Ana Marie Cox
Encyclopedia
Ana Marie Cox is an American
author and blog
ger. The founding editor of the political blog
Wonkette
, she is currently the Washington correspondent for GQ and is The Guardian
's lead blogger on US politics. She previously worked at Air America Media.
, Puerto Rico
. She attended high school at Lincoln Southeast High School
in Lincoln
, Nebraska
, where she wrote for the school's newspaper, The Clarion. She graduated from the University of Chicago
with an AB in History in 1994. She began graduate school at the University of California at Berkeley, where she was studying American history, but left school and instead became an editorial assistant at the publishing company Alfred A. Knopf
.
. Later, she was an executive editor of Suck.com
, where she wrote under the pen name
"Ann O'Tate" (wordplay on annotate).
In 2004, Cox became the founding editor of political blog
Wonkette
. Under her tenure, Wonkette was a sportive commentary on Capitol Hill
Washington politics, as well as more serious matters of politics and policy. Cox and Wonkette gained notoriety in the political world for publicizing the story of Jessica Cutler
, also known as "Washingtonienne", a staff assistant to Senator
Mike DeWine
(R.
-Ohio
), who accepted money from a George W. Bush
administration official and others in exchange for sexual favors. On January 5, 2006, she officially announced her retirement as the blog's editor and her imminent transition to "Wonkette Emerita".
Her novel Dog Days, a satire of Washington D.C. life for which she was reportedly paid $250,000, was published on January 6, 2006. On July 27, 2006 she was named the Washington editor of Time.com
, where she also writes The Ana Log. She is also under a mid-six-figures contract with Penguin to write a nonfiction book.
On 12 April 2007 Cox claimed on Time magazine's website that she agreed to appear on the Don Imus
radio show despite the show's history of racially and sexually charged content because she wanted to be considered part of the media elite. Cox wrote: "I'm embarrassed to admit that it took Imus saying something so devastatingly crass to make me realise there just was no reason beyond ego to play along. I did the show almost solely to earn my 'media elite' merit badge." Cox announced on 5 December 2008 that she would no longer be contributing to the Time magazine's Swampland blog.
On 19 January 2009 she debuted on Air America Media as their first Washington DC based national correspondent. She was a frequent guest on The Rachel Maddow Show
. She also guest hosted the show in Maddow's absence on 4 September 2009. In 2009 Cox also became a contributing editor for Playboy
.
On the 17 February 2010 episode of ABC's 'Top Line' webcast it was announced Cox had become the Washington correspondent for GQ magazine.
Cox left Washington in March 2011 to deal with personal and family matters. It was later reported that she did not have plans to return.
, New York
, and Congressional Quarterly
. They reside in Washington DC.
In 2009 on an Amtrak
train from New York to Washington Cox had a severe allergic reaction
after eating a lentil
salad. Fox News host Greta Van Susteren
saw her choking and came to her aid with Benadryl
, after which Cox recovered. Cox later personally thanked Greta for saving her life.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
author and blog
Blog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...
ger. The founding editor of the political blog
Blog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...
Wonkette
Wonkette
Wonkette is a left-leaning American online magazine of topical satire and political gossip, established in 2004 by Gawker Media and founding editor Ana Marie Cox, and edited by Ken Layne from 2006 to 2011...
, she is currently the Washington correspondent for GQ and is The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
's lead blogger on US politics. She previously worked at Air America Media.
Early life
Cox was born in San JuanSan Juan, Puerto Rico
San Juan , officially Municipio de la Ciudad Capital San Juan Bautista , is the capital and most populous municipality in Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the United States. As of the 2010 census, it had a population of 395,326 making it the 46th-largest city under the jurisdiction of...
, Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...
. She attended high school at Lincoln Southeast High School
Lincoln Southeast High School
Lincoln Southeast High School is a public secondary-education school located in Lincoln, Nebraska, USA. It is part of the Lincoln Public Schools school district. Opening September 25, 1955 under the direction of Principal Hazel G. Scott with an enrollment of 652 students in grades 7-12, Southeast...
in Lincoln
Lincoln, Nebraska
The City of Lincoln is the capital and the second-most populous city of the US state of Nebraska. Lincoln is also the county seat of Lancaster County and the home of the University of Nebraska. Lincoln's 2010 Census population was 258,379....
