I woke up this morning to an email from Gillian Reagan, the reporter who had slammed me in a hit piece for Business Insider, defending her work and mitigating her sins, while not seeing how they all added up to an obvious hit job. Thus began a war of words that’s continued all day. Honest journalistic enterprise or partisan attack piece? You be the judge:
PART 1: Gillian Reagan’s email
Hi Andrew,
We’d like to respond to your post on Big Journalism. May we repost the entry onto BusinessInsider.com so we can respond?
Let us know how you’d like to work it out.
Best,
Gillian
–
Gillian Reagan
The Business Insider
xxx@businessinsider.com
xxx Fifth Avenue, 7th Fl
New York, NY 10003
646-xxx-xxxx
~~~~
PART 2: Blodget Response to My Piece
From Buisness Insider:
Our Response To Andrew Breitbart’s Allegations About Us And Our Story
Yesterday, we published a story about Andrew Breitbart’s new site, Big Journalism. The story contained numerous quotes from Breitbart, including this one, in which the right-leaning Breitbart was describing sites operated by the left-leaning Arianna Huffington:
“My sites offer truth,” he said, “and her sites offer leftist sin.”
We liked that quote. It was original and evocative. After we published our story, however, Breitbart called and denied ever having said such a thing.
The interview notes taken by the story’s author, Gillian Reagan, included the “leftist sin” quote, but the interview was not taped. (At her prior job, Gillian recorded all calls automatically, but we have not yet installed this technology at the Business Insider–or made a decision about whether we will). After reviewing the situation, we concluded that Gillian might have misheard Breitbard and that Breitbart might, in fact, have said “leftist spin.”
We offered to make the change. Breitbart said he didn’t care what we did. We made the change anyway. We also retracted another assertion in the original post that Breitbart had disputed, which is that he had said he doesn’t read Politico. We noted these changes in the post, and we apologized for the errors.
Relatedly, we have a content-sharing agreement with Gawker.com: We occasionally run some of Gawker’s posts and Gawker occasionally runs some of ours. The republished posts are clearly labeled as having been written and published by each site, respectively. Yesterday, Gawker decided to run our Andrew Breitbart post.
Today, in a long post at his site, Andrew Breitbart says he thinks we are just a front for Gawker–a way for Gawker editors to get interviews with people who won’t talk to Gawker anymore. We aren’t. We reached out to Breitbart because we thought his new site was relevant to the business of journalism. Gawker then decided to run the post after the fact, independently. In a separate complaint, Breitbart also objects to our use of the image of him above, because he says it makes him look insane.
We apologize again if we misquoted Andrew Breitbart, and we wish him well with his new endeavors–including his “war” with leftist media.
~~~~
PART 3: I Respond to Blodget and He Responds Back
I emailed Business Insider and they framed my email and a response into the following article:
Business Insider Blasted For “Sins Of Undisclosed Ideological Bias”
Earlier, we explained how we may have misquoted web entrepreneur Andrew Breitbart yesterday. We said he had blasted Huffington Post for its “leftist sin” when instead he said “leftist spin.” We explained how, when Mr. Breitbart took issue with this, we amended the quote and apologized.
Subsequently, we received the following note from Mr. Breitbart who still believes our apparent transposition of “sin” and “spin” is evidence of a vast left-wing conspiracy.
Mr. Breitbart also raises an interesting and important topic, which is whether journalists should always tape-record calls with sources and, if they do, disclose that they are tape-recording them. (For reasons we describe here, our reporter, Gillian Reagan, thought she had recorded the call when in fact she hadn’t–a fact that Mr. Breitbart also takes as evidence of bias.)
Ms. Reagan’s Recorded, Er, Unrecorded Article is Based on a False, Biased Construct
I am a jocular, secular Jew and I usually find myself quite comfortable to speak freely in interviews with New York-based in-all-likelihood left-leaning journalists like Gillian Reagan. Yet I choose my words carefully. She laughed a lot of the time, so I thought she understood I wasn’t a speaking-in-tongues Pentecostal Christian (not that there’s anything wrong with that!) That’s why the central offense of Ms. Reagan’s article bothers me so: I don’t speak in “truth” — “sin” language.
“‘Truth’ and ’sin’” represent a distinct Christian outlook and I am not a Christian. I recall saying my sites will tell “truths the mainstream media refuse to cover.” I likely said Arianna’s site mostly offers “leftie spin.” Putting the term ‘truth’ which I believe I used in a completely different context to grant the manipulated “truth-sin” construct is clearly a greater journalistic “sin” than the one offered by your correction/clarification.
The photo and the provocative writing style represent a very Gawker-like approach to the subject matter as well. So seeing the piece later on Gawker was very clarifying. The photo that Business Insider chose to run puts the false “truth-sin” dichotomy into hyperdrive to make me look like an angry “Christinist” — to quote Charles Johnson and Andrew Sullivan, who are leading the charge to make all dissent of President Obama and liberal government expansion appear to be coming from “extremist” religious quarters. (It also reflects the administrations attitudes, too. See Janet Napolitano’s Homeland Security report on domestic terror threats. This meme is trying at best, and dangerous at worst given the real terror threats posed by radical Islam, but I digress.)
I also told Ms. Reagan how in helping create Huffington Post I can now recognize that the ideas represented at the New York Times and the Huffington Post affirm what most already know and that is the New York Times is provably a left of center operation. Huffpo granted the perspective readers needed to make that determination. Their ideological outlook is a DNA match.
Had I read up on Ms. Reagan and saw her attempted take-down of Matt Drudge, a person for whom I have immense respect, I wouldn’t have taken the call in the first place. My bad. Hers was a hit-piece. I assume you are sophisticated enough in this racket to see this was her intention from the word go.
What I find most egregious today in your response is how you brush off the tape-recording aspect of the story. She never told me she was taping. And when I confronted her on the falsehoods she jumped to the “I taped it card.” Without missing a beat I told her, “Good, I want to hear it,” or words to that effect, and that “I want others to hear it, too.”
