Farewell. The Flying Pig Has Left The Building.

Steve Hynd, August 16, 2012

After four years on the Typepad site, eight years total blogging, Newshoggers is closing it's doors today. We've been coasting the last year or so, with many of us moving on to bigger projects (Hey, Eric!) or simply running out of blogging enthusiasm, and it's time to give the old flying pig a rest.

We've done okay over those eight years, although never being quite PC enough to gain wider acceptance from the partisan "party right or wrong" crowds. We like to think we moved political conversations a little, on the ever-present wish to rush to war with Iran, on the need for a real Left that isn't licking corporatist Dem boots every cycle, on America's foreign misadventures in Afghanistan and Iraq. We like to think we made a small difference while writing under that flying pig banner. We did pretty good for a bunch with no ties to big-party apparatuses or think tanks.

Those eight years of blogging will still exist. Because we're ending this typepad account, we've been archiving the typepad blog here. And the original blogger archive is still here. There will still be new content from the old 'hoggers crew too. Ron writes for The Moderate Voice, I post at The Agonist and Eric Martin's lucid foreign policy thoughts can be read at Democracy Arsenal.

I'd like to thank all our regular commenters, readers and the other bloggers who regularly linked to our posts over the years to agree or disagree. You all made writing for 'hoggers an amazingly fun and stimulating experience.

Thank you very much.

Note: This is an archive copy of Newshoggers. Most of the pictures are gone but the words are all here. There may be some occasional new content, John may do some posts and Ron will cross post some of his contributions to The Moderate Voice so check back.


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Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Thar's Gold In Them Thar Empty Heads!

By John Ballard



Digby points to a timely Yahoo News report.



Being a high-profile leader of the small-government movement is very big business.

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Wherever Palin goes, attention follows � and money usually comes with it....Palin has gone from a state of indebtedness (due to legal troubles in Alaska) to estimated earnings of $12 million in less than a year. Palin makes $1 million a year for her contributions to Fox News. She sold her first book, "Going Rogue," to HarperCollins for $7 million and a second book for an undisclosed amount. She gives speeches around the country for an average fee of $100,000 each....Beyond her Tea Party activities, Palin has also signed up to star in a reality show on life in Alaska for the Learning Channel. She'll reportedly be paid $250,000 per episode.

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[Glenn] Beck was blunt with Forbes Magazine when discussing his success. "I could give a flying crap about the political process," he deadpanned. "We're an entertainment company." Forbes said that Beck's company, Mercury Radio Arts, raked in $32 million from March 2009 to March 2010. That included $2 million from Fox News for his daily television show, $10 million for his daily radio show, $3 million for speaking events, $4 million from his online operation, and a whopping $13 million in print endeavors with Simon & Schuster...

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You might say [Dick] Armey has actually lost money because of his Tea Party role. Criticism of the fact that he continued to work for lobbying law firm DLA Piper while holding the chairmanship of FreedomWorks caused him to resign from the lobbying firm in August. According to the Dallas Morning News, that decision cost Armey $750,000 a year. Of course, Armey's position at FreedomWorks still pays him $550,000 a year, and his Tea Party activities have greatly enhanced his public profile.

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[Andrew] Breitbart certainly isn't making Beck or Palin money.... But according to his business partner, Breitbart's network of sites is now attracting over 10 million unique readers a month and generating over 40 million pageviews. If those numbers are correct, Breitbart's bare bones staff is attracting an audience as big as a large regional newspaper, and millions of dollars of revenue could follow. Breitbart says he plans to expand his empire soon by launching three more sites: Big Peace, Big Education and Big Tolerance. Breitbart was also paid $500,000 for an upcoming book, "Thinking Big."

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Fox had its best ratings year ever in 2009. While much of that is due to the continued dominance of consevative host Bill O'Reilly, who is less directly involved in Tea Party activism and promotions, it's also a result of Beck's record-breaking success for the network in Fox's 5 p.m. slot. More viewers means more money from advertisers means more revenue for Fox News and its parent company News Corp. According to the New York Times, Fox News chairman Roger Ailes made $23 million in 2009 for his role in that success. This year may be even better: According to Gabriel Sherman, every time Palin appears on the channel, ratings shoot up 10 to 15 percent.


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