Politico Has Published an Astonishing 17 Items on Mark Leibovich’s “This Town”

Courtesy of Politico.

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New York Times Magazine correspondent Mark Leibovich’s new book, This Town, is in many ways a story about Washington, DC’s obsession with itself. So it shouldn’t come as a total surprise that one of the book’s biggest targets, Politico, has been both its biggest critic and its biggest promoter. Since April, the outlet has published, by my count, 17 stories and items on the book, ranging from video segments to photo galleries to stinging critiques of This Town‘s cultural critiques.

It started in April, when Mike Allen and Jim Vandehei launched a preemptive salvo against Leibovich, whom they characterize as “at once a supremely confident and strangely self-conscious writer.” The duo known as VandeAllen wrote: “we thought we’d have some fun and do some reporting on his reporting on our friends, sources and subjects to find out who else should worry most about his book.” The story was accompanied by a video segment featuring the two reporters discussing Leibovich’s “incest book*,” with Vandehei noting that “if someone chronicled all the silly things I’ve said in the last 15 years, it would be a hoot!” There was also a slideshow of the suspected main characters of This Town, which included five people, one of whom was Leibovich. Their article was featured in Allen’s daily tip-sheet, Playbook—”Not out till July, but everyone’s talking.”

In July, as the book’s publication date neared, Politico flooded the zone. On July 3, media reporter Dylan Byers wrote that a bookstore had mistakenly begun selling copies of the “highly anticipated book about the way things work in Washington, D.C.” two weeks early. Later that day, he scooped that the Times would excerpt a portion of the book, which “is expected to unearth some unsavory details about key Beltway players, including super-lawyer Robert Barnett, media-insider Tammy Haddad, various former Obama aides and POLITICO’s own Mike Allen.” Byers’ review that night noted that “Leibovich is quoted as referring to [Politico] in the book as ‘the caffeinated trade site,’ ‘the emerging company-town organ for Political Washington,’ and ‘an organization of healthy self-regard.'” The following day, Allen covered the same ground, while quoting generously:

Politico often gets blamed for defining down and amping up political news today. The ‘haters,’ as Politico’s editors call their critics, are often the same Washington insiders whom the publication reports on – and who read the thing religiously… Politico is an organization of healthy self-regard.

On July 5th, Allen quoted 985 words of Leibovich’s forthcoming New York Times Magazine excerpt (previously reported in Politico), and colleague Mackenzie Weinger compiled a guide to “Who’s up, down in ‘This Town'” which notes that Allen “is cast as an ‘enabler’ of journalistic groupthink, according to the Post’s review.” Another story that day flagged a list of talking points produced by the White House on top aide Valerie Jarrett. Byers took on a New York Times review which had generated controversy in this town for its suggestion that Washington has neither good pizza nor delicious sandwiches (it has both, but let’s not do this again). After a long weekend, he revisited the subject, concluding that This Town demonstrates the need for another Tim Russert “not just to make The Club feel better, but to improve its standing with the rest of nation.”

Tuesday was a new day, which meant a new video of Leibovich discussing his book with reporter Lois Romano, who pressed him on whether he’d broken any “unspoken code” by reporting on the people he rubbed elbows with in social settings. On Wednesday, Allen flagged a piece by the Huffington Post‘s Michael Calderone, which noted that “VandeHei is mentioned 16 times in the book, more than the aforementioned 17 Times editors, reporters and columnists combined.” By Thursday, Romano’s interview had been converted into a think piece, excerpted in Playbook, about the chilling effect of This Town on the social scene of “a town that shuns wannabes and impostors”—a previously unknown stereotype of Washington, DC.

Lest you think Politico has reached peak self-obsession, though, consider this: the book just came out on Tuesday.

*There is no incest in This Town.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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