It is longtime MRC media analysis director Tim Graham who writes “almost everything published under [Bozell’s] name,” a former MRC employee tells me in an email. “That includes his weekly column. Same goes for his books, which at least carry Graham’s name in a secondary billing, but also aren’t written by Bozell (but Bozell keeps 80-90% of the advance and all profits!)”
Two other people with ties to MRC confirmed that Graham is Bozell’s ghostwriter – and that Graham is not happy with the assignment.
“Tim just resents having to do it,” says a former employee.
Graham’s wife, too, is so angry about the arrangement that she refuses to attend Media Research Center events.
“She hates Bozell,” I’m told.
The real meat of Romenesko’s story, though, is his correspondence with Bozell’s syndicator, who took a stern view of ghostwriting when they didn’t know it was Bozell that Romenesko was asking about:
If you know of one of our columnists who supposedly is not writing the column but rather “assigning an underling to pen them (an underling who is not credited),” I think it only fair that you tell us who has been accused of this so we can talk to the columnist. Yes, we expect all of our columnists to write their own columns, though we understand that some work closely with researchers.
Their tune, and their story, changed when Romenesko brought up Bozell…
