http://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/la-na-breitbart-rise-fall-20160318-story.html
Back in 2011, the feisty right-wing media personality Andrew Breitbart made a prediction about Donald Trump that turned out to be prophetic.
"Celebrity is everything in this country," Breitbart said in an appearance on Fox News, calling Trump "not a conservative."
Breitbart, who launched an irreverent, anti-establishment conservative news site that shares his name, said then that Trump's media savvy and his plans for a presidential run should be a warning to the Republican establishment. "If these guys don't learn how to play the media ... we're going to probably get a celebrity candidate."
Breitbart, who died in 2012, was right: Trump has become that celebrity candidate who threatens to redefine conservatism itself. Ignoring establishment orthodoxy, Trump has gained endless TV attention and overpowered establishment opponents, which has threatened to start a civil war over the future of the Republican Party.
But Breitbart did not foresee that the political tensions unleashed within the GOP by Trump's candidacy would consume his own conservative media empire.
It began last week when a Breitbart reporter accused Trump's campaign manager of violently grabbing her, which led to the resignations of several staffers who publicly denounced the company on the way out the door. They said that Breitbart had surrendered its editorial independence and become a mouthpiece for Trump, to the point that it valued protecting Trump's campaign more than standing behind one of its journalists.
“What's so unusual about Breitbart is it became completely indistinguishable from the Trump campaign.
— Eric Boehlert, senior fellow at liberal media watchdog Media Matters
