Andrew Breitbart was laid to rest yesterday. My good friend, Jim Hoft (the tenacious mind behind Gateway Pundit), attended his funeral. As Jonah Goldberg pointed out in the recent podcast, this past year seems to have brought more significant losses than seems natural. Giants, such as Christopher Hitchens, Tony Blankley, James Q. Wilson, and Vaclav Havel, will be sadly missed, but can be honored and remembered for a life lived sufficiently fulfilled and complete. But, the same cannot be said of Andrew Breitbart. Instead, we honor and grieve for a fearless, Conservative champion who still had a fresh and powerful energy of more great things to yet achieve. He was a unique and irreplaceable force who, as a fellow Conservative astutely observed, was not just a soldier…he was a General. Using Jonah's words, his loss is a tragedy.
I was not fortunate, like Rob Long, Jonah Goldberg, and Jim Hoft, to have ever known Andrew. But, reading and listening to the tributes, such as the Ricochet podcast and the one Jim Hoft posted this morning on Gateway Pundit, gives us all a glimpse into the man whose life was larger than the physical space he filled. Jim Hoft's Ode to Andrew Breitbart, delivered at Andrew's funeral reception is beautiful, moving, and worth reading. The link to it is below.
I don’t know Saul Alinsky But I knew Andrew Breitbart. He put shame in its place. He led by example. He was a friend.
I don’t know John Podesta or Contessa Brewer or David Brock or Saul Alinsky. But I know Andrew Breitbart. And I know Andrew started a movement. A freedom movement. An American movement. And I know in honor of Andrew we will continue this battle. In honor of Andrew Breitbart.
.. FU War
Sometimes, a martyr is more powerful than the physical person. Now, Andrew Breitbart is everywhere.
By the way, I Own The World came up with a way to honor the memory of Andrew Breitbart. You can purchase your “Breitbart Is Here” T-shirt at Anthem Studios and all of the proceeds will be donated to the Breitbart family.
I did not know Andrew Breitbart well, but I felt very much like I did. I could not claim that Andrew and I were friends...and yet I knew that we were.
When I heard Andrew for the first time, he was either a guest host or a guest on Dennis Miller's radio show. This was way before ACORN or Pigford or Shirley Sherrod or Anthony Wiener or Ricochet or any of that which followed. He talked about his family and his upbringing and his revelation regarding conservatism and his decision to step into the fight. I recall a story about being at work (at home.) His wife Susie had left him in charge of one of his toddler sons. He was deep into his work (for Drudge or Arianna?) when a neighbor called to tell him that his little son had left the house, crossed the street and arrived at his neighbor's front door. Of course when Andrew told it it was with great drama and simultaneous comedy. The story had a happy ending and taught a valuable lesson to young parents listening. He also described his home in LA and how he could look out his window to the nearby cemetery and see the graves of fallen soldiers. That was important to him because it reminded him of the great sacrifice which was made for him...and his family...and our Nation. I treasured those stories............and then we were smitten by Hillsdale College.
My husband and I met at Adrian College just down the road from Hillsdale about 1000 years ago. We were attending an Adrian reunion and decided to take the short drive and visit Hillsdale's campus. If you even do the same you will understand why Hillsdale is so unique....in fact we recently bought a home there, across the street from the Dean of Men.....but that's a story for another day.
We booked our first cruise ever, a Hillsdale Cruise, and found that along with spectacular speakers Mark Steyn and Stephen Hayes, a last minute program addition was Andrew Breitbart. By then ACORN was big news. We were sitting at the bar one evening and who should walk in but Andrew, accompanied by a close friend and Andrew's 10 year old son, dressed in a suit (his son.) It was then that I met Andrew. When I spotted him approaching, I jumped up and I practically tackled him right there and then. But he did not run away and stayed for quite a while.... I asked questions and he gave answers....and he asked me questions back. He told us that his wife had stayed home with the other three kids and so Andrew brought his oldest son along instead.
The next day at sea he was our speaker (in a wrinkled suit.) Not everyone knew who he was at the outset, but they certainly did at the end. He shared stories and more stories completely from memory. One of the things I recall was that he had his laptop in his backpack on stage with him and he confessed that he was going a bit crazy during his talk because he knew that he was missing something... some breaking news story....because he couldn't be on the internet and speak to us at the same time. He could not stop talking and really, none of us wanted him to, except perhaps Dr Arnn and Douglas Jeffrey.....so we moved out into the hallway to continue with Andrew. Later that afternoon he held an impromptu followup forum due to popular demand, and arrived in wrinkled cargo shorts and t-shirt. He never seemed to want to impress but rather to engage. Later I would see him again outside the dining room. I asked what would be the next BIG as Big Hollywood and Big Gov had already rolled out. He told me Big Peace and then Big Education. Today I read that BIG EDU was scheduled to debut this weekend. Can't wait!
