Readers will remember the Aspen Times. They’re the little but old – venerable, we’re told – newspaper of Aspen. These days it’s a hard left rag in a hard left town of limousine liberals who are screwed, swindled, salved and soothed by the local Stalinists in an obscene spectacle something like a Mexican donkey show.
One of the frequent perks for Aspen Times editors and reporters, as for many other members of the ruling Aspen establishment, is housing subsidized by the limo-libs for dimes on the dollars – often slopeside.
I was the token conservative columnist with the Aspen Times for seven years. But I grew a little big for my britches. Over that time, I became the most-read columnist in the newspaper. Then I started to become more-read than even front-page news. I was occasionally the very most-clicked item in the newspaper.
Ah, but that wasn’t their goal. I was hired not to succeed in offering a viewpoint contrary to the Aspen leftwing establishment, but to be a token. So, on Christmas Eve in 2019 they fired me. By email.
It all worked out for me. I started this blog which now has over 800,000 readers. In an annual poll conducted by the Aspen Times, meanwhile, their readers named me “Best Columnist” in Aspen for each year since I was fired, and last year also voted me “Mr. Aspen.” (Thanks guys!)
Here’s where my dear friend Karma comes in. The Aspen Times was sold last winter to a respected newspaper family named the Ogdens out of West Virginia. They’re Republicans, which is intolerable to the “tolerant” leftists of Aspen. Those slopeside multimillion dollar subsidized digs for Aspen Times employees are rumored to be in jeopardy,
The Aspen Times’ distaste for the political leanings of their new owners may have something to do with ensuing events, which I will now summarize (more is available HERE).
It started when the newspaper ran a report months ago that one of the local billionaires (they’re a dime a dozen here) was somehow in league with Vladimir Putin. The evidence of this was apparently thin, at best. So, the billionaire sued the Aspen Times for defamation. The Aspen Times understandably wanted to settle this lawsuit.
The new owner apparently asked staff not to comment on the lawsuit. That’s normal and prudent. Employees are typically asked not to issue gratuitous commentary on litigation involving their employer, because the comments become evidence at trial which may or may not be consistent with the company’s legal position.
Some of the employees defied that request, either deliberately or negligently. At least one of those employees was consequently fired.
Another (who might be just an “independent contractor” as opposed to an actual employee) quit. His reason for quitting was evidently that he objected to being restrained in commenting on the pending litigation.
This grown man bragged in a public forum that he “cried” about all this. Literally. He literally cried about it and he literally bragged about crying. Several times he cried and several times he bragged about it.
Boo-hoo.
He feels his pain, even if the rest of us don’t. Notably, while this baby cries for being assigned the grown-up task of not compromising pending litigation involving his boss, he and the rest of Aspen journalists (ah, what an oxymoron) made nary a peep back when yours truly was canned for being unwoke.
Blissfully unaware of their hypocrisy, the crybabies spin their own reckless insubordination into a horrible act of censorship by the new owners. Freedom of the Press is at stake, they cry. It’s a First Amendment issue (one of the few amendments they still like, at least when it’s on their side). And because they have strong feelings about the issue, we’re supposed to infer they’re right about it.
In other words, their “journalism” comes from the school of “left-is-always-right-and-the-right-is-always-wrong” and “the-harder-I-cry-the-more-persuasive-I-am.”
The kids of Aspen City Council got involved too, as they do in everything. I’m not being mean in characterizing them as kids – one is a tennis instructor with just one name (which might be one more name than he’s earned) and another is named “Skippy” (which might be exactly the name he’s earned). These kids control a $200,000,000 city budget for this 7,000-person town. Do the math – that means the city budget is about $30,000 per resident.
Accustomed to their daily fellating from the Aspen Times, the City Council-eers have begged liberal Aspen billionaires to buy the newspaper back. Maybe they’ll rename it “Pravda.”
I’m not a businessman, and not really even a newspaper man. I’m a retired lawyer with a fantastically witty and informative blog (to which you can obtain a free subscription HERE!). But my sense after living in Aspen a while and writing for the Aspen Times for seven years until they fired me (did I mention they did it by email on Christmas Eve?) is that some housecleaning is in order.
The Editor had already been fired or forced out before this latest brouhaha. Now it looks like a few others will follow. Nothing sweeps like a new broom.
Best of luck to the Ogden family, but I don’t think they really need it. They know how to run a business and how to run a newspaper. They may be from the East, but this ain’t their first rodeo. And they don’t seem to be the crybaby type.
the Aspen beat 
This makes me happy. I stopped reading the Aspen Times after they canned you.
Very interesting! Congrats to you for coming out on top!! I have a question: “taxpayer-subsidized housing for dimes on the dollars – often slopeside.” How? Why?
If you wait by the river long enough…………..
People who behave without honor are often surprised to find their behavior comes back to bite them.
