The Nation Exposes My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy

The hostility of segments of the Christian right to Romney coincides with its mounting interest in Fred Thompson. Less than two weeks before Focus on the Family launched its attack on Romney, the Family Research Council began an informal campaign to rally support for Thompson.

Without fanfare, the Family Research Council's director of web communications, Joe Carter, and the group's web editor, Jared Bridges, founded Blogs for Fred, a website that alternately shields Thompson from criticism and promotes him as the Great Right Hope. When Carter and Bridges are not plumping for Thompson, they blog on the website of the Family Research Council, advancing the causes of faith, family and freedom for the purportedly nonpartisan 501(c)(3) organization.

If you're surprised to find that Blogs for Fred is part of an "informal campaign" by the Family Research Council, you're not alone. It comes as a surprise to us too. Although Jared and I both work for FRC, we've been careful to keep our formal jobs completely separate from this site. FRC is, as Max notes, a nonpartisan organization that cannot, does not, and will not endorse political candidates. As private citizens, though, we have the right to promote and shield from criticism anyone we choose. We choose Fred, our Great Right Hope.

Max continues:

In the meantime, Carter has found time to attack other religious-minded bloggers for alleging that the Family Research Council's criticism of Romney is motivated by political partisanship. When The Rev. Dan Schultz, author of the progressive Christian blog Street Prophets, said, "The Religious Right has decided to stick a shiv in Romney's campaign," Carter posted a petulant response on Schultz's blog accusing him of having a "conspiratorial mindset." Carter also went out of his way to defend his boss, Tony Perkins, from charges that the Family Research Council president might be involved in a plot against Romney, despite his having trashed Romney to the AP. "There is no vast right-wing conspiracy," Carter said. "There are just people advocating for their positions."

Indeed, I did accuse Rev. Schultz and his fellow Kos Kids of having a "conspiratorial mindset." That seemed to me a much more polite response than calling them a bunch of tinfoil hat wearing nutjobs. The Street Prophets blog, part of the "DailyKos community", is regrettably prone to believing the most elaborate of Vast Right Wing Conspiracies. In this case, they believe that a cabal of "religious right" operatives (including, it appears, me) joined forces with the Boston Globe(!) to stick a shiv in Romney's campaign.

Part of the problem is that for people who hang out at the Borg collective known as DailyKos, criticizing someone with similar political views really is akin to "sticking a shiv" in them. We conservatives, however, would call this "valid criticism." In this case, however, it is neither. While I've been critical of Giuliani, McCain, and even Thompson, I've never had a harsh word for Romney.

But Max also fails to apply the first rule of investigative journalism: "Follow the Pronouns." Consider this section:

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, which functions as Focus's Washington lobbying arm, immediately joined the pile-on. He briefed the Associated Press on the record, explaining that Romney must "take some responsibility" for his supposed connection to Marriott's porn profiteering. The AP report on the accusation against Romney was subsequently reprinted in the pages of major outlets from the Boston Globe to the Washington Post.

Notice how Max puts quotes around what Perkins supposedly said. Now let's look at the actual quote by Perkins:

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, a leading conservative group in Washington, said: "They have to assume some responsibility. It's their hotels, it's their television sets."

If we "follow the pronouns" we see that Perkins uses "They", "their", and "their." The usage of plural pronouns--as well as the context of the AP story--shows that he is referring not to Romney but to the Mariott Hotel chain.

Now either Max is being intentionally deceptive, or he is just sloppy. I prefer to believe--based on prior experience with his "reporting"--that he is simply a poor excuse for a journalist who obtained his position because of nepotism. Of course I could be wrong; he might just be a liar.

In fact, Brien Shea, founder of The Fred Store, denies that he ever told Max that his company "openly seeks a lucrative contract with the Thompson campaign." So maybe Max is both sloppy and deceitful.

He is also unquestionably vindictive.

Back in May, Max wrote a entry on The Huffington Post and made the rookie mistake of hotlinking to an image on FRC's servers. Jared and I decided to pull a silly, juvenile prank by replacing the image. We figured that Max would be a bit miffed, a touch embarrassed, but that since he himself likes to annoy people (he even made it on a CNN segment on heckling) that he would be able to take a joke without becoming emotionally unhinged.

Unfortunately, that wasn't the case.

Max went nuts. For about a week afterward he tried to smear me as a "racist's racist" for a post I wrote in which I quoted atheist professor Richard Dawkins. Max thought I had made the statement, but when he realized that it was Dawkins, he admitted that the British zoologist was the real racist -- but that I was a racist for quoting him. Such is the logic of the Left.
This went on for about a week before I realized that Max was nothing but a petulant boy who, unable to stand the taste of public embarrassment, spits out bile and slander. So I was expecting him to lash out again. I just wasn't expecting it to be so….well, so flattering.

Max may think that portraying Jared and me as powerful political operatives is a damning accusation. But since we are the illegitimate children of, respectively, Lee Atwater and Karl Rove, we take it as quite a compliment. In fact, our daddies would be proud. Just as I'm sure Sid is proud of lil' Maxie.