Reply All: #131 Surefire Investigations

November 15, 2018 4:26 PM

This week, the return of YYN: from a deranged mascot to the top of the FBI

Gritty, previously on the blue.

From the Rachel Maddow show: Scheme Targeting Robert Mueller Goes Hilariously Off The Rails.

posted by dnash (15 comments total)

So, I had heard most of the stuff about Jacob Wohl's hilariously bad attempt to smear Mueller. But, like, I hadn't actually listened to any of the press conference, just read descriptions. And for sure I had never heard about his history of "I was just in a hipster coffee shop" tweets which .... I ... I just.... OMG I WAS WALKING DOWN THE STREET LISTENING TO THIS AND I HAD TO STOP CUZ I WAS LAUGHING SO MUCH.
posted by dnash at 4:29 PM on November 15, 2018 [1 favorite]

I was originally introduced to this clown from left twitter dunking on his hilariously transparent lies, so I got to find out in reverse about how Hipster Coffee Shop Guy was behind the Mueller smear, AND I got to find out about his equally inept attempts at being a teenage hedge fund manager. He's certainly a child prodigy, but his medium is dumbass schemes.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 6:00 PM on November 15, 2018 [1 favorite]

I had seen the hipster coffee shop thing around, but hadn't realized it was connected to James Wohl. What a journey.

As someone who grew up in a white sox family, I do feel a special affinity for people who associate themselves with horrible, violent, drunken fans.

The gritty metafilter thread is wonderful because you can see the tides turn for gritty in real time.
posted by dinty_moore at 6:06 AM on November 16, 2018 [4 favorites]

The thing that gets me about James Wohl isn't just that he keeps on failing at evil like a recurring scooby doo villain, it's the fact that he has a seemingly unlimited amount of money to do so. Where does it come from?
posted by dinty_moore at 6:25 AM on November 16, 2018

> dinty_moore:
"The thing that gets me about James Wohl isn't just that he keeps on failing at evil like a recurring scooby doo villain, it's the fact that he has a seemingly unlimited amount of money to do so. Where does it come from?"

You know, when you sell your soul, you need to pick CAREFULLY who you sell it to.
posted by Samizdata at 6:33 AM on November 16, 2018

I kept chuckling on the streetcar about Gritty, and the hipster coffee shop stuff left me laughing so hard the dude next to me moved to a much less comfortable seat.
posted by yellowbinder at 6:36 AM on November 16, 2018 [4 favorites]

Also I didn't realize Wohl got his start as a Twitter Trump Sycophant, I just assumed he wedged himself into fringe punditry via less embarrassing means. That's the kind of high-quality journalism I can get behind.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 6:40 AM on November 16, 2018 [1 favorite]

Wohl says on his Twitter bio that he's "Head of the Most Well-Known Opposition Research Firm in the World."

A "research firm" that only exists in his head, that has never done any actual research.

And it looks like he has an equally delusional and rabid father, David Wohl, enabling and supporting him.
posted by dnash at 8:24 AM on November 16, 2018

This was top quality YYN, and for once a politics-related Reply All where I actually got some new information and wasn't sitting there going, "OMG you guys where have you been for the past three years???!"

So here's a question: What would happen if David and Justin Wohl got together with David and Albi Whale? Nesting, interlocking folie a deux?
posted by soren_lorensen at 11:54 AM on November 16, 2018

This was a great episode where I had at least heard of the various pieces but didn't know the details and wouldn't have ever put it all together. My 15 year old is getting into Reply All and really liked this one too.

Wohl says on his Twitter bio that he's "Head of the Most Well-Known Opposition Research Firm in the World."

A "research firm" that only exists in his head, that has never done any actual research.

Robert Wuhl did a better job investigating Batman.
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 1:21 PM on November 16, 2018 [1 favorite]

I'm not sure I would have realized, on first reading the tweet, that I understood none of it. I probably would have assumed it was a reference to some gritty new television show that I'd never heard of called The Fanatic. This one really hit the "you didn't know that you didn't know" spot, at least for me.

But, surely, the point of the SEPTA thing is making fun of the original poster by claiming that people getting coffee in the commuter train dining car are in a "hipster coffee shop," highlighting how meaninglessly broad that slander is. I feel like that's the only part of the whole thing I actually did understand and was surprised our hosts came to a very different conclusion.
posted by eotvos at 10:52 AM on November 18, 2018

Having grown up with it myself, I can independently confirm that the Action News intro song is the greatest piece of music in history
posted by DoctorFedora at 3:52 PM on November 18, 2018

I lived in Philly for a while but I left 20 years ago. Even so, as soon as they mentioned the Action News song, I was singing it in my head.
posted by moonmilk at 4:15 PM on November 18, 2018 [1 favorite]

Between the last episode finding out that PJ has kept his 610 area code and this one letting me hear the second verse of "Move Closer to Your World," I feel very seen from my tiny corner of Delco.
posted by gladly at 6:37 PM on November 18, 2018 [3 favorites]

Yay this episode was great! I appreciate all the journalism Reply All has been doing this past year but a lot of it is kind of grim and serious. This episode was hilarious and fun. And yet more than just "two guys cracking jokes on a podcast", there's a lot of depth unpacked over the course of getting to Yes Yes Yes. Great work.

Sadly Maya Kosoff's tweet seems to be deleted now. It used to be here.

i just left a hipster coffee shop in philadelphia. all the young libs there were sipping disposable mugs full of SEPTA sewer sludge and murmuring among themselves about how gritty is actually the phanatic's son.

posted by Nelson at 1:01 PM on November 20, 2018