Previously posted at BillMoyers.com

At the end of a week that reminds us to be ever vigilant about the dangers of government overreaching its authority, whether by the long arm of the IRS or the Justice Department, we should pause to think about another threat -- from too...

With all the fanfare around the new movie version of The Great Gatsby, directed by Baz Luhrmann with a screenplay by Luhrmann and Craig Pearce, it's a great time to go back to the book and be reminded of F. Scott Fitzgerald's elegant, graceful writing; so fragile and yes, unique,...

We were struck this week by one response to our broadcast last week on gun violence and the Newtown school killings. A visitor to the website wrote, "It is interesting to me that Bill Moyers, who every week describes the massive levels of corruption in our government... [and] the advocates...

This week, we spent time with Francine and David Wheeler, parents of six-year-old Ben Wheeler, one of the 20 children and six educators shot and killed at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Francine and David moved from New York City to Newtown to raise a family...

Originally posted at BillMoyers.com

If you want to see why the public approval rating of Congress is down in the sub-arctic range -- an icy 15 percent by last count -- all you have to do is take a quick look at how the House and Senate...

Originally posted at BillMoyers.com

You may think you know about Martin Luther King, Jr., but there is much about the man and his message we have conveniently forgotten. He was a prophet, like Amos, Isaiah and Jeremiah of old, calling kings and plutocrats to account -- speaking truth...

At moments, "The Lessons of Watergate" conference, held a couple of weeks ago in Washington, D.C. by the citizen's lobby Common Cause, was a little like that two-man roadshow retired baseball players Bill Buckner and Mookie Wilson have been touring. In it, they retell the story of the catastrophic moment...

Along with its sandy beaches and quality snorkeling, the Cayman Islands' reputation as an offshore tax haven for corporations, banks and hedge funds has become so well-known its financial institutions now are featured in travel brochures as yet another tourist attraction.

So as we traveled across the Caribbean this...

To those who would argue that the notion of a perpetual motion machine is impossible, we give you the revolving door -- that ever-spinning entrance and exit between public service in government and the hugely profitable private sector. It never stops.

Yes, we've talked about the revolving door until we're...

Originally posted at BillMoyers.com

In our last episode of that ongoing Washington soap opera, "As the Door Revolves," we introduced you to former federal prosecutor Mary Jo White, pursuer of drug lords and terrorists, who left government to become a hot-shot Wall Street lawyer defending such corporate giants...

Last week, the New York Times published a chilling account of how indiscriminate killing in war remains bad policy even today. This time, it's done not by young GIs in the field but by anonymous puppeteers guiding drones that hover and attack by remote control against targets thousands of...

If you've seen the movie Zero Dark Thirty, you know why it has triggered a new debate over our government's use of torture after 9/11.

The movie's up for an Oscar as best motion picture. We'll know later this month if it wins. Some people leave the theater claiming the...

The inauguration of a president is one of those spectacles of democracy that can make us remember we're part of something big and enduring. So for a few hours this past Monday the pomp and circumstance inspired us to think that government of, by, and for the people really is...

If you're one of those who equate the worlds of Washington and Hollywood -- the standard joke: "Politics is show business for ugly people" -- then a presidential inauguration is the Oscars, Golden Globes and Emmy Awards combined, right down to the parties, balls, extravagant wardrobes and goody bags stuffed...

In economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman's book, End This Depression Now!, there's a chapter titled "The Second Gilded Age" in which he describes the extraordinary rise in wealth and power of the very rich during this era of unregulated greed. Since Ronald Reagan's election in 1980, the...

We wrote and spoke about guns just a few days before Christmas, following the massacre in Newtown, Connecticut. So did Wayne LaPierre, CEO of the National Rifle Association. His now infamous "no questions" press conference was the most stunning, cockeyed, one-man show since Clint Eastwood addressed that empty chair...

As Saturday Night Live's Stefon would say, this Washington tale has everything: accusations hurled and counter-hurled, handguns, multimillion dollar payoffs -- just what we need to briefly distract us as the parties play chicken up on Capitol Hill's fiscal cliff.

The story first came to public attention...

We've seen how Washington insiders write the rules of politics and the economy to protect powerful special interests but now, as we enter the holiday season, and a month or so after the election, we're getting a refresher course in just how that inside game is played, gifts and all....

We're spending a holiday season weekend at the home of friends in a small Connecticut town just a few miles up the road from Newtown. Returning from the local store, our friend Emily tells us that the talk there this morning is of nothing but the killings; every customer seems...

Until now, this hasn't been the best year for media mogul Rupert Murdoch. For one, none of the Republicans who'd been on the payroll of his Fox News Channel -- not Newt Gingrich or Rick Santorum or Mike Huckabee or Sarah Palin -- became this year's GOP nominee...