We all have people in our lives who make an impact in ways we do not expect. I am a "tea party person" and because of leaders like Andrew, I have become a stronger advocate for what I believe. I plan to continue to advocate for America and to fight against "Ameritopia." Thanks Andrew.
It's a reunion and a remembrance. Jonah Goldberg (author of the forthcoming The Tyranny of Cliches: How Liberals Cheat in the War of Ideas) sits in for Peter Robinson and, of course, we talk about the life and times of Andrew Breitbart, courtesy of three guys who knew him well. Then we take questions from members on a variety of topics, political and cultural. Warning: Heavy Star Trek references ahead.
Here's the direct link to this week's episode (but use our new audio player below), however the best way to hear the podcast is to subscribe! Visit our Feedburner page for a number of other subscription options. Or better yet, use Stitcher.
The Ricochet Podcast is proudly sponsored by Encounter Books. This week's featured title is Why the West is Best: A Muslim Apostate's Defense of Liberal Democracy by Ibn Warraq. Available at EncounterBooks.com and Amazon.com.
It is with a heavy heart I write about the death of our conservative warrior, Andrew Breitbart.
My first response at hearing the sad news was absolute disbelief – how could such a man die who was so full of life? It seemed a terrible transgression against common sense and reason.
I remember having arrived in Los Angeles for a business trip, and driving through the city, enjoying the sunshine, and laughing uproariously at the news reports that Breitbart had taken over Anthony Weiner’s press conference. I will forever remember him this way. He was triumphant, valiant, laughing and prodding at the press, knowing they wanted to destroy him, and absolutely overwhelming them with the most potent weapon Andrew wielded so well - the truth.
This terrible day makes me recall the somber poem by Walt Whitman that always brings tears to my eyes:
O CAPTAIN! my Captain! our fearful trip is done;
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won;
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring:
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead.
O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills;
For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths—for you the shores a-crowding;
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head;
It is some dream that on the deck, You’ve fallen cold and dead.
My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip, the victor ship, comes in with object won;
Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells!
But I, with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead.
Walt Whitman’s haunting words describe the terrible murder of Lincoln after the North’s victory in the Civil War. While our victory is not yet determined, we must use our sorrow at Andrew’s death, and our joyful memories of him, to ensure that success that he fought so fearlessly and valiantly for.
Like Kurt Schlichter put it, “There will never be another conservative warrior like Andrew, but there will be many more conservative warriors because of him.
So it’s after a day of thinking about Andrew and what he gave us, what he left us, that I can confidently answer the question, “how could he could die?”
He didn’t, and he won’t, as long as we continue to fight against the lies of the liberal media and those who would destroy our great country. We must renew our commitment to that struggle that he threw himself into with such wit, intelligence, and glee.
We must fight on, in the memory of our great friend, defender of truth, and son of liberty, Andrew Breitbart.
Well, then, it’s done; the lessons lessened, the assumed presence, the big space, disappeared. You were always good but better with the hair, somehow, more photographic, unruly and ferociously sweet.
The beach sand is cool, today, on the feet, and the gulls unconcerned. A hawk now, drifting, effortless, waiting, watching and then plunging with clenching talons. The fish, unawares, is doomed.
It is gray today and the clouds move quickly; the waves come today as they did yesterday and will tomorrow, even though you think they should pause, for just a moment, for Andrew, and you think that it may be true as someone once said that there is only one prayer, really, only one that matters, one that needs saying and repeating until it makes sense, complete sense, and it is this: Thy will, not mine, be done.
Just that. It’s all there is. That, and the aching heart.
I've read so many of the testimonials today from those who know Andrew, that you would think it would be more than enough. But Andrew's personality was so massive, so infectious and passionate, that I think we are all just grappling for words just to begin to describe the superhuman specter of Andrew Breitbart.
I have known him for the better part of two decades now, having first met him when he was an IT specialist…and then I got to know him better over the years through a circle of journalists and misfits in LA. We were the same age and went to neighboring high schools on the Westside of Los Angeles and immediately bonded over the experience of losing faith with the values and priorities of the community we were raised in. I always thought that was the key to understanding how Andrew looked at the world. For us from our earliest days, "The Man" carried an NPR tote bag and had a poster bearing RFK's ripples quote on his office wall. These were our authority figures in baggy cardigan sweaters who preached tolerance until the rare moments when they were confronted with views other than their own, at which point we both saw the mask of tolerance and diversity vanish. I always felt that Andrew's gleeful charge against the liberal establishment was a continuation of our war against these earliest authority figures, and this why he always insisted that conservatism was the truly punk rock option in our world.
