoggi also was -- or wasn't -- an activist fighting horrific repression, in addition to being a career journalist who worked for a U.S. paper??!!

By the way, also in the need to be clear, taking Mike Pompeo’s word about anything is never a sure thing to do.  After all, this is the guy who signed over Afghanistan to one of the co-founders of the Taliban, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, who the Trump administration helped get out of prison – and then took a cool photo together to commemorate the event.  Not that one should draw any false connections to terrorists from that, even if Pompeo himself might do such a thing if it was others.

Why in the world Mike Pompeo oddly wants to denigrate activists is another question his efforts raise.  After all, Martin Luther King, Jr. was an activist. So was Rosa Parks.  And Gandhi.  Rep. John Lewis was an activist.  And Harriet Tubman.  Margaret Sanger.  Nelson Mandela.  Cesar Chavez.  Greta Thunberg.  Nobel Prize-winner Malala Yousafzai.  And Nobel Prize-winner Desmond Tutu.  President Theodore Roosevelt was an activist and also won the Nobel Prize.  President Barack Obama, too (including the Nobel Prize).  Elijah Cummings.  Alexei Navlny.  Bob Geldof.  Upton Sinclair was an activist – and a writer.  Maya Angelou was an activist – and a writer.  Elie Wiesel was an activist – and a writer, and won the Nobel Prize.  All of whom (and so many others) worked to make society a better place. 
 
But Mike Pompeo wants you to think activism is a bad thing.  Whether it’s your full-time endeavor or something you do as part of your life.
 
It must be noted that he does also write about legal U.S. resident Jamal Khashoggi, a career journalist and activist, who was brutally murdered and dismembered, that “
 
It is just utterly bewildering that Mike Pompeo made a conscious decision in his book to go off in this direction about U.S. resident Jamal Khashoggi, a journalist who was brutally murdered and dismembered.  That he also notes about Mr. Khashoggi, oh, by the way, "he didn't deserve to die" is so woke of Pompeo.

"He didn't deserve to die."  Nice attempt at a save, as they say.
 
It’s hard to imagine what possessed Mike Pompeo to address the brutal murder of a U.S. resident and journalist in the preposterous, contemptible way he did in his book.  One can come up with all manner of disreputable explanations, though they’re nothing more than guesses – and for all we know, might not go far enough.  Desperately trying to cover his butt as part of a deplorable Trump administration response as he hopes in his fantasy world to dream of becoming president is probably the most polite explanation available.  Covering the butt of Trump's many dealings with the Saudis (including the current LIV golf tour) and Jared Kushner getting $2 billion from them is another matter, as well.
 
Finally, it’s at this point, I have an unexpected addendum to this all.
 
I had been planning to write this article the moment I saw the story about Pompeo’s strange attack on Jamal Khashoggi.  In fact, I initially posted a tweet about it.  Then, a half-hour latter, I noticed that I got a reply.  It was from Ms. Hanan Elatr Khashoggi. 

Every year around this time, there are articles about which recorded version of A Christmas Carol is "the best."  Usually it comes down to the films that starred either Alistair Sim or Reginald Owen.

But for me, it's this one.  It's not a movie, though, or a TV production.  It's, of all things, an hour-long audio version that was done in 1960 for, I believe, the BBC.  It's quite wonderful and as good an adaptation of the story as I've come across.  It stars Sir Ralph Richardson as Scrooge, and Oscar-winner Paul Scofield as Dickens, the narrator.  Casts don't get much better than that.

I first heard this on radio station WFMT in Chicago which has been playing this every Christmas Eve for many decades.  Eventually, I found it on audio tape.  I've listened to it annually since I was a kidling.  Some years I think I won't listen to it this year, but put it on for a few minutes for tradition's sake -- but after the first sentence it sucks me in.

There are four reasons why, for me, this is far and away the best version. But one reason leaps out.

First, the acting is as good as it gets.  Scofield is crisp and emphatic as the narrator, and almost every creak of his voice draws you in to the world, and Richardson as Scrooge is a Christmas pudding joy.  Second, being radio, you aren't limited by budgets to create the Dickensian world.  Your imagination fills in every lush and poverty-stricken, nook and cranny -- and ghostly spirit, aided by moody sound effects and violins.  Third, the adaptation sticks  closely to the Dickens tale, and Scrooge comes across more a realistic, rounded-person than as a Mythic Icon.  

And fourth, and most of all by far, unlike any of the other version, this includes...Dickens.  While the story of A Christmas Carol is beloved, it's Dickens' writing that makes it even more vibrant than the story alone is.  And that's all lost in the movie versions, even down even to the legendary opening line, "Marley was dead, to begin with."  Or any of the other classic narrative lines.  (Like my favorite, when Scrooge first comes in contact with a ghost and was "as close to it as I am now to you, and I am standing in the spirit at your elbow.") Or the richness of Dickens setting the mood and tone and description of the gritty and ephemeral and emotional world.  All that's gone in movie versions, good as the productions may be.  (One semi-exception: they use 'Gonzo' as a sort-of Dickens narrator in the Muppet adaptation of the story, and that's great -- though ultimately it's a Muppet version and fun, good but hardly a definitive telling...) But all of that Dickens narration is here in this radio adaptation, and Scofield's reading of it is joyously wonderful and memorable.  For many, this will be A Christmas Carol unlike any other you're aware of, giving it a meaning and richness you didn't realize was there.  The ending of the tale is so much more moving and joyful here, as we listen to Dickens' own words, that begin with "Scrooge was better than his word.  He did it all, and infinitely more," and it soars from there, to perhaps my favorite extended passage about the new Scrooge and how good he is in the "good old world. Or any other good old world."

If you have the time or inclination, do give it a listen.  If only for five minutes to at least get the flavor.  You might find yourself sticking around.  Let it play in the background, if you have other things to do.  It runs about 55 minutes.

(Side note:  speaking of Dickens, if you know the original Broadway cast album of Oliver!, the actor here who plays the Ghost of Christmas Present, Willoughby Goddard, was Mr. Bumble on Broadway and also in the original London production.)

Normally I would post this later in the evening -- but given the various time zones across the country, I thought that I'd get it embedded earlier to give as many listeners as possible the chance to hear it on Christmas Eve.

This might not play immediately, since it's a large file and may have to buffer first.  But be patient, it's worth it.​​