ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Progressive group Justice Democrats rebukes Biden White House picks.
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ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Why Matthew Yglesias Left Vox.
The journalist Matthew Yglesias, a co-founder of Vox, announced today that he is leaving that publication for the paid-newsletter platform Substack, so that he can enjoy more editorial independence.
The move may prove a good fit for Yglesias, who began his career as a highly successful independent blogger before blogging at The Atlantic and then elsewhere. But his absence as a staffer (a Vox spokesperson noted that he will continue to host a podcast, The Weeds) will make the publication he co-founded less ideologically diverse at a moment when negative polarization makes that attribute important to the country.
Like Andrew Sullivan, who joined Substack after parting ways with New York magazine, and Glenn Greenwald, who joined Substack after resigning from The Intercept, which he co-founded, Yglesias felt that he could no longer speak his mind without riling his colleagues. His managers wanted him to maintain a “restrained, institutional, statesmanlike voice,” he told me in a phone interview, in part because he was a co-founder of Vox. But as a relative moderate at the publication, he felt at times that it was important to challenge what he called the “dominant sensibility” in the “young-college-graduate bubble” that now sets the tone at many digital-media organizations.
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Many outlets, he argued, are missing something important. “The people making the media are young college graduates in big cities, and that kind of politics makes a lot of sense to them,” he said. “And we keep seeing that older people, and working-class people of all races and ethnicities, just don’t share that entire worldview. It’s important to me to be in a position to step outside that dynamic … That was challenging as someone who was a founder of a media outlet but not a manager of it.”
One trend that exacerbated that challenge: colleagues in media treating the expression of allegedly problematic ideas as if they were a human-resources issue. Earlier this year, for instance, after Yglesias signed a group letter published in Harper’s magazine objecting to cancel culture, one of his colleagues, Emily VanDerWerff, told Vox editors that his signature made her feel “less safe at Vox.”
Yglesias had been personally kind and supportive of her work, she wrote, but as a trans woman, she felt the letter should not have been signed by anyone at Vox, because she believed that it contained “many dog whistles toward anti-trans positions,” and that several of its signatories are anti-trans. The letter’s authors reject those characterizations.
I asked Yglesias if that matter in any way motivated his departure. “Something we’ve seen in a lot of organizations is increasing sensitivity about language and what people say,” he told me. “It’s a damaging trend in the media in particular because it is an industry that’s about ideas, and if you treat disagreement as a source of harm or personal safety, then it’s very challenging to do good work.”
Safetyism claims yet another scalp, just as it did during the Tom Cotton freakout at the New York Times this past summer, and at the Atlantic (where the above article appears), whose crybully staffers suffered a collective meltdown when Kevin Williamson was hired to write there.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: The Democrats’ civil war begins.
Insert obligatory Kissinger quote about the Iran-Iraq War here.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: BLM Drops by Biden White House Celebration With a Message: “For all of you f**king journalists, for all of you white liberals who have been celebrating, getting drunk off your asses about Biden winning this election, you are all a bunch of f**king fools!”
Analysis: True. But to borrow from a classic Far Side cartoon, “Yes, they’re all fools, gentlemen…But the question remains, ‘What kind of fools are they?'”
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Disneyland reopening: Theme park fires back over CA’s ‘arbitrary guidelines.’ In September, Disney announced it was laying off about 28,000 employees in its Parks, Experiences and Products division:
Disneyland is firing back at California following the release of the state’s theme park guidelines.
In an online statement Ken Potrock, president of the Disneyland resort said:
“We have proven that we can responsibly reopen, with science-based health and safety protocols strictly enforced at our theme park properties around the world. Nevertheless, the State of California continues to ignore this fact, instead mandating arbitrary guidelines that it knows are unworkable and that hold us to a standard vastly different from other reopened businesses and state-operated facilities. Together with our labor unions we want to get people back to work, but these State guidelines will keep us shuttered for the foreseeable future, forcing thousands more people out of work, leading to the inevitable closure of small family-owned businesses and irreparable devastating the Anaheim/Southern California community.”
Flashback: Florida reopens state’s economy despite ongoing pandemic.
—Headline, Disney-owned ABC News, September 25.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Left Targets Dianne Feinstein For Not Attacking Amy Coney Barrett Hard Enough.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: “The Biden campaign accused progressive firebrand Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., N.Y.) of undermining the Democratic Party by pulling out of an upcoming event meant to honor Israeli peacemaker Yitzhak Rabin. A Biden campaign associate called Ocasio-Cortez’s decision ‘problematic’ and told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that ‘if she agrees [to participate in the event] and then pulls out, she’s creating problems for her own party.’”
