For  decades, most conservative leaders (and nearly all elected Republicans) could be  reliably intimidated by name-calling, especially by allegations of racism.   Andrew Breitbart didn't care what his opponents called him. n Instead of  apologizing, he turned a new media spotlight back on the accusers.  In the  process, he broke major stories that "mainstream" reporters wouldn't  touch.

Breitbart  particularly despised the left's efforts to silence opposing views by labeling  them as "hate speech."  And when he told fellow conservatives not to fear  being attacked as racist, sexist, homophobic, and Islamophobic, no one could say  he didn't practice what he preached.  Breitbart's standard response to such  slander amounted to two words: "f*** you."  This, along with a few other  stray profanities, has earned the film an "R" rating, which the producers hope  to reverse.

Andrew  Breitbart came to national attention in 2009 as the Tea Party movement was  forming.  Shaken by the explosion of anti-tax grassroots activism, the  institutional left wheeled out its biggest weapon -- accusations of racism -- as  the media called the movement "too white" and hostile to minorities.  When  the editorial propaganda had little impact, Congressional Black Caucus members  accused Tea Party protesters on Capitol Hill of screaming racial slurs at  them.  Despite the absence of any evidence, the Democrat media eagerly  promoted the charges.

Breitbart's  characteristic response was to confront the slander head-on.  After  tracking down and reviewing multiple video clips of the event, he publicly  offered to donate $10,000 to the United Negro College Fund if anyone could  substantiate a single racial slur -- an offer he eventually raised to  $100,000.  As Hating Breitbart demonstrates, the old media ignored  the videos he provided to document the incident and continued to push their  racial narrative -- even as the race-baiting congressmen became increasingly  reluctant to discuss the matter. The outcome was a clear win for Breitbart and  what he called his "new media army."  In another segment, Breitbart can be  seen asking audience members to hold their cameras up in the air.  As  virtually everyone in the crowd waved a camera or smart phones, his message was  clear: why should we rely on partisan "journalists" who manipulate the news to  serve an agenda?  We are the media.

Hating  Breitbart is clearly a labor of love, and as such, it has a fair number of  "inside baseball" moments.  Some viewers may tire of watching Breitbart  lounge around hotel rooms being quirky and mercurial, at the expense of more  footage of his powerful public appearances.  However, both of the  "operating modes" Breitbart claimed as his complete repertoire -- jocularity and  righteous indignation -- are fairly represented.  His righteous indignation  usually targeted the left's politics of division, which he summarizes crisply as  "the opposite of e pluribus unum."

Andrew  Breitbart had a keen understanding of how the left operates.  He knew how  organizers create  and advance a "narrative"  -- a useful story based on inflammatory lies.  Moreover, he understood how  news operations and news cycles function.  He greatly amplified the impact  of the O'Keefe-Giles ACORN  videos  by rolling them out in stages, allowing ACORN leaders to compound the damage by  falsely claiming the duo had been "turned away" in other cities when they  solicited taxpayer-funded help for their supposed underage prostitution  business.

In  addition to his tactical skills, Breitbart had an instinctive sense for the  possibilities created by new communications technologies and a flair for the  unconventional.  In many ways he was the antithesis of the old media  caricature of a conservative activist.  In one entertaining segment,  Breitbart is shown telling a New Orleans audience that his excessive partying as a college student at Tulane insulated him  from the worst of the leftist indoctrination purveyed there.

Breitbart's  media scoops followed a pattern: they were initially ignored, then he was  reviled for promoting them, then he was proven right.  The old media tended  to overlook the last stage, but his triumphs resonated across the new media he  represented so effectively.  Tea Party groups were vindicated, ACORN offices shut down across the country, and  Anthony Weiner's much-touted political career came to a sudden end.  Is it any wonder that  the leftists hated the man?

Whether  Andrew Breitbart will be remembered as an aberration or a prototype remains to  be seen, but he understood something that conservatives too often forget:  politics is not a business or a game.  Our freedom is under attack, and  this is a war.  At his formidable peak, Breitbart was conservatism's most  inspirational leader. His leadership has ended. The inspiration  remains.