Growing up on the Westside and not subscribing to liberal views, one has to choose to either keep your head down and keep your opinions to yourself or to be branded a nut and all the rest of it. For most - myself especially - who do not subscribe to the overwhelming dogma of our community - the burden of having to constantly defend yourself is too much and we choose to keep our heads down and duck the fight as much as possible, lest every business lunch turn into World War Three. For Andrew, this was never a choice. The idea that he should muzzle his beliefs was unthinkable. He was not constitutionally capable of that dishonesty. And the idea that he should not pursue his ideas where ever they might take him was also unthinkable. More than anything else, I think Andrew was just appalled to his core by the notion that a person had to be credentialed by some elite establishment to have the right to express his views, the right to investigate whatever he chose and as a very early citizen of the internet he saw that the online world put into his hands power that the titans had once reserved for themselves. And thus the more he was vilified, the more he needed to show those who felt a person with his background and his views should be neither seen nor heard, that in the internet age, there was nothing they could do to keep him on a leash anymore.
He took so much joy from the fight. He loved talking about his ideas, his theories with anyone - busboy to CEO - he talked to everyone he met like a fully accredited member of his roving debate society. He spoke in strong, unmild language, but he never once talked down to anyone he met or anyone he sparred with.
There was a price to be paid, however. For himself, being a pariah in his homeland was a badge of honor. But in one of my last conversations with him, about a month ago, he worried about the toll that this status would exact upon his always beloved wife Susie. He told me of a couple friends of theirs who had ended their relationships with the Breitbarts because of his activities. Andrew could never even conceive of giving up doing what he believed in, but at moments like this - and there were other tough times along the way - I felt as though he wished he could be someone who didn't believe quite so much or quite so strongly, all the while knowing that feeling less passionately would be his fate.
Personally, I'll remember a private club we shared. For a few of the past New Year's Eves, old and married and off the party circuit, Andrew and I would find ourselves the only people awake in our respective houses and would count down to midnight together over instant messenger; making fun of the network shows, talking about the state of his ever growing empire, comparing notes on how the world had changed for two Westside boys who had come a long way - in thought but not in miles - from the world of our youth. Finally signing off at 3 AM, the talk still flowing but the flesh failing, I went to bed every one of those years feeling I had had the best New Year's eve anyone can ever ask for, a party that truly left me feeling full and complete.
Like so many others, when I heard the news of his passing I thought it must be a joke. The idea that a dynamo like Andrew could suddenly be gone was just impossible and at the day's end, it still is beyond comprehension.
My thoughts and prayers to Susie and the kids. I will miss Andrew terribly.
On the desk before me as I write these words is a scrap of paper bearing Andrew Breitbart’s email address and phone number, written in his own hand about six weeks ago. I was walking past a coffee house and saw him seated at an outdoor table, engaged in conversation with a man who, if I recall correctly, was interviewing him for the Malibu Times. I abandoned all sense of decorum and approached, introducing myself by my pseudonym in the hope that he had heard of me and, in case he hadn’t, adding that we had a mutual friend in Rob Long.
To my astonishment he said he had enjoyed reading my work and suggested we go to lunch, then wrote down his contact information on a scrap of paper which he tore from a legal pad. There I was, the most minor of figures in the conservative commentariat, barging in on the man who was arguably its most influential, yet he could have not been more gracious, even when I barged in a second time to report that the scrap of paper he had given me had blown away within a minute my of leaving him. He wrote out the information a second time and repeated the lunch invitation, and off I went to report the encounter to my wife.
We never had that lunch. I sent an email that went unanswered, then, knowing how impossibly busy he was, pondered what to do next. I was still pondering this morning when I learned he had died.
A few weeks ago I was at the Police Academy near Dodger Stadium and saw some fire trucks and an ambulance parked outside. I learned that a fellow officer, one not much older than I, had collapsed and died while playing racquetball. He was a man who had spent more than twenty years as a cop, surviving God knows how many scrapes with death before settling into the relative safety of a job behind a desk. And he died playing racquetball.
And Andrew Breitbart died while taking a walk. At 43.
It’s true what they say: You just never know.
I wish I had called him. It would have been a nice lunch.
Me in the middle, friend on the left and Andrew Breitbart autographing on the right. I had the pleasure of hearing him speak multiple times, was even blessed to have a few conversations with him. The very first time I saw him at an event I was so excited I waved to him, he was such a gentleman and nice guy he waved right back.
