The Secret of the Young Cluck

Mssrs. Bogg and Ailes have been chronicling the thrilling junior detective adventures of Megan McArdle, who is exactly like Nancy Drew, only unappealing, obsessed with garish kitchen appliances, and (dammit) not fictional. This is McArdle's latest. It is actually rather remarkable. Sincerely. Here. Read this, and try to avoid remarking on it by exclaiming "whatthefuck," or some variation of similar:

There's been a bit of back and forth with some correspondents, asking why I was not outraged about the East Anglia hack?  Interestingly, no one has asked me why I wasn't outraged by the Buffalo reporter who called Scott Walker pretending to be David Koch--which seems to me to be a closer parallel.

Interestingly, Megan McArdle is paid to inform the public as to any inane, ideologically convenient non-sequiturs that flit into her capacious elfin skull.

It gets better!

Scientists and journalists are held to higher standards than, say, your average computer hacker. Trust in our work product is dependent on our personal integrity, because it can't always be verified independently.

I beg pardon, but I entirely missed Megan McArdle erupting in righteous wrath at any right-wing blogger, right-wing journalist, or "main-stream-media" figure who said boo about the fact that private correspondence was stolen and then grotesquely misrepresented. Why, I rather recall this particular lachrymose disingenuous crap emanating from her en-dive of a granite-countertopped Internet hangout back in the day, as it happens.

You have to love the "scientists and journalists" becoming the "our" up there, though.

The idea that Megan McArdle is "held to standards" would be comical, were not one to glumly realize that she does meet certain very firm standards every single time she blathers online. These are just not the standards of science or journalism. If she ever were to accidentally commit science or journalism, she would not hesitate to clutch her sterling-silver $8000 toaster to her bosom and most heartily repent her thoughtcrime.

Someone who has just said that it is very bad if you steal things, but has demonstrated that she has no problem using stolen goods, has a fascinating set of ethical guidelines, at least from a clinical point of view. Hence, I consider her newsletter oddly edifying, though I decline to subscribe to it, in any sense of the term.

(This post made me very tired. I was going to make fun of PowerLine, but that will have to wait until tomorrow.)