To Blog Or Not To Blog

"The bottom line: Journalists who are afraid to speak as themselves in public. They thus separate themselves from the public they serve: scared of us or feeling superior to us, but not among us in any case. That is a mistake and an insult . . .

"Here's Hiltzik choosing to enter into a conversation with the public -- the act of blogging is precisely that -- but then pulling back to refuse to interact with honestly, at eye level. It's an act of lying and of cowardice. He complains that others online hide behind anonymity. And I agree with him in my general mistrust of the anonymous. But he doesn't get to hide behind that. He has a byline and a podium and he can't dash in and out of the closet, try as he might."

John Hinderaker applauds the CIA's firing of Mary McCarthy, accused of being of one of Dana Priest's sources:

"My only regret is that the investigations didn't start sooner. Democrats in the CIA have been conducting a leak war against the Bush administration for at least the past three years. Perhaps if the law had been enforced more vigorously long ago, the later leaks, which were even more damaging to national security, might not have occurred."

Well, McCarthy gave $2,000 to John Kerry, but how does Hinderaker know the other leakers are Democrats? Could there be such a thing as a nonpartisan whistleblower? And wasn't Scooter Libby--a certified Republican--indicted in a leak case as well?

The NYT and TheNYTandWP have McCarthy profiles.

But on National Review's The Corner , Andy McCarthy says:

"There is no mention by the Post -- none -- that Mary McCarthy is a big Kerry campaign and Democratic Party contributor.

"How can the WPost justify reporting one friend's mere impression that McCarthy is not biased and that it is very difficult even for those who know her well to understand why she would leak sensitive information, and yet not report the objective fact that -- after a meteoric professional rise in intelligence circles during a Democratic administration -- McCarthy, while a government official on a government salary, gave at least $7,700 of her own money in a single year to Democratic political campaigns?"

I would agree. Absolutely relevant information.

Ron Burkle, the guy who accused former Page Sixer Jared Stern of shaking him down, makes lots of money by being a Friend of Bill --and so does Bill.

Brad Blog is ecstatic over the latest "New Low for Bush" survey: