THE DOUBLE DEATH OF GARY WEBB -- THE MAN WHO EXPOSED THE CIA'S DRUG CONNECTIONS (plus, The Strike at Seuil)

When Gary Webb killed himself ten days ago, it was, in a way, his second death. When Gary was a reporter for the San Jose Mercury News, his groundbreaking series on drug-dealing by the Nicaraguan Contras with the collusion of the CIA, "The Dark Alliance," brought him an avalanche of media condemnation from the Big Boys (like the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times) who'd missed the story. They destroyed Webb's reputation, and his career.

If only they'd put as much energy into investigating the CIA itself. A huge amount of what Webb wrote was later confirmed in a CIA Inspector General's report, and in the findings of investigators for the Senate committee that investigated the CIA-drug links (as the top investigator for the Senate Select Subcommittee on Terrorism, Narcotics, and International Operations, the admirable Jack Blum, testified in 1996).

On Webb's death, the L..A. Times--as my friend and colleague Marc Cooper has written in a stinging L.A. Weekly column--"decided to give his corpse another kick or two, in a scandalous, self-serving and ultimately shameful obituary. It was the culmination of the long, inglorious saga of a major newspaper dropping the ball journalistically, and then extracting relentless revenge on an out-of-town reporter who embarrassed it." Don't miss Cooper's exposure of the L.A. Times' spavined ethics in its outrageous post-mortem treatment, and the vilification which preceded it, of Gary Webb--whom we salute as a courageous, groundbreaking, and sometimes humanly fallible journalist who deserved better at the hands of his confreres on the national dailies. To read about it all, click here.

ELSEWHERE IN THE WORLD:

Have you ever heard of an entire publishing house going on strike? Well, that's what's happened in Paris, where the whole staff of Seuil--the last remaining large independent publisher and distributor of quality books--yesterday walked out to protest its takeover by another, smaller company. Seuil is considered one of the Big Three in French publishing, along with Gallimard and Grasset--a trio of publishing houses whose incestuous domination of the Prix Goncourt, France's most presitigious literary prize, has been consecrated with the nick-name Galligrasseuil.

At stake in this musical chairs ownership shuffle (which has been marked by an insider trading scandal by the Seuil C.E.O. who engineered the house's sale) is Seuil's distribution network. Seuil distributes a dozen other, smaller imprints -- including the invaluable Phebus, which among other works publishes translations and reprints of current and historic texts on North Africa's Arab culture, with a backlist that includes many jewels.

The new owner plans to rake in a fortune by selling off Seuil's various distribution organs--and because of Seuil's privileged relationship with independent booksellers and its generous terms to them, the impact on the book trade as a whole of this death-by-division of Seuil will be great indeed.

One of the great pleasures of my years living in Paris was the astonishing number of books from other countries that the French publish in translation--most of which are not available in English. To take just one favorite example: of Pier Paolo Pasolini's 50-plus books, only five have appeared in English--but nearly all were available in French, to my great delectation. Many translations are published by Seuil and the other houses it distributes, offering an extraordinary window on world literature to those who read French. We say a grand bravo to the Seuil strikers. You can get details on what's up with the Seuil takeover, and its larger meaning, in a December 17 op-ed piece from the daily Liberation .....And, for an in-depth, insider look at the incestuous world of publishing in France, the investigative/satirical weekly Le Canard Enchaine last month published a folio paperback in its series Les dossiers du Canard, about the publishing industry, entitled "Tant qu'il y a des tomes" (As Long AsThere Are Books). It contains background on the Seuil scandal, and a lot of other secrets usually known only to publishing initiates--plus it's a great read. You can order it for 5.35 Euros, plus postage, from Le Canard Enchaine, 173 rue Sant-Honore, 75001 Paris.