Kos and Jerome Armstrong respond. via Ed Cone.

I’ll stick by with what I said. I’ll add that the timing of this is real unfortunate because it is distracting folks from something that occured that used your money for an illegal purpose.

I despise folks that attempt to make people look bad for their political gain.

Zephyr Teachout admits to a Dean campain practice: paying off bloggers “to ensure that they said positive things about Dean”.

There is a tremendous difference between this and the Williams situation: one was paid off with tax payer dollars, the others were paid off to be part of a campaign they clearly believed in, with campaign funds. One was illegal. One was not. One did not make disclosures. The others did.

Jeff Jarvis raises many questions that are worth discussing.

Being paid to do what you love is no wrong thing. In fact – that’s the right idea if you ask me. But can you trust a pundit/journalist who is being paid by some entity to faithfully report about that same entity? That’s tough. Sometimes getting paid helps you become an expert in your field. At other times – it leaves you nothing more than a paid hack.

The question has come up many times before. The way Dan Gillmor has handled this in the past has always impressed me.

Similarly, you rarely hear me mention Comcast, Philly.com, KRD, or any of my previous employers because you can’t trust what I say about them 100%.

More at EdCone.com and rc3.org.