CONFESSIONS OF A GUERRILLA WRITER:
Adventures in the Jungles of Crime, Politics, and JournalismCopyright © 2000, 2001 by Dan E. Moldea
Prologue
Since 1974, I have been a fiercely independent investigative journalist, who has concentrated, for the most part, on investigations of the Mafia. During my turbulent career--which has now yielded eight true-crime books--I have become widely known as one of the most daring and controversial reporters in America.
But, as an unabashed political lefty and a long-time streetfighter who refuses to take a punch without fighting back, I have made nearly as many enemies as friends, burning nearly as many bridges as I've built. I have taken on such powerful institutions as the Mafia, the Teamsters, Simon & Schuster, the Reagan White House, MCA, the National Rifle Association, the Los Angeles Police Department, the FBI and the Department of Justice, the National Football League, the legal and illegal gambling communities, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, Kenneth Starr and the Office of the Independent Counsel, and the political right wing, as well as a variety of politicians, organized-crime figures, white-collar criminals, and murderers.
Furthermore, in what many still consider an act of journalistic heresy--apart from my 1990-1994 libel suit against the New York Times--I served as Larry Flynt's lead investigator for eight weeks during his monumental crusade to expose President Bill Clinton's enemies who had conflicting standards of private behavior for public officials: One for those they like, and another for those they don't like. Specifically, my work for Flynt led to the dramatic resignation of U. S. House Speaker-designate Bob Livingston--the climactic moment that derailed the entire impeachment-and-removal process against the President, and, arguably, helped to foil a right-wing attempt to overthrow the Executive Branch of the United States Government. For this, I make no apology.
Yet, despite the chronic chaos and combat that has marked my career, I have worked hard to establish a solid reputation as a careful and thorough journalist and author. I have never missed a deadline. I have never misquoted a source. I have never taken an off-the-record quote and placed it on the record. I have never revealed a confidential source, without permission from the source. Also, no one has ever sued me for any reason for anything contained in any of my previous seven books.
Joe the Boss of my own operation, I receive no weekly paycheck, no expense account, no paid vacations, and no pension or welfare plans. I will not get a gold watch when I retire. Usually overcommitted and underfinanced, I have spent almost as much time at war with the media as I have fighting the Mafia. And, on top of that, I have been nearly killed on no fewer than six different occasions. Through all of this, I have demonstrated my personal toughness--not because I can dish it out, but because I can take it.
The following action-packed story is not simply a series of unconnected anecdotes and vignettes; rather it is an interconnected and relentless succession of events in which one adventure leads to the next, with high-profile characters who weave in and out of the overall plot. Also, on a higher level, this is a contemporary history of four decades of crime, politics, and journalism--and the news-making events that occurred during that turbulent period--as seen through the eyes of a fiercely independent journalist who has taken some licks but survived to tell this story.
(Selected chapters from Confessions of a Guerrilla Writer can be found at moldea.com.)