I can’t prove it, but in the thirty seconds she fumbled to answer and came up empty, I felt I had successfully called her bluff. I believe strongly that she lied when confronted thinking I wouldn’t ask for the tape to be made public. Her voice showed serious concern in the 30-seconds. But, again, I can’t prove it.
What I am starting to see over and over again is a fundamental lack of acknowledgment that young journalists with a liberal outlook want to please their liberal bosses. At no point is anyone taking responsibility for the “sins” of undisclosed “ideological bias” in any newsroom when it’s the elephant in the middle of the room. To not acknowledge that the series of “errors” and picture choice add up to an attempt to take down an ideological foe a notch or two is a symbol of what’s killing the publishing industry.
Millions see it — and flee.
Perhaps you should take that into consideration if you want to stay in business, or join the HuffPo in the open embrace of ideological reporting.
Andrew,
Thanks for the note.
As I said in our response, if Gillian misquoted you as saying “leftist sin” instead of “leftist spin,” we apologize. Based on my dealings with Gillian to date, I don’t think there was any ideological basis for the error. The words do sound pretty similar, especially in the context of a jovial conversation.
The recording of calls is an interesting topic. Based on a quick survey of our newsroom, several folks who come from traditional media organizations say this is standard practice for all calls. It’s standard practice in certain divisions of Wall Street firms, as well. The obvious benefit of such a practice is that it eliminates (or at least drastically reduces) disputes like this. As I noted in the response, we don’t yet have a company-wide policy about recording, but we’ll disclose it clearly on the site if and when we do.
Based on my daily reading and editing of the Business Insider, I don’t think we lean politically one way or the other. We have some raging conservative free-market types (e.g., John Carney), some libertarians (Joe Weisenthal), some tech folks who couldn’t care less about politics (Dan Frommer), and some bleeding-heart liberals (Erin Geiger-Smith, Nick Saint). Overall, however, the focus and viewpoint of the site is business, not politics. As most of our readers will attest, we take swings at anyone we think deserves it, regardless of party.
(In the interest of full disclosure, I voted for President Obama. I’m not happy with many decisions his administration has made–most notably those of his finance and Treasury team–but overall I remain a big fan. However, that doesn’t stop me–or us–from calling him out when he’s a bonehead.)
I, too, have great respect for Matt Drudge. He’s one of the pioneers of this medium, and he continues to show us and everyone else how it’s done.
Best of luck with your site.
Henry
~~~~
In two separate memos to his readers, Blodget completely avoids the “I taped the call… whoops, I didn’t tape the call.” Why is that?
Also, now that Business Insider has corrected the Christianist-meme slur against me, known as the publisher of right-leaning publications, he transfers my heretical ass into the other convenient place for leftist-media types wanting to marginalize their political enemies: the “conspiracy” camp.
Blodget wrongly distills my carefully chosen words into a statement that I provide “evidence of a vast left-wing conspiracy.” For the record, I am describing a “culture” of newsroom left-leaning conformity, not a coordinated, secret “Soros & Bones” society. Though John Podesta and George Soros certainly do their best to convey that there’s something secret, well-funded and nefarious going on.
To deny that New York-based magazine and newspapers, other than those few openly conservative ones, are anything but liberal in mindset is “crazy,” and that is what Mr. Blodget has done providing a convenient and timely reinforcement for why we launched Big Journalism.
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119 Comments
Hi Mr. Breitbart,
First, thank you for everything you do to call mainstream journalism to account for their lack of fairness and accuracy. You are a very important voice, and I often find myself thanking God that you are doing what you're doing, because few other people are, and none with as much effect (except Drudge of course).
I've been following this thing on his site and this one, and hope that it will now come to a conclusion. I think you've made your point, and it is definitely a fair point.
Wow. Dealing with these people must make you want to yank your own hair out sometimes.
Keep up the good work. This is one of only a few sites to tell it, like it is. THANK YOU
Hi Andrew,
First off, don't worry about (hit peaces), as if you did anyway. Instead, worry when they stop doing hit peaces on you, because then, you're as irrelevant as they are. Keep it up man!
The taping or not taping statements were what stood out to me. If I am following this chronologically, Blodgett first claimed:
"The interview notes taken by the story’s author, Gillian Reagan, included the “leftist sin” quote, but the interview was not taped. (At her prior job, Gillian recorded all calls automatically, but we have not yet installed this technology at the Business Insider–or made a decision about whether we will). After reviewing the situation, we concluded that Gillian might have misheard Breitbard and that Breitbart might, in fact, have said “leftist spin.”"
That wording indicates there was never any intent to tape record (she previously did it automatically at a different job, but that's not the standard procedure here…).
Then that shifts to: "(For reasons we describe here, our reporter, Gillian Reagan, thought she had recorded the call when in fact she hadn’t–a fact that Mr. Breitbart also takes as evidence of bias.)"
Their link to 'for reasons we describe' actually does not support their claim. They do NOT explain she thought she recorded the call but hadn't, it's merely the first statement again- the call was not recorded, though she recorded calls in her old job, but that's not the practice in THIS job. If they truly meant to 'explain' that Gillian thought she had recorded the phone call, then they should have said so, but what they said was actually very different.
And finally, I find it very odd that they wish to insist their reporter thought she recorded the interview.
If their spin is correct- she *thought* she recorded the interview, but then later found she was mistaken- what they are admitting is that she wrote up the article *very* carelessly, making no attempt at all to make sure she heard and remembered the conversation correctly. Are we really supposed to believe she honestly thought she'd recorded the interview but could not be bothered to attempt to play it back until after Breitbart contacted her to challenge her version? What sort of reporter is that?
With their version, we have a sloppy, careless, slapdash reporter who writes off the cuff without checking the recording she thinks she made, and with yours she's dishonest . I don't see that either version is a good reason to trust her.
Andrew, the more I read from you – - – the more I like having you on my side. Yes, I am idealogue. But I am also intellectually honest. As I think you are, and as it is obvous most others in journalism are not.
Along with Charles Krauthammer, and a few others – you and all your sites have absolutey become daily 'must reads' for me.
I'm glad you're here.
