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You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Dolt 45 / Pre-Dawn Open Thread: Another Bannon Comeback Failure

Pre-Dawn Open Thread: Another Bannon Comeback Failure

by Anne Laurie|  September 4, 20183:46 am| 21 Comments

This post is in: Dolt 45, Don't Mourn, Organize, Enhanced Protest Techniques, Fables Of The Reconstruction, Free Markets Solve Everything, Open Threads, Post-racial America, Republican Stupidity, Assholes, Flash Mob of Hate, Riveted By The Sociological Significance Of It All

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I’m not sure how this is meaningfully different from inviting David Duke https://t.co/u4OfM5BXnL

— b-boy bouiebaisse (@jbouie) September 3, 2018

Up with the rocket and down with the stick, as my Irish granny used to say… but the cycles are getting shorter. This particular publicity attempt was over before most people even knew to complain about it…

Can’t fathom a justification for this. He isn’t in government. He isn’t leading a fringe website anymore. He isn’t interesting. He’s a crank who’s trying (and since Trump, largely failing) to get majority white countries to elect bigots. https://t.co/Qz0NxumU9t

— Radley Balko (@radleybalko) September 3, 2018

And he talks to anyone who doesn’t move away from him, and even some who do. https://t.co/lXn0PpullV

— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) September 3, 2018

A statement from David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker, explaining his decision to no longer include Steve Bannon in the 2018 New Yorker Festival. pic.twitter.com/opayiw5GQ2

— The New Yorker (@NewYorker) September 3, 2018


BTW, interviewing Bannon isn’t a crazy thing. But it’s also not all that necessary at this point. He’s got no real patron or base he’ll admit to. He’s either bankrolled by Russians to help out in Europe, or he’s old news here.

— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) September 3, 2018

I’d enjoy a real Remnick-Bannon conversation. But not on a festival stage. Ideally on a plane, where they randomly were assigned seats next to each other for a long flight. And I‘m in the row in front, hearing everything and resisting the urge to live-tweet.

— Carlos Lozada (@CarlosLozadaWP) September 4, 2018

This might be the most succinct explanation I’ve seen for why/how @NewYorker screwed this up. https://t.co/ZZRYP5bKkk

— Daniel W. Drezner (@dandrezner) September 3, 2018

Seems @NewYorker lost sight of key distinction between warily hearing out and scrutinizing @SteveKBannon's views, and celebrating him as a Festival headliner. Like an honorary degree or distinguished lectureship, latter implies a measure of acclaimhttps://t.co/cwvYLhJZtx

— Suzanne Nossel (@SuzanneNossel) September 4, 2018

Yup, though his current hustle is the "Bannon Rehabilitation Project" — trying to redeem himself not in the public's eyes, but in Trump's, to regain his lost influence https://t.co/inL7c6qgez

— Joshua Green (@JoshuaGreen) September 4, 2018

Bannon is a Newt knock-off: Smart,curious,worldly, industrious, enamored w florid language, an autodidact, undisciplined, sloppy, unfocused, somewhat narcissistic, convinced he’s a world historical figure, a dick, & unconcerned w the human/societal/political carnage he causes

— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) September 3, 2018

(The comparison — much as I hate to admit it — is unfair to Gingrich, who at least had hustle. The Giant Albino Axolotl actually managed the Repub fantasy of pulling himself up by his own bootstraps, however loathsome his methods. Bannon is just another Straight Outa Scarsdale wanna-be who flames out of every ‘influencer circle’ he attempts to conquer within five years.)

So is Gorka gonna replace Bannon at the Ideas festival or what?

— Daniel W. Drezner (@dandrezner) September 3, 2018

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Reader Interactions

21Comments

  1. 1.

    Keith P.

    September 4, 2018 at 4:20 am

    If you really want to troll Bannon, invite Bill Murray as a replacement.

  2. 2.

    NotMax

    September 4, 2018 at 4:20 am

    Sheesh. And The New Yorker readers thought Tina Brown was a disaster…

  3. 3.

    Betty Cracker

    September 4, 2018 at 4:28 am

    I think Suzanne Nossel nails it in the tweet above — there’s a difference between reporting on dangerous shit-stains like Bannon and giving them the imprimatur of respectability. The New Yorker isn’t the only media outlet that has failed to grasp that distinction. “The Nazi Next Door” human interest stories are another example.

