WND and the Right-Wing Hu$tle

posted on 4/7/2019 by the Salt City Sinner

Based on the content of Joseph Farah’s columns, repeated entreaties for donations from readers, weird and shifting business models, and the scuttlebutt in their comments section, I’ve had my suspicions about WND and Joseph Farah for some time now.

The Washington Post doesn’t need to speculate or imply or have suspicions, though. Saturnalia arrived early this year in the form of a lengthy article, based on on-the-record information from former WND staff and internal emails. It establishes that WND is in dire straits indeed:

“[Farah’s] realm is being sucked into a tornado of unpaid bills, pink-slipped employees, chaotic accounting, declining revenue and diminishing readership, according to interviews with more than 25 former employees, shareholders, company insiders and authors associated with the firm's flailing publishing units, as well as a review of hundreds of internal documents, including emails and financial statements obtained by The Washington Post. 

“Even though Farah claimed in WND columns and emails to supporters last year to receive hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations —including tax-deductible contributions — some former employees and contractors have been laid off or had their deals canceled without being paid money they say they were owed. Many authors who signed on with the site’s publishing arm, including former Republican senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, are fuming about allegedly not receiving royalties owed to them. Coburn recalled in an interview that he had a ‘very frank and disturbing’ conversation last year with Farah about unpaid royalties for his 2017 book, ‘Smashing the D.C. Monopoly.’ 

“’I accused him of not being honest,’ Coburn said. ‘He doesn’t keep his commitments. He doesn’t keep his word.’”

If that were all there were to this story, it would be remarkable enough. Has the public demand for noxious right-wing calumny really declined in such a steep way?

Not really. As Amanda Marcotte explains:

“Conservative audiences who want to wallow in a right-wing fantasy world where women have abortions for fun, roving gangs of immigrants are coming to kill you, and ‘globalists' are running elaborate, secretive conspiracies to steal America from white people no longer have to turn to WND, with its subpar web design and often incomprehensibly written articles. The conspiracy theories and racist paranoia those audiences crave is being served up in a slick, professional style at Fox News, in the mouths of supposedly reputable pundits like Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity.”

And there’s more in the Washington Post story. Big Joe Farah might claim that he is motivated by faith – in his god, in the conservative movement – but, in the end, he might be just another grifter:

“Interviews and documents show an organization that existed in almost constant crisis mode, chronically late in paying its employees and vendors, and wrestling with internal allegations about questionable spending by its founders and claims they were withholding information from the company’s board and using company funds to support a comfortable lifestyle in the Washington suburbs.
…
“[At one point] a change in corporate structure stripped minority shareholders of much power, which was further concentrated in the hands of the Farahs, according to one internal document. Some complained that Farah needed to be more transparent about how much he and the rest of his family were being paid, according to emails and interviews. … Inside the operation, troubles were percolating. A high-ranking executive had been raising concerns about Elizabeth Farah’s spending on a company credit card, citing charges made to a wine shop, a clothing store, a cosmetics seller and a company that supplies materials for home-schooling, according to an internal memo obtained by The Post that lists each charge.”

Now, according to WND, Joseph recently suffered a stroke. I was unsurprised that he wasn’t up to the challenge of answering the Post’s claims, but managing editor David Kupelian did squeak out a response*. Kupelian calls the article “unfair, misleading, and just wrong,” and whines that the Post “cast aspersions on not just on the actions, but the motivations” of Farah. Coming from WND, this is a real knee-slapper.

The fall of the House of Farah is emblematic of a problem that the conservative movement has consistently failed to grapple with. I’m not talking about the homophobia, the Islamophobia, the anti-immigrant hysteria, the misogyny, or the greed. After all, these traits – seen in the distorting light of right-wing ideology – are a feature, not a bug. No, what Farah represents is a much less high-minded constituency: the charlatan. He and his poorly-put-together operation represent the gold-shilling huckster, the snake oil peddling homeopath, the multi-level marketing predator, and the survival gear price-gouger. He might be out to make a change, but that impulse is secondary to his efforts to make a buck.

This tendency extends far beyond the mere receipt of so-called wingnut welfare. For further examples, I’d check out the Netflix documentary A Gray State (which documents the story of grafter, madman, and murderer David Crowley), the Alex-Jones-centered podcast Knowledge Fight (in particular the second episode at about 23 minutes, if you’d enjoy a taste of the InfoWars business model), this Kevin Drum post from 2015, or this Vox piece on Jacob Wohl.

I wish Joseph Farah a speedy recovery – and I hope that he enjoyed the gravy train while it lasted. I’m sure it a pretty sweet ride.

*While I have posted about WND extensively in the past and you can find links at any of those posts, I won’t be linking directly to them anymore.