He gave me hope for the right. He was willing to bring a gun to a gun fight. He had guts, brains, and he never backed down. I sure hope he was the first of many.
Unfortunately, I only had the pleasure of meeting Andrew Breitbart once. Thankfully, it only took one meeting to get a feel for what made him so special. True to Breitbart’s form, I met him walking into a restaurant at 2 am after the Fox News Republican Primary debate in Orlando. He had a spark in his eyes that suggested the night was still very young for him even though he had a speaking engagement the next morning at 8. I walked up to Mr. Breitbart to tell him about my experience with his alma mater Tulane University a year ago. I told him how Tulane, after killing a small forest bombarding me with recruitment mailings, told me that because I was homeschooled in high school, the school would operate under the assumption I had learned nothing and require I send the school detailed course descriptions and a title of every book I had read as part of my high school education. I was expecting to get the standard, dismissive “Cool story kid” response from Breitbart. However, that wasn’t his style. Brietbart immediately took an interest in the Tulane University Admissions Department’s treatment of homeschoolers. To me, this was a mundane moment of stupidity by a university, to Breitbart it was a battle against anti-homeschooler prejudice that had to be fought. Tulane’s anti-homeschool sentiment could not be tolerated, and Breitbart was willing to launch a crusade against Tulane. That was the Andrew Breitbart ethos. In an age where too many conservatives allow the media to dictate what ideas and rhetoric are acceptable, Andrew Breitbart jumped into the ideological fray guns blazing. Breitbart understood that conservatives cannot win if they let a hostile media tell them how to fight. Rather than tie one hand behind his back so he would appear reasonable to the media, Breitbart was always willing to wage war. He was a crusader in the true sense of the term, RIP Andrew Breitbart. He was not the crusader we deserved, but the one we needed.
Less than two weeks ago, I sat in UCLA's Jackie Robinson Stadium watching the Bruins' baseball team take on the visiting Maryland Terrapins, although I concentrated mainly on watching my son (one of the Terps' student mangers) spitting pumpkin seeds over the bullpen fence. My concentration was broken by a firm hand on my shoulder, and I turned to find the grinning face of Andrew Breitbart looking down at me. He was scruffy and windblown, wearing a t-shirt and baggy khaki shorts. Why was he there? Simple. He was driving past on his new Vespa, and he could see that a game was going on. Andrew loved baseball. The leisurely pace was the perfect respite from his peripatetic lifestyle. So there we sat, laughing and talking (mostly about baseball), but it was impossible to be in his company without talking politics. He relished his role and talked about never backing down. He had no use for the spineless. He was excited about a new project that would take on this country's educational establishment.
As we left the stadium, he pointed proudly to the Vespa, designed to allow him to get around his neighborhood in the face of an excruciatingly slow highway construction project that had made L.A. traffic even more nightmarish than usual. As I drove out onto the street, I looked into my rearview mirror and saw Andrew--in his less-than-stylish helmet--giving me a thumbs-up sign and a wave. In just a few minutes he would be home, surrounded by the family he loved so much and talked about that day with such pride and enthusiasm. I'm very sad that I will never be able to see him again, but I ache because his wife and children and parents and sister must suffer that same fate.
The tremendous work that Andrew Breitbart accomplished for the conservative cause is all the more remarkable when you consider that he really only became a household name for us conservatives over the past three years.
In April, 2009, while I was working on Uncommon Knowledge, Peter Robinson booked Andrew to appear for an interview. Though Andrew had already established Breitbart.com and Big Government, he hadn't yet become the superstar he would later become, as evidenced by the beginning of segment three in the interview where Peter introduces Andrew as “one of the ten most important people in the media that nobody’s ever met.” To the day he died, Andrew remained one of ten most important people in media, but he was so generous with his time that many of us were fortunate enough to meet him.
The interview itself was great. Andrew's sense of humor and big personality were truly unrivaled, and will be sorely missed.
One more, if you will. We remember Andrew's tirelessness, his energy, his delight at chest-bumping the barricades with a come-at-me, bro grin, right? Right. But it took its toll; it had to.
He was at my house last summer for a party, and it was a great raucous event - everyone was his friend by the end, if they wanted to be. Andrew stayed late. Everyone else was gone. We were having a last drink in the kitchen, waiting for his cab. He was leaning up against the counter, expressing frustrations about how he was regarded by the establishment right, the difficulty of getting the message through the thick stone walls of the mainstream media, the damned toll of it all sometimes, the discouraging moments when rewards seemed scant.
He could tire, and did; perhaps he had his moments of self-doubt that may have stabbed as deep as any conviction he was on the right path. I remember that conversation, because it was the opposite of everything else he always was - and it made who he was all the more remarkable.
