Friday, August 17, 2007

NLS eavesdropped on ODBA

Where are the "ethical" bloggers to protest Ben Tribbett's eavesdropping on the ODBA?

There are conservative bloggers who feel we should be more genteel and civil in our discourse ... embrace the libs, if you will ... and it has been a sticking point with me since I began blogging.

What I discovered when I jumped into the Virginia blogosphere was most libs were viciously attacking George Allen, gleefully jumping all over "macaca," trying to take Virgil Goode down because he was aware of the Muslim danger in this country, and going after every other Republican candidate/official they could write about.

I was shocked at the vitriol and profanity that was written and, yet, there were conservatives who insisted we must take a "nicer" tone ... and even distanced themselves from those who tried to fight fire with fire. We all remember the Waldo/Shaun/Dog episode.

The Old Dominion Blog Alliance features "right-of-center" bloggers from all over Virginia, and we have a message board for communicating with other members of the group. It was revealed by Ben Tribbett yesterday that he had been reading our correspondence for a while.

Today Jim Riley at Virginia Virtucon takes him to task:

Now, it is no secret that we here at Virtucon and several other conservative blogs in Virginia are part of what is called the “Old Dominion Blog Alliance.” Heck, we proudly display our seal on our blogs, list blogrolls and even put up RSS feeds from it. We also have a private Yahoo! group that is accessible and only viewable to members of the ODBA. We use this and its email distribution list to discuss topics, share news and yes — even strategize and coordinate. (Shocking, I know!)

Well, what will surprise you is this comment from Ben:
A lot of the conservative blogs are members of a group called the “Old Dominion Blog Alliance“. I usually just sit back and read the emails from that list with amusement…
Whether these emails are being forwarded to Ben via a mole in the group or one of the little noticed members of the group is actually him, this is perhaps the most unethical thing to have been perpetrated upon the Virginia blogosphere since its inception (and that includes the “Too Conservative” incident that we uncovered.)

Call it what you will, but the bottom line is Democrats have adopted Watergate-style tactics and ethics here in Virginia, secretly spying on their political enemies. We shouldn’t be surprised, though – after all, it is the party of Clinton.
Those who are so quick to sling "ethics" around are being awfully quiet....

Related posts at Spark It Up!!! and Leslie Carbone and Cathouse Chat and Good Sense and Black Velvet Bruce Li and J's Notes and Ward View and Deo Vindice and Virginia Oddsmaker.

Updated roundup from Leslie Carbone.

1 comment:

Charles said...

I won't go into the ethics of intercepting e-mails by means that are dishonest, or if NLS is doing so. If I did, I would say that if the e-mails were properly labelled as protected communication, and if getting on the e-mail list required a signed statement respecting privacy of the communication, then:

1) if Ben signed up himself using a fake name, that would be a fault against him
2) If someone sent Ben the e-mails, it would be THAT person, not Ben, with the ethical problems.

My comment though is this: Unless you are talking to yourself, if you say something you don't want someone else to know, they'll end up knowing about it. And sometimes, even talking to yourself can be risky.