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Head of Glenn Beck’s Media Empire Quits as The Blaze Burns Down
dailybeast ^

Posted on 01/29/2016 9:20:33 PM PST by drewh

Kraig Kitchin will stay with the company, but resigned from the top job after friction with fellow Beck executive Jonathan Schreiber. A ‘mass exodus’ of staff may follow.

In what knowledgeable observers say is a sign of increasing turmoil in Glenn Beck’s troubled media empire, Beck’s longtime mentor and corporate executive, Kraig Kitchin, has quit as CEO of The Blaze.

Kitchin’s replacement, Stewart Padveen, a digital startup entrepreneur who joined Beck’s company last summer, will be the fourth leader of The Blaze since late 2014.

Kitchin, 54, who took over operations of Beck’s conservative-leaning subscription digital and cable television enterprise last June—after two previous CEOs abruptly left in the space of six months—is resigning along with two other senior executives: Jeremy Price, director of advertising sales, and Liz Julis, director of marketing.

Both are based in New York, 1,500 miles removed from corporate headquarters in the Dallas suburb of Irving, Texas.

Several other key employees, including at least two senior producers based in The Blaze’s shrinking New York operation, are expected to follow them out the door.

A source close to the situation predicted a “mass exodus” from the New York studios, which are housed in a largely unoccupied 35,000 square-foot space at Midtown Manhattan’s Bryant Park, previously rented by Yahoo, under a 10-year lease costing Beck’s privately held company an estimated $2 million a year.

Kitchin—who co-founded Premiere Radio Networks three decades ago and has worked with personalities as diverse as Rush Limbaugh, Ryan Seacrest, Whoopi Goldberg, and Beck—tried to put the best face on his resignation in a company-wide email sent out Thursday night.

He described his apparently self-imposed demotion as a result of outside business obligations.

“Our organization--The Blaze--deserves and needs an exclusively focused leader and that’s something I cannot provide, given existing commitments I choose to honor,” Kitchin wrote, adding that “I’m not leaving this company. I’ll stay with The Blaze, working every day as the Interim Head of Sales with a focus on finding the right person for that position, assisting in the transition, on advertiser growth, program development, and industry relations.”


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Front Page News; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: albatross; beck; cruz; dailybeast; elections; glennbeck; jonathanschreiber; kookandcanuktor; kraigkitchin; theblaze; trump; trumpwasright
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To: drewh

“monthly traffic for TheBlaze.com had dropped to 16.4 million unique visitors”

that’s probably because that website is so overloaded with massive ad-crap that it instantly crashes ordinary browsers and freezes browsers that have every ad-blocker known to mankind.

I used to try to go there to post comments, but finally have just given up completely.


21 posted on 01/29/2016 9:37:59 PM PST by catnipman (Cat Nipman: Vote Republican in 2012 and only be called racist one more time!)
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To: Neu Pragmatist

Bookmark


22 posted on 01/29/2016 9:38:25 PM PST by Stegall Tx (Why are we in this handbasket, and why is it getting so warm? (stolen tagline))
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To: chris37

I was just watching Glenn Beck on Megyn Kelly show suggesting that Trump’s supporters, who dehumanize anyone who disagrees with them by calling them pigs, slobs, losers, and whatever else, are edging towards violence


How 0bamaesque.


23 posted on 01/29/2016 9:38:47 PM PST by Jane Long (Go Trump, go! Make America Safe Again :)
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To: navymom1

Sounds like more trouble in Beck’s open-borders paradise ..


24 posted on 01/29/2016 9:39:10 PM PST by Neu Pragmatist (Trump is the only one who will secure our borders . Vote Trump)
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To: bigbob
Dick Morris is happy to know that Glenn Beck has taken his place as the Biggest Idiot in Media.

Sorry, Turd Blossom owns that crown, and is unlikely to relinquish it in the foreseeable future.


25 posted on 01/29/2016 9:41:29 PM PST by 867V309 (Trump: Bull in a RINO Shoppe)
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To: paintriot

LOL.. gotta have the Goldline..


26 posted on 01/29/2016 9:43:02 PM PST by Neu Pragmatist (Trump is the only one who will secure our borders . Vote Trump)
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To: drewh

$5 million in debt. TheBlaze traffic cut in half in just one year (11/14-11/15). A majority owner who is certifiably nuts. THIS is who Ted Cruz heralds as his big endorsement?