Andrew..thank you so much for the work you do in such an important time in history. Trust no one. You are a target to be set up for discrediting. But I'm sure you know this.
The new site is great…but I'm afraid I'm spending too much of my life on blogs!
I would have said mouthbreather in lieu of knuckle dragger, but, otherwise, you read my mind! I wonder if they snicker at the ballbuster Breitbart *only* went to Tulane? I won't even bother to check, but, with Ms. Reagan sounds as though she graduated from Phoenix Online University. Keep it up, Andrew!
Gawker Media informed staff that in 2010, writer's bonuses would no longer be based on pageviews and going forward network's bonuses will be based on unique views.
Picking a fight with Breitbart seems like an easy way to prime up unique views. If you can't beat him throwing the religion card out to a bunch of infantile hippies might help them cover the January rent.
You know for a fact that they are poring over this (and your affiliated sites) every second of the day to see what will be posted up next. It's like a game to them, but they fear that they will lose THE GAME. As far as I'm concerned, the game is OVER, the MSM is pushing lies and censored left wing flap at the citizens. Anything BUT the TRUTH.
If you want the truth now, you have to go out and look for it, and find it yourself. That's why I'm over here…………and not over there. Keep them guessing Andrew, and keep them looking…………….because your winning………………… the GAME.
I just thought of another intellectual compatriot: David Horowitz. He'd be fun to have around BigJournalism, I think.
(BTW, I think too many Big Things: government, journalism, hollywood, climate, science, economics, etc. etc. could
become a distraction, not a good thing. It is important to cross-fertilize.) ….Lady in Red
Very interesting tidbit. Maybe all BIG sites should refuse to give them a click-through.
Wow!
Mr. Breitbart, the Left has no use for carefully chosen words, because then they can't use your own words against you. So they comment on what they think you wanted to say (because you are an evil right winger and we know how those people think) rather than what you actually said.
With the Left, it is why let the facts and the truth get in the way of a carefully thought out opinion? They have an opinion of you and they aren't going to let a silly thing like facts get in the way of that opinion.
Mr. Breitbart, I am very angry at you though. Because of you and all your "BIG" web sites, I now spend way too much time reading these sites instead of working!
And you have more "BIG" sites to come???? Curse you!
Seriously, you are doing a fantastic job and I wish for you nothing but spectacular success.
Do you wrap your head in duct tape when dealing with these people? If not you should.
I heartily welcome Big Journalism but this story is a tempest in a tea pot. Flog the new site but let's not get silly.
I don't know. I was a newspaper editor for a decade and it was standard practice in my newsroom you ask before taping. If the reporter knows how to do their job you don't get issues like this.
The editor's full disclosure comes across as trying too hard. It's as if he hopes admitting his own love of little Barry Bam Bam will difuse the accusations of liberal bias.
When it is the truth, there is no such thing as too much information. Stay on it Andrew.
Andrew, thank you for your Big sites. Saw your appearance on Bill Maher, and on C-SPAN and am thoroughly impressed with how genuine and even keeled you are.
As for HuffPo, I think Leftist Spin and Leftist Sin both work. A truly deplorable site, yet well executed and sorry to say required reading if you want to know how the other side thinks.
Wow Andrew why do you even bother or care what the left thinks, writes, or says about you? Engaging these people any further than asking them to correct their original error is absolutly futile. You're only going to lose credibility with any further exchanges. When they ask why you started Big Journalism, Big Government, or Big Hollywood your default answer should be a very humble, " I saw it as a way to create a few new jobs, that's all I'm hoping to achieve with them. Trying to explain to the biased left wing media that they ARE biased and severly skewed to serve left wing causes is like trying to convince a person who smells bad that they have BO. (That's short for Body Odor not Barack Obama, or is it? You tell me.) My point here is that they can't smell their own stink and they never will. You just need to go about your business of bringing the truth to your readership and stop worrying what they say about you to their readership. Keep up all the good work you are doing and don't sweat the small stuff.
That's a slur on Phoenix University.
"So they comment on what they think you wanted to say (because you are an evil right winger and we know how those people think) rather than what you actually said."
Exactly. Blodget said: "…Mr. Breitbart who still believes our apparent transposition of “sin” and “spin” is evidence of a vast left-wing conspiracy."
So don't worry about your carefully chosen words. The leftist media will just make up your words and your thoughts for you and attribute them to you in print. They know better than you do what you believe.
Sheesh.
Boy, this site was clearly needed!! Probably too late to change any minds in left-leaning "new's" rooms, since their brainwashing has been going on for decades…most from birth. Like Dan Rather, grasping the rope that is tied to a sinking/dropped anchor, and refusing to let go whilst even knowing that it is no longer attached to the ship.
Andrew said it best, here – "Millions see it — and flee."
I thought it was time I gave a break to the 2-bit journalism hookers at UC Berkley.
Andrew looks more like a Presbyterian to me.
Business Insider eh, why am I not surprised?.. Well done Andrew!!! Any more backpedaling by these libtards and you'll soon be labeled a baby eater… just sayin'..
In the land of fairies, honesty and responsibility are Unicorns that fly away on their calling.
Also, remember notes were mentioned. She recorded and took notes? I am not very impressed with any of this. The picture was hand picked for a reason. There are hundreds of pictures that could have been chosen to place the subject in a better light. Look to any paper and their pictures to generally see how they view people they cover.
Shoddy work this time out, but lets hope Ms. Reagan earns her chops by learning from this experience, and possibly becoming a good jouranlist. Lord knows we need more good journalists and less "people that write stuff."
So the Gawker clone just wanted to "reach out". Those words are a giveaway every time. Thanks for your work, Mr. Breitbart and best wishes for BigJournalism.
It's called CYA.
Cover. Your. Ass.
And try to sound smart when you do it.
This is how it works. Take down some small schmuck. It gets the big boys thinking…
Problem is, by the time it gets them thinking, it's too late. (insert evil laugh here)
Don't forget this from Breitbart:
"I am a jocular, secular Jew and I usually find myself quite comfortable to speak freely in interviews with New York-based in-all-likelihood left-leaning journalists like Gillian Reagan. Yet I choose my words carefully. She laughed a lot of the time, so I thought she understood I wasn’t a speaking-in-tongues Pentecostal Christian (not that there’s anything wrong with that!) That’s why the central offense of Ms. Reagan’s article bothers me so: I don’t speak in “truth” — “sin” language.
