14 newyork| september14–27, 2020
intelligencer
166 minuteswith...
Ben Smith
St arting trouble withtheNewYorkTimesmedia columnist.
byclaremalone
roomandbroodingthoughtsovercupsof
tea;it hashotthumbs,sweaty armpits,and
AirPodsthat keepdying.It’sa reporter’scol-
umn,a tips-drivenenterprise.“Ifyou’renot
breakingnews,youdon’t haveany credibil-
ity,”Smithtoldmeoverbreakfast nearhis
DitmasParkhome,whereheliveswithhis
wife,LienaZagare,thepublisheroflocal-
newssiteBklyner;threekids;andthree
dogs.At43,he’s freckledandstilla bitboy-
ishlooking,likea cast memberofTheSand-
lotallgrownup.We chattedabouthisteen-
age son’s scooprevealingthenew principal
ofStuyvesantHighSchool,andhewas
clearlyproud—andtooksomeof thecredit:
Smithhasdictatedtextsandemailstohis
sonwhiledrivingforyears,so“hereally
knows,mechanically,howtoreport.”
Byhisownadmission,Smithhasnever
beencomfortablepassingwhat hecalls
“thesesortofethicaljudgments”aboutthe
messymediabusiness.“I don’t wanttobea
scold,”hetoldme.Instead,hiscolumnhas
beena relentlesschroniclingofthethings
powerfulpeopleknow, gossipabout,and
makebusinessdecisionsoff of. AndSmith
is doingit fromtheultimateEstablishment
mediaperch,writingandreportingwitha
lesspolitesensibilitythantheTimesreader
maybeusedto.Thereare“internet values
versusprintvalues,” hesaid.Printfirst,
apologizelater.
Heknowstheway totorquethenarrative
ofa story sothat it playsintothemost deli-
ciousangleorsupposition.Smith’s columns
don’t alwaysdeliveronthepromiseofthe
headline,butthereaderge ts pulledinany-
how.Weekbyweek,Smithis launderingthe
internet’s voicethroughhiscolumn,loosen-
ingtheGray Lady’scorset eversomuch.
Timestraditionalistsmayberighttobe
spookedbySmith.Ifthere’s onemarked
characteristicofhisshort tenureascolum-
nist, it ishiscompulsivedesiretomake
hamburgeroutofsacredcows.See:Ronan
Farrow. OrhisJunecolumnonWashington
Post executive editor Marty Baron—
hagiographicallyportrayedintheOscar-
winningmovieSpotlight—thatsuggested,
“Maybethisguykind ofsuckswhenit
comestoBlack-peoplestuff,”asreporter
Wesley Lowery put it. Baron declined to
comment for this story, and Carolyn Ryan,
Smith’s editor, who used to work for Baron
at the Boston Globe, told me the Times has
to make sure “that we are never gratuitously
hammering other outlets for their sins.”
But when it’s time to start hammering, it
certainly doesn’t hurt that Smith is a white
guy who grew up in New York City, went to
Yale, likes wearing a tie, and used to run a
digital news operation backed by a huge VC
betthat, fora time,seemedlike it mightbe
thefutureof media.AsLowery,wholeft the
PostinFebruary,toldme,Smith’s columns
onracehavejust amplifiedwhat Black
reportershadbeentalkingaboutamong
themselvesforyears,but“peoplearemore
receptivetoargumentsandcritiques,even
ofthemselves,whentheytrust orknowthe
personlevelingwiththem.” Smith’s mem-
bershipinthe“IRunStuff ”clubseems
secureevenashepokesat theothermem-
bersofit.It alsomay bethat, forthebosses,
there’ssomethingoddlyflatteringabout
beingtargetedbySmith:His scrutiny is fur-
therconfirmationofyourpower.
Still,NewYorkereditorDavidRemnick
triedtotalkSmithoutoftheFarrowcol-
umn,someoneattheTimeswithinsight
intotheeditingprocesstoldme,tonoav ail.
Thoughhewouldn’t speaktomeabouthis
conversationswithsources,Smithdidsay
headmiresRemnickquitea bitand“he’s
beenreallynicetome.”TheNewYorker
declinedtocomment.
Smithhasthegiftofbeingunafraid of
makingpeopleuncomfortable.Ormaybe
justblitheconfidence.In 2017,duringthe
presstourforThePost,StevenSpielberg,
MerylStreep,andTomHanksdida panel
interviewwithSmith,thesort ofaffairthat
usuallytakesona chummy tone.Instead,
Smithtooktheopportunity toaskSpielberg
if hehadbeenawareofany sexualmiscon-
duct byDustinHoffmanwhenhe’d worked
withtheactordecadesago. (Thiswasat the
heightofMeToo,andHoffmanhadbeen
accusedof gropingandmakinginappropri-
atecomments.) In a videooftheevent,
Spielberglookstakenaback.“I,inworking
verycloselywithhim,neverexperienced
that,”hesaid.Afterward,I wastold,the
storycirculatedthat Hankswasheardmut-
tering“FuckBuzzFeed”intheelevator.
A ke y part ofSmith’s scoop-houndmen-
tality is that “helikestogetyelledat,”Noto-
poulossaid.Hethickenedhisskinworking
attheObserver,theSun,andtheDaily
News,wheresuccessasa journalist was
measuredbya source’s fearof notreturning
yourcall,notsocial-medialikes.Manypeo-
pledescribedSmithtomeasa creature of
theNewYorktabloids.He cameupwith
MaggieHabermanandGlennThrushin
Photograph by Brian Finke
P
uckish chaos agent” is how
Charlie Warzel describes his
former BuzzFeed News boss
and current New York Times
colleague Ben Smith. “He loves
to make chaos,” says Katie Notopoulos, a
BuzzFeed reporter. Smith has a “constant
desire to stir shit,” another onetime col-
league says, while ex–BuzzFeed editor Saeed
Jones puts it this way: “Ben is a messy bitch
who lives for the drama.”
Smith, the New York Times’ new media
columnist—and BuzzFeed’s old editor-in-
chief—has indeed spent the past six months
stirring up an amount of shit, drama, and
chaos that is notable even for these shitty,
dramatic, and chaotic times. Consider:
There was the column in which he
slammed the work of Ronan Farrow, The
New Yorker’s star reporter, as revealing “the
weakness of a kind of resistance journal-
ism,” and another that somewhat trollishly
described the lifestyles of the rich and not-
that-famous media executives living in
country homes in the midst of the pan-
demic. He helped break the story of Hearst’s
troubled culture, leading to an executive’s
resignation, and dropped the bomb that
Brett Kavanaugh, long before he was on the
Supreme Court, was one of Washington
Post icon Bob Woodward’s confidential
sources—and that scoop wasn’t even the
point of that particular column.
On nights when his stories drop, blue-
check-mark tweeters weigh in on Smith’s
latest. “Holy Cow,” the man who is every-
where on the internet, Yashar Ali, said of
one. “Tendentious” and “appalling” was
Naomi Wolf ’s take on another. The motley
crew of Ann Coulter, Caitlin Flanagan, and
former White House “ethics czar” Norm
Eisen are also on the record as having
strong reactions to Smith’s work. In a short
time, Smith has returned the “Media Equa-
tion” column—made legendary by David
Carr, the straight-talking ex-addict journal-
ism folk hero who died in 2015—to the posi-
tion of power it had attained during Carr’s
time in the chair.
Smith’s column isn’t the deeply philo-
sophical, dignified sort that evokes a quiet
