Koch brothers pick a fight with The New Yorker

Oil baron brothers David and Charles Koch aren't the types to throw out old magazines, according to recent reports. The Koch brothers have taken up against the American Association of Magazine Editors, who recently nominated an anti-Koch New Yorker article for a National Magazine Award in reporting.

Jane Mayer's "Covert Operations: The Billionaire Brothers Who Are Waging War Against Obama" ran last August. The Koch brother declined to be interviewed for the piece.

Now, a representative for the Koch brothers has written a letter to the ASME board, protesting the nomination of Mayer's piece.

"Her article is ideologically slanted and a prime example of a disturbing trend in journalism, where agenda-driven advocacy masquerades as objective reporting," wrote Koch Industries Senior Vice President and general counsel Mark Holden, according to the New York Post.

Mayer said she tried to get either of the Koch brothers to agree to an interview for about five months, and that the brothers also refused to cooperate with the magazine's famously rigorous and thorough fact-checking operation.

David Remnick, editor of the magazine, defended Mayer's work.

"Jane Mayer put together an accurate and honest piece of reporting. To watch them go around to try to undermine a superb piece of reportage is pathetic," he told the Post.