News & Updates

David Boaz, of the Cato Institute, discusses Jane Mayer’s attack on Art Pope. “Jane Mayer of the New Yorker, fresh from her expose of the nefarious Koch Brothers’ conspiracy to reduce taxes and regulation, has found a new target: James Arthur (Art) Pope, chairman and CEO of Variety Wholesalers and a major contributor to free-market and Republican causes, especially in North Carolina.” Read more Source: The Cato Institute

Conn Carroll, an editorial writer at The Washington Examiner, defends Art Pope in his October 10, 2011 editorial. “Last week, Bloomberg Markets Magazine published a 7,000+ word, 14 author hit piece, on Koch Industries Inc. that was so pathetic, Bloomberg’s own Businessweek editorialized against it. This week, The New Yorker’s Jane Meyer, also of Koch hit piece fame, has published a new hatchet job, this time on retailing magnate Art Pope.” Read more Source: The Washington Examiner

Art Pope speaks with ABC TV station WTVD about The New Yorker article about him Watch the video Source: WTVD

In this article dated October 10, 2011 in The New Yorker Jane Mayer criticizes Art Pope. “In the spring of 2010, the conservative political strategist Ed Gillespie flew from Washington, D.C., to Raleigh, North Carolina, to spend a day laying the groundwork for REDMAP, a new project aimed at engineering a Republican takeover of state legislatures. Gillespie hoped to help his party get control of statehouses where congressional redistricting was pending, thereby leveraging victories in cheap local races into a means of shifting the balance of power in Washington. It was an ingenious plan, and Gillespie is a skilled tactician—he once ran the Republican National Committee—but REDMAP seemed like a long shot in North Carolina. Barack Obama carried the state in 2008 and remained popular. The Republicans hadn’t controlled both houses of the North Carolina General Assembly for more than a century. (‘Not since General Sherman,’ a state politico joked to me.) That day in Raleigh, though, Gillespie had lunch with an ideal ally: James Arthur (Art) Pope, the chairman and C.E.O. of Variety Wholesalers, a discount-store conglomerate. Read More Source: The New Yorker

Mark Bauerlein, an English professor at Emory University, dissects The New Yorker profile of Art Pope, concluding that it “isn’t a good essay and isn’t good journalism.” Read more Source: The Chronicle of Higher Education