It's no contest, of course. Andrew takes one of the staples of the media age, a Bonfire of the Vanities-style leftist photo-opp and, as only he can, turns it around on the organizers. In the span of a couple of minutes of conversation, the demonstrators physically retreat from one man of courage and conviction. Watch this deeply educational colloquy to understand what we in the conservative movement have lost.
Here he is at his final CPAC address, delivered less than a month ago. It is quintessential Breitbart: joyous, dogged, irreverent, insightful, and cheerfully defiant. His career contained several valuable lessons for the conservative movement. Foremost among them was one he lived out every day: we need not apologize for our convictions. (Do note that there is one non CoC-compliant word at the end of the remarks).
I couldn't tell you what Andrew Breitbart's favorite syrup at IHOP was. I don't know his favorite movie. I never met his - by all accounts - lovely and loving family.
But I can tell you this: Andrew Breitbart changed my life.
With his early morning passing today, the conservative world has lost a warrior and general. At the young age of 43, and apparently due to "natural causes," Mr. Breitbart died at his home in the Los Angeles area just after midnight. He leaves behind a wife and four children. He leaves behind a conglomerate of news and journalism sites that have, in many ways, revolutionized the way information is reported to those of us unwilling to simply sit in front of our television at 6pm to hear what talking heads in Manhattan deem news-worthy. He leaves behind an army of conservative soldiers who were ready to follow him into battle against the institutional Left in this country.
I didn't know Andrew very well. Over the past six months I exchanged emails, Tweets, and text messages with the guy. I had the privilege of interviewing him for AEI's "Values & Capitalism" podcast - aptly named "The RJ Moeller Show" - last summer. (Side note: It was only after our 50-minute, thoroughly entertaining, conversation concluded that I realized I had accidentally stopped recording 7 minutes into it. I was way too mortified to tell Breitbart because by this point he was sweating and agitated from having to think about how dumb the mainstream media is.)
The most memorable experience of 2011 for me was getting to spend about 5 hours with Andrew at a sports bar in Venice, CA where we talked about everything from his first make-out session at a concert in Orange County, to the behind-the-scenes details of that first week when the ACORN scandal story broke, to his genuine concern that religious, middle-America conservatives thought he was too much of a bully.
What I heard that evening was not the over-the-top, in-your-face media personality and instigator that most people thought of him as (and with good reason!); instead I heard a dad who loved his kids and cared deeply about the fate of his country. He wasn't putting on a show for a show's sake (although no one could blame him for enjoying many of the things he got to do on a daily basis). He was self-aware of his public persona and wanted to do whatever he could to shine a light on the pervasive progressive bias in our news media and academia.
The guy understood the news media, clearly, but even more importantly perhaps he understood popular culture and its unparalleled impact on society. He saw that even if you were to split the difference in terms of how liberal the news media is, you would still have the entire entertainment industry to deal with. Hearts and minds were being won over to a progressive, secular worldview well before a young man or woman graduated college and started paying taxes and voting.
I left my night out with Breitbart reinvigorated and determined to return to Los Angeles at some point in the near future and to seize any future opportunity I could to learn at his feet. You meet certain people in life and you just know that it would be smart to absorb as much as you can from them. Fortunately, the very next day, while I was still in Los Angeles, Dennis Prager hired me to come work for him and so it looked like I may get my wish (twice over!).
And so now I am out in Los Angeles and awoke this morning to a flurry of of text messages, email alerts, and missed calls from friends and family back in Chicago. I read the first text and my heart sank. But not for me, not for my career, or any potential mentoring relationship I might have been able to cultivate with Breitbart. (We were going to try and meet up for lunch soon). My heart sank for the family Andrew talked so glowingly about that evening in Venice. My heart sank for all of the close friends and co-workers who lost someone special. And, to be perfectly honest, my heart sank a little for the conservative movement.
We have far too many George McClellan's on the Right and not nearly enough George S. Patton's. And Andrew Breitbart was a Patton. More than his tactical genius on the field of battle, the thing that made Patton so invaluable was this: he was essentially the only American general the Germans feared. When your enemy, ideological or otherwise, has no real fear of your side other than the possibility of losing an election here-and-there, a culture shift is impossible. But when you begin to put forth fierce, fearless, and talented warriors, others who might have previously "sat this one out" are more likely to join in the fight.
And this is what frightens the enemy more than anything else.
That's not to say that I agreed with everything Andrew Breitbart said and did. Surely tone and presentation matter. But reading a few quotes attributed to Breitbart is not the same as reading his book, following his television appearances, and getting a chance to talk with the man at-length. I did read his book. I have scoured YouTube for any and all Breitbart-related clips I could find over the past few years. I did get that chance to have a deeper conversation with him.
