Useful Idiots
Useful Idiots with Katie Halper and Aaron Maté
The Deadliest Coverup of the 20th Century
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The Deadliest Coverup of the 20th Century

How the US government hid its guilt in the deadliest attack in human history

Lesley Blume is a journalist. She married a journalist. Her father wrote for Walter Cronkite. Her whole community is journalists.

So, in 2016, when Trump rose to power, her community was suddenly under attack.

“All of a sudden to see your entire community be under assault like that and be designated as enemies of the people was so shocking and demoralizing, and it felt like an all hands on deck moment.”

The best way to fight back, she decided, was to write a book that proved to America just how crucial reporters are in democracy, to “reinstate this idea that journalism at its best serves the common good.”

“And so,” she explains, “when I came across Hersey’s story, which had been shockingly untold, I knew that I had my story.”

John Hersey, a Pulitzer-prize-winning pioneer reporter who saw combat to cover World War II, wrote what some consider the most important work of journalism of the 20th century: Hiroshima.

In her book, Fallout: The Hiroshima Cover-up and the Reporter Who Revealed It to the World, Blume uses painstaking research to document how the US government obfuscated its role in the deadliest attack in history and comes to the realization that dropping the bomb was not justified, despite what we’re taught in school.

Plus, future-ex-Governor Cuomo couldn’t take the heat from last week’s Useful Idiots review, how Trump’s big beautiful tax cut actually (surprise) helped the rich, and the world burns from climate change.

It’s all this, and more, on this week’s (gloomy) episode of Useful Idiots. Check it out.

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Useful Idiots
Useful Idiots with Katie Halper and Aaron Maté
Useful Idiots is an informative and irreverent politics podcast with journalist Aaron Maté and podcaster/writer Katie Halper. Episodes feature on-the-road coverage of the 2020 campaign and exclusive interviews, with humor, commentary and dissection of the politics news of the week. Join Katie and Aaron as they examine important stories that have slipped through the cracks and what the media got wrong – and laugh about whatever is left to laugh about.