The world’s most respected journalism prize may get neutered this year.
Over the weekend, WaPo racial protestor Wesley Lowery went to a party at The Daily Beast deputy social media editor Asawin Suebsaeng‘s house and was heard boasting that he and a team at WaPo will receive a Pulitzer for a project on deadly police shootings.
The prizes will be announced Monday at 3 p.m. Prepare for a certain head to get so big that it could explode all over town if he gets the award or any part of it.
The news was reported in Mike Allen‘s Politico Playbook. The best part about Allen’s jabs is that they are always subtle, but those who read him regularly know that the church-going reporter does not often insult people in the Washington bubble. So when he does, it’s considered to be quite a beating.
“Washington Post national reporter Wesley Lowery jubilantly told friends at a party this weekend that he and a Post team (or perhaps the paper institutionally) will win a Pulitzer Prize today,” Allen reported in this morning‘s Playbook.
In other words, something not quite so new happened: WESLEY WAS BRAGGING ABOUT HIMSELF.
Washingtonian‘s Andrew “Dijon” Beaujon‘s ass-kissy writeup heavily praised Wesley for breaching Pulitzer etiquette. The Mirror is going to present what Beaujon — of TBD fame — wrote and offer a different, more accurate translation.
What Beaujon wrote: “At the Post, Lowery, who has a large social media presence and a habit of actually saying what he thinks, has always been something of a controversial presence–a big change from people who followed the old-school code of conduct, in which journalists aver in public that they hold no opinions of their own.”
In other words… Lowery is a big dick who constantly accuses anyone who disagrees with him of being racist.
What Beaujon wrote: “A group of people who make their living prying secrets out of others have no obligation to keep their own–especially when it comes to the Pulitzers.”
In other words: What a breath of fresh air compared with the shit lava seeping out of nearly every graph of his story. Beaujon actually writes one sentence that makes good common sense.
What Beaujon wrote: “But the interesting thing here is that the Pulitzers are kind of designed as a form of journalistic deodorant.”
In other words… Not even sure what Beaujon means here. I just hope for the sake of his coworkers that he used deodorant this morning.
This isn’t the first time that Wesley has talked about himself or made himself the story. It’s also not the first time that Allen has spanked him for it.
In June, 2014, Allen got some crap when he subtly made fun of Wesley’s ego.
Wesley, who was feverishly covering Ferguson — except for the weekend he returned to Washington to go on “Meet The Press” or the time he skipped a Baltimore riot to play with his brother from another mother, HuffPost‘s Ryan J. Reilly, on the red carpet of the White House Correspondents’ Dinner — went on CNN and invited MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough to Ferguson to do some real coverage.
This was after Scarborough suggested that Wesley “move on” when police tell him to do so. Wesley made it clear — as if it’s not clear that most journalists he encounters are beneath him — that he thinks talking heads are worthless.
Allen wrote, “Ya Can’t Make It Up!”
And then simply quoted him.
“Well, I would invite Joe Scarborough to come down to Ferguson and get out of 30 Rock where he’s sitting and sipping his Starbucks smugly,” Wesley told CNN. “[L]et me be clear about this: I have LITTLE PATIENCE for talking heads.”
You would have thought Allen had called Wesley the n-word or his mother a whore. The heat came from from liberal reporters like idiotic Alex Pareene, his pal Tom Kludt, then at Talking Points Memo, HuffPost‘s Jason Linkins, New York Mag‘s Jonathan Chait and some members of the Twitterati.
Linkins, who quit writing up the Sunday shows so he could eat brunch, wrote that Allen had taken a “gratuitous pot-shot” at Wesley. (Maybe the fat went to Linkins’ brain. Linkins didn’t seem to understand that Wesley had said these appalling things and was more intent to make Allen wrong for running a couple of disgusting quotes.)
Kludt’s headline was this: “Mike Allen Mocks Wesley Lowery.”
He wrote, “Politico’s Mike Allen apparently found it odd when the Washington Post’s Wesley Lowery, one of two reporters arrested this week in Ferguson, Mo., went after “talking heads” like MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough.”
This is because it was odd. It is odd when a then-24-year-old reporter makes himself the center of the story and then speaks down to an older, seasoned journalist and former congressman about how to cover a story.
In his story, Kludt, now at CNN, ironically had Pareene mocking Allen: “YA CAN’T MAKE IT UP – lapdog to power and ethically compromised industry spokesman @mikeallen is thought by some to be a talented journalist,” Pareene tweeted.
Allen was bashed in lower corners of the world as well.
A liberal blog no one has ever heard off called First Draft — no, it’s not a sports blog or the NYT’s morning newsletter — that called Allen the “biggest fuckstick in American journalism.”
The headline left absolutely nothing to the imagination: “THIS WEEK IN FUCK MIKE ALLEN.”
But good luck Wesley! We’ll be rooting for you.