Next up, Rolling Stone's "contributing editor" (the dude's not big on titles) Matt Taibbi completely demolishes New York Magazine's fiction writer John Heilemann's contention that the President was motivated to support gay marriage for fundraising reasons since, Taibbi added, he was "outed" by Joe Biden "flapping his jaws" — "Unless they're incredibly clever and Machiavellian to do it this way, to sort of have it accidentally come out of Joe Biden's mouth, and then this big statement, I don't see this as a rush for campaign cash at all."
If anyone is heir to Hunter Thompson's legacy as a political reporter first, and Rolling Stone writer second, it's Matt Taibbi. His fierce, incisive, fearless reporting on behalf of we, the people, exposing the malfeasance and criminality in our financial system is worthy of the mantle he would never presume to assume: Rolling Stone's all-time leading light, Hunter S. Thompson.
Funny thing about John Heilemann, whose writings and execrable book, Game Change, are speckled with Hunterisms — "Fear And Trembling," "Fear And Loathing", etc. — which they euphemistically call in their business "appropriations" but which I prefer calling plagiarisms ... soon after its publication he assumed the title of New York Magazine's "National Affairs Editor." I searched the Google machine but could find no promotional blurb, much less any evidence New York Magazine had a "National Affairs Editor" before Heilemann.
But I did find this, from Rolling Stone's legendary publisher, Jann Wenner, remembering Hunter:
“We were deep into politics and shared the same ambition to have a voice in where the country was going (thus the “National Affairs Desk”). We became partners in this as well, as mad as it may have seemed at the time — a rock-and-roll magazine and a man known for writing about motorcycle gangs, joining forces to change the country. We used to read aloud what he had just written, get to certain phrases or sentences, and just exclaim to each other, “Hot fucking damn.” It was scorching, original, and it was fun. He was my brother in arms.” (Hunter S. Thompson's name remained on Rolling Stone's masthead as "National Affairs Editor" until the day of his death.)
Watch Alex and Matt make short shrift of two monumental phonies:
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