, Nebraska
Nebraska
Nebraska is a state on the Great Plains of the Midwestern United States. The state's capital is Lincoln and its largest city is Omaha, on the Missouri River....
, where she wrote for the school's newspaper, The Clarion. She graduated from the University of Chicago
University of Chicago
The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...
with an AB in History in 1994. She began graduate school at the University of California at Berkeley, where she was studying American history, but left school and instead became an editorial assistant at the publishing company Alfred A. Knopf
Alfred A. Knopf
Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. is a New York publishing house, founded by Alfred A. Knopf, Sr. in 1915. It was acquired by Random House in 1960 and is now part of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group at Random House. The publishing house is known for its borzoi trademark , which was designed by co-founder...
.
Career
Cox was an editor of the progressive online magazine, Bad SubjectsBad Subjects
Bad Subjects is a research collaborative that operate generally out of California, United States under the name "Bad Subjects" as part of the open access electronic publishing cooperative EServer.org...
. Later, she was an executive editor of Suck.com
Suck.com
Suck.com was one of the earliest ad-supported content sites on the Internet. It featured daily editorial content on a wide variety of topics, including politics and pop-culture and was targeted at Generation X...
, where she wrote under the pen name
Pen name
A pen name, nom de plume, or literary double, is a pseudonym adopted by an author. A pen name may be used to make the author's name more distinctive, to disguise his or her gender, to distance an author from some or all of his or her works, to protect the author from retribution for his or her...
"Ann O'Tate" (wordplay on annotate).
In 2004, Cox became the founding editor of political blog
Blog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...
Wonkette
Wonkette
Wonkette is a left-leaning American online magazine of topical satire and political gossip, established in 2004 by Gawker Media and founding editor Ana Marie Cox, and edited by Ken Layne from 2006 to 2011...
. Under her tenure, Wonkette was a sportive commentary on Capitol Hill
United States Capitol
The United States Capitol is the meeting place of the United States Congress, the legislature of the federal government of the United States. Located in Washington, D.C., it sits atop Capitol Hill at the eastern end of the National Mall...
Washington politics, as well as more serious matters of politics and policy. Cox and Wonkette gained notoriety in the political world for publicizing the story of Jessica Cutler
Jessica Cutler
Jessica Louise Cutler is a blogger, an author, and former congressional staff assistant who was fired for detailing her active sexual life, including receiving money for having sex, in her blog.-Education:...
, also known as "Washingtonienne", a staff assistant to Senator
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
Mike DeWine
Mike DeWine
Richard Michael "Mike" DeWine is the Attorney General for the state of Ohio. He has held numerous offices on the state and federal level, including Ohio State Senator, four terms as a U.S. Congressman, Ohio Lt. Governor, and was a two-term U.S. Senator, serving from 1995 to 2007.- Biography :Born...
(R.
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
-Ohio
Ohio
Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...
), who accepted money from a George W. Bush
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
administration official and others in exchange for sexual favors. On January 5, 2006, she officially announced her retirement as the blog's editor and her imminent transition to "Wonkette Emerita".
Her novel Dog Days, a satire of Washington D.C. life for which she was reportedly paid $250,000, was published on January 6, 2006. On July 27, 2006 she was named the Washington editor of Time.com
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
, where she also writes The Ana Log. She is also under a mid-six-figures contract with Penguin to write a nonfiction book.
On 12 April 2007 Cox claimed on Time magazine's website that she agreed to appear on the Don Imus
Don Imus
John Donald "Don" Imus, Jr. is an American radio host, humorist, philanthropist and writer. His nationally-syndicated talk show, Imus in the Morning, is broadcast throughout the United States by Citadel Media and relayed on television by the Fox Business Network.-Personal life:Imus was born in...
radio show despite the show's history of racially and sexually charged content because she wanted to be considered part of the media elite. Cox wrote: "I'm embarrassed to admit that it took Imus saying something so devastatingly crass to make me realise there just was no reason beyond ego to play along. I did the show almost solely to earn my 'media elite' merit badge." Cox announced on 5 December 2008 that she would no longer be contributing to the Time magazine's Swampland blog.