“‘Truth’ and ’sin’” represent a distinct Christian outlook and I am not a Christian. I recall saying my sites will tell “truths the mainstream media refuse to cover.” I likely said Arianna’s site mostly offers “leftie spin.” Putting the term ‘truth’ which I believe I used in a completely different context to grant the manipulated “truth-sin” construct is clearly a greater journalistic “sin” than the one offered by your correction/clarification."
Sheesh indeed.
I notice Blodget carefully avoids discussing the Breibart photo choice.
Because he knows it's clear evidence of liberal snarky hit-piece journalism, and it's indefensible.
Weak, evasive, condescending, petulant and unprofessional. Yup, liberal.
Andrew, this is like trying to have a debate with Keith Olbermann or raking leaves on a windy day.
I'm not biased, some of my best friends are Republicans.
Andrew, I just want to thank you. Between breitbart.com, Big Hollywood, Big Government and now Big Journalism I have no time to do housework and that's a good thing.
Make 'em cite sources, Andrew, that screws 'em every time. I'm completely tired of this "Sources say…" crap. I wouldn't have even tried this when I was in college. As the Obama voters might say: "You da man."
AB Great stuff, too easy an example to prove why you are ON FIRE. Thomas Sowell's book CONFLICT of VISIONS becomes more real every day… "We think they are WRONG, they think we are BAD"
Ms. Reagan will sleep like a baby tonight. She feels (not thinks) she was doing her duty.
NEXT UP in 2010: BIG SPORTS! Sports Journalists are the WORST of them all!
Andrew, I think this new launch can be a great success. But not if you squander your energy on pygmies. I spend many hours a day combing the internet for news and opinion, and I have never heard of the Gawker or the Business Insider. Who cares what they say or do? If you chase every one of these little twerpy lefty spin shops around, you won't be able to do the real noble work you have set out to do. Go after the big boys.
"Subsequently, we received the following note from Mr. Breitbart who still believes our apparent transposition of “sin” and “spin” is evidence of a vast left-wing conspiracy."
No bias here, nosiree, none at all. (Whistles and looks around).
Until the MSM can hire a more balanced mix of liberals, independents and republicans, there will always be a leftist bias because that's what the industry is mostly comprised of. The farther left or right you are, the less you are able to see your own bias. They cannot see the trouble that they are in.
Clean and clear journalism. Thank you Mr. Breitbart. I am going to enjoy breathing fresh air which I haven't in a long, long time.
Henry, named one conservative, one libertarian, but yet he could name two "bleeding heart liberals". Therefore, there are 2 "bleeding heart liberals" for every 1 conservative. There are 2 "bleeding heart liberals" for every 1 libertarian. Sounds to me that the "bleeding heart liberals" of the organization out number those who are not of the same mindset. No bias though in his organization … yeah, right.
(Yes, before anyone goes off on me I know I would need to do an entire poll of the peoples political affiliations for it to be a much better guest-emaion. )
Well, we all have learned about the shot that was heard around the world in school.
Now we have heard the click of the keyboard heard all around cyberspace. What a wonderful time in history we are all living.
Thanks AB!
aka shekay
Andrew, this is a GREAT site, unblemished by liberals, so far…. I'm surprised that you're surprised by this common leftie tactic. No matter what you said, they would have taken a snippet and spun it out of context or just made something up out of whole cloth.
They are all strangers to the truth and live only to hide what they really think, so as to continue the charade of impartiality…Case in point, the climate fraudsters only get away with their nonsense because the MSM is dense, lazy, ignorant, uninformed (except by "peer review").. oh and so biased.. Next site BIG SCIENCE then you can roll all the sites into one and call it " The 4 CORNERS of BIG DECEIT"…
Good job, Andrew! Just keep on sassing the leftist media!
That stood out for me as well. I would think that if it is standard practice for a journalist to record all interviews that it would also be standard practice to inform them of that at the beginning of the interview, and before turning on the recorder. To do otherwise, regardless of state law, would be a breach of journalistic ethics.
""I voted for President Obama. . ."
Not. Good. Enough. We want to know
did you get the bumper sticker!
Have you seen Andrew's hair in some of his interviews? Looks like he *IS* trying to yank it out
Not that there's anything wrong with that. In fact, that's the reason I shave my head. Avoid the problem altogether…
I think the key is to ask the simple question: why would she record the conversation, and then NEVER ONCE listen to it while she's actually writing the piece and quoting Breitbart? Assume it's true for a minute. That means she wrote the entire piece, including direct quotes of people, without ever checking her recording (because had she checked, she would have realized it didn't exist). Even assuming no bias, that's hack journalism. VERIFY VERIFY VERIFY!
Of course, the stupidity of the excuse actually proves it's a lie anyway. She always intended a hit piece and didn't care what Breitbart said at all.
One probably pertinent question. IF a reporter thought she had 'taped the call', wouldn't she have played back the tape at least once while writing up to insure she hadn't made any mistakes, and had caught all the 'nuance' that it was possible to catch?
This doesn't pass the whiff test either, as it's obvious from the threads that (if you believe the gawker/business insider person (and I feel comfortable saying that as the article seemed to go up on both sites at close to the same time)) the first time she 'attempted' to play back the 'recording' was on the phone. So is she 'lying', 'incompetent as a reporter' or does she have perfect hearing and memory?
Also, somewhat amazingly both gawker and business insider use the same data center provider, in the nyc/nj area there are a TON, and the datacenter provider they both use isn't all that big. Quite a coincidence, not unbelievable, but certainly something that makes at least me go 'hmm'.
[...] a grain of salt (or at least, as big of a grain of sodium chloride as you’d take an article in an American newspaper), but if true, this story sounds truly [...]