    Nearly two years into the Trump nightmare, major media outlets keep demonstrating that they aren’t up to the task of effective, factual — let alone courageous! — reporting in a time of ascendant fascism and authoritarianism.

  4. 4.

    Aleta

    September 4, 2018 at 5:36 am

    In Jan and Feb there were protests at the U Chicago after a professor invited Bannon to speak and he accepted. I looked for what happened:

    “Booth professor Austan Goolsbee, who was expected to debate Steve Bannon at UChicago earlier this year, suggested on Monday that the former White House strategist is a “snowflake” for not debating him. 

    Goolsbee made the comment in response to a tweet from conservative writer John Podhoretz (A.B. ’82), who was criticizing New Yorker Editor David Remnick for disinviting Bannon from an interview at a festival hosted by the publication. 

    Bannon accepted to speak here at U Chicago on economic nationalism but when he found out I was going to debate him, he bailed out. Nobody needs a lecture from him about who the snowflakes are in the marketplace of ideas. https://t.co/ijnt22Jca1
    — Austan Goolsbee (@Austan_Goolsbee) September 4, 2018

    The Maroon reported in January that Goolsbee had been asked to debate Bannon at UChicago. But months passed and no information about the event was released. By the end of March our reporting indicated that Bannon was unlikely to come.”

    -The Maroon, yesterday

    Bannon is still going to the ‘open future festival’ held by the Economist Sept. 15.

  5. 5.

    J R in WV

    September 4, 2018 at 5:52 am

    Someone in the tweeting called Steve Shithead Bannon an auto-didact, “french” for self-educated.

    I thought Bannon graduated from a US military service academy, like Annapolis? How is that an auto-didact? Or are they using auto-didact to refer to the strange nazi crap he absorbed from other nazis after he was discharged from the service?

    If I had a ticket to an event, and after purchasing the ticket a shitstain like Steve Shithead Bannon was announced as a member of the audience, let alone the presenters/performers, I would demand a refund of the ticket costs, plus any other costs incurred, like air fare, food, hotel, etc.

    I once respected The Economist as a source of news, but now see that it’s a propaganda rag outlet for nazis, and will never click on a link or open a magazine lying on a table anywhere. Lest I infect myself with nazi bullshit in my mind. Obviously it can happen to otherwise normal people…

    ALSO, Good Morning, rickyrah, everyone. Blech, OZHillbilly!

  6. 6.

    Chetan Murthy

    September 4, 2018 at 5:59 am

    @J R in WV:

    I once respected The Economist as a source of news

    Ehh. As a friend once said to me: “The Economist never met a large public bureaucracy it liked, nor a large private bureaucracy it didn’t like.” They’re tolerable, but the biases are so damn baked-in.

  7. 7.

    PIGL

    September 4, 2018 at 6:06 am

    @J R in WV: Concerning The Economist: To paraphrase someone from Usenet days, Scratch a libertarian find a fascist.

  8. 8.

    OzarkHillbilly

    September 4, 2018 at 6:13 am

    @J R in WV: Blech.

  9. 9.

    JR

    September 4, 2018 at 6:15 am

    @NotMax: Remick has been good. But this, well…

  10. 10.

    gene108

    September 4, 2018 at 6:17 am

    Had a pleasant dream of somehow whisking the current crop of Republicans to jail and installing President Al Gore, who on my advice withdrew Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination.

    So much better than reality.

  11. 11.

    sukabi

    September 4, 2018 at 6:19 am

    @J R in WV: autocorrect failure, it should have been “asshole-idiot” not autodiadact.

  12. 12.

    Chacal Charles Calthrop

    September 4, 2018 at 6:34 am

    @PIGL: the Economist was always the quintessential Very Serious publication where the editors were sure the Iraq war was a great idea and that social security was going to bankrupt the US. Maybe they had scholarly cred during the Cold War or something, but they’ve been garbage during the entire 21st century as far as I can tell.

  13. 13.

    CliosFanboy

    September 4, 2018 at 7:04 am

    @Chacal Charles Calthrop: they have good international coverage, but you have to understand where they are coming from.

  14. 14.