27 posted on 01/29/2016 9:51:49 PM PST by montag813
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To: drewh

Our local radio station recently rescheduled their program lineup and put the Glenn Beck show on after Rush. To be blunt, it’s unlistenable garbage, and Beck is a friggen loon.


28 posted on 01/29/2016 9:53:40 PM PST by SpaceBar
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To: drewh

I can’t even listen to Beck on the radio. All he and his buddies do is gossip about Trump. They’re like teenaged girls complaining about the pretty girl at school. “Oh Trump thinks he’s so hot but I know he has herpes”. “Oh did you see Trump at the movies...what a total phony.” Oh Trump stole my boyfriend last semester...I hate him so much...”


29 posted on 01/29/2016 9:55:17 PM PST by DouglasKC
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To: catnipman

I rarely have gone to the site due to the junky ads... You are not the first to mention it.


30 posted on 01/29/2016 9:56:14 PM PST by PghBaldy (12/14 - 930am -rampage begins... 12/15 - 1030am - Obama's advance team scouts photo-op locations.)
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To: All

Uh oh. He’d better protect himself by buying GOLD today! Glenn, if you use promo code: mmich you’ll receive free shipping as well!


31 posted on 01/29/2016 10:02:44 PM PST by mmichaels1970
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To: Helicondelta
looks like his hemorrhoids are flaring up again...
32 posted on 01/29/2016 10:03:23 PM PST by Chode (Stand UP and Be Counted, or line up and be numbered - *DTOM* -w- NO Pity for the LAZY - Luke, 22:36)
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To: PghBaldy

Maybe Trump will buy the channel for OANN so us conservatives has a Fox News alternative that favors kicking the illegals out, building the wall, and minimal H1b visas.

Boycott Fox, send Murdoch packing back where he came from


33 posted on 01/29/2016 10:06:35 PM PST by Zenjitsuman (A)
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To: Qiviut

Wait until silly season is over. Conservatives can be quite stubborn during political years.


34 posted on 01/29/2016 10:06:38 PM PST by Jonty30 (What Islam and secularism have in common is that they are both death cults)
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To: drewh

Operations, Sales, & Marketing leads all quit. An entrepreneur is not the skillset required right now. This org needs a disciplined, systematic leader who can stabilize and rebuild. Look for continued struggles here.


35 posted on 01/29/2016 10:08:26 PM PST by HonkyTonkMan
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To: DouglasKC

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynR0yRhxeL8


36 posted on 01/29/2016 10:09:23 PM PST by Albion Wilde (Who can actually defeat the Democrats in 2016? -- the most important thing about all candidates.)
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To: proust

I believe the Cruz campaign has gifted Rubio 2nd place in Iowa with crazed Beck and this——http://theconservativetreehouse.com/2016/01/30/unbelievable-ted-cruz-campaign-sends-out-personal-shaming-letters-to-iowa-voters/


37 posted on 01/29/2016 10:12:25 PM PST by yadent
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To: proust
Glenn Beck was a local radio guy on 9/11/01.

He set aside whatever his usual radio jock shtick was, that day.
I know that, because I turned the radio on after the first tower was hit, along with going from internet site to site seeking news.I spent most of the day listening to him try to put into words what was going on. I appreciated him searching for news to relay, and his very human reactions on air.

He started losing his mind several years ago.

Prior to his FOX gig, he had already lost much of his credibility as a semi-serious entertainer, IMHO.

I would pray for him, but for the fact he has openly mocked various Judeo/Christian theologies, and I wouldn't want to offend his sincerely held beliefs in...whatever he says he believes in today.(I stopped keeping up with his new shticks) I hope he gets some kind of professional mental help, but I'm not sure he is open to seeking it, or if it even exists for him to find, since he has spent the last decade pretending to be on some sort of public spiritual journey, while mocking spirituality. Just a wild guess, but I can imagine he has suddenly decided to explore Islam, as his next new guiding "faith". Whatever. Cruz sure does know how to pick 'em!

38 posted on 01/29/2016 10:14:39 PM PST by sarasmom
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To: Zenjitsuman

There is certainly a market for a conservative channel after the crap fauxsnooze pulled.They will never get it backif they ever had it to begin with.


39 posted on 01/29/2016 10:19:19 PM PST by HANG THE EXPENSE (Life's tough.It's tougher when you're stupid.)
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To: ShivaFan

Are you serious about the the seance, because I could totally see him doing something nutty like that.


40 posted on 01/29/2016 10:20:07 PM PST by Husker24
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