"Leftist-sin" simply does not make any sense at all. I am a Catholic and I understand the meaning of sin, and the word is something that should be understood by a Jew
…… however, I can see no logic in "leftist-sin". An editor should have been asking questions about what that phrase meant before allowing it to be published. I agree with Andrew Breitbart that Gillian Reagan used that phrasing for a purpose, and it was meant as a smear.
I have noticed that the liberal left in the USA (who are in fact Marxist-Maoist communists) have a tendency to put down people who believe in God. The only ones that they do not put down are the Mohammedans. It is for this reason that Andrew is correct in sensing that Gillian Reagan had another agenda.
I love this site, mostly because it represents to the Leftist media what a light means to a cockroach. The 'fighting back' the Right is doing is, sadly. happening in media…not with the political Right itself. Are they happy to have media carry their water? I don't know, but I do know that Breitbart, Limbaugh and Beck (et al) won't be showing up on my ballot in November…a bunch of heretofore unknowns will. In the end, the Leftist media is showing a level of rage never seen before. With the government of their dreams installed, this was supposed to be their 'raining candy' year. But you can find nary a smile from the likes of Olbermann, Matthews and anyone at the NYT you can name.
Onward, BigJournalism! A great start!
There is an inherent condescension in their overly accomodating tone, which in my opinion is a greater evidence of bias and elitism than if they just said "STFU you conservative knuckle dragger". IMO
Andrew, why argue with idiots??
Very good Andrew.
You have exposed how they distort the truth. They obviously want to try and destroy your reputation. That is what the true intention is by Ms. Reagan. This is the typical leftist agenda. Destroy any and all that dare question their bias. She may have actually taped you, thought she taped you and is trying to do to you, what your intrepid crew did to ACORN. I'm sure there will be many attempts to get to you this way. You cannot go up against a Billion Dollar Baby like ACORN and not have attempts to discredit you. You're a threat to them.
They're attempting a gotcha, saying something provocative that would turn off your base. What weasels.
Frank Zappa has a message for them… Henry and Gillian… You are Plastic People, plastic people…
They were never truly interested in your business. Only to snivel, snort and snicker like Bill Maher on cocaine in the yellow snow.
"I voted for President Obama. . ." Does this joker think he even had to say it?
Or at least wear a tin foil hat………………….LOL
"As I said in our response, if Gillian misquoted you as saying “leftist sin” instead of “leftist spin,” we apologize. Based on my dealings with Gillian to date, I don’t think there was any ideological basis for the error. The words do sound pretty similar, especially in the context of a jovial conversation."
Oh, Henry.
If that isn't the sloppiest dodge, sleight of hand trick…really now. C'mon man…you have to do better than that.
You "used" it because it was "evocative" and "different"…wouldn't you want to be damn sure it was also true? Leftist SIN…"might" have been mistranscribed into her notes…or "misheard". How convenient. Leftist spin is such a common phrase in the blogosphere, one would expect that if Andrew or some other interviewee had sad leftist sin…it would be MUCH more likely to be misheard the OTHER direction. Almost zero chance of an "innocent" mistake, not even an attempt at clarification or attempt at broadening the "sin" concept. THAT would have been the natural response to such a comment. Ask for expansion. Dig deeper. It wasn't done, because it didn't happen.
Isn't the damn job supposed to be one where you make SURE you hear the key element of your slant correctly? The whole point of using the quote…or so you say, (after the fact)…is BECAUSE it was so different and evocative. That makes it the SEMINAL point…and you wind up apologizing because it doesn't even pass the whiff test, much less the smell test.
If your pup reporter is so incompetent that she can't transcribe properly or doesn't know if she is recording or can't hear the words in a conversation, she needs more training…not alibis for a hatchet job. She already put a hatchet job on Matt Drudge, Andrew has a history with Drudge that is in your HEADLINES…are you saying we should avert our gaze and not connect the dots? She has a proven animus toward Drudge. Andrew has a connection to Drudge in his history that you go to the lengths of putting in your headlines. Do you take all your readers as imbeciles unless proven otherwise? Because the folks here aren't as gullible.
The recording of calls is an interesting topic. Based on a quick survey of our newsroom, several folks who come from traditional media organizations say this is standard practice for all calls. It’s standard practice in certain divisions of Wall Street firms, as well. The obvious benefit of such a practice is that it eliminates (or at least drastically reduces) disputes like this. As I noted in the response, we don’t yet have a company-wide policy about recording, but we’ll disclose it clearly on the site if and when we do.
Really. Ohhhhhhh, Henry…there you go again. If you have a policy regarding recording of calls that mirrors standards and practices…are you going to have your reporters tell the folks they interview ahead of time? Or after the fact? If Ms. G.R. BELIEVED she was tape recording the call, she certainly didn't come clean with that fact up front. If she didn't believe she was taping the call, she lied about it. And if she didn't know, she certainly didn't follow any standards and practices protocol or Code of Journalistic Ethics that I am aware of in discussing it then…or now.
Based on my daily reading and editing of the Business Insider, I don’t think we lean politically one way or the other. We have some raging conservative free-market types (e.g., John Carney), some libertarians (Joe Weisenthal), some tech folks who couldn’t care less about politics (Dan Frommer), and some bleeding-heart liberals (Erin Geiger-Smith, Nick Saint). Overall, however, the focus and viewpoint of the site is business, not politics. As most of our readers will attest, we take swings at anyone we think deserves it, regardless of party.
Yeah, but Henry…you share content with Gawker…not National Review Online. You hired someone to interview Andrew, who has an axe to grind with Matt Drudge….not Carney or Weisenthal. And you didn't come clean on the hit piece when she got caught red handed.
I, too, have great respect for Matt Drudge. He’s one of the pioneers of this medium, and he continues to show us and everyone else how it’s done.
And you show that respect, Henry…by using someone with an axe to grind against him…to "mishear" key elements of an article against his brilliant protege'.
Oh, Henry…..
