Posted on 10/20/2013 6:59:28 PM PDT by Jet Jaguar
New York Times magazine correspondent and author of the explosive book “This Town” Mark Leibovich detailed intricate internal workings of Washington and compared two of the most powerful men in news and politics, Mike Allen and Matt Drudge, in an exclusive interview with The Daily Caller.
Mike Allen’s morning ‘Playbook’ email has the power to shape the political discussion, he explained, because hundreds of decision makers in the political circuit read it every morning.
“These hundreds of people are TV bookers, and reporters, and hill staffers of both parties, and White House staffers, and lobbyists and a lot of people in some of the state capitals, too,” he said.
The power of Playbook stems from its ability to shape the news cycle.
“Mike basically has this knack for writing this email about things that people have missed over night, things that are central to the political discussion,” Leibovich said. ”What is striking about Mike, in addition to him being a very quirky, kind of eccentric, fascinating guy, is that he has this inordinate amount of power in that people read what he says, and then you can just see ten cable shows in a given day given over to what Mike says is important. You can see the front page of the next days newspapers. So he is what we would call now a ‘conversation driver.’”
Leibovich compares the reach that Allen has with that of Matt Drudge, the owner and operator of the hugely successful news aggregation website site, The Drudge Report.
“They are very distinct.” Leibovich said “I mean, they both have incredible amounts of power, incredible amounts of reach. I think Mike’s reach is more to insiders per say and it flowers out… Conservative media, liberal media will read him. I think Drudge is more of a headline. You literally have millions of people on there a day and it just goes directly to those news consumers and it is much more direct, frankly… Mike is a conversation starter. Drudge has a much more definitive conversation within his website which he is updating constantly. They are both wildly influential and I read both of them.”
...and “insider.”
And I'm sure that that's just why the smirking elites like it!
I liked ‘barn’ better!
Playbook = Journolist.
Mike Allen is a lib reporter who runs a Journolist-type email list and web page called Playbook that lazy reporters use to get their stories each day. He puts his playbook together each night based on talking points and leaks he gets from government insiders and other media contacts.
Moreover, the GOP-e uses him as its weapon of choice to backstab Conservatives, and he was originator of many of the worst Palin hack jobs that occurred from 2008 to 2012, when Team Romney was desperately trying to stop her.
For example:
Oops! That's Mike Donald! Who the hell is Mike Allen?
What’s a Mike Allen, and how could he possibly be more influential than Matt Drudge?
Who’s Mike Allen?
Who is Mike Allen?
He write for that called Daily email or something something like that
Nobody ever seen the picture of him he kinda remind me of Male version of Nikki Finke from Deadline Hollyweird there is no photo of her
VEry Greta Garbo type
Funny you should mention lack of photos. I used to see Matt Drudge in photos all the time, now, I only see pic of Matt that are about what? Ten years old. No, it’s not my business, but I wonder if Matt does not want to be seen in recent pictures because he has changed in some way. I don’t mean changed as dramatically as the movie reviewer Ebert did, after the removal of his jaw due to cancer. I mean something like the former actor. now director Ronnie Howard, who, to this day, hates being seen without that damn ball cap to hide his shiny bald head. Matt may just like being a man of mystery, because this business can quickly destroy you if you let it rules your life.
I think of Matt as Greta Garbo of the net
Personally I think he is shy dude there are celebrities who really shy in real life
I guess better a Greta Garbo than a Howard Hughes, who died rich, demented and alone.
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