A screen shot of what appears to be an email response written by Andrea Rodgers, founder of the style site Ask Miss A, landed in our inbox Thursday. “Oh please no,” the alleged email reads. “I really don’t want any plus size fashion on the site.”

Really? How could the editor of a website heralding the tagline “Style Meets Charity” come off as so uncharitable? Mean, even.

A search of Rodgers’ website for the term “plus-size” does render results on clothes for larger women. Examples:

• Chance Fashion: The Second Annual Plus Sized Fashion Show At Neighbours In Seattle, 4/13
• CurvyGirls Bridal, 7/12
• Wendy Williams Outs Our Fear of Fat, 11/10

So, has Rodgers made a recent editorial decision to ban fat fashion? Read more

Blogger Dave Catanese, a freelancer formerly with Politico, did the unthinkable for Esquire. He dropped off Twitter for a week just to see what would happen. In the story, he compares his addiction to that of an food addict at an all-you-can eat brunch. So it wasn’t a cake walk. There were moments he wanted to gorge. But no, he didn’t combust. The worst of it: he felt less relevant. For Washington media, that’s dying a thousand deaths. “Gone was the ability to be immediately self-assured that my take on the topic d’jour mattered and held value with my peers,” he wrote. “If it sounds a tad self-absorbed, well, welcome to Washington.”

Some embarrassing details Catanese admitted in his first-person account: 1. Among the first things he does upon waking is he sees how many new followers he has and checks his retweets. 2. He nearly screwed up the entire assignment by  initially clicking on Twitter. Then he remembered. “It was just a split second, though,” he writes. 3. He sometimes falls asleep with his phone in hand: “On some particularly insatiable nights, I fall asleep with the phone nestled in my hand on the pillow.” Seriously, nestled?

The writer admits there were upsides to taking the week off — he read more, he slept without the device cradled in his hand. “I’ll probably gradually ease back into my Twitter habits, mostly because it’s a main avenue to promote my work as a freelancer and for my site TheRun2016.com,” Catanese told FishbowlDC this morning. “But I must say I haven’t gotten back into the Twitter groove just yet. I think being away from it for a week and not missing anything major made it slightly easier to stay away from. I didn’t wake up Monday morning dying to Tweet, but then again it’s only been a few days.”

Still, maybe more importantly, traffic on his website, TheRun2016.com, dipped 30 – 50 percent while he was away from his Twitter buffet.

At one point he writes:

Twitter offers a shield, which allows you to be expressive, bold — even offensive — for all of your most influential followers to witness, without having to confront the awkward social consequences of an in-person engagement. (“How can he be so hilarious on Twitter and yet so awkward in person?” a friend recently asked me about one of the city’s more prolific political Tweeps.)

Naturally we went on a FishbowlDC manhunt to see if we could figure out who this prolific Tweep was.

We pressed Catanese on who this individual is.

Read more

Politico White House Correspondent Glenn Thrush and Breitbart News‘ Editor John Nolte didn’t waste much time this morning before trading barbs. It began with Nolte tweeting a link to a Breitbart story with the headline “Politico’s Thrush Politicizes Oklahoma Tornado: ‘Global Warming Denier.’”

‘Global Warming Denier’: Politico’s Thrush Politicizes Oklahoma Tornadoshar.es/ZJxCY via @breitbartnews

— John Nolte(@NolteNC) May 21, 2013

A little more than an hour later, Thrush fired back.

Great to have qualified professionals such as @noltenc to determine the parameters of objective journalism- and what topics are off-limits

— Glenn Thrush (@GlennThrush) May 21, 2013

Nolte responded with a not-so-subtle jab at Thrush.

Happy to help, and feel free to consult me in advance if the urge comes again to use tragedy to advance your partisan agenda. @glennthrush

— John Nolte(@NolteNC) May 21, 2013

After the exchange, Thrush had a suggestion for Nolte and no, it wasn’t to dislodge his head from his asshole. Read more

When the clock struck 6:39 p.m. last night, RedState Editor and Fox News Contributor Erick Erickson released a tweet that would draw mountains of hate from lefties his way. Before he did it, he released Bible verses. Some 171 retweets and 87 favorites later, was it worth it?

The tweet that blew a gasket:

I wonder when President Obama will find out about Oklahoma.

— Erick Erickson (@EWErickson) May 20, 2013

Asked whether he regrets his remark, Erickson told FishbowlDC: “I think the blowback certainly has to make me reconsider whether it was wise to do at that time. And I probably should have waited, though I think the senator who raced to the floor to make it about global warming set a very high bar for politicization that I did not reach. The reality though is had I tweeted that today, tomorrow, or next week the accusations would be the same though not as intense.”

Do the obscenely negative responses affect him? “I’m used to it,” he wrote by email. “It also highlights just how angry some people are — to an irrational level of anger. You can disagree with and be offended by that tweet, but I’m not sure how it makes me evil, racist, or not a Christian.”

Erickson pointed to another tweet that also sparked hatred. It came from former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palinand involved prayer. “Honestly, what stuck out more to me was Sarah Palin’s tweet praying for the people of Oklahoma,” he wrote. “I pulled it up to retweet it and on my Twitter app, right after she’d done it , the app showed the first response to her from someone was ‘shut up you bitch.’ Amazing.”

Also amazing to Erickson was this: “The people fixated on that tweet ignored the many dozen others I tweeted or retweeted encouraging people to pray and donate to relief efforts.” In conclusion, he said, “Odd for me to say given my job, but I’m more and more convinced that the 24 hour news cycle focused on tragedy outside anyone’s control is just not helpful for people’s well being.”