I SUPPOSE IT MAKES ME A BAD PERSON, BUT I’M KIND OF ENJOYING THE LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: The Revolution Comes for Oliver Stone.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Antifa Drives Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler Out of His Home.
The race for Worst Mayor in the United States is starting to heat up. There are a lot of contenders: de Blasio, Garcetti, Lightfoot, Durkan, Frey, Bottoms… They’re all bad public servants and even worse liars. Most mayors only disappoint and infuriate their own citizens, but these select few keep pissing off the whole world. Now there’s a dark horse in the race, and he’s moving up fast. He might not be running the biggest city in the country, but right now it’s one of the most violent. And he has absolutely no idea what to do about the chaos and destruction within his city limits, because his liberal ideas about the world haven’t prepared him for it. Of course, I’m talking about Ted Wheeler, the mayor of Portland, Oregon.
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Wheeler has made a big show of rejecting federal help, because #DrumpfIsBad. In return, Antifa is going after him even harder.
And that’s just another week in Portland. It’s commonplace now. Everybody who’s been paying attention knows about it. And yet, when CNN sends “journalists” to cover it, they send out stuff like this instead:
Wheeler isn’t the only mayor to have had Antifa and/or BLM arrive at his front door: San Jose mayor’s home vandalized, becomes subject of protests. “The vandalism to [Mayor] Liccardo’s home occurred just one month after the home of Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf was also splattered with graffiti messages such as ‘Defund OPD’ and ‘Cancel Rent.’”
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo’s Home Vandalized By BLM Protestors.
Neighbors of San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo quickly banded together after his home was vandalized following protests Friday night.
According to witnesses, someone spray painted the front of the mayor’s home, which had a Black Lives Matter sign in the window, with phrases that included “BLM,” Jacob Blake, along with profanities.
Liccardo said he was away visiting a relative at the time of the incident. The mayor said the vandalism does not detract from his support of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Flashback to 2016: San Jose Mayor Justifies Mob Violence.
Thousands of Americans participated in that most benign of civic rituals in San Jose, California, on Thursday night: seeing a presidential candidate speak. Of course, that candidate was Donald Trump, so as these engaged citizens streamed out of the arena, they were subjected to astonishing levels of violence. An angry mob pelted eggs, tomatoes, and bottles at the spectators—as well as the police, who tried (and failed) to maintain some semblance of order. Other Trump supporters were set upon and punched. One was left with blood streaming down his face…The mayor of San Jose, Democrat Sam Liccardo, reacted angrily to the events. Not that he was particularly upset at the violent mob that attacked innocent Americans, of course. No, his ire was directed at Mr. Trump. “At some point Donald Trump needs to take responsibility for the irresponsible behavior of his campaign,” the mayor said. Apparently it was downright “irresponsible” of Trump to even set foot in California’s third largest city.
It’s all fun and games on the left until the mob comes for you.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Dems get Green Party kicked off ballot after pressuring petition-signers; ‘voter suppression’ alleged.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: The Revolution Comes for Portland’s ‘Wall of Moms.’
Related: Portland mayor pleads with vandals: Don’t you see that you’ve become a prop for Trump’s campaign? “Appealing to their decency is a nonstarter. But appealing to their hatred by claiming that someone whom they detest even more than the cops might be profiting from their rampage? Now you’re talking. America’s political culture is one of intense negative partisanship and Ted Wheeler is all in.”
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: George R.R. Martin Responds to Accusations of Hugo Awards Racism, Apologizes for Mispronouncing Names.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Joe Biden Campaign Hispanic Organizers Claim ‘Toxic’ Work Culture, Demand Apology After ‘Lectures.’
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Bernie Sanders’ co-chair: Voting for Joe Biden like eating ‘half a bowl of s–t.’
Related: New Biden Ad Fails To Explain How He Would Have Handled Coronavirus Differently.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY. All About the Benjamins: Ice Cube Says Hollywood Owes Black Entertainers Reparations.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Longtime columnist and blogger Andrew Sullivan resigns from New York magazine.
Columnist and blogger Andrew Sullivan is leaving New York magazine, his professional home since 2016, he announced Tuesday.
