Politico’s Mike Allen apparently found it odd when the Washington Post’s Wesley Lowery, one of two reporters arrested this week in Ferguson, Mo., went after “talking heads” like MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough.
Lowery went off on Scarborough on Thursday after the former Republican congressman-turned-MNSBC host said the reporter may have gotten arrested in the St. Louis suburb so he could get on TV.
“Well, I would invite Joe Scarborough to come down to Ferguson and get out of 30 Rock where he’s sitting and sipping his Starbucks smugly,” Lowery said during a subsequent appearance on CNN.
Lowery added that he has “little patience for talking heads.”
Allen seemed to think this smacked of chutzpah coming from a young scribe, so he offered the following item in Friday morning’s edition of Politico Playbook:
YA CAN’T MAKE IT UP – Wesley Lowrey, 23-year-old Congress/politics reporter for the WashPost, responding on CNN to suggestions that he should have obeyed police amid a riot: “[L]et me be clear about this: I have LITTLE PATIENCE for talking heads.”
Allen is accustomed to catching heat from other journalists, but the ridicule that has followed his dig at Lowery has been particularly loud.
For one, Allen originally got both Lowery’s name and age wrong (he is actually 24). These two details have since been corrected. But Allen also erred when he wrote that Lowery failed to obey the authorities “amid a riot.” Lowery and the Huffington Post’s Ryan Reilly were arrested inside a Ferguson McDonald’s. Reilly said the fast-food restaurant was “tranquil” before the cops arrived.
It served as yet another reminder of the cozy rapport Allen maintains with the likes of Scarborough, whose show features a Politico-centric segment every day and Allen appears on regularly.
“In Allen’s world, which is defined by overlapping and possibly coterminous circles of sources, friends, and paid advertisers, the sort of effrontery displayed by Lowery first toward the police and then toward an esteemed television commentator was thoroughly intolerable,” wrote New York Magazine’s Jonathan Chait.
“YA CAN’T MAKE IT UP – lapdog to power and ethically compromised industry spokesman @mikeallen is thought by some to be a talented journalist,” tweeted Alex Pareene.
Allen doesn’t exactly have an acrimonious personality, and Friday’s shot at Lowery was about as harsh as it gets for him.
In a March installment of Playbook, Allen took what was perceived as a jab at FiveThirtyEight founder Nate Silver, who at this point is nearly as well-known for his Politico mockery as he is for election forecasts.
“FiveThirtyEight debuts, finally giving smart people something to read on the web,” Allen wrote in the newsletter before linking to a post at Silver’s site titled “You Just Had Sex, So How Many Calories Did You Burn?”
But when TPM reached out to Allen at the time, he had only warm things to say about Silver and company.
In the same spirit, TPM sought comment from Allen on Friday to elaborate on his thoughts about Lowery, but he has not responded.
This post has been updated.