Andrew,
Congratuations on this new site. It is being read here in Thailand and I have forwarded it to friends in Japan and Korea. As a regular poster on BG, I spend a large part of my time reading and posting there. Keep up the good work and remember, if the libtards are criticizing you, you know you are doing something right. Ray
I have to say Andrew, that I LOVE all of your big sites! When you decided to put the bigjournalists up..I knew they were going to go after you BIG time……:) pun intended ! However, anytime someone starts out with a lie (not you, her) I tend NOT to believe anything else they have to say…I would imagine that the liberal sites are in the process of pulling their hair out, trying to find a way to 'get you'…don't let 'em see you sweat and keep up the GREAT work!!!
I view this kerfuffle with quite a bit of ambivalence: The editor's efforts to resolve complaints seem sincere, even though, it appears, with an effort to retain confidence in the reporter. My sense is that the reporter likely did record the interview, but floundered with the challenge "I'd like to hear it…" because the tape would not support the article.
I think that for two reasons: (1) Taping interviews is reportedly part of this reporter's method of working, not something anyone would comfortably skip (regardless of who the employer is for a given piece, it's hard to believe a writer who habitually uses a recorder doesn't own one); and (2) If she had "forgotten" to tape the interview, she would certainly be aware of that after her article was posted and she was responding to a complaint about it — in fact, if she "thought" she'd taped the interview but then wrote the piece without referencing the tape, the first thing any normal reporter would do upon notification of a dispute would be to (try to) check a tape or interview/post interview notes scribbled down at the time.
(continued)
What is at least as problematic to me is the re-posting of the article by Gawker without the subject's knowledge or permission. Regardless of agreements between Gawker and InsideBusiness, that second use without Andrew's awareness or input is way over the line.
I love it Andrew, better you than me brother.
Wear this as a badge of honor and move forward. I am sure they will try to make an issue out of this for a while, just ignore it and keep on truckin' No time for more comments. The more they get your goat, the longer they will persist hoping to distract you from Big Journalism. Can't wait for Big Environment……………explain again how GE and Gore are the HUGE benefactors of watermelon ideology (read as: Green on the outside red on the inside.). Get it out there and expose the global government "Eden" that the world seeks to gradually impose upon US. Keep inserting integrity and investigative journalism into the country.
What we really need to find out about the interview between Mr. Breitbart and Ms. Reagan, is if she is a hottie. Because if she is, then it really doesn't matter who said what in this little he said/she said debate. Sorry Breitbart, but if she is hot, a majority of men are going to automatically side with her. You might want to add some "cheesecake" shots of yourself to help you with the ladies. If she isn't hot, well then obviously you are in the right (pun intended).
I didn't realize how truly awesome my handle [BigDadio] was until just now. It is my Angry Mob name from a few months ago. Maybe one day I'll get to post a story or 2 on one of the Big sites. One can only dream…
Andrew, Mike and all.
Keep up the good work! Thank you for giving us the places to go.
Tawnya
Totally agree with you. Of course, I realize now, the editor said he polled the newsroom (which includes those traditional journalism types) and asked about recording CALLS, and they all said it's standard practice. I've only been out for three years (switched careers because I just couldn't take being associated with the profession any longer) but in the four or five newsrooms I worked in or around, I don't recall reporters ever recording phone conversations. I believe there was a way for really important interviews, but I can't believe it became "standard practice," even if you did ask the person.
I actually discouraged my reporters from using the recorders. I trusted these folks because I hired them. Relying on a tape, in my opinion, makes you sloppy. It makes you listen less closely. And then when the recorder breaks… you don't have anything because you never honed your note-taking abilities. In 10 years or so, I can't recall one "I didn't say that" moment. Now, there were times when the person would say "I would like to see the story before to make sure I'm quoted properly, blah blah blah" and of course, that's a no no. But we would compromise and ask which quotes, within reason (like 1 or 2) the person would like confirmed. The reporter would then read back only that quote. And you know, I can't think of one instance where we were told it was wrong.
Again, it's the quality of the journalist you hire. That's the issue I think we're seeing more and more, especially here. We have these people who call themselves journalists getting jobs they have no right being in. It seems as if journalism schools are failing miserably, which is no surprise when you realize if the news business is 95% lib, the schools are 99.9%. They can't handle minor assignments without allowing their personal bias through, because they're "out to change the world." They're not equipped with basic skills.
And so, you now have sites like this one beginning to show true journalism again, a lot of times coming from non-journalists who use their own sense of common sense and curiosity to guide them – which is how it should be.
Wow, these leftists stop at nothing,including lying. What great journalism they practice….not. Only the indoctrinated leftwing or paid hacks believe a word these people utter anymore. Thank you Mr.Breitbart for being one of the straight talkers in America today….might I also say one of the brillant ones also. (I am not paid to say that and don't know Mr.Brietbart but only of his work.)
Excellent deconstruction, Andrew. So-called Journalists in the wider media aren't used to having to defend their writing, line by line, like that. You did a fantastic job. It's about time someone started calling these guys on the subtext of their "stories."
thats why i am here.
That's the typical Lib response. Twist words, slander, insinuate and then make false apologies which then twist more words, slander and insinuate. The entire time they also come across with a holier then thou tone. How Andrew Breitbart is able to deal with those people without losing his mind is amazing.
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I think we'd like to hear more from you, Nora Charles.
That stuck out to me too. I didn't work in newspaper nearly as long as you have– a little newsprint here; a little television there. But when I worked in television my job was to interview people and I never taped anyone without permission. Typically I just did pre-interviews since we did the on-air ones shortly after that, so recording wasn't really necessary at that time. But the lawyer we had on staff sure as heck would have been all over me had I been doing anything remotely as iffy as unauthorized recordings. They were always guarding against lawsuits. It just seems that a trained journalist, which it sounds doubtful that that's even what we're dealing with here, would know better than to tape anyone without permission. And then to say whoops I didn't record it after all after the fact is just weird. Unprofessional doesn't begin to describe this.
Andrew, I suggest you invest in a recorder and LOTS of tapes. That way YOU have the proof and don't have to rely on someone, who wants to smear you, to provide proof of what you said or did not say.
Keep up the good work!
