There is still plenty of bad blood between The Daily Caller and websites that employ Ben Smith. We’ve devoted plenty of time to the fights between The Daily Caller and Politico, but it seems that they are turning their attention to Buzzfeed.

The Daily Caller’s Jeff Poor called out Buzzfeed’s McKay Coppins in a piece that took on pundits who blamed the conservative media for losing the election for Mitt Romney. Poor opens his piece by saying, “Only in the delusional world of online journalism, a world saturated with narcissists fueled by Twitter followers and TV appearances, could one come to the following conclusion: The “conservative” media lost Mitt Romney the election. That’s the new theory being advanced by one of this bubble’s occupants, BuzzFeed’s McKay Coppins.” This all stems from this piece from Coppins.

A snappy Coppins reacted to Poor’s story on Twitter, saying… Read more

Commentary‘s John Podhoretz continued his harassment-flirting with BuzzFeed earlier in the week, telling one of their reporters he was late on a development in the Gen. David Petraeus sex scandal.

“Wait, wait, so the FBI agent who launched the [Paula] Broadwell investigation sent SHIRTLESS PICS OF HIMSELF to Jill Kelley?” BuzzFeed‘s McKay Coppins tweeted with a link to a newly-published WSJ story. Paula Broadwell and Jill Kelley are (of course) the two women at the center of the scandal which led to Petraeus’ resignation as CIA chief.

“Do try to keep up,” Podhoretz replied 14 minutes later. “That’s so 18 minutes ago.”

Coppins asserted he had sent his tweet out just three minutes after the story was published. “I was bored by it 90 seconds earlier. And you call yourself BuzzFeed,” Podhoretz said in response. Read more

Throughout the election it became common knowledge that BuzzFeed‘s McKay Coppins was the Mormon covering the Mitt Romney campaign. Coppins tweeted about being Mormon several times and Politico called him “the Mormon on Mitt’s trail.”

Even so, it was never an issue extensively covered by Coppins. Today, however, he has a lengthy first-person account about his experience covering Romney headlined “A Mormon Reporter On The Romney Bus.”

Coppins writes about Romney aides who were uneasy talking to him simply because, like Romney, he’s a Mormon and the campaign didn’t want it to be a high-profile issue. He says he approached his coverage of Romney knowing how the faith had shaped his world view. Despite Romney’s own obvious avoidance of of discussing his religion, Coppins says Romney’s candidacy has, at least to some degree, demystified it.

Most importantly, Coppins begins and ends the story with personal stories of fellow reporters chatting about the underwear Mormon’s wear… Read more

Quotes of the Day — the Election Day version

“This sign is on a window of a store that’s inside the security zone of Obama’s Des Moines rally.” — Yahoo! News’ Chris Moody with the accompanying photo.

Journo on line to vote before 7 a.m.

“My voting precinct is selling coffee for $1 to people in line. #waspy” — Matt Spence, The Times of London.

Uh oh.

“Dead to me.” — Breitbart.com editor John Nolte on New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie turning down Romney campaign event request.

Stop and buy the roses

“Attn: guys who have been too busy politicking to be nice to your ladies—roses are on sale $9.99/dozen @ Whole Foods today.” — Roll Call‘s Meredith Shiner.

Guiding Sophia’s Light

“Respectfully I don’t give a rats butt about JayZ or Kid Rock!” – theGrio and Essence columnist Sophia Nelson on Obama and Romney musical supporters. Usually Sophia is spouting sermon’s on Twitter. On Monday she strayed.

Chuck Todd assesses nightmare election scenarios

“In place for Today Show, will have a look at some of the nightmare scenarios that could lead to indecision” — NBC’s Chuck Todd.

Spotted: Meg Ryan at Biden event

“Spotted on the cuts riser at Biden’s Richmond event, being opened with songs by her beau john Mellencamp: Meg Ryan.” — NBC News campaign embed reporter Carrie Dann.

Hallucinating D.C. Metro rider

“Saw a gent on metro who looked like a moustachioed Ari Shapiro. Was briefly convinced he’d got a disguise and made a thrilling escape.” — a D.C. woman calling herself Abbott Rabbit regarding the NPR White House Correspondent.

Keeping it Real: “Run into reporter from OTHER station at event tonight. Okay we have the same jobs, do we really have to make small talk? So BORING!” — ABC7′s Stephen Tschida.

Boybander has sex with vegetables?

“I can’t be the only one who makes stock while changing the lyrics of ‘Sexual Healing’ to be about vegetable peeling.” — Wired‘s Spencer Ackerman. We’re just kidding about the headline but couldn’t make rational sense of Spencer’s words.

Which journo gets to vote at the crack of dawn? And which news outlet takes to talking about campaign dildos?

Read more

For people lucky enough to have power for their computers or juice in their smartphone, Twitter was an infinitely superior news source than TV during Frankenstorm. Sure, lots of information gets thrown around that isn’t accurate, but that happens on TV, too. If you were in one of the hard hit areas and had a question, you could always just turn to Twitter rather than trying to call an emergency outfit in the middle of the chaos. Reuters has an excellent breakdown of some of the great examples of how Twitter was put to good use.

Of course, as in any fast-moving situation, someone has to act like a jerk… Read more

BuzzFeed‘s McKay Coppins is catching flack for characterizing claims in a Mitt Romney campaign ad as “misleading” rather than “a lie.”

