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You are here: Home / Like Father Like Son

Like Father Like Son

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L. Brent Bozell III has a “forced ghostwriter” for columns that go out in his name:

The conservative Media Research Center often urges liberal news outlets to TELL THE TRUTH, but the Reston, VA-based press watchdog isn’t telling the truth about its own leader: Brent Bozell doesn’t write the syndicated column that appears under his byline.

It is longtime MRC media analysis director Tim Graham who writes “almost everything published under [Bozell’s] name,” a former MRC employee tells me in an email. “That includes his weekly column. Same goes for his books, which at least carry Graham’s name in a secondary billing, but also aren’t written by Bozell (but Bozell keeps 80-90% of the advance and all profits!)”

Two other people with ties to MRC confirmed that Graham is Bozell’s ghostwriter – and that Graham is not happy with the assignment.

“Tim just resents having to do it,” says a former employee.

I would guess Bozell is one of many who doesn’t bother crediting his ghostwriter.

Reader Interactions

59Comments

  1. 1.

    BGinCHI

    On the other hand, I could probably write Bozell’s shit in less than an hour, so whatever he’s paying that dude is probably pretty good bang for the buck.

    What’s the news here? Bozell is not a real intellect?

    All right wing politics is corruption. Period.

  2. 2.

    Amir Khalid

    Those quoting “Bozell’s” writings should henceforth attribute them thus: “According to Brent Bozell III’s staff ghostwriter, Media Research Center media analysis director Tim Graham, …”

  3. 3.

    brent

    I don’t understand a key issue in this story. How is Graham forced to do anything? If he resents the ghostwriting whats preventing him from just refusing to do it or, for that matter, leaving?

  4. 4.

    mai naem

    This is like that crazy Japanese composer who was doing this for about 20 yrs. He had paid the ghost composer about $70K over the years.

  8. 8.

    Amir Khalid

    @brent:
    If Graham refuses to ghostwrite for Bozell The Third, who is after all his boss, I guess Bozell could fire him for insubordination. He might be unwilling to quit because of a realisation that he wouldn’t get a gig this good anywhere else. Or maybe this is just Graham negotiating through a proxy for better pay and/or more credit.

  13. 13.

    Corner Stone

    mistermix, concurrent to your recent post on the TWC and Comcast deal, any thoughts on this reporting:
    Revolving Door: Top Obama Admin Antitrust Officials Tied To Comcast
    “Could the revolving door shape the antitrust enforcement for the proposed merger between Comcast and Time Warner? Republic Report looked into the officials responsible for overseeing antitrust enforcement, and found that at least two have close ties to Comcast.”

  14. 14.

    Corner Stone

    @Amir Khalid:

    Or maybe this is just Graham negotiating through a proxy for better pay and/or more credit.

    Graham isn’t going to get a raise out of this revelation. At least, not in his current job. And what other wingnut outfit would take him after he used a proxy to talk out of turn?

  15. 15.

    Shygetz

    I don’t get it…why does MRC pay Bozell when they can get this ghostwriter to write literally the same stuff for presumably much less money? Is the “Bozell Brand” really that strong? I mean, here in rural Georgia, I roll in pretty wingnutty circles. Brent Bozell is not a name that gets dropped very often. Any by “not very often” I mean “never”.

  17. 17.

    Eric U.

    well, there is at least one troll that says he just c/p from DKos. Which, if true, would be a service because every time I go over there my blood pressure rises.

  18. 18.

    Snarki, child of Loki

    Well, Graham’s ghostwriting days are just about over. Technology will soon be able to replace both Graham AND Bozell.

    Yes, Artificial Stupidity will soon be here.

    I, for one, welcome BreitBot 9000 to the Realm Of ConservaTwits.

  19. 19.

    theMEitcong

    @brent:

    It’s almost as if Bozell is shoving this down Graham’s throat. Repeatedly and often. And Graham resents it, oh yes.

  21. 21.

    Amir Khalid

    @Shygetz:
    Never misunderestimate* a chief executive’s capacity to believe in his own importance.

    *Beautiful word, this. Any idea who coined it?

  23. 23.

    Elizabelle

    Is Bozell claiming deafness?

    Shades of Japan’s “famous deaf composer isn’t deaf and has a ghostwriter” saga from last week.

    Except less interesting.

    And productive output of poorer quality. Not as socially redeeming.

    Meh.

  25. 25.

    brent

    @Amir Khalid: If that is right then it essentially boils down to Graham having a job he doesn’t like. But being paid to do work you aren’t fond of is nothing at all like being forced to do that job, which is the language the article uses repeatedly and which makes no sense to me at all unless I am missing something crucial.

