by Richard Kostelanetz (February 2012)

I’ve written before that the most deflating “rejection letters” ever to come my way were written by unidentified factotums at the FBI and CIA, both declaring, in response to my Freedom of Information requests, that they had no files on me. I didn’t believe them then and don’t now, not only because their offices were filled with guys who clipped periodicals (well before they got computers) but also since my name is unique. Furthermore, back in 1959, while a freshman at Brown University, I published in the undergraduate newspaper a favorable review of a book critical of the FBI, incidentally recommending the decriminalization of illicit drugs as the surest way to reduce crime in America. (The review is reprinted in my Political Essays (Autonomedia, 1994).) That review along with that opinion should have marked me as henceforth worth the FBI’s attention, n’est-ce pas? more>>>