Hello and welcome to Background Briefing, available 24-7 at background briefing.

I'm Ian Masters, and today we'll examine a number of stories and issues in the news.

We'll begin with Trump patrolling the streets of Washington, D.C. tonight,

and how he has sabotaged independent sources of knowledge,

flooded communications media with disinformation,

and is rewriting history to conform to ideology rather than facts,

including Trump's counterfactual charges that crime

in Washington is out of control, despite data that shows violent crime in D.C. is at a 30-year low.

Joining us is Peter Stone, a Washington-based investigative journalist who has covered a wide

array of lobbying, legal, and campaign finance issues.

He's the author of Heist, Super Lobbyist Jack Abramoff, his Republican allies and the buying of Washington,

and currently writes for The Guardian, where his latest article we will discuss is,

hallmark of authoritarianism. Trump banks on loyalists as he

wages war on the truth. Then we'll speak with Ocita Wenevou, who is a contributing editor for

the new republic and a columnist of The Guardian writing about American politics and culture.

He's the author of the new book Just Out, The Right of the People, Democracy in the

Case for a New American Founding.

And we will discuss his article at the nation to make democracy work, give more of it to workers,

and how the US now ranks below the top 15% of democracies today

and can be found in the 28% of countries who have flawed democracies.

And before we begin with our tax dollars paying for the bombing of innocence abroad

and racist thuggery at home,

...