“This will be my last week at New York Magazine,” Sullivan tweeted. “I’m sad because the editors I worked with there are among the finest in the country, and I am immensely grateful to them for vastly improving my work. I’m also proud of the essays and columns I wrote at NYM – some of which will be published in a collection of my writing scheduled for next year.”
Sullivan did not directly state his reason for leaving but said on Twitter that it was “pretty self-evident” and the “broader questions involved” would be discussed in his last column on Friday.
New York editor in chief David Haskell confirmed Sullivan’s resignation in a memo to staff obtained by CNN Business.
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“I am trying hard to create in this magazine a civil, respectful, intellectually honest space for political debate,” Haskell said. “I believe there is a way to write from a conservative* perspective about some of the most politically charged subjects of American life while still upholding our values. I also think that our magazine in particular has an opportunity to be a place where the liberal project is hashed out, which is to say not only championed but also interrogated.”
Or as Seth Mandel of the Washington Examiner tweets, “Translation: I want to challenge our reader base but I don’t know how to do that without challenging our reader base,” adding, “that feeling when you thought you were publishing far-right-wing ideas because you hired Jon Chait.”
* If Obama and Kerry supporting faux-conservative Andrew Sullivan can’t make it at the former home of Tom Wolfe, I’m not holding my breath for Sullivan to be replaced by an actual conservative anytime soon.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Lincoln Project Co-Founder Rick Wilson Ambushed Over Bush Support By [Stephen] Colbert’s Cartoon Anchors.
(Yes, that’s an actual headline, as the Matrix’s programming continues to glitch very badly in its simulacrum of 2020 AD.)
Related: The Lincoln Project out-garbages itself, fires Ben Howe over old tweets. “There is no way that taken as a whole, Ben Howe’s Twitter history is more offensive or vitriolic than Rick Wilson’s.”
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Seattle mayor who defended CHOP is outraged after protesters showed up at her home.
She thought they would only invade her constituents’ property — but protesting at an official’s house is straight out of Saul Alinsky’s playbook.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY:
If, to borrow from Irving Kristol, a conservative is a leftist who just got mugged by reality, will the McCloskeys reconsider any portion of their worldview, having successfully fought off their leftist mugging last night?
UPDATE: Not Democrats?
JUST NBC THE ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Watch as a mostly peaceful protester from the ‘Black House Autonomous Zone’ makes a running tackle at NBC News’ Andrea Mitchell.
Related: Video: CNN, MSNBC Repeatedly Lie, Claim Seattle CHAZ ‘Entirely Peaceful.’
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Second City Theater CEO Denounces Self, Steps Down.
Andrew Alexander, the CEO and co-owner of famed The Second City improv theater, said he is stepping down after a former performer leveled accusations of racism against the comedy institution.
In a lengthy letter posted on the company’s website, Alexander said he “failed to create an anti-racist environment wherein artists of color might thrive. I am so deeply and inexpressibly sorry,”
He vowed Friday that he will be replaced by a person of color.
Might as well quit. Humor is no longer allowed anyway.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: L.A. Pride Organizers Apologize After Involving Police In Upcoming Solidarity Protest.
ANNALS OF LEFTIST AUTOPHAGY: Why isn’t Andrew Sullivan allowed to write his column?
Cockburn understands that Sullivan is not just forbidden from writing for the New York magazine about the riots; his contract means he cannot write on the topic for another publication. He is therefore legally unable to write anything about the protests without losing his job — at the magazine that, in 1970, published Radical Chic, Tom Wolfe’s brilliant and controversial excoriation of progressive piety. It’s the bonfire of the liberals!
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Sullivan’s card has been marked, partly because — many years ago — he edited the New Republic and dedicated an issue to a debate about The Bell Curve, the controversial book by Richard J. Herrnstein and Charles Murray on IQ. At magazines such as the Atlantic, where Sullivan did some of his best work as a journalist and pioneering blogger, this now makes him persona non grata.
Read the whole thing, but…the Atlantic? As Jim Treacher tweeted on Thursday to Sullivan:
Sullivan’s 2008 stint at the Atlantic caused serious damage to the magazine’s reputation, cemented by the hiring and then immediate shameful firing of Kevin Williamson by editor Jeffrey Goldberg in 2018. (The cause of which was a sneak preview of the New York Times’ meltdown earlier this week caused by its crybully young staffers.)