On 19 January 2009 she debuted on Air America Media as their first Washington DC based national correspondent. She was a frequent guest on The Rachel Maddow Show
The Rachel Maddow Show (TV series)
The Rachel Maddow Show is a news and opinion television program that airs weeknights on MSNBC at 9:00 p.m. ET. It is hosted by Rachel Maddow, who gained popularity with her frequent appearances as a liberal pundit on various MSNBC programs. It is based on her former radio show of the same name...
. She also guest hosted the show in Maddow's absence on 4 September 2009. In 2009 Cox also became a contributing editor for Playboy
Playboy
Playboy is an American men's magazine that features photographs of nude women as well as journalism and fiction. It was founded in Chicago in 1953 by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. The magazine has grown into Playboy Enterprises, Inc., with...
.
On the 17 February 2010 episode of ABC's 'Top Line' webcast it was announced Cox had become the Washington correspondent for GQ magazine.
Cox left Washington in March 2011 to deal with personal and family matters. It was later reported that she did not have plans to return.
Personal life
Cox is married to Chris Lehmann, formerly of The Washington PostThe Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
, New York
New York (magazine)
New York is a weekly magazine principally concerned with the life, culture, politics, and style of New York City. Founded by Milton Glaser and Clay Felker in 1968 as a competitor to The New Yorker, it was brasher and less polite than that magazine, and established itself as a cradle of New...
, and Congressional Quarterly
Congressional Quarterly
Congressional Quarterly, Inc., or CQ, is a privately owned publishing company that produces a number of publications reporting primarily on the United States Congress...
. They reside in Washington DC.
In 2009 on an Amtrak
Amtrak
The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, doing business as Amtrak , is a government-owned corporation that was organized on May 1, 1971, to provide intercity passenger train service in the United States. "Amtrak" is a portmanteau of the words "America" and "track". It is headquartered at Union...
train from New York to Washington Cox had a severe allergic reaction
Allergy
An Allergy is a hypersensitivity disorder of the immune system. Allergic reactions occur when a person's immune system reacts to normally harmless substances in the environment. A substance that causes a reaction is called an allergen. These reactions are acquired, predictable, and rapid...
after eating a lentil
Lentil
The lentil is an edible pulse. It is a bushy annual plant of the legume family, grown for its lens-shaped seeds...
salad. Fox News host Greta Van Susteren
Greta Van Susteren
Greta Van Susteren is an American commentator and television personality on the Fox News Channel, where she hosts On the Record w/ Greta Van Susteren...
saw her choking and came to her aid with Benadryl
Benadryl
Benadryl is a brand name allergy medicine marketed over-the-counter by Johnson & Johnson subsidiary McNeil Consumer Healthcare. Prior to 2007, Benadryl was marketed by Pfizer Consumer Healthcare...
, after which Cox recovered. Cox later personally thanked Greta for saving her life.
External links
- Column archive at The GuardianThe GuardianThe Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
- Column archive at Mother JonesMother Jones (magazine)Mother Jones is an American independent news organization, featuring investigative and breaking news reporting on politics, the environment, human rights, and culture. Mother Jones has been nominated for 23 National Magazine Awards and has won six times, including for General Excellence in 2001,...
- Video discussions/debates videos featuring Cox on Bloggingheads.tvBloggingheads.tvBloggingheads.tv is a political, world events, philosophy, and science video blog discussion site in which the participants take part in an active back and forth conversation via webcam which is then broadcast online to viewers...
- Wonkette In The Flesh: An Evening with Ana Marie Cox, transcript of interview at Columbia Journalism School, October 2004
- South by Southwest Interactive audio interview, March 2005
- Cox's Wonkette post announcing her "ascension to Wonkette Emeritus"
- Washington Post article on Cox's retirement from Wonkette
- NYTimes.com Review of Dog Days