Hardly a "tempest in a teapot," sir (or madame or whatever). This is just another example (and we need to know about as many as possible) of how the euphemistically-called "mainstream media" is being daily exposed for what they are–shills for the one-worlder, socialist, bug-witted morons that inhabit academe and Democrat politics and have been since the mid-1930's. (I refuse to call Democrats "democratic." There's NOTHING "democratic" about the Democrat Party.)
Unfortunately, most "Schools of Journalism" these days–and especially those on both coasts–are infected with the same disease as "Schools of Education" and "Colleges of Sociology." That is, aging hippies are the professors/teachers/instructors, who fell in love with Marx and Alinsky "back in the day" and who haven't the brains to look critically at any of the nonsense they peddle to our kids (and future "journalists.") I know whereof I speak having recently spent almost 100 grand for such an "education" for my own daughter–admittedly somewhat less leftist being outside of the vaunted "Ivy League."
My mother used to tell me, "Don't lie. That way you don't have to remember what it was you said."
In the immortal words from "Dumb and Dumber": KICK HIS ASS, SEA-BASS!"
This is how Rudi Guliani cleaned up New York. Don't let the little things slide by.
ANDREW,please keep dsetroying these COMMUNISTS(I know,a strong word to use) in Big Media. Maybe we need a site to cover BIG ACADEMIA and BIG LAW next, since almost all academians and most lawyers have more in common with Chairman Mao than with Horace Mann or Antonin Scalia.
As an active print journalist for nearly 20 years, I can personally attest to the left leaning culture of all newsrooms.
This is partly because journalists live in a bubble, because of their odd working hours, they socialise mainly with other journalists.
They distrust their sources, but take as gospel the word of academics. They distrust mainstream religion, so use the guidance of academics for their moral centre. They are not introduced to new or contrary ideas.
At the heart of it, working journalists (in the main) have contempt for their readers/views as they believe that because they interact directly with 'newsmakers' they are better informed and more intelligent. The internet, of course, has since proved them wrong, which is another reason why old-media types are contemptuous of it.
And to think she thought she was going to knock you around.
Maybe you should take those calls more often, because I'll bet this experience is going to drive her nuts for years.
(It's obvious she was bothered enough to pass it on to her boss, she couldn't handle it).
Andrew once again proves the point that the liberal media is so biased it is incapable of recognizing it's own bias. In other words, it's not liberal bias that drives the liberal journalist's message, but rather the fact that he or she believes there is only one correct answer to every question and only one side to every issue.
The three things that keep us free are the buck, the voice and the gun, in that order. Money lets us prosper, voice lets us speak for or against, and the gun defends us against enemies foreign….and domestic. Those who would take away our freedom will attack these in order. With no wealth, people have no power, which enables a corrupt ruling class. With a corrupt ruling class in power, they stifle the voice . Then they can and will outlaw the gun by fiat.
It is frightening to watch what this administration is doing and how fast they are trying to do it, but then, all facists dictators came to power quickly by "not wasting a good crisis." Meetings held in backroom secrecy that will affect every American and a huge chunk of our money to do what the public has rejected, is just one sign of how bad things are.
The most important story is often the one never written. There is a glut of original content available that you aren't competing with the other press for and you are doing a service of informing the public of what is being hidden. Best of luck to you.
Wow, a real human being, not just a knuckle dragging hominid!!
Great new site! I see they decided to go with "I don't think we lean right or left" fiction. Of course they do, why else would I be here! So, he voted for Obama, what a revelation. Isn't it odd that his idea of taking a swing at Obama ends with a pledge of his undying love?
The bottomline is that Gillian Reagan just simply isn't very bright. Just a simple glance at the conversational context, that being Huffington's blog, and leftist "sin" versus "spin" makes no sense, certainly not enough sense to go to print without clarification. An intentional smear or just dimwittedness lacking an editor's that-doesn't-make-sense oversight?
How stupid or disingenuous can you be to be "unsure" if you recorded an interview? Pathetic.
Andrew … we need you to start the Big GOP website to shed light on what the hell is going on there. It is the root of all problems conservative right now and seems to stub its toe on every step.
Remind me never to mess with Andrew Breitbart.
To tell you the truth, I looked at the photo at the top of the article before I posted. I wanted to make sure I wasn't going to insult the guy! LOL
Excellent deconstruction, Andrew. So-called Journalists in the wider media aren't used to having to defend their writing, line by line, like that. You did a fantastic job. It's about time someone started calling these guys on the subtext of their "stories."
It take so much energy to keep lies straight. It appears they are so adept at it that it comes naturally.
The only question I'd have for Mr. Breitbart would be "What's with the muffins you were talking about on Red Eye?"
"We offered to make the change. Breitbart said he didn’t care what we did." hahaha, of course not, because nobody reads that liberal s%$t!
Hay Andy thanks for being a beacon of truth on the internet old huff is just tha an old women making money pandering to th left loud mouths.Thanks again Andy.
Is this the same Henry Blodget that worked at Merrill Lynch and sold the stocks that he was telling everyone else to buy back in the Dot com boom? Great site, thanks for the work you do.
I actually think Huff post IS leftist SIN
These people aren't used to dealing with people who don't have fear. The left is accomplishes its goals by scaring people who are afraid of being perceived as racist, homophobic, misogynistic, hating the earth, not caring about animals, uncompassionate, or just not nice. Now that they have to go up against Mr. Breitbart, they don't have anything in the playbook for someone like him who isn't afraid of these threats. It's fun to watch them squirm…
First of all, congratulations on the launch of a site that demonstrates infrequent glimmers of potential. I've been following your ordeal with this alleged Gawker front — which it is clearly not — since the original post and have managed to enumerate my reactions to your primary grievances with this conflict. Humor me with your consideration.
1.) Blogging networks share content. The modern landscape of Internet journalism is 90 percent aggregation. This should not be an unfamiliar fact to someone who collaborated on the founding of the Huffington Post.