“There’s really no good explanation or excuse for it,” Coppins tweeted out. “Mitt Romney’s Jeep ad is misleading. Full stop.” The ad in question states that President Obama, through the auto-bailout, “sold Chrysler to Italians, who are going to build Jeeps in China.” The claim has faced criticism for not providing a full context that even though Jeeps will be made in China, Chrysler’s existing workforce in America will remain.

“It’s a bald faced lie,” MSNBC’s Goldie Taylor shouted at Coppins, who also received the equivalent of rotten tomatoes from a certain Washington editor… Read more

Today we have another installment of: “Ask Piranhamous Anything.” And we do mean anything. Send your queries to FishbowlDC@mediabistro.com. This isn’t an advice column — Piranhamous doesn’t know what the hell you should do with your life any more than you do — and worse, he doesn’t care. Try to keep your questions short — we want to keep this fun, simple and insightful.

1. So what’s really going on inside Breitbart.com? Do you think it’s as tumultuous as BuzzFeed suggests or more?

I know some people who’ve written for them and I’m not surprised to hear it’s a mess. Any organization has these sorts of office politics, but when the leader and only person with a complete vision dies, a mess is to be expected. There was a lot of sour grapes in the piece by BuzzFeed. McKay Coppins is obviously not a fan, but it didn’t read like he has “sources” deep within the organization. Read like they were posers, unpaid, angry hacks who are upset that their stuff doesn’t make the cut anymore. That said, who really cares? You don’t care how sausage is made, you only care how it tastes, and if their traffic is any indication, people think it tastes pretty good.

2. What’s your take on having sex with a newsroom coworker? Good idea or bad idea?

With a newsroom co-worker, go for it. In the newsroom with a co-worker, might want to rethink that. As long as you aren’t the person’s boss, and he or she isn’t yours, who gives a damn? Though I would like to see journalists interact with more real human beings. They’ve sort of been screwing the public through their cheerleading and bias for a long time, some of them should try doing it literally. Might open their eyes some.

Piranhamous addresses anonymous sourcing… Read more

Quotes of the Day

“Gotta be 65 degrees on a terrific autumn night” — FNC’s Chief White House Correspondent Ed Henry.

Anticipatory Storm Complaints

“Approaching big storm prep: batteries, check. Canned food, check. Emergency generators, check. Full-page apology ad from Pepco, check.” — C-SPAN Communications Director Howard Mortman.

“.@PepcoConnect Let’s just say that your track record as regards restoring our power is somewhere between abysmal and catastrophic.” — Yahoo! News‘s Olivier Knox.

“@OKnox Why doesn’t PEPCO just shut off our power now and get it over with?” — NYT‘s Jonathan Weisman.

“My boyfriend: Buying all the toilet paper from the grocery store before everyone else gets there. #BePrepared” — Lisa Rowan, vintage blogger.

Compliment or Insult: Who really knows?

“Your always-perfect hair reeks of pure #journalism,” a follower writes in to FNC’s Bret Baier, who, of course, responds, saying, “Good to know -thanks- I’ll try to keep it together.”

Ana Marie Cox “endorses” Obama

“It’s true: I have chosen to endorse Obama because I’m proud to have someone of the *human* race as President. So there.” — The Guardian‘s Ana Marie Cox. Does a pundit do endorsements? Do they really need to? Pretty sure we already new the progressive Cox was for Obama.

Journo Love

“Go @AprilDRyan! She’s interviewing Obama tomorrow at 5:40 p.m. in Oval Office. First member of WH press corps to do so in months.” — Politico‘s Jennifer Epstein on American Urban Radio White House Correspondent April Ryan.

Breitbart.com Editor needles BuzzFeed Political Editor

“Source tells me @BuzzFeedBen‘s BuzzFeed Politics is something of a laughingstock. Actually, herds of sources tell me this.” — Breitbart.com‘s John Nolte, still smarting from BuzzFeed‘s McKay Coppins story on internal Breitbart.com matters.

Overheard…

“Overheard on the Romney press bus: ‘I think Meat Loaf is two words.’ ‘Yes, it is two words.’ — NPR’s Ari Shapiro.

See FishbowlDC’s Fan Club Board after the jump as well as thoughts from a media observer… Read more

In a column for The Daily Beast, media reporter Howard Kurtz included a BuzzFeed report in a wrap-up of what he says has become a “clown campaign.”

“It’s the last two weeks of a presidential campaign,” Kurtz writes, “a time for suspense, for intrigue, for plot twists and…well, a whole lot of silliness.” He goes on to chronicle a few weird developments in campaign coverage over the past several days, including… Read more

Despite being fired, unemployed and absent from the FNC airwaves for the last two months, Michelle Fields is included in Details magazine’s “Next Wave of Political Pundits.” The list was published online yesterday.

There’s little reason to doubt that once Fields is once again gainfully employed that she’ll be back on FNC and it’s quite possible she has a bright future there. But Details has her listed as a “Guest Commentator” when she hasn’t been seen on the network since she was let go from The Daily Caller in August.

Fields appears to spend her time these days tweeting and updating her personal blog.

Others who made Details‘ list seemed to make more sense apart from a certain senator’s daughter… Read more