And what I came away with - what I will remember about Andrew Breitbart - are two things in particular:
1) This is a good and decent nation, and one that is worth fighting for. She is made great not by her politicians or nightly news anchors, but the every-day, hard-working, law-abiding citizens and taxpayers who want nothing more than to create a better life for their kids.
2) "Courage, man. Courage!" Have a boldness in your convictions and be willing to do something about them when they are undermined or attacked. Now again, I might not have shared the same theology with Andrew Breitbart, and if I am called to be a voice in the public square later in life I will take a different overall tone than he did, but I would be unspeakably proud if one day someone wrote about me: "He showed the same fearlessness as that Andrew Breitbart guy before him."
After listening to my personal views on the need for not only a political and economic "revolution" in this country, but a spiritual and moral one as well, the last thing Andrew Breitbart said to me (and my friend Drew) that night in Venice, CA last summer was this: "You guys are the revolution."
I take that with me as I venture forth on my new life in Los Angeles. If you believe as I do, if you share in my convictions, those weren't just my marching orders from a now-fallen general -- they are now yours as well.
R.I.P. Andrew Breitbart (1969-2012)
----------------
You will absolutely be able to read better, more in-depth obituaries in the coming days, but I wanted to share with you my favorite Breitbart clip. It's of AB confronting paid protesters outside of his speech in suburban Chicago:
A lot of people are talking about Andrew Breitbart today, trying to sum up what he meant to us, to the other side, and to American politics in general. And many of them will get it right. That's the thing about Andrew: he was such a wonderful and dazzling bundle of energy and contradiction, that even his (many) detractors knew a lot about him. Andrew didn't hide anything.
But tomorrow or the next day, the political caravan will move on. New fights will emerge. Someone -- probably a few people -- will try to fill Andrew's giant shoes. I can't imagine anyone's succeeding, but I hope for our side someone does.
But here's what I want you to know about Andrew: when he laughed, he laughed loudly. And he laughed a lot. I remember hearing a particularly hilarious, and filthy, joke and thinking, "This is a joke for Andrew." And when I saw him at a party a few days later, I didn't even hesitate. Didn't wait for the pleasantries. "Andrew," I said, "I've got a joke for you." And I told him, and he laughed his crazy loud laugh, and followed it up with one of his own, and then quickly started filling me in on his latest scheme to win back the country, peppered with asides and casual profanities and blazing fury and sudden guffaws.
He was that way: funny and serious at the same time.
But here's what I really want you to know about Andrew: in the only three things that matter in a man's life, he was a hero. He was a doting and deeply smitten husband to wife Susie. A rambunctious and tireless dad to four spirited, generous children. A loyal and thoughtful friend. His house was always noisy and filled with children and friends and political allies.
I used to think, when I saw them out together -- Andrew mobbed by admirers, Andrew relating the latest nasty dust-up -- or at home with the ringing phones and the computers beeping, "Poor Susie."
Look, it's a loss for our side. But someone will come along to take care of the politics. Someone always does.
But it's the loss of that husband, and father, and friend, that is irreplaceable. If you're a praying kind of person, please pray for Susie and the children. And if, like me, you're not, then today is a perfect day to learn how.
Andrew Breitbart literally changed the world. If it weren’t for him I believe: (i) Anthony Weiner’s lies about his twitter photos would not have been exposed, (ii) the New York 9th congressional district would still be held by a Democrat, (iii) ACORN would not have been demolished as thoroughly as it was, (iv) the Drudge Report would not be as prominent as it is, and (v) the “Big” sites would not exist. Further, I suspect I’m leaving out a few other major accomplishments. All this by a man of only 43 years.
By a quirk of fate, I got to spend an afternoon with Breitbart the day after one of his world-changing moments. The day was Wednesday, Sept. 14, the day after the special election for the New York 9th congressional seat. Breitbart wanted to meet me because he wanted to meet some conservative academics, possibly to help with the BigEducation site that he planned to introduce. I asked, and he agreed, to let me interview him and post it on Ricochet.
One of my favorite moments of the day was when he pointed to a gift that I had given him. The gift was small poster of Coach John Wooden’s Pyramid of Success. “Is that some sort of astrology thing?” Breitbart asked.
“No,” I replied. And then we began discussing some of the building blocks of the pyramid, including “Enthusiasm” and “Confidence.” Breibart then replied:
I can tell you where I get my enthusiasm and confidence. I talk to lots of tea-party groups. And after I talk, I stick around and hang out with folks. Sometimes military people come up to me and say things like, “We’ll take care of the enemy in Iraq and Afghanistan. You take care of the enemy at home.”
