Imus Won't Read Jonathan Alter's Book, But That Doesn't Mean You Shouldn't

Despite a flurry of recent activity over at Newsweek, Jonathan Alter is still a senior editor and columnist at the weekly magazine, and told Imus things are looking up at the problem-riddled publication.

“We have a new buyer, his name is Sidney Harman,” said Alter. “He’s a very deep pocket, and a very, very smart guy.”

This overt display of sucking up to the new boss puzzled Imus, who believes Alter is an incredible writer who would be snatched up by anybody should Newsweek ever fold. But the self-effacing journalist confessed he was never worried about his own future.

“I was quite worried about the future of Newsweek,” he said. “We went through a terrible spring, we got the crap kicked out of us in the press everyday. People were reporting the magazine was going to die, and couldn’t be saved.”

It was difficult for the innocent Alter to comprehend that people would actually be rooting for Newsweek’s failure, to which Imus’s compassionately replied, “Hello? Welcome to Earth! When I got fired, there were so many people who were so happy, it was ridiculous. Then they start rooting for you to get a job again.”

The I-Man’s feel-good reaction to a federal judge overturning California’s controversial ban on gay marriage yesterday was not shocking to Alter. “You’re what I consider to be a ‘leave-me-the-F-alone’ kind of person, and a true Conservative in that kind of way,” he said.

Besides, Alter wondered, what kind of person really wants to tell somebody else they can’t be happy?

“Me, for one,” Imus quickly said.

President Obama’s poll numbers are the lowest they’ve been during his presidency, though Alter, whose book The Promise goes inside the Obama administration, pointed out that Ronald Reagan’s numbers were even lower at this point in his presidency.  

In Imus’s view, Obama “is a nice guy and all,” but has no clue what he’s doing. All evidence to the contrary in The Promise, which Imus has not and will never read.

He criticized Obama’s handling of the BP oil spill, even though, as Alter pointed out, Obama secured a $20 billion liability fund from BP, a far greater number than the Republicans in Congress had in mind.

“You know what they want the cap for BP to be? $70 million, with an M,” said Alter. “That’s a bar bill for BP.”

Or, Imus added, “That’s Michael Steele’s bar bill at some topless joint in California.”

-Julie Kanfer