Andrew Breitbart

SAINT PAUL—On Monday night, Internet-guru turned right-wing messiah Andrew Breitbart arrived at the National Review party wearing jeans, a lime green, open-collar button-down and the beginning of a beard. For now, his wavy gray locks were tucked behind his ears.

Waiting in line for a beer, Mr. Breitbart said that at this point he was completely comfortable with his conservative transformation.

“The only thing that still bothers me is the dearth of artists in our party,” he said, looking around the room. He was the only one not wearing a blazer.

Two months ago, he began writing a column called “Big Hollywood” in the Conservative Beltway newspaper The Washington Times, which, among other things, addresses that dearth and more specifically the oppression of artists in entertainment industry whose views don’t conform to the “Hollywood left.  read more »

Felix Gillette talks to Griff Jenkins, Fox News' man on the mean streets of St. Paul: "Roughly a week earlier, Mr. Jenkins had waded into the protestors in Denver without the aid of a security crew. Things had gotten entertainingly ugly (YouTube-worthy ugly), and now his bosses were insisting on precautions."

Leon Neyfakh meets the staff of The National Review in St. Paul for the Republican National Convention. Jack Fowler, publisher of the magazine is planning their "post-election Caribbean cruise, an elaborate week-long fundraiser for the magazine involving 250 members of the conservative intelligentsia on a boat rubbing shoulders with such celebs as Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, and Christopher Buckley." PLUS: Print Defender Matt Weiland Keeps 50 States in One Book.

Plus: GOOD grows up... Curl, Interrupted... Andrew Breitbart at the RNC.

Irina Aleksander sat down with socialite and writer Tatiana Boncompagni, whose new book Gilding Lily may ruffle some feathers in her social set. Just don't tell that to Tinsley Mortimer, Lydia Fenet and Jennifer Creel, who are throwing her a book party on Tuesday.

Ms. Aleksander also put in a call to Gossip Girl producer Josh Schwartz to ask whether he really thought those CW Network ads were too racy. He says: No way!

And Spencer Morgan, reporting from the Republican National Convention, spent a whirlwind evening with Matt Drudge crony Andrew Breitbart, who's launching a new website called (modestly) Big Hollywood.

ST. PAUL—His name may sound unfamiliar, but Andrew Breitbart has built a career helping to create the Drudge Report and the Huffington Post, while also overseeing his own news-aggregation site breitbart.com—and becoming prominent in a largely underground movement of conservatives in Hollywood. Next week he plans to launch a new site (www.breitbart.com/bighollywood) that will give voice to this rogue community in the entertainment industry. 

“I don’t have a set goal of saying like, ‘Jean-Claude Van Damme and Donny Osmond are going to be blogging on my site and you’ve got to come in,’” he told the Transom on Monday evening at the Republican National Convention.  read more »