Could a robot reporter have investigated D.C. sleaze better than I did in the 1970s?
Charles Smith , Future scandals , GSA , Media , Politicians , Sen. Ribicoff , The Solomon Scandals

Could a robot reporter have investigated D.C. sleaze better than I did in the 1970s?

David Rothman 0 comment

Could a reporter bot have been me in real life in the 1970s—or Jonathan Stone, the far more dashing investigative journalist in my novel The Solomon Scandals? And who would have made a better sleuth, humans or AI? With the above in mind, let me share a cautionary story about a CIA-occupied building and an […]

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GSA , Politicians , Sen. Ribicoff , The Solomon Scandals , Washington area life

JFK’s murdered mistress: Insider’s book alleges CIA role

David Rothman 0 comment

On CIA matters, The Solomon Scandals is fiction—not about what happened, but what could have happened. To this day we still don’t know the full story of why a U.S. senator held a secret stake in a CIA-occupied building in Arlington, VA, that the agency leased by way of the scandal-ridden General Services Administration. What has been established over the years is […]

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GSA , Media , The Solomon Scandals , Washington area life

Beyond GSA ‘crats at play: Scrutinize office leasing

David Rothman 0 comment

Tax dollars at work, GSA style Angry taxpayers are buzzing over the organizational “culture” at the General Services Administration, the federal procurement agency. I don’t mean Chaucer, Mozart or Van Gogh. Enjoy this spoof video for a GSA conference—rudely picked up by ABC News and others. Hey, you helped pay for it. GSA was supposed […]

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GSA , The Solomon Scandals

Mind reader and clown helped kill GSA leader Martha Johnson’s job

David Rothman 0 comment

”Among the other expenses were $3,200 for a mind reader, $6,300 on a commemorative coin set displayed in velvet boxes and $75,000 on a training exercise to build a bicycle.” – Washington Post report on $823K splurged on a 300-employee federal conference in Las Vegas. Ouch. The gems in the sentence above don’t even include […]

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Building collapses , GSA , Sen. Ribicoff , Skyline Plaza , The Solomon Scandals , Washington area life

The Solomon Scandals novel vs. online gossip about Skyline Towers and the intel community

David Rothman 0 comment

The Solomon Scandals is a novel, but two actual events helped inspire it and are the topics of online gossip today—several decades later: —The deadly Skyline Towers building collapse in Northern Virginia, where 14 workers died and dozens were injured. —The late Sen. Abraham Ribicoff’s secret and illegal investment in a CIA-occuped building in Arlington. […]

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GSA , Washington area life

The Solomon Scandals’ bureaucratic setting—a few decades later

David Rothman 0 comment

Much of The Solomon Scandals is about conflicts between friendship and duty. A rickety high-rise may tumble as a result, with hundreds of IRS and CIA workers inside. Washington has a culture of traded favors, one reason why Congress and the Interior Department unwittingly let the oil spill happen in the Gulf. And how about […]

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GSA , The Solomon Scandals

Martha N. Johnson: GSA’s new leader vs. dirty politics—the ‘Solomon Scandals’ angle

David Rothman 2 comment

A sad and bizarre update: Here. Margo Danialson, Oberlin B.A., is reporter Jon Stone’s partner in crime or anti-crime in The Solomon Scandals. She’s a 20-something real estate specialist at the government’s business agency, for which Seymour Solomon, a well-connected federal landlord, has built a rickety high-rise on the banks of the Potomac River. Now […]

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GSA , Sen. Ribicoff , Skyline Plaza , The Solomon Scandals , Washington area life

A tale of two obituaries—plus wisdom from J.Y. Smith, first official editor of the W. Post obit desk

David Rothman 0 comment

You regulars already know my complaint. For whatever the reason, Washington philanthropist Robert H. Smith enjoyed a free ride from the Post’s usually stellar obituary desk as well as from the editorial page. His family’s paid obit at Legacy.com was rather redundant. Ahead I’ll compare the Smith encomia with a more balanced write-up of Indianapolis […]

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GSA , The Solomon Scandals

‘The Solomon Scandals’ vs. Dan Brown’s latest, ‘The Lost Symbol’: Same city, different books

David Rothman 0 comment

Tip: You can add us to your RSS feeds and receive free updates like this one. Dan Brown’s new bestseller, The Lost Symbol, is a conspiracy novel set in Washington, D.C., just like The Solomon Scandals. Brown even includes a power figure with the last name of Solomon. If you want to read about a […]

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Building collapses , GSA , Sen. Ribicoff , The Solomon Scandals

The IRS as fodder for David Foster Wallace and me

David Rothman 0 comment

In my little overview of D.C. fiction, I quoted Jeffrey Charis-Carlson, a specialist in this area: "It takes a great novel to make bureaucracy interesting." But how about writing about individual bureaucrats? That’s what I did with the love interest of Jonathan Stone, my reporter protagonist in The Solomon Scandals. Margo Danielson is a young […]

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