I live by a veterans’ cemetery. I can see it from my window. In fact, I live on the side where the new graves are. Sometimes I see parents who are my age burying their sons. At times I get these Woodenesque clear moments. I’m from L.A. I’m from Hollywood. There’s a tendency for us to be shallow, and I know I have my shallow side. But when these folks come up to me, I basically get slapped out of my A.D.D., and it makes me focus. They tell me, “These are serious times. You have a duty. Keep doing what you do.” And I heed their call.
These people—the military people, the tea-party people, the frickin’ fly-over-country people who the media institutionally berate and malign—come up to me and say “Thank you.” And when they do, [Breitbart paused] … IT … IS … EVERYTHING.
My wife and I first moved to Los Angeles about a decade ago. We were overwhelmed. Neither one of us had ever lived in a city with a population over 600,000. It took a couple of years for us to actually feel like LA was a place we could live in and eventually raise children.
The transition in our psyches of Los Angeles as obstacle and Los Angeles as home is entirely due to the wonderful people we have met down here. The first person who really made the Southland feel like a small town -- with all the benefits of a small town -- was Cathy Seipp. I met her through the internet. I had been reading both her NRO columns and her personal blog "Cathy's World" for a little while and I decided to contact her to see if she would speak about her life as a journalist at an event I was sponsoring for some high school students. She agreed.
She was charming and gracious and she introduced me to a number of people who have made this megalopolis the most magical city in the world. Cathy's circle of friends included people with a wide variety of political beliefs, one of those people was Andrew Breitbart.
I remember when I first met Andrew. It was at a monthly gathering of journalists, screenwriters, and me. I am none of those things. I'm just the director of a small non-profit -- that I won't go into any further detail about -- who happened upon a vibrant and interesting community. Andrew and I instantly clicked. Breitbart's sense of humor, his charm, and his love of his family were infectious. We had similar tastes in music, comedy, and baseball.
God how I wish I had been able to attend a Dodger's game with Andrew.
While I wasn't a journalist or screenwriter, and this affected how some of the attendees would engage with me, Andrew always went out of his way to chat with me and to introduce me to the "interesting guests" he would bring to the events. He treated me like an equal and even once called me his "little historian" because of my tendency to bring up strange references from history while talking about modern pop culture and politics.
About two years ago my attendance at these monthly gathering faded. I had started an MBA program. With this added to the stress of working a full time job, trying to ensure my wife had time to write, and helping her raise twin daughters, I let my regular attendance at the event slide. I always intended to start back up. In fact, if it weren't for a horrible flu I was going to try to make it this month.
In those two years I had 24 opportunities to spend time with a truly charming and gracious man. I missed them all.
Andrew Breitbart was one of my heroes. Where I timidly hide my real name behind a pseudonym that references a document of political philosophy, Breitbart boldly challenged those on the left who were filled with venom and hate. Those who -- like me -- followed his twitter feed know that he regularly was the target of mean spirited comments on the internet. He was a target for the hypocritical intolerance of many on the Left. I could always judge who among my friend I considered reasonable about politics, even when I disagreed with them, by what they had to say about Andrew.
I am afraid to read my Facebook page today. I am afraid to read my "non-Nathaniel Wright" twitter feed today. I can tolerate reading venom spewed at Andrew by people I don't know, but I cannot stomach seeing it from anyone I do know.
The news of Andrew Breitbart's passing this morning was shocking; It's still hard to believe. I had the pleasure of meeting Andrew a few times over the last couple of years. The first was in April of 2010 when I hosted him at the California College Republican convention here in Los Angeles. Nobody could rev-up a crowd of conservative college students more than Andrew could; and all the while double-fisting margaritas--one of which ended up all over his shirt during a heated part of his speech.
His loss is a terrible blow to America and to freedom. His inspiration reminds me of a line from Ronald Reagan's first inaugural address:
Above all, we must realize that no arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women. It is a weapon our adversaries in today's world do not have. It is a weapon that we as Americans do have.
In the arsenal of freedom, our most powerful weapon is the truth. Our enemies in politics and in the world do not have it, and as Andrew forcefully, and always cheerfully, showed us: They can't handle it.
Pray for his wife and four children who will feel his loss more than we could imagine.
I never met Breitbart - and now tragically I never will. But of all the heroes fighting the culture wars on our behalf he was probably the one I admired above all - and the one whose feisty, rumbustious, no-prisoners style I've striven most hard to emulate.
