"A cross between Sam Spade and Sherlock Holmes" (Jim Hightower), Greg Palast turned his skills to journalism after two decades as a top investigator of corporate fraud and racketeering. A persona non-grata in the United States, Palast's reports have been exiled to BBC's top current affairs show, Newsnight, and England's Guardian newspapers. He is a Patron of the Trinity College Philosophical Society, an honor previously held by Jonathan Swift and Oscar Wilde.