F*cking Brilliant Analysis Mr. Aspen! As a new resident of Texas, who moved from the RFV this April after 17 years as a business owner there, I wouldn’t sully my chimney with the ashes of that rag to start a fire in my stove, even if the bath water was nearly freezing as fast as it flowed from the faucet!!! Your column is the only good thing to come from that paper, glad I’m subscribed to this blog!
And he who laughs last, laughs best. I’m laughing with you all the way. Your 800,000 followers could probably do a gofundme buyout for the rag, but who wants a rag. Only 2000? runny nose cry babies in Aspen! We’re in the front range now, and are happy with the Denver Gazette. I bet you and the Clinger and a few others could do the same for the Roaring Fork Vally. You seem to be well on the way.
Cheers
Bill
Thanks for your always timely and humorous blog columns. Or however you call it. You do the writing and I do the reading.
“ Accustomed to their daily fellating from the Aspen Times, the City Council-eers”.
Hey, who can blame them, Biden et al (read Obama & Jarrett Assocs) get the same favors from the national legacy media so why not a little bit of virtual oral from the local presstitutes?
Seriously Karma really is a nasty bitch, kinda like more than a few ex wives. see e. g. Amber Heard and apparently by acertain accounts Angelina (now something less than) Jolie.
Whether this fish-wrap newspaper is rotting from the head down or from the inside out, your synopsis and analysis implies a correspondence with the larger Aspen establishment. By analogy, when CNN implodes, can Woke Culture be far behind? Alas, whereas CNN has a foil in FOX News, which eclipses its viewership by a 5:1 ratio, the only local alternative to The Aspen Times is the even more overtly “red-diaper, doper baby” Aspen Daily News. Why do our installed civic socialists think they need to dislodge the evil Ogden aliens by buying the Times, when all that is required is to transfer a few more of the Times’ best assets — columnist John Colter comes readily to mind — to the Daily News and, voila, the perfect Pravda is within their grasp?
Make that John ColSON. Not that anyone cares.
The Aspen Times’ dogma just got run over by karma.
Perhaps this is Divine retribution, or cosmic revenge, or a balancing of the celestial scales.
How does that old Sicilian expression go? … Revenge is a dish best served cold.
Glenn, You did have another conservative writer for the Aspen Times. I don’t know whether Melanie Sturm was fired as you were but her columns were much read and commented on.
That’s certainly true, Robert.
Melanie was and is excellent. And it was she who introduced me to the Aspen Times. She stopped writing for them a few years before I was fired that memorable Christmas Eve.
As I heard in the Army long ago, “What Goes Around Comes Around.”
Another very gratifying pendulum swing to the right. Having lots of those moments lately…but still not enough.
Much to enjoy in today’s post. It seems that the crybully leftists are being hoist on their own petard on many fronts. Elon Musk peeved a certain cabal of SpaceX SJW employees who publicly criticized him and demanded that he be replaced. (First, the very idiocy of demanding tha Musk be replaced at Spacex is mind-boggling! Like one of the janitors at the Sistine Chapel demanding that Michelangelo be dismissed before he finished the ceiling fresco.) He responded by firing them! Quelle surprise! It has become standard operating procedure for lefties and SJW’s to think they are immune from repercussions; they apparently believe iti s only those on the right or conservative side of the issues can be disciplined for their opinions. Nice to see that the pendulum swings both ways. And particularly nice to see how you prospered despite the ill intent of TPTB at Aspen times.
Cathartic experience, isn’t it? Happy for you.
Ah revenge, a dish best eaten cold. Savor this moment. It couldn’t have happened to a nicer bunch
“one is a tennis instructor with just one name” . One name instantly flashed to mind,”Skippy-dippy?”, only to see on the next line that you really did have a ‘Skippy’. That. Was. Funny.
I sure wish the Ogden family would buy out our local rag..a once upon a time decent newspaper, but now is run by a liberal entity. I wrote for them over the years, too. I finally cancelled my subscription last week. Karma is sweet..thanks Glenn for sharing this..it made my day.
We can hope that this will be something that we will see more and more often — for the health and safety of all Americans.
Oh, and another important and well-deserved proclamation:
LET’S GO BRANDON!
I have one thing to add. I’m with you in your reluctance to read this propaganda sheet. Until now.
Now that it has a new owner — an owner that seems committed to quality journalism rather than cheap and formulaic propagandizing — let’s support them. Let’s start reading the Aspen Times again, and help the new owner make a go of it.
Pingback: Today’s News 6-19-2022 |
Some schadenfreude here, but if ever it was warranted, this is the time. Too bad. I like Roger Marolt, but as soon as I read his post I thought he was wrong on this. His column wasn’t urgent, really. It’s not like he was exposing corruption. Why did he feel a need to fling it into pending litigation?
Love it! Wishing the new owners of the Aspen Times the best. And also wishing the best for you, Glenn.
Why not rejoin the Aspen Times,Glenn…
Pingback: Fascist officials of Aspen threaten to cancel a newspaper because its new owners are unwoke | the Aspen beat