Earlier this week, MSNBC personality Tucker Carlson announced he would become the latest traditional media figure to follow in Arianna Huffington’s stilettoed footsteps by starting a news aggregator, the Daily Caller, which launches in July. According to a statement on the website, the Caller will feature “some of the most timely, accurate and fearless journalism on the web,” with “original reporting on politics, government and culture, breaking news updated to the minute, satire, analysis and research,” all from a right-wing perspective.
Now, we have to admit, all things aside, we have kind of a soft spot for Carlson (If you don’t, you should read this). But that didn’t stop us from sending him a series of obnoxious e-mails in which we tried to goad him into saying something outrageous and Internet-y about his competitors. Mostly, we failed. The pretty-much-unmolested transcript of our conversation follows.
Daily Intel: So, all of the articles about your new project say that you’re competing with the Huffington Post. But isn’t what you are doing also competing with Tina Brown’s Daily Beast, which you sometimes write for?
Tucker: Even if I could, I’d never compete with Tina, both because I love her, and also because I’m not that stupid.
Daily Intel: Says: You love her? (Thinks: Does he mean in a Harold and Maude kind of way? Ew. Don’t ask that. You don’t want to know the answer.) Says: That’s kind of gross.
Tucker: And also true.
Daily Intel: (Thinks: !) But you hate Arianna, right? Like you are going to crush her, traffic-wise?
Tucker: Nice try. There is no way I’m going to attack someone with a successful site, when mine isn’t even up yet.
Daily Intel: Dude, that’s how you create BUZZ on the Internet. Say something like, “I’m going to kick that Cypriot’s ass all the way back to the Mediterranean.”
Tucker: Greece. But close. They run half the island.
Daily Intel: Ohhhh. So her family is like those guys in The Wire? We get it. We wouldn’t want to mess with those people either. At least tell us this: Will you be creating original content at all or just mooching off of others like we do?
Tucker: Creating original content is the whole point. We think we’ve found a way to make reporting profitable for everyone involved. Probably an overstatement to claim we’re going to save journalism, but I think it will help, maybe a lot.
Daily Intel: Will it have slideshows of people wearing shorts?
Tucker: No shorts. Only pants.
