64 Facts About Andrew Sullivan

1.

Andrew Michael Sullivan was born on 10 August 1963 and is a British-American author, editor, and blogger.

2.

Andrew Sullivan started a political blog, The Daily Dish, in 2000, and eventually moved his blog to platforms, including Time, The Atlantic, The Daily Beast, and finally an independent subscription-based format.

3.

From 2016 to 2020, Andrew Sullivan was a writer-at-large at New York.

4.

Andrew Sullivan has stated that his conservatism is rooted in his Catholic background and in the ideas of the British political philosopher Michael Oakeshott.

5.

Andrew Sullivan was born in South Godstone, Surrey, England, into a Catholic family of Irish descent, and was brought up in the nearby town of East Grinstead, West Sussex.

6.

Andrew Sullivan won a scholarship in 1981 to Magdalen College, Oxford, where he was awarded a first-class Bachelor of Arts in modern history and modern languages.

7.

Andrew Sullivan founded the Pooh Stick Society at Oxford, and in his second year, he was elected President of the Oxford Union for Trinity term 1983.

8.

Andrew Sullivan's dissertation was titled Intimations Pursued: The Voice of Practice in the Conversation of Michael Oakeshott.

9.

Andrew Sullivan first wrote for The Daily Telegraph on American politics.

10.

Andrew Sullivan was appointed the editor of The New Republic in October 1991, a position he held until 1996.

11.

In 1994, Andrew Sullivan published excerpts on race and intelligence from Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray's controversial The Bell Curve, which argued that some of the measured difference in IQ scores among racially defined groups was a result of genetic inheritance.

12.

Andrew Sullivan began writing for The New York Times Magazine in 1998, but was fired by editor Adam Moss in 2002.

13.

Jack Shafer wrote in Slate magazine that he had asked Moss in an e-mail to explain this decision, but that his e-mails went unanswered, adding that Andrew Sullivan was not fully forthcoming on the subject.

14.

Andrew Sullivan wrote on his blog that the decision had been made by Times executive editor Howell Raines, who found Andrew Sullivan's presence "uncomfortable", but defended Raines's right to fire him.

15.

Andrew Sullivan suggested that Raines had done so in response to Andrew Sullivan's criticism of the Times on his blog, and said he had expected that his criticisms would eventually anger Raines.

16.

Andrew Sullivan has worked as a columnist for The Sunday Times of London.

17.

Ross Douthat and Tyler Cowen have suggested that Andrew Sullivan is the most influential political writer of his generation, particularly because of his very early and strident support for same-sex marriage, his early political blog, his support of the Iraq War, and his subsequent support of Barack Obama's presidential candidacy.

18.

On July 19,2020, following the unexplained absence of his column for June 5, Andrew Sullivan announced that he would no longer write for New York.

19.

Andrew Sullivan announced he would be reviving The Dish as a newsletter, The Weekly Dish, hosted by Substack.

20.

Andrew Sullivan describes himself as a conservative and is the author of The Conservative Soul.

21.

Andrew Sullivan has supported a number of traditional libertarian positions, favouring limited government and opposing social interventionist measures such as affirmative action.

22.

One of the most important intellectual and political influences on Andrew Sullivan is Michael Oakeshott.

23.

Andrew Sullivan endorsed Senator Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination in the 2008 United States presidential election, and Representative Ron Paul for the Republican nomination.

24.

Andrew Sullivan devoted a significant amount of space on The Atlantic, questioning whether Palin is Trig's biological mother.

25.

Andrew Sullivan seeks as a good Oakeshottian would to reform the country's policies in order to regain the country's past virtues.

26.

Andrew Sullivan argues that the Republican Party, and much of the conservative movement in the United States, has largely abandoned its earlier scepticism and moderation in favour of a more fundamentalist certainty, both in religious and political terms.

27.

Andrew Sullivan has said this is the primary source of his alienation from the modern Republican Party.

28.

Andrew Sullivan rejected the "liberal" label and set out his grounds in a published article in response.

29.

Andrew Sullivan accused Jeong of spreading eliminationist rhetoric; a belief that political opponents are a societal cancer that should be separated, censored or exterminated.

30.

Andrew Sullivan wrote the first major article in the United States advocating for gay people to be given the right to marry, published in The New Republic in 1989.

31.

