Category Archive 'Matt Drudge'

27 Oct 2016

Conservative Intellectuals Finding Their Own Base in Revolt

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dantedarkwood
Gustave Dore: Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita/ mi ritrovai per una selva oscura,/ ché la diritta via era smarrita.

Ross Douthat, an echt conservative intellectual, argues that conservative intellectuals should blame themselves for the Trumpkin peasant revolt. Firstly, by allying with George W. Bush’s failed presidency, and secondly, by relying on AM Talk Radio (Sean Hannity) and Internet bloggers (Matt Drudge, Breitbart) to do so much of the message communicating.

Every political movement in a democracy is shaped like a pyramid — elite actors on the top, the masses underneath. But the pyramid that is modern American conservatism has always been misshapen, with a wide, squat base that tapers far too quickly at its peak.

The broad base is right-wing populism, in all its post-World War II varietals: Orange County Cold Warriors, “Silent Majority” hard hats, Southern evangelicals, Reagan Democrats, the Tea Party, the Trumpistas. The too-small peak is the right’s intellectual cadres, its philosophers and legal theorists and foreign policy hands and wonks.

The peak is small because conservatives have always had a relatively weak presence within what James Burnham, one of modern conservatism’s intellectual godfathers, called the “managerial class” — the largely liberal meritocrats who staff our legal establishment, our bureaucracy, our culture industries, our universities. Whether as provincial critics of this class or dissidents within it, conservative intellectuals have long depended on populism to win the power that the managerial elite’s liberal tilt would otherwise deny them. …

But now, in the age of Donald Trump, the populists have seemingly decided that they can get along just fine without any elite direction whatsoever. …

History does not stand still; crises do not last forever. Eventually a path for conservative intellectuals will open.

But for now we find ourselves in a dark wood, with the straight way lost.

19 Jul 2016

Blame Drudge

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Drudge1

The Business Insider argues it’s all Matt Drudge’s fault.

CNN couldn’t stop Donald Trump. Neither could Fox News.

Some of the nation’s most influential conservatives, from Glenn Beck to Bill Kristol, were powerless. Karl Rove and the Bush family had no effect. Scandal after scandal failed to put a chink in his armor.

And the 16 other GOP contenders, comprising some of the party’s brightest and budding stars, proved to be impotent.

But some observers say that one man may have had the power to prevent Donald Trump’s accession within the Republican Party: Matt Drudge.

“If Drudge had come out really negatively against Trump and had supported someone who would have played well with his reader base like Cruz, it would have been much harder for Trump to win,” BuzzFeed political reporter and editor Andrew Kaczynski told Business Insider, referring to Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas.

The news mogul, one of the most mysterious individuals in the media industry, operates entirely outside the New York City and Washington, D.C., apparatus. He is seemingly accountable to no one. He is rarely spotted in public and holds close company with only a few select people. Reporters tip him off to stories through email or instant messages but never expect a reply, knowing he is unlikely to write back.

Yet despite his reclusiveness, Drudge holds a firm grip on the conservative news cycle. As the founder and operator of the Drudge Report, he influences and often creates news narratives.

“In a sense, the Drudge Report acts both as a waterfall creating a ‘trickle down’ effect within the right-leaning (and sometimes mainstream media) as well as a gravitational force drawing stories to its preferred narrative,” conservative talk-radio host John Ziegler said.

Read the whole thing.

31 Mar 2013

“Ouch — That’s Just Brutal”

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Ed Driscoll filling in for vacationing-Glenn Reynolds admires a fine example of the artful juxtapositions of Matt Drudge.

10 Jan 2013

Matt Drudge Causes MSM To Have a Cow

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Glenn Reynolds yesterday actually included a rare image capture in his posted link as a deliberate tribute to Matt Drudge’s eloquent talent for juxtaposition.

Leftie Establishment journalists, naturellement, reacted like irate monkeys on exhibit at the zoo, flinging epithets, ridicule, and abuse in Drudge’s direction.

10 Mar 2010

Senate Warned Against Reading Drudge

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Fox News detects a partisan slant in potential virus warnings pertaining to Drudge Report, one of the most active and infliential agggregators on the Internet, whose reporting commonly, but not always, features a conservative perspective.

