First Off the Press

In his memoir, “Like a Rolling Stone,” Jann Wenner has a chapter called “The Scoop of the Seventies” devoted to the articles Howard Kohn and I wrote in 1975 about Patty Hearst and the SLA.

Part One of that series was called “The Inside Story.”

For most of the many months that story was in process, it was a secret known only to a very small group of us. We were uncertain when we would publish it, partly because Patty Hearst and her kidnappers-turned-colleagues were still underground, and we didn’t want to inadvertently be responsible for getting them caught or killed.

(Remember that all the rest of the group had died in a fiery shootout with the LAPD.)

As fate would have it, the FBI located and arrested Hearst and the others on a Thursday in September and publication of our article was set for the following Monday. All hell would be breaking loose upon publication because Jann had arranged for NBC’s Today show to cover the release exclusively, with the rest of the media invited to the office for what would prove to be a raucous press conference Monday morning.

Security around the release was tight; Jann hired Pinkerton’s to guard all the issues of the magazine except one.

The entire staff of the magazine was secluded at a resort near Big Sur for the long weekend while Howard and I stayed in San Francisco to tape our interview with NBC before we headed south to join the rest.

Finally, late Saturday afternoon, in Jann’s words, “Howard and David made it down…brandishing a copy of the new issue that no one had seen yet.”

A photo of that copy of the magazine we brandished that night is at the top of this post, with the words handwritten by Jann up top “Do Not Leave This Lay Around — David.”

So that’s the story. It turns 51 come September.

HEADLINES:

• Trump tells US negotiators ‘not to rush’ into deal with Iran (BBC)

• White House says Iran deal could take days (Axios)

• Details emerge of a potential Iran deal as US cites progress (AP)

• The ‘warrior ethos’ promises victory — history says it leads to defeat (The Conversation)

• Orange County toxic tank on path to spill or explode; experts searching for solutions (ABC)

• Oral arguments are taking forever. Supreme Court justices have had enough (CNN)

• Tech billionaires used performance drugs in secret. Now they’re selling a revolution. (WP)

• The Democrats’ Civil War (Journal of the Plague Years)

• Trump Is Setting His Sights on Restricting Legal Immigration (NYT)

• Russia hits Kyiv with hypersonic ballistic missile in ‘deranged’ attack (Guardian)

• How Ukraine Found the Cards To Win, Without Help From the U.S. (Time)

• Ukraine is turning private companies loose on Russian attack drones (BI)

• U.S. support for Taiwan complicated by Middle East war, Trump’s reconciliation with China (WP)

• American who gave US$5,000 to China farmer for tree planting decades ago invited to view forest (SCMP)

• Marco Rubio combats Cuban-American backlash as he seeks Havana deal (FT)

• Suspected gunman dead after exchanging fire with Secret Service near White House (WP)

• Three generations, one roof, and a new American dream (BI)

• Becerra versus Steyer — or someone else? Answers to these FAQs may help voters make a choice (SFC)

• Bruce Springsteen is a model for how celebrities should resist Trump (Guardian)

• What to know about the AI models that are jolting Washington (Politico)

• Venture Capitalist John Doerr Says AI Is the Biggest Tech ‘Tsunami’ Ever (WSJ)

• With AI now reading student names at graduation, not everyone is applauding (WP)

• OpenAI Announces Construction Of New Data Center On Top Of Sick Child (Onion)