drudge blog

Anyone who’s followed Drudge extensively knows that “conservative” may be a bit of a misnomer in describing his politics. While he’s vocally pro-life and G.O.P. all the way in regards to economic policy, elsewhere he’s very much across the board in the crazy quilt of American political ideology. Somewhere between a populist and a libertarian, he’s let his radio audience know what he thinks about post-9/11 right-to-privacy issues that sprout up every time a citizen goes through airport security.

More than once last November, Matt discussed the possibility that an individual’s airport X-rays could be preserved in a database.

Well, our homie ain’t down with that.

You know nothing good’s goin’ down when his voice starts that mercurial rise and fall, when the last words of a sentence are a gravelly purr. When Matt refers to pics of his “manhood”, his pitch reduces to a nervous, reluctant grumble.

During last fall’s massive wind-and-light show in South Florida, Matt fled to L.A. and recorded one Sunday’s radio show from there. This necessitated a complicated hand inspection of some cumbersome radio equipment at the airport. The attendant on duty made some comments that Drudge found neither necessary nor pleasing.

“I almost punched him,” he recalled, “and that’s the last you would have heard from this host.”

But the Drudge wrath was in gorgeous flower on his return home from a trip to Budapest. After being peppered with questions from a U.S. Customs Agent about where he was going, where he lived, and did he own his home, yadda yadda, Matt balked. “Where are we going with this?” He asked. In this case, he and U.S. Customs were going on a little trip to “the quiet room”.

“Something happened,” one of the Fed’s Finest lectured him. “It’s called 9/11.” “That is a political statement,” Matt recalled snapping back. “Not a yadda yadda yadda yadda…” Some retort which unfortunately I can’t recall.

I could write quite a few essays on the PR ramifications of Drudge’s postings, press commentary, and actions — and I will, as long as I have time and Lance graciously allows me this forum. I see a crisis communications issue that needs to be addressed ahead of time. If he’s going to be hell-bent on protecting his privacy when dealing with airport authorities — and this is certainly a valid position to adopt — he needs to be intellectually and professionally prepared for the consequences if an attitude outburst of his generates media attention. In today’s media landscape, it’s not yet popular to cop a ‘tude with airport or homeland security. Time will change this, but not yet.

While I’ve ribbed Matt a bit in my past blogs and on Drudge Forum, I actually feel protective of him, private package and all. I’m just afraid one of these days I’ll stumble across his mug shot on Smoking Gun, which will undoubtedly be paired with a color X-ray photo of his extremities in all their transparent glory. Ya can’t win for losing. (In the meantime, check out his current archived records here - the Blumenthal imbroglio and an apparently yet-unpaid traffic citation for running a red light with his bike.)

Maybe Matt should beat them to the punch: Get his own X-rays photographed, sell the rights to a monster stock photo conglomerate like Corbis Stock Market or Getty Images like Trump did with his wedding pics last week. This just might thwart the Federal Government’s attempts to store an image of his beautiful insides in a retrieval system. In this day and age, it’s easier and quicker to protect a copyright than your civil liberties.

RegoPark is a pseudonym for a writer with a background in marketing communications. She is currently working on a novel about PR and the alternative media.