CNN may have chickened out on their expose, but the Today show is running an interview with Alexandra Robbins on her new book about the Skull and Bones, and MSNBC is running an excerpt from it.

While in Germany, Russell befriended the leader of an insidious German secret society that hailed the death’s head as its logo. Russell soon became caught up in this group, itself a sinister outgrowth of the notorious eighteenth-century society the Illuminati. When Russell returned to the United States, he found an atmosphere so Anti-Masonic that even his beloved Phi Beta Kappa, the honor society, had been unceremoniously stripped of its secrecy. Incensed, Russell rounded up a group of the most promising students in his class-including Alphonso Taft, the future secretary of war, attorney general, minister to Austria, ambassador to Russia, and father of future president William Howard Taft-and out of vengeance constructed the most powerful secret society the United States has ever known.

MSNBC: The Legend Of Skull and Bones Update: MSNBC has taken this down but you can find the excerpt here.

(via The Revolution mailing list).