    Gin & Tonic

    September 4, 2018 at 7:20 am

    @CliosFanboy: Indeed. I am a subscriber and have been for many, many years. The writing is first-rate, and they cover a lot of places and people whom you wouldn’t otherwise hear about. Their editorial position is known, but their news articles do not often show their biases. And their obituaries are often works of art. Chacun à son goût.

  15. 15.

    PIGL

    September 4, 2018 at 8:17 am

    @Chacal Charles Calthrop: Yes, indeedy. Used to read it to pretty regularly especially when I was travelling I felt to give me a certain area of international sophistication to be seen with it on the airplane. Even at my then tender age, I could discern the difference between the Editorial policy and the news reporting, Which was unusually a cosmopolitan especially for the time. It’s the Editorial policy to which I referred by “libertarian”. I got tired of that much smug, though, and stopped reading years ago

  16. 16.

    JGabriel

    September 4, 2018 at 8:18 am

    A statement from David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker, explaining his decision to no longer include Steve Bannon in the 2018 New Yorker Festival. pic.twitter.com/opayiw5GQ2

    — The New Yorker (@NewYorker) September 3, 2018

    Or … the New Yorker decided to cancel Bannon’s interview because no one was buying tickets for it. I know my first reaction upon hearing that Remnick was interviewing Bannon was not outrage, but, “Pffft. Who the fuck wants to see that guy?”

  17. 17.

    germy

    September 4, 2018 at 8:50 am

    @JGabriel: Remnick canceled Bannon because one by one the other celebrity attendees were dropping out.

    In the end it would have been Remnick and Bannon, with no other guests.

    Here’s my theory, for what it’s worth:

    Remnick didn’t want his festival to be only liberals agreeing with each other. He wanted “another viewpoint” that in his arrogance he thought he could win a debate with. Now, since the New Yawker is a prestige publication, he wasn’t going to have any old conservative voice. He wanted the biggest celebrity. So he chose Bannon. He honestly didn’t foresee the controversy. He thought the other celebrity attendees would be fine with it, because they’d all think “It’s the New Yorker!” Prestige.

    So now he cancels, giving Bannon and his fans something to whine about (with smiles on their faces) but Remnick still doesn’t think he did anything wrong.

    New Yorker magazine editors have a history of arrogance and tunnel vision, going back through Tina Brown, Shawn, all the way to Harold Ross. So I wasn’t surprised at any of this.

  18. 18.

    Procopius

    September 4, 2018 at 9:07 am

    Funny. I haven’t read The Economist for at least fifteen years, but IIRC, it was one of my best sources for learning how the U.S. media were lying to us about Iraqi WMDs. They didn’t argue against the invasion, as I recall, but they didn’t argue in favor of it, as the NYT and WaPo did. They were certainly early in pointing out the housing bubble. Of course, my memory could be completely farkled.

  19. 19.

    Lee Hartmann

    September 4, 2018 at 9:32 am

    @germy: I mostly agree with this, but with a slightly different angle. I think there is an East Coast Elite, somewhat above the fray view that seeps into the thinking of otherwise smart people like Remnick. This makes it hard for the elite to grasp what many of us are feeling; that this is a very dangerous time for our republic, for the hope of a wiser, more humane society; that we truly have enemies of freedom, not merely among the population but actually holding nearly all the levers of power; and that they need to be fought with every tool at our disposal. Having a tough chat with Bannon isn’t one of those tools.

  20. 20.

    germy

    September 4, 2018 at 9:39 am

    @Lee Hartmann: Remnick and his associates are certainly above the fray.

    He can write all he wants about dangerous times, but the only affect on his own life is an increase in circulation (at least before this festival controversy) and a reduction in his taxes.

    And now, just as I expected:

    Huh. Call me old-fashioned. But I would have thought that the point of a festival of ideas was to expose the audience to ideas. If you only invite your friends over, it’s called a dinner party. https://t.co/VwkL4zOrbX— Malcolm Gladwell (@Gladwell) September 4, 2018

  21. 21.

    germy

    September 4, 2018 at 9:40 am

    Next up from Gladwell:“How can you have a food festival without inviting botulism and E. coli?” https://t.co/O9DlD8Lgxl— The Hoarse Whisperer (@HoarseWisperer) September 4, 2018

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