[A]n e-mail is circulating warning U.S. Senate staffers not to view one of the most popular news sites on the Web, claiming it could spread computer viruses.

The Senate Sergeant-at-Arms, the chamber’s official gatekeeper, said the Drudge Report, a news aggregator, and whitepages.com, a telephone directory site, “are responsible for the many viruses popping up throughout the Senate,” according to an e-mail from the Environment and Public Works Committee obtained by FoxNews.com.

Another e-mail from a separate office warned that staffers who had visited the Drudge Report or White Pages had experienced viruses on their PCs.

“Please avoid using these sites until the Senate resolves this issue,” the e-mail read. “The Senate has been swamped the last couples (sic) days with this issue.”

But the Drudge Report suggested that politics might be behind the warning, noting in an original story that the e-mail came as the “health care drama in the Capitol reaches a grand finale.”

The Drudge Report noted that it served more than 29 million pages Monday without an e-mail complaint about “‘pop ups,’ or the site serving ‘viruses.'” …

A spokesman for the Environment and Public Works Committee said the Senate Help Desk cited the Drudge Report and whitepages.com only as possible examples of Web sites generating pop-up ads that might be causing a recent increase in the number of virus infections.

“Our non-partisan systems administrator notified both Majority and Minority staff that this issue had been brought to her attention,” the spokesman said in a written statement. “It is still not exactly clear where the increase in viruses is coming from, and staff have been advised to be cautious with outside Web sites at all times.”

A GOP aide to the Environment and Public Works Committee told FoxNews.com that there has been “a flurry of activity in the last couple of days” and that a couple of people on the staff had had “computer problems.”

But Brent Baker, the vice president for research and publications at the Media Research Center, wondered why the conservative Drudge was cited as an example instead of a liberal site like the Huffington Post.

I look at Drudge Report daily and I’ve seen no evidence to suggest that there is any legitimate basis for such warnings at all.

06 Jan 2009

Was It Something She Said?

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Ann Coulter takes aim while visiting Woodstock, NY

Ann Coulter had been scheduled to appear this morning on NBC’s Today program promoting her new book Guilty: Liberal “Victims” and Their Assault on America, but on Sunday the “progressive” blog-site Media Matters cracked the ideological whip and reminded NBC of its duty to provide no aid or assistance of any kind to opponents of the Revolution, especially those who go around saying such politically incorrect things.

Media Matters has documented that NBC has repeatedly provided Coulter a platform to spew her inflammatory rhetoric even as NBC-affiliated hosts and anchors have expressed disapproval of her statements or criticized the media for promoting her. Coulter’s latest book is rife with such inflammatory and offensive comments.

Matt Drudge reports that NBC has faithfully fallen into line, and has banned Coulter for life, at least.

The nation’s top selling conservative author has been banned from appearing on NBC, insiders tell the DRUDGE REPORT.

“We are just not going to have her on any more, it’s over,” a top network source explains.

But a second top suit strongly denies there is any “Coulter ban”.

“Look for a re-invite, as soon as Wednesday,” said the news executive, who asked not to be named.

NBC’s TODAY show abruptly cut Ann Coulter from its planned Tuesday broadcast, claiming the schedule was overbooked.

Executives at NBC TODAY replaced Coulter with showbiz reporter Perez Hilton, who recently offered $1,000 to anyone who would throw a pie at Ann Coulter. Hilton is also launching a new book this week. …

Coulter was set to unveil her new book, GUILTY.

One network insider claims it was the book’s theme — a brutal examination of liberal bias in the new era — that got executives to dis-invite the controversialist.

“We are just not interested in anyone so highly critical of President-elect Obama, right now,” a TODAY insider reveals. “It’s such a downer. It’s just not the time, and it’s not what our audience wants, either.

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UPDATE:

Life is short, it seems. Michael Calderone is reporting that NBC has changed its mind again.

Conservative author Ann Coulter will appear on Wednesday’s “Today” show, according to an NBC spokesperson.

Coulter has been talking up being bumped by NBC for the past two days, both on other networks and the radio. A controversy erupted when Drudge splashed that she’d been “banned for life,” leading NBC to deny that she was banned, and later offering her a new segment.