And the 8 best in worst reactions to Erickson’s remark… Read more

Journalist Lizzie O’Leary got Twitter all excited on Friday afternoon when she casually tweeted, “Pregnanté.”

Naturally, several people on Twitter assumed this was O’Leary announcing that she was with child. This would have been big news considering that, not long ago, O’Leary spoke to Cosmo about her battle with endometriosis, which puts a damper on baby-making. The congratulatory tweets started coming in. Bloomberg’s Ryan Sutton tweeted, “ZOMG congrats! counting the days until your offspring annihilate(s) the competition on teen jeopardy!” WaPo’s Jim Tankersley responded, “!!!!!! that’s great news.” WSJ’s Victoria McGrane kept up the overuse of exclamations by tweeting, “CONGRATS!!!!!!!!”

So, what’s the problem? Read more

Over the weekend Washington Monthly Web Editor Ryan Cooper came a little unglued (this is putting it mildly) when he discovered late Saturday night that the magazine had been compromised. Or at least that’s what he thought.

God fucking dammit, stop hacking our website you assholes

— Ryan L. Cooper (@ryanlcooper) May 19, 2013

He continued by trying to calm himself. “Deep breath,” he wrote. By 10:34 p.m. he appeared to calm down slightly and followed up with this philosophical declaration.

There is a special place in hell for hackers of small, ramshackle websites.

— Ryan L. Cooper (@ryanlcooper) May 19, 201

We also requested comment from Editor-in-Chief Paul Glastris through what is hopefully the publication’s secure generalized email system. Read more

The House voted on a bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, yesterday, and the Twittersphere noticed, with uncommonly long hashtag #ObamaCareInThreeWords trending through last night.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) kicked off the avalanche of left and right-wing-aimed Tweets with this:

Hey folks, #ObamaCareInThreeWords — go!

— Darrell Issa (@DarrellIssa) May 16, 2013

Well, “folks” from all over took to Twitter to describe Obamacare in (mostly) three words. Here are some of the top Tweets from inside the Beltway.

Vince Coglianese of The Daily Caller opted to make an observation about the hashtag itself instead commenting on the healthcare bill.

A Long-ass Hashtag #ObamacareInThreeWords

— Vince Coglianese (@TheDCVince) May 16, 2013

Rep. Scott Rigell (R-Va.) decided the hashtag wasn’t long enough, so he made up a new one while dutifully informing Twitter users of the proper terminology.

Not So Affordable & Hurting Small Businesses.#Obamacareinthreewords #butidontcallitobamacarebecausethatispejorative #affordablecareact

— Rep. Scott Rigell (@RepScottRigell) May 16, 2013

Unfortunately for Rigell, the hashtag didn’t catch on.

WaPo blogger Greg Sargent made up a new word as to not go over the three-word limit.

Drove conservatives batsh*tcrazy #ObamacareInThreeWords

— Greg Sargent (@ThePlumLineGS) May 16, 2013

Read more

Back on May 3, the world commemorated “World Press Freedom Day.” Everyone except North Korea, that is. They decide to wait until May 15 to celebrate by running an editorial in the state-run newspaper Rodong Sinmun. The piece is called “Mockery of Press” and it takes several shots at American media and the so-called ”Freedom of report.”

WaPo reports on the rambling editorial, which seems to make the argument that American media is both too restricted and too free. While it seems to be a generalization of ALL of American media, two reporters get glowing reviews from The Dear Leader.

Who are Kim Jong-Un’s approved reporters? Read more

Oh what a little time outside the Beltway will do for a person. On Tuesday afternoon, Adam Weinstein, a former engagement editor and national security reporter for Mother Jones and a former contestant on Survivor Baghdad, exposed his real feelings about the AP-DOJ scandal, including a sarcastic crack at National Journal national reporter Ron Fournier.

Weinstein, who did a stint for Mother Jones in Washington last year, is always a bit of firecracker. In October of 2012, he called FNC and Daily Caller‘s Tucker Carlson a “dickbag” after lashing out at him on Twitter for once wearing bow-ties. Now Weinstein’s based in Miami and working as an editor, writer and media consultant.

Fournier, who tweets at least once an hour, didn’t lob any comment back at him.

Atlantic Media Prez Justin Smith announced today that it’s launching Defense One, a new media brand for the national security community, later this summer. Defense One, according to a morning release, aims to deliver “high-quality news and analysis” to defense leaders and stakeholders navigating “the unprecedented” transformation of U.S. defense strategy and operations. Ken Doctor broke the news of Defense One in a column about the “newsonomics of influentials” for Neiman Lab on May 9. Adweek wrote about it early this morning at 12:14 a.m. Adweek reports that the site has yet to hire an editor. The launch, as stated in the release, will be underwritten by Northrop Grumman.

The operation will start out small, says Atlantic Media spokeswoman Linda Douglass, but they ultimately plan to build a team of 18-20 staffers.

The product is geared to the national security leadership community — Defense leaders (military flag-officers, civilian DoD leadership, National Security Council and staff), Congress (House and Senate Armed Services and Appropriations Committees), and others who play an influential role, such as contractors and think tanks.

“Defense One will bring to this important market the disruptive combination of intelligent, indispensable journalism and leading edge digital expertise that is the hallmark of all of Atlantic Media’s properties,” said Smith in the release. “We see Defense One as a major growth venture and a core Atlantic Media brand.”

Also “unprecedented” in the defense media market, they say, Defense One will launch an iPhone and Android App in the fall and a special eBook Series by the end of the year.

But some are skeptical that this will be that different from what already exists. Read more