Such a bruising, controversial media presence, author, blogger, publisher and perennial Occupy movement basher Andrew Breitbart has shockingly passed away at age 43. Less than an hour ago, Breitbart.com editor-in-chief Joel B. Pollak posted the following In Memoriam statement:

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.

Read more

Andrew Breitbart seems to have fully recovered from his Shirley Sherrod scandal. But he just helped pick a fight that has the potential to get a whole lot uglier. Former Illinois Tea Party candidate Joel B. Pollak just published a lengthy “investigation” on Breitbart’s Big Government site into eXiled founder and editor Mark Ames. At the heart of the piece is the contention that Ames and his fellow eXiled editor Yasha Levine are the ones who originated the anti-Koch brothers meme so prevalent in the media these days. Which is true. However, since Pollak is a huge fan of the Kochs, the piece is mainly a rhetorical strategy to deflect attention away from the Koch brothers–by dismissing the critiques against them as originating from the degenerate Ames. Ames, you see, unapologetically uses drugs and has solicited prostitutes, which automatically makes him unreliable–or so the thinking goes.

Ames and The eXiled were at the forefront of the anti-Koch movement. It would seem logical for those looking to turn the rhetorical tide against the brothers to target Ames. But Pollak and Breitbart should have let this one go.

Read more