On her website, Coulter writes that “Drudge gets results: Today show changes mind.” She’ll be appearing during both the 7 a.m. and 10 a.m. hours.

09 Jul 2008

Grow Up Already

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The London Times cannot resist the temptation of using the scary headline: Russia threatens military response to US missile defence deal.

And Matt Drudge links their story and adds an alarming photo of a missile launch.

(Oh no, Russia is already sending nukes our way!)

Was Russia really threatening to launch ballistic missiles or order some of its Combined-Arms Armies westward in the direction of the Fulda Gap?

No. Not really.

What the actual story said was:

Moscow argues that the missile shield would severely undermine the balance of European security and regards the proposed missile shield based in two former Communist countries as a hostile move.

“We will be forced to react not with diplomatic, but with military-technical methods,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

Obviously, Russia was merely alluding darkly to its own capabilities of using technical methods to gain an ability to defeat defensive missiles. Russia is threatening a particular kind of arms race not a nuclear first strike or an invasion of Western Europe.

National Enquirer-style misleading headlines may win Drudge and the London Times a few more readers today, but they certainly do not increase readers’ respect for those particular sources. I’d say that they are only trading future readers for some extra ones today.

07 Jan 2008

Drudge Pulls Everybody’s Chain… Again

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Large portions of the Blogosphere have launched themselves late this morning into a lemming-like pursuit of a mischievous meme proposed by that rascal Matt Drudge:

Hillary is losing in New Hampshire. How soon will she withdraw?

TALK OF HILLARY EXIT ENGULFS CAMPAIGNS
Mon Jan 07 2008 09:46:28 ET

Facing a double-digit defeat in New Hampshire, a sudden collapse in national polls and an expected fund-raising drought, Senator Hillary Clinton is preparing for a tough decision: Does she get out of the race? And when?!

“She can’t take multiple double-digit losses in New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada,” laments one top campaign insider to the DRUDGE REPORT. “If she gets too badly embarrassed, it will really harm her. She doesn’t want the Clinton brand to be damaged with back-to-back-to-back defeats.”

Meanwhile, Democrat hopeful John Edwards has confided to senior staff that he is staying in the race because Hillary “could soon be out.”

“Her money is going to dry up,” Edwards confided, a top source said Monday morning.

MORE

Key players in Clinton’s inner circle are said to be split. James Carville is urging her to fight it out through at least February and Super Tuesday, where she has a shot at thwarting Barack Obama in a big state.

“She did not work this hard to get out after one state! All this talk is nonsense,” said one top adviser.

But others close to the former first lady now see no possible road to victory, sources claim.

Developing…

[The dramatic reversal of fortunes has left the media establishment stunned and racing to keep up with fast-moving changes.

In its final poll before Iowa, CNN showed Clinton with a two-point lead over Obama. Editorial decisions were being made based on an understanding the Democratic primary race would be close, explained a network executive.]

Drudge is a scamp, isn’t he?

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Rightwing News, in picking the 20 Most Annoying Liberals, puts Hillary’s rival into a more accurate perspective, awarding him only number 20:

Barack Obama: It’s almost tempting to leave Bambi off the list since he’s not a race-baiting parasite like Al Sharpton and more importantly, because Hillary Clinton probably dreams of gouging his eyes out with an ice cream scoop every night.

On the other hand, anybody who got into the Senate by beating Alan Keyes and who hasn’t yet served a full term, isn’t by any objective standard even qualified to be President. Still, America’s most vapid politician, a guy who should have had his presidential campaign sponsored by Hallmark greeting cards — because in a whole year’s time, I’m not sure he said anything deeper than something you’ve read on the back of one of those cards — is now the favorite to be the Democratic nominee.

03 Apr 2007

Drudge Falls for Slanted, Recycled Propaganda Story

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That sucker Matt Drudge was embarassingly rolled this morning by British red-diaper-baby journalist Patrick Cockburn (one of several active scions of the late Stalinist Claud Cockburn. Drudge published in italics atop his news blog the screaming headline:

PAPER: BOTCHED U.S. RAID LED TO IRAN HOSTAGE CRISIS

A failed American attempt to abduct two senior Iranian security officers on an official visit to northern Iraq was the starting pistol for a crisis that 10 weeks later led to Iranians seizing 15 British sailors and Marines.