In 2014, Andrew Sullivan opposed calls to remove Brendan Eich as CEO of Mozilla for donating to the campaign for Proposition 8, which made same-sex marriage illegal in California.

32.

In November 2019, Andrew Sullivan wrote another Intelligencer column on young women who, in their teens, had begun to transition to live as men but who later detransitioned.

33.

In 2006, Andrew Sullivan was named an LGBT History Month icon.

34.

Andrew Sullivan supported the 2003 invasion of Iraq by the United States and was initially hawkish in the war on terror, arguing that weakness would embolden terrorists.

35.

Later, Andrew Sullivan criticised the Bush administration for its prosecution of the war, especially regarding the numbers of troops, protection of munitions, and treatment of prisoners, including the use of torture against detainees in United States custody.

36.

In retrospect, Andrew Sullivan said that the torture and abuse of prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq had jolted him back to "sanity".

37.

Andrew Sullivan authored an opinion piece, "Dear President Bush," that was featured as the cover article of the October 2009 edition of The Atlantic magazine.

38.

Andrew Sullivan rejected the accusation and was defended by some writers, while others at least partly supported Wieseltier.

39.

In March 2019, Andrew Sullivan wrote in New York magazine that while he strongly supported the right of a Jewish state to exist, he felt that United States Representative Ilhan Omar's comments about the influence of the pro-Israel lobby were largely correct.

40.

Andrew Sullivan devoted a significant amount of blog space to covering the allegations of fraud and related protests after the 2009 Iranian presidential election.

41.

Andrew Sullivan was inspired by the Iranian people's reactions to the election results and used his blog as a hub of information.

42.

Andrew Sullivan frequently quoted and linked to Nico Pitney of The Huffington Post.

43.

Andrew Sullivan has advocated for tighter immigration controls on asylum and overall lower levels of immigration.

44.

Andrew Sullivan has criticized Democrats for what he perceived as their unwillingness to implement such controls.

45.

Andrew Sullivan still believes race is a reasonable prism through which to view the world, and that if only our racial stereotypes are "true," they are acceptable.

46.

Andrew Sullivan is therefore an unreliable and ideologically-biased guide to political and social science.

47.

Andrew Sullivan identifies himself as a faithful Catholic while disagreeing with some aspects of the Catholic Church's doctrine.

48.

Andrew Sullivan expressed concern about the election of Pope Benedict XVI in a Time magazine article on 24 April 2005, titled "The Vicar of Orthodoxy".

49.

Andrew Sullivan wrote that Benedict was opposed to the modern world and women's rights, and considered gays and lesbians innately disposed to evil.

50.

Andrew Sullivan has agreed with Benedict's assertion that reason is an integral element of faith.

51.

Andrew Sullivan takes a moderate approach to religion, rejecting fundamentalism and describing himself as a "dogged defender of pluralism and secularism".

52.

Andrew Sullivan defended religious moderates in a series of exchanges with atheist author Sam Harris.

53.

In late 2000, Andrew Sullivan began his blog, The Daily Dish.

54.

Andrew Sullivan believes recognition of same-sex marriage is a civil-rights issue but expressed willingness to promote it on a state-by-state legislative federalism basis, rather than trying to judicially impose the change.

55.

Andrew Sullivan gave out yearly "awards" for various public statements, parodying those of the people the awards were named after.

56.

In February 2007, Andrew Sullivan moved his blog from Time to The Atlantic Monthly, where he had accepted an editorial post.

57.

Andrew Sullivan left The Atlantic to begin blogging at The Daily Beast in April 2011.

58.

Andrew Sullivan posted his final blog entry on 6 February 2015.

59.

In July 2020, Andrew Sullivan announced that The Dish would be revived as a weekly feature, including a column and podcast; he published there and elsewhere a notable obituary of Queen Elizabeth II.

60.

Andrew Sullivan was widely criticised in the media for this, with some critics noting that he had condemned President Bill Clinton's "incautious behavior", though others wrote in his defence.

61.

In 2003, Andrew Sullivan wrote a Salon article identifying himself as a member of the gay "bear community".

62.

Andrew Sullivan was barred for many years from applying for United States citizenship because of his HIV-positive status.

63.

On 1 December 2016, Andrew Sullivan became a naturalised US citizen.

64.

Andrew Sullivan has been a daily user of marijuana since 2001.