Matt Taibbi
Matt Taibbi is an author, polemical journalist and podcaster that tackles the most pressing contemporary issues on politics, media, finance, and sports. Matt is the author of several New York Times bestsellers The Divide, Griftopia, and The Great Derangement. His Subtrack newsletter, TK News, is one of the most popular on the site, boasting more than 30,000 paying subscribers. He also hosts a popular podcast, Useful Idiots, with the comedian and filmmaker Katie Halper, where the two debate hot-button media issues and interview unconventional leftists. He was a Contributing Editor for Rolling Stone, the number one brand in music publishing and pop culture, where he infamously labeled Goldman Sachs “a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity, relentlessly jamming its blood funnel into anything that smells like money.” He also edited and wrote for The eXile, the New York Press, and The Beast.
JOURNALISM AND EARLY CAREER
Matt began as a freelance reporter working in the former Soviet Union, including a time in Uzbekistan, from where he was deported for criticizing President Islam Karimov.
He later worked as a sports journalist for the English-language newspaper, The Moscow Times.
He co-edited , with Mark Ames, an English-language satire newspaper called The Exile where he reported on corruption both in the Russian government and in the American aid community.
His work often has drawn comparisons to the gonzo journalism of writer Hunter S. Thompson, who also covered politics for Rolling Stone.
Earlier, he played professional baseball in Russia, professional basketball in Mongolia, and worked as an investigator in a Boston-based private detective agency.
HONORS & RECOGNITIONS
2008 National Magazine Award for Columns and Commentary
Sidney Award, The Great American Bubble Machine
BOOKS
Hate Inc.: Why Today's Media Makes Us Despise One Another (2021)
Spanking the Donkey: Dispatches from the Dumb Season (2018)
I Can't Breathe: A Killing on Bay Street (2017)
Insane Clown President: Dispatches from the 2016 Circus 2017)
Smells Like Dead Elephants: Dispatches from a Rotting Empire (2014)
The Divide: American Injustice in the Age of the Wealth Gap (2014)
Griftopia: A Story of Bankers, Politicians, and the Most Audacious Power Grab in American History (2010)
The Great Derangement: A Terrifying True Story of War, Politics, and Religion at the Twilight of the American Empire (2008)