Early on the morning of 11 January, helicopter-born US forces launched a surprise raid on a long-established Iranian liaison office in the city of Arbil in Iraqi Kurdistan. They captured five relatively junior Iranian officials whom the US accuses of being intelligence agents and still holds.

In reality the US attack had a far more ambitious objective, The Independent has learned. The aim of the raid, launched without informing the Kurdish authorities, was to seize two men at the very heart of the Iranian security establishment.

Better understanding of the seriousness of the US action in Arbil – and the angry Iranian response to it – should have led Downing Street and the Ministry of Defence to realise that Iran was likely to retaliate against American or British forces such as highly vulnerable Navy search parties in the Gulf.

Take the hayseeds out of your hair, Matt. That commie swine Cockburn has simply recycled a very old story, dating back to January 12th (followup 1/13, followup 1/28, still more 1/29), repackaged it with a few new quotes, and given it a major leftist spin.

Allahpundit debunks Cockburn’s bolshevik drivel here, remarking in conclusion:

British media sure are good at anti-western propaganda, aren’t they?

Myself, I have a special award for Comrade Cockburn:

Sure, the US raid on Irbil/Erbil/Arbil (however you spell it) was a significant Allied response to Iranian acts of war against coalition forces operating in Iraq, apparently apprehending some number of Iranian intelligence officers caught red-handed in Iraq engaged in organizing and supplying the insurgency.

Doubtless every act of interference on the part of Coalition forces to Iranian activities in Iraq, or of hostility toward Iran’s surrogates, could be construed as part of the pattern of increasing tension preceding the recent Iranian hostage-taking of British naval personnel. But events completed last January are not exactly today’s news.

Only limited information was ever officially released, making it impossible to know exactly who was apprehended, and even more impossible to evaluate that action’s precise goals or success. So the Cockburn story consists in its entirety, as a philosophy professor of mine used to say, of statements which are “meaningless, trivial, or simply false.”

03 Mar 2007

Why Did the Market Tank?

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This week the stock market experienced the largest decline in equity prices in four years.

A Tuesday selloff dropped the Dow Jones Average 416 points, and a dismal week ended with the Dow losing 3.3 percent, the S&P 500 4.4 percent and the Nasdaq 5.9 percent. It even cost me money. AP

So, what really caused this hideous and dramatic market downturn?

US News’ senior writer James Pethokoukis thinks he knows.

The observant Mr Pethokoukis identifies the cause as none other than the Blogosphere’s own Matt Drudge, who on Tuesday February 27th, just about the time the stock market’s ship hit the rocks, posted the following headline:

01:28:35 Greenspan Warns of Likely Recession… *

linking to an AP article featuring the same, basically misleading, headline.

As Pethokoukis ruefully notes:

the Maestro was hardly so definitive as Drudge made him out to be. Here is what Greenspan said, according to AP:

“When you get this far away from a recession invariably forces build up for the next recession, and indeed we are beginning to see that sign. For example in the U.S., profit margins … have begun to stabilize, which is an early sign we are in the later stages of a cycle. While, yes, it is possible we can get a recession in the latter months of 2007, most forecasters are not making that judgment and indeed are projecting forward into 2008 … with some slowdown.”

Frankly, Greenspan’s remarks were hardly any more revealing than the opaque testimony he used to give to Congress.

Michael S. Malone, at ABC, read the Pethokoukis article, and agrees. He philosophizes about how we all read news these days, and how markedly the Internet is making the paleomedia obsolete, concluding on the subject of that rascal Drudge tanking the stock market for us:

That’s what Matt Drudge did, and now it seems he can move the entire world economy. When was the last time a New York Times headline did that?

All I can say is: Do us a favor, Matt, please say something positive next week.

10 Oct 2006

David Zucker’s Madeleine Albright Campaign Ad

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David Zucker, producer of Scary Movie 4, turned out this little bombshell for GOP use in the final days running up to the 2006 election.

All those big brains who have brought Republican prospects to their current point of success thought Mr. Zucker’s ad was “too extreme,” “way over the top.”

So he just gave it to Matt Drudge.

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