One of the big problems with conservatives, another of my heroes David Horowitz has argued, is that we're just too darned nice. As I noted, once, in the Spectator:
Often former leftists make the best conservatives — think Paul Johnson and Peter Hitchens — for they suffer fewer illusions about how devious, dangerous and unprincipled the left can be. Schooled in Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals and the Leninist method, Horowitz knows all too well that the left will lie, besmirch, cheat, character-assassinate, bully, threaten, blackmail, ballot-box-stuff, bomb, kill, anything to get its way. Conservatives are no match because ‘they’re too decent, too civilised,’ up against ‘destroyers, racists, bigots. I refuse to call them liberals — we are the liberals. They are totalitarians.’
Not for a moment am I suggesting that Breitbart wasn't nice. What I am saying is that, like Horowitz, he understood rather better than most conservatives just how vile and unprincipled the liberal-left can be: and wasn't afraid to use their tactics against them.
You saw this, especially, in his devastating use of Twitter. If you subscribed to @andrewbreitbart, most of the Tweets you'd get were Retweets of the spectacularly horrible insults which had been Tweeted to him by his leftist opponents. I now do this myself. When, as happened the other day, some college kid Tweeted asking for someone to knife me (because, apparently, he disagreed with my views on global warming) I simply Retweeted it - and allowed public exposure to do my work for me. Pretty soon, that college kid had been so inundated with criticism from my other Twitter followers he felt compelled to apologize profusely. (Though I don't doubt fear of prosecution for incitement to murder may have been a factor in this, too).
Another of Breitbart's techniques was simply to turn up at leftist rallies - and film himself being abused. Can you imagine if, say, Keith Olbermann or Bill Maher were simply to turn up at CPAC they'd get the same level of abuse? I honestly don't think they would. It's not how we conservatives roll. I know there are some Ricochet commentators who disagree with me on this point, but I say they're wrong. Put crudely, conservatism is a philosophy of ideas, liberalism a philosophy of emotions. We don't really go in for character assassination like the other side do because we consider it cheating.
Who will replace Breitbart? No one will and that's my worry. Whether we polite conservatives realize this or not there's a war going on here and unless we take the fight to the enemy like Breitbart did it's a war we're going to lose.
Andrew Breitbart was one of the kindest, most generous men I've ever known. He was a man in perpetual motion, with boundless energy and a Falstaffian wit. He was a loving father and broke a host of boundaries in life and dedicated himself to putting tools and information in the hands of citizens to do battle for liberty in the public square. He was inquisitive, insightful, and did nothing without gusto. He delighted in the rush of confrontation with the left, because he recognized them for their true nature, and had no patience for false politeness about their intentions for the nation. His enemies painted him as a wild-eyed blustering clown - but oh, how he confounded them, and they learned, again and again, that he would laugh last.
Breitbart believed intensely in the value of hard work and the essential worth and sanity of the American people. He was confident that if only the people knew the truth, if only they had something other than the New York Times to give it to them, they would choose the right path. So he had many enemies, and many more friends.
A line from G.K. Chesterton, which I have for years considered a personal motto, always seemed to me an apt description of Breitbart's life: "We are to regard existence as a raid or great adventure; it is to be judged, therefore, not by what calamities it encounters, but by what flag it follows and what high town it assaults."
Andrew loved the fight because he loved his country. And so he charged up that hill, again and again, day after day, to smash the icons of the left. He was larger than life, and we will all miss him dearly.
RIP Andrew Breitbart: warrior, innovator, patriot.
When I first heard of Andrew Breitbart's death, I didn't believe it. At all. I was hoping it was some kind of sick joke. But it's been confirmed by the LA Coroner's Office. He died shortly after midnight. Here's what is up at Big Journalism:
With a terrible feeling of pain and loss we announce the passing of Andrew Breitbart.
Andrew passed away unexpectedly from natural causes shortly after midnight this morning in Los Angeles.
We have lost a husband, a father, a son, a brother, a dear friend, a patriot and a happy warrior.
Andrew lived boldly, so that we more timid souls would dare to live freely and fully, and fight for the fragile liberty he showed us how to love.
Andrew recently wrote a new conclusion to his book, Righteous Indignation:
I love my job. I love fighting for what I believe in. I love having fun while doing it. I love reporting stories that the Complex refuses to report. I love fighting back, I love finding allies, and—famously—I enjoy making enemies.
Three years ago, I was mostly a behind-the-scenes guy who linked to stuff on a very popular website. I always wondered what it would be like to enter the public realm to fight for what I believe in. I’ve lost friends, perhaps dozens. But I’ve gained hundreds, thousands—who knows?—of allies. At the end of the day, I can look at myself in the mirror, and I sleep very well at night.
Andrew is at rest, yet the happy warrior lives on, in each of us.
What a terrible loss for his wife and four children. And for the rest of us, too.
