Chapter Forty-One - On the Brink of: Trump's Golden Age

Two veteran political journalists Jim Asher and Dale Eisman who have investigated and analyzed Washington power for decades discuss what they saw in watching the Trump Inauguration and what they think it portends. It was a weird day from the guest list to the richest man in the world making a Nazi salute and it's likely to get more weird, they agree.

James Asher, now retired, was a veteran investigative journalist and Pulitzer-Prize winning editor. Over his career, he worked as reporter and editor at five newspapers on the East Coast, including the Philadelphia Inquirer and The Baltimore Sun, In 2002, he moved to Washington as national investigative editor for The Knight Rider company. He later ran the Washington Bureau for the McClatchy Co., which bought Knight Ridder in 2006. Under his leadership, McClatchy set a standard for independence in Washington, winning numerous national awards for journalistic excellence. In 2017, he shared a Pulitzer for his work on the global Panama Papers document leak about off-shore tax havens. In all, he managed and edited four other projects that were finalists for a Pulitzer, including two for McClatchy and two for The Sun. 

After leaving McClatchy, he worked for Injustice Watch, a nonprofit focused on criminal justice reform, and he helped The Associated Press with its coverage of the Mueller investigation of Donald Trump. 

A native of Utica, NY, Asher holds a B.S. and a M.S. from Syracuse University and did postgraduate work in finance, economics and accounting in Temple University's MBA program.

Dale Eisman is a veteran journalist who capped a 37-year newspaper career in Virginia and Washington DC with an eight-year stint advocating for good governance as a writer and editor at Common Cause. He’s covered trials in state and federal courts and campaigns for offices from city council to the Virginia statehouse to the US House and Senate. He’s also been catapulted off aircraft carriers and tracked sailors, soldiers, airmen and Marines in the US, Europe, and the Middle East. Now retired, he lives in Surf City, NC.