  26. 26.

    Bobby Thomson

    Gosh, next thing you’ll be telling me that CEOs don’t actually write the things that go out under their names.

    Unremarkable and far more widespread than you realize. Few people with power, wealth, or fame do their own writing. When they do it comes off like Tom Perkins.

  29. 29.

    Mnemosyne

    @Bobby Thomson:

    Gosh, next thing you’ll be telling me that CEOs don’t actually write the things that go out under their names.

    Scandalous! It’s not like we at the Giant Evil Corporation don’t know who the ghostwriters for the executives are who do all of the introductions, speeches, press releases, etc. for them.

    Of course, those executives generally don’t have a regularly published column in the newspaper or present themselves to the public as professional writers, either.

  31. 31.

    Mustang Bobby

    @maya: I had the exact same thought when I read the story last night. Thanks for posting it; I guess that makes you my ghostwriter… (ha ha)

    Fun fact: The lyrics to “The Ballad of Gilligan’s Island” also fit the melody of “Ghostriders in the Sky.”

    You’re welcome.

  34. 34.

    Vlad

    If Graham doesn’t like it, then he should just bully some poorer, weaker subordinate of his own into doing the work.

  35. 35.

    Splitting Image

    This is actually pretty consistent with how the Masters of the Universe view all other kinds of work. The moochers and takers who draw paycheques every two weeks aren’t responsible for a dime’s worth of the profits generated by a company.

    All, and I mean all, of the credit for said profit belongs to the job creators in the upper management, so the fact that some insignificant 47-percenter drew a cheque for writing what he was told doesn’t mean that one of his betters isn’t entitled to the by-line. All of you libtards are simply out of touch with reality.

  36. 36.

    Splitting Image

    @Vlad:

    If Graham doesn’t like it, then he should just bully some poorer, weaker subordinate of his own into doing the work.

    And then there is this. If that Graham person were a job creator like his boss, he’d have delegated the work to some other sucker (and taken the credit).

  38. 38.

    Amir Khalid

    There’s also the matter of the misrepresentation of the column’s authorship. It looks to me like Creators Syndicate wasn’t in on it, i.e. it didn’t know that Graham wrote them under Bozell Eye Eye Eye’s byline. But now that it does know, it has for some reason decided to protect Bozell rather than drop the column.

  39. 39.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Much as I think the left-blogosphere is sometimes too quick to dismiss the influence of the The Village, I gotta say….

    . Brent Bozell III

    who?
    /rhetorical, I am familiar with the Bozell/Buckley family tree

  43. 43.

    catclub

    @schrodinger’s cat: I am pretty sure Amir is trolling with that question.

    Plus, I wonder if someone should tell Graham that he can get health insurance on the individual market now. maybe he can leave a job he doesn’t like with portable health insurance.

  44. 44.

    cminus

    @Mustang Bobby: Another fun fact: the music/lyrics of the Christmas carol “Joy to the World” can be fit to the lyrics/music of Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love a Bad Name”.

  48. 48.

    Roger Moore

    @Matt:

    Clearly, Bozell needs to rediscover the “dignity of work”, amirite?

    Assumes facts not in evidence. For him to “rediscover” the dignity of work, he would have had to have recognized it in the first place.

  51. 51.

    Thoughtful David

    @catclub: I’m guessing this is the real source. So, I’m imagining that Graham probably had some kind of pre-existing condition, say, some cancer in his past. He needed the job working for Bozell, in order to keep his insurance, so he kept his mouth shut and wrote the columns and books, pissed off and stewing the whole time.
    Now, suddenly, with PPACA, he can get insurance on his own, so he doesn’t need that job so badly anymore, and starts talking.
    See, Bozell? That PPACA did come back and bite you in the ass!

  54. 54.

    Beatrice

    You can also sing any Emily Dickinson poem to the tune of Gilligan’s Island.

    Because I could not stop for Death – He kindly stopped for me – The Carriage held but just Ourselves – And Immortality!

  55. 55.

    Quicksand

    Ah yes, a “forced ghostwriter.” Or as I like to call it, an “employee.”

    Imma go be outraged about something else today if y’all don’t mind.

  56. 56.

    Fort Geek

    @brent: Tim Graham stays for the medical. If only there were a way he could look up several medical plans on…let’s call it an “exchange” where he could compare things…

  57. 57.

    snarkworth

    I’m sure Bozell “is one of many who doesn’t bother crediting his ghostwriter” because nobody credits their ghostwriter. Hence the term.

    Authors may mention the ghostwriter of a book in the acknowledgments, but not on the cover.

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