September 5th 2008
Jann Wenner Pays The Price
N
otorious lefty publisher Jann Wenner, publisher of Rolling Stone and chairman of Wenner Publishing, is feeling the pinch in the pocketbook this morning for his decision to turn his distant also-ran to People, Us, into a flagship for his political extremism.
Three celebrity weeklies — OK!, People and Us Weekly — featured Sarah Palin on their cover, but one of those magazines is reportedly losing subscribers because of it.
Us Weekly, which unlike People and OK!, chose a rather caustic cover line (“Babies, Lies and Scandal”) is said to have lost thousands of subscribers in just the first 24 hours following the printing of the issue.
“I’m hearing it’s 5,000, maybe more,” says one well-placed source in the industry. Another source claimed that as many as 10,000 readers have already canceled their subscriptions. (MSNBC)
An Us spokesperson denies the 5,000 and 10,000 figures but other than that, won’t talk about it. No explanation given for the “Lies” in the headline, which I’m told refer in the story to lies about her told by leftyblogs. No explanation about why they’re attacking Palin for having an unwed daughter when the boss at Wenner Publishing is no poster boy for good marriage:
In 1995, Jann Wenner left his wife of 28 years for another man, Matt Nye, with whom he shares three children all under two years old. Wenner has three older children with his wife, whom he has never divorced. But wait, there’s more! Just last year, Wenner was cheating on Nye — with a married man.
This pillar of good judgment has already contributed $5,800 to the Obama campaign, but thought he’d contribute an Us cover as well. Maybe this should be investigated as an illegal, over the limits contribution. He’s had BHO on the cover of Rolling Stone twice with fawning articles both times, and BHO and Michelle on the cover of Us, with a gusher of a praise-paean inside. Here’s Wenner discussing his BHO coverage with Howard Kurtz on CNN:
KURTZ: But you closed the interview — you closed the interview with these words: “Good luck. We are following you daily with great hope and admiration.”
It sounds like you’re getting ready to write him a check.
WENNER: Already done that.
KURTZ: You’re an Obama donor.
WENNER: I put that in there because I — I left that in there because of his answer to that thing, in which he says, “Don’t worry, we’ll get this done.”
KURTZ: Now, if you didn’t consider his musical choices to be cool, would you reconsider your enthusiasm for Senator Obama?
WENNER: If he was an Abba fan, honestly, yes. I mean, look, the guy knows his Dylan really well.
There’s a particular type of person who knows Dylan really well and likes Dylan. To like that kind of lyrics, to like the statements of Dylan, to like that kind of voice, it’s not being a cultural snob. It’s that he is at a — as I said, an intellectual and cultural level, and he has a — shares a kind of mutuality of insight with Dylan, who I think is, you know, the leading literary figure of our times, you know, and one of the leading literary figures of the century.
To appreciate that and get it at that level I think is important. I think that sensibility is what I’m looking for.
KURTZ: All right. So apparently he passed the Wenner test.
Last question. In the past you’ve interviewed John Kerry, Al Gore, Bill Clinton for “Rolling Stone” cover stories. I don’t see any Republicans on that list. If John McCain called you up and said, “I would like to come and sit down with you and be on the cover of ‘Rolling Stone,’” what would be your reaction?
WENNER: Well, I think we might take him up on it. We had Bush on the cover recently. It was a cartoon of him sitting on a stool with a dunce hat on his head, and it said< “The Worst President in American History?” by…
KURTZ: Not exactly the kind of cover that you did for Obama.
WENNER: Well, I’m just trying to say that McCain will have to take his chances when he comes.
Rolling Stone has never positioned itself as an objective news magazine; it has always been wrapped in the counter-culture, and it’s certainly within bounds for Wenner to use it as an Obama hype machine.
But Us is another story altogether. It was created and is marketed as a competitor to People and has positioned itself among its readers in the same mode – fluffy and dirt-digging stories about celebs, a few heartstring-pullers each issue, and when it comes to politics, no politicizing. It’s readers are overwhelmingly women – women who apparently see in Palin someone to admire and sympathize with, not someone to attack.
Wenner has a new awareness of that today, and I couldn’t be happier.
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September 5th, 2008 at 9:00 am
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