The pattern is simple. The paid-for writer (an individual or a group) writes a series of pieces that sound reasonable, then they throw in a paid-for zinger. Since much of what they write is reasonable, the hope is you will expect the paid-for piece must also somehow be reasonable.

Ran across this in the local political weblogs, first. There is a character who goes under the pseudonym "Jubal" when posting. He posts a lot. Sometimes the posts are somewhat reasonable. Other times they are not. Turns out "Jubal" is in fact Mathew Cunningham, whose business is "opinion management".

Seems he is not alone.

You can see a similar pattern in the postings of the CATO Institute – a series of reasonable notions, then a paid-for zinger. Their main paid-for theme seems to be "don't tax rich folks".

Funny bit – they allowed comments at first. After I added a "this does not make sense" comment to one of their more blatant zingers, they turned off comments. :)

Always did wonder what all those "institutes" based in Washington were about…

I hope really hope these people have trouble sleeping at night …

Way to earn an honest living … loser