2.) The lack of concrete evidence, such as a recorded conversation, extracted from the interview is not a mortal violation of journalistic ethics. While taping an exchange is certainly the advisable route in any situation similar to the one you have described, it is not the unarguable principle etched in stone. You would certainly agree that contemporary reporters live in a viciously breakneck environment where hesitation of a mere few minutes can be fatal. The Business Insider fiasco is obviously not a scenario to which this general concept can be wholly applied, but it is a product of lackluster etiquette that has remained unaddressed by the whirring media climate. Deceiving you into believing a taped conversation exists when it genuinely does not, however, is worthy of condemnation.
3.) Blodget apologized more than an adequate number of times. He understands your, er, emotions and is willing to reconcile what damage the piece may have inflicted. Of course, he avoids the Elephant Room because that is the single aspect of this situation which is truly worth of chastisement. Hopefully, the readers of this site are intelligent enough to draw those types of conclusions without the aid of your italicized comebacks.
Journalism doesn't need divisiveness now. A quick scan of the previous comments on this post are sickening. They're the type of sycophantic echoing that can only harbor the lust for the retribution of a defined opponent rather than a flawed institution. The healing of journalism deserves no less than an objective analysis of fundamental principles obscured — such as the voice recorder debate or undisclosed sharing of intellectual property — by a flustered media struggling to adapt to complex platforms. I expect Big Journalism to solve the problem while staring it in the eyes. I do not expect you to simply look at it from another angle.
Andrew,
Next time you speak with Henry Blodget please remind him he still owes me alot of money caused by his corrupt peddling of fake research on stocks – you remember, the fraud that got him barred from the securities industry for life.
He was lucky to find a new industry with standards so low that he could plan new fraudulent schemes – like bogus, hit piece interviews.
Good luck with Big Journalism – the industry has long been in need of it.
Why would this woman not know if she taped the call or not? Would she not have to press a button or something? At her old job all calls were automatically taped? The taped phone call that wasn't, gives away the game.
Thanks flat taxer, my husband is also a former journalist (we met at a news room). Our two best friends are former journalists, one of whom now works in the media department of a city council. He is openly contemptuous of the industry he was once so proud to work in. although my newsroom experience is in Australia, the common culture is universal.
Is she a pupil of John Kerry? "I taped the call before I didn't tape it, but I was in favor of taping the call…"
If journalism was 10% damaged, calm reconciliation would be in order. It's 90% damaged. Time for more radical therapy.
Doesn't need divisiveness? Why are you telling US this? We're not the ones with the 90% majority in the MSM who are ignoring, ridiculing, and lying about opposing ideas. Lecture them first.
Cheers for posting the whole chain of events – it makes this transparent. Fantastic work – if only the majority of journalism worked this way!
In 2002, then New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, published Merrill Lynch e-mails in which Blodget allegedly gave assessments about stocks which conflicted with what was publicly published.[5] In 2003, he was charged with civil securities fraud by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.[6] He settled without admitting or denying the allegations and agreed to a bar from the securities industry. He paid a $2 million fine and $2 million disgorgement.
The mainstream media is not 90 percent liberal. That is a gross falsehood. It may be more than half leftist, but it is by no means an overwhelming majority. The highest rated cable news network leans right. The daily newspaper with the highest circulation is decidedly conservative. Stop whining about being in an outspoken minority, in which you are clearly not — take a look at the reckless pundits who have thrown their convoluted conspiracy theories to the forefront of conservative media culture. They are the ones who have obscured any self-respecting conservative's efforts to reconcile the news industry.
Have you even considered the unfathomable thought that news should not contain any bias — liberal or conservative — to begin with? While I won't draw conclusions about your principles, it seems that the majority of commentators on this site are far more concerned with avenging rightist personalities than calling for an objective overhaul of journalism in a toxic media environment that has scarred its founding standards.
"Time for radical therapy"? Let me know how that goes.
OBAMA IS PERFECT EXAMPLE WHY AMERICA WANTS A "NATURAL BORN CITIZEN" FOR PRESIDENT!
It is Obama that is pushing for leniency and mercy for his "TERRORIST MUSLIM BROTHERS" Barack Obama, right before the eyes of all Americans, is setting the perfect example of why the Founding Fathers wanted a NATURAL BORN CITIZEN with a strong allegiance to the United States of America by having a mother and father who both were U.S. citizens, for president! This clown as president and "COMMANDER in CHIEF" does not know which country he is supposed to be devoted too! He is conflicted! America can not have a president and Commander in Chief that is militarily conflicted…he can't recognize who the enemy is!
Well said. Requiring that the President be a natural born citizen was, according to John Jay, the "strong check" against foreign influence at the highest levels of our government, which was at the time of John Jay's letter to Washington (summer of 1787), the Commander In Chief of the American Army.
And being a natural born citizen was not enough for our Founding Fathers. They understood that foreign influence came not only from a foreign birthplace and/or non-citizen birthparents, but also from having lived in a foreign country. Hence, they added the 14-year US residency to the presidential requirment in Article 2 Section 1 Clause 5:
"… and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States."
Thanks, I just sent a version to Dick Morris. Maybe he has the courage to talk about this. So far I have to say that Andrew Breitbart has been very silent!
Opening paragraph of the BusinessInsider piece: "Here comes BigJournalism.com. Drudge protege Andrew Breitbart has just launched his new media site and he's ready for war." The picture is a screenshot with the Fox News logo and "The Glen Beck Program" title clearly visible. I interpret the intended effect to be an eye-roll and a mental linking of Brietbart, Drudge, Fox, and Glen Beck. The expression on Breitbart's looks like an expression of disgust, more than anger to me, based on my new micro-expression skill gained from "Lie to Me"
.
[...] “War of the Words: Henry Blodget Ignores the Elephant in the Room” (January 8, 2010) (http://bigjournalism.com/abreitbart/2010/01/08/war-of-the-words-henry-blodget-ignores-the-elephant-i…, as “a war of words that’s continued all [...]
Good idea. Dick Morris comes across as not being afraid of anyone. The person who I think should have stepped forward by now with his opinion is Judge Napolitano, who is very knowledgeable of the Constitution. I have emailed him in the past, but never a reply.
[...] out in the writing eventually — especially when you start having to fumble on topics such as bias in the media, bias in your own office, where you stand on movements such as the Tea Partiers versus [...]
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