Someone asked me, in relation to my series  (Parts I, II and III)  on the Minnesota Monitor’s sloppy attribution and possible apparent plagiarism – “why are you pounding so hard on Jeff Fecke?”

I’ll cite Michael Corleone; “It’s not personal.  It’s business”. 

Oh, I’ll cop to having “creative differences” with Fecke; his non-Monitor blogging over the past few years has slid into a morass of Atrios-style snarking.  It irritates me, as a conservative, as a blogger, and as a reader. 

But that hardly makes Fecke unique among leftybloggers; he’s been doing it a long time, and among what passes for the mainstream of leftybloggers, he’s no worse than most, better than quite a few. 

It is business.

Part of it is that, as someone who once did aspire to be a journalist, it sticks in my craw when I see people practicing the craft shoddily – even allowing that I was no master of the craft myself.  As a conservative, it irritates me even more when that slipshod craft is practiced toward partisan ends.

But above all?

We – overtly partisan bloggers of the left and the right – are engaged in a battle for the hearts and minds of Americans; of Minnesotans.  Left-leaning benefactors – from George Soros on down – are pouring a lot of money into trying to win that battle, from projects big (bankrolling attack-PR firm “Media Matters for America”, with whom the Monitor’s parent organization, the Center for Independent Media, used to share offices) to small (trying to establish online publications like the Monitor and its sister publications, Colorado Confidential and the ironically-named Iowa Independant as reputable “news” organizations).  They are – in my opinion – trying to buy credibility. 

It’s working, in many respects; the mainstream media routinely carries Media Matters hit pieces as if they were independent research; some local media give the Monitor, likewise, complete credence.  Hiring Eric Black wasn’t a bad move toward that end, one must admit.

Against that, the center-right independent alternative media has…well, not a lot of money, at least none that I’ve seen filtering down to us lil’ ol’ conservative bloggers in Minnesota. 

Just facts. 

In my three-part series, I presented a bunch of them; either shoddy attribution or plagiarism, depending on your definition of either.  I present them, unvarnished, to help the unaligned news consumer and voter gauge the credence they want to give the various news – and alternative news – options available to them.

And in the online world, facts are available like never before.

So I’d like to present this challenge to center-right bloggers in Minnesota; look over the Monitor.  Find the quotes that are presented as if they were direct quotes made to Monitor reporters – in other words, quotes that are not attributed to press releases, AP copy, or linked to news organization websites or other blogs.  And if you’re a center-right blogger in Iowa or Colorado, you can follow suit with your local Center for Independent Media affiliate as well.

Google ’em. 

See if you get any hits. 

If  you do, see if those hits predate the MinMon/ColCon/IoIndy piece in which the otherwise-unattributed quote appeared.

If so – publish it in your blog.  Let the world know.  Shine a light on the type of “credibility” that the lefty plutocrats’ pieces of silver have bought them.    

And please keep me posted.

The battle for this nation’s hearts and minds needs to be fought at a higher level.

So let’s fight it.