Okay, It's Ugly And Stupid, But...

I don't advise going here. It's a nasty little blogwar with a couple of liars and a couple of (god bless 'em) AoS Digital Brownshirts giving them hell.

But, some people may be interested in such nastiness, so here.

I don't mind giving them traffic today, because I suspect, for most people who click, it will be one of the last times they check out the very credible, and very honest, and very civil Q and O.

Who, by the way, I never read, because the blog sucks. Yeahp-- I said never. I still don't think I've actually ever "read" their blog in the sense of actually going to it of my own desire. It was always off an Insty link (in which I usually just quoted Insty's own quote) or an email tip or, of course, Allah.

If I've ever actually gone to Q&O before the past two days, I'd be surprised.

There were a couple of days when I was desperate to post and started randomly clicking on my blogroll... but even then, I don't think I bothered with Q & O.

Blogwar Over: Jon, who I think is really the prime mover of the Q&O site, has attempted to de-escalate things, and has been fair. And I've apologized to him for, in a fit of juvenile anger, declaring "this blog sucks." (His, I mean. My does suck, as you all are painfully aware.)

McQ and the prissy, preening, pretentious prancing pretty pony Dale Franks have had their heads served to them so forcefully, and in so many permutations (underhanded lob, overhand smash, in your face spike) that there hardly seems to be any further point to it.

Except that, I suppose, I would like Jon to print a retraction, or a correction, or his own take on the matter, but at this point I don't think it matters if he does or not. I won't sweat it either way. I think he ought to, but I know he has a couple of idiots to deal with, so I'll accept his decision to let scary-thoughtful and always-civil superblogger "Dale Franks" leave his asinine post up for the world to read.

"someone" told me that I was crossing the, um, Blogger Obsession Disorder line, and he was right. I have, by and large, refrained from getting into these comment pissing-matches, and my Rule Zero has served me in good stead. In the past week I've sparred with Idiot Paul from Wizbang and now lying prancing ponies McQ and Franks from Q&O, and during that time, my blog suffered, my blood pressure spiked, and I behaved in a juvenile fashion that served me no bit of good.

That's it for me. I hope I have the forebearance to avoid commenting on a post attacking me.

Like the forbearance that Glenn Greenwald has shown on countless occasions, avoiding all comment in posts denigrating him. Fortunately for him he had "Rick Ellensburg" and "Ellison" and "Wilson" and "Ryan" to make his points for him, whereas I didn't.

(Okay-- I did have the amazing Megan, and John, and Pablo, and Warden, and JackStraw, and a few I'm sure I'm forgetting. But they are, as I've said before, sock-puppets themselves. I don't have real people defending me like Glenn Greenwald does.)

Blogwar Back On: Dale Franks just doesn't know when to quit.

Deciding to "prove" I read his blog -- which I don't, by the way -- he googles to find me linking them. One of his examples is a case of a COMMENTER linking Q&O in a thread.

Okay, fine.

The first batch of examples of me "reading his blog" all end with me writing "Thanks to Instapundit for the Q&O" quote and "Thanks to Allah." Like I told him: I only even see his site when I get tipped about it, or read a quote on Instapundit.

McQ posted one of these citations as "evidence" I read the blog, but somehow forgot to include the key sentence at the end: "Thanks to Instapundit for the Q&O quote."

Well, now Dale, digging e'er deeper, finds five or more citations to Q&O over the past two years, and some of these, he triumphantly announces, don't have hat-tips to them, thus proving I came to Q&O without prompting.

Apparently he disregards the possibility that I didn't tip anyone for these posts as the tip came from a Q&O blogger himself. Like, for example, McQ:

Re: "New Evidence of Ace Links Without Attribution"

Hey, guys? Ever realize I don’t hat-tip when the tipster himself is tipping to his own blog?

How’s this email grab ya:

....

from McQ to Allah [and a long list of addressees, including me]

Guys … through a particularly good connection I have obtained and posted a copy of Jesse Macbeth’s original and unaltered DD214. It is clear as a bell and shows he was a Chapter 11 discharge with all of 1 month and 13 days in basic training.

I have it on line now at:
http://www.qando.net/details.aspx?Entry=3957

See, when a blogger sends you a tip, and you link it, you don't say "McQ has the story. Hat-tip: McQ." You just post it.

There's no reason to hat-tip, and no one ever does it in that situation. Plus, we bloggers like to hide the fact that we're relentlessly promoting our blogs through email. Well, I don't really do that very much, but a lot of people do.

To recap: When a tip comes from the blogger himself, no hat-tip. No attribution. The illusion is created that the linking-blogger just found the piece himself, because he's such a fan of the site.

Instapundit doesn't hat-tip me when he (occasionally) links me. And a lot of those links come at my own prompting. So he does me the favor and pretends he was just reading Ace of Spades HQ one day and came across an interesting piece.

Now, I really don't feel like going through my email box and proving all of my unattributed Q&O links are the direct result of blog-pimping emails (maybe even by Dale Franks himself), but if he's going to be an absolute asshole about this, I can do so. I seem to have a lot of Q&O emails in my box, despite the fact that I have never, until an hour ago, written one of them an email myself.

(Except, maybe, those two times when I sent EVERYBODY in my mailbox a tip.)

So, keep it up, Dale. If you want me to expose you for how petty, dishonest, and, in the scheme of things -- even in the no-account world of blogging -- meaningless you are, keep it up.

I had thought a truce was the best policy, but, given that you had your ass handed to you so thoroughly in the comments, you thought you'd be cute and just start posting new lies on the front page.

posted by Ace at 05:16 PM

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