Robin “Rew” Marty answers my questions about Andy Birkey’s piece on last week’s vandalism of a “Soulforce Q” bus in Iowa…

…well, no. That’s not true. Robin – a high double-dog poobah at “Minnesota Monitor”, the local rentablog that swears it’s never gotten a nickel from George Soros, but has released no financials that I’m aware of – doesn’t “answer” the questions in the sense of “resolving ambiguities” or “filling in logical gaps”.

No, perhaps Robin – who is no dummy – giggles and smirks and avoids actually bothering with any of that “clarifying opacity” stuff that journalists are supposed to fuss over. Perhaps it’s in solidarity with most other leftybloggers; “nobody gives an intelligent answer until everyone can give an intelligent answer”.

In any case – we got nothin’ here:

So it’s Springtime, and young men’s fancy turns to thoughts of love, yadda yadda yadda…

I can only assume that’s what’s going on here, since Mitch has obviously developed a crush on me. He can barely make it a week without pulling my braids or stealing my lunch box or some sign that proves his underlying devotion to me.

Tee hee, but the only thing my heart turns to is Flash’s kegerator.

She claims that I do…

… a cute little insinuation that Andy Birkey has a disclosure he’s not disclosing:

What is Birkey’s relationship with “Soulforce Q”? While his sympathies are apparent in context (“Expect more events like these as Soulforce and the Equality Ride directly confront the institutions that produce this type of hatred”), his relationship is not.

Obviously not taking the time to see that Andy’s been covering Soulforce since October of 2006, he just assumes Andy’s making some sort of push in his own interest. I guess Mitch’s crush on me is more recent than I knew.

And that’d make two of us, but again, irrelevant.

No, I didn’t know that Andy Birkey’s been covering “Soulforce” for six months. In fact, I doubt most readers who happened onto the site would know it, or have the faintest idea about it. Nor, if you believe that journalism should be clear, should they have to. You don’t want your readers to have to dig great swathes of context out of your stories.
No, I was insinuating nothing. Read my original piece; I wondered why key elements of the story were left out, and from where Birkey drew his bout of clairvoyance?

The worst part is, he is still claiming that we must be part of Media Matters since we share offices with them, even though the Center moved offices a few months ago. I hope he hasn’t been sending me poetry to the DC office, since I’m not sure how long they forward the mail.

Aw, shucks. But again, the Minnesota Monitor’s parent organization – the one that paid rentabloggers like Marty and Jeff Fecke throughout the campaign and (presumably, though I could be wrong) still does, did share offices with Media Matters for quite some time. And try as I may (and I have), I can find no financial disclosures of any kind from that organization.

So Robin can giggle and smirk all she wants – and, indeed, she does…:

But his little spitballs and stickers on the back of my shirt are noticed and appreciated, and seen for what they truly are – an obviously smitten admirer.

Don’t worry Mitch, I’ll see you at the garage soon, and you can bring me the flowers.

…but the questions remain:

• Why didn’t Andy Birkey tell the entire story?  The fact that Dordt college cleaned the vans up with their own maintenance staff?  Would that have upset the “baaaad Christians vandalized us” narrative too badly?
• How does Minnesota Monitor’s “Pledge” square with that shortcoming?
• And, as re Minnesota Monitor, where does that money come from, anyway?  You guys yap endlessly about Michael Brodkorb being a “paid GOP operative”, even though he discloses his income fully and promptly.  Why won’t MNMon and the Center for Independent Media do this?

And love is best saved for those that are worthy. Like a fresh new M1911A1 or a Gibson Les Paul.

Sorry. But we can be friends!