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Fumento will have to do better

In the ongoing saga that is Michael Fumento’s ego, comes the latest in which he supposedly addresses Tim Lambert’s claims that:

IP’s of those scrubbing Fumento’s Wikipedia entry match the IP of comments left at Tim Lambert’s blog. That IP can be seen at Wikipedia here and it is 69.143.188.141.

Tim claims further that IP address matches the comments at his blog of Tracy Spenser.

I did another post on this subject here where someone claiming to be Michael Fumento left a comment. The person who left that comment’s IP was also 69.143.188.141, which matched both the IP address that Tim Lambert posted and the IP address of the person editing Michael Fumento’s Wikipedia entry.

Fumento responds thusly:

So instead he merely claims I have posted on his website, using a false name. In blogging terminology, that’s using a “sockpuppet.” He claims he’s compared my IP address to that of the alleged sockpuppet’s and they’re the same. Problem is, the only proof is is his word and this is the word of not just anybody but of Tim Lambert. Conversely, when John Lott used his “Mary Roush” sockpuppet, numerous people were able to confirm that Roush’s and Lott’s IP address were the same. [I wrote this in error: Turns out when Lott’s IP address was correlated with Roush’s, he immediately admitted he and Roush were the same. This puts him far above Lambert, who caught red-handed admit to nothing.]

At the same time, Lambert has accused me of rewriting my own Wikipedia entry. Actually he rewrote it; I attempted to strike it. (I couldn’t, for the wonderful reason that Lambert was there first.) Why did I try to strike it? I don’t feel encyclopedia entries are the places for vendettas. It’s not appropriate in the Encyclopedia Brittanica nor is it in Wikipedia.

I’ll repeat, that IP address matches the comments left at my blog.

He then goes on a tirade accusing Lambert of using sock puppets and prior to that made reference to Tim’s Jihdadists friends. Nice. That’s the Fumento I remember. Regardless, Fumento did not mention that I confirmed the IP address left in the comments here. That means one of three things likely are happening:

1 – Tim’s accusations are correct.
2 – That someone, who also happens to live in the same town he does and happens to like defending Fumento, is impersonating Fumento. Or that someone is masking their IP.
3 – Tim is lying

Which is more believable?

Since Fumento left a comment here and never acknowledged that on his blog, the leads me to believe that either his impostor posted here or he chose not to mention it because he knew it wouldn’t lend to his story. So, Mr. Fumento, is someone who happens to live in your town (or who masks their IP to make it appear that way) impersonating you? Did you or did you not leave a comment on my blog? I think you did since you admitted that was you changing the Wikipedia entry. Now, all I need to believe you’re using sockpuppets is access to Tim Lambert’s logs showing that IP matches the Wikipedia entry.

And I should say upfront that I have never taken issue with Fumento’s work necessarily. I have taken issue with the fact he’s a prick.

Xrlq thinks Fumento is right.

Update: Tim gave me access to his WordPress account here’s a screen shot of a search for Tracy:

Note the IP. Pretty convincing to me. It is possible that someone masked their IP and did that but I find it unlikely.

Update 2: Apparently, in WP (not in WP but in MySQL) you can fiddle with the database and edit an IP address. So, no this is not absolute 100% proof that Fumento is engaging in sockpuppetry. So, it is possible that Tim and others are engaged in some sort of conspiracy to discredit Fumento.

47 Responses to “Fumento will have to do better”

  1. Xrlq Says:

    That someone, who also happens to live in the same town he does and happens to like defending Fumento, is impersonating Fumento.

    How do you figure? Have you personally verified that the IP address 69.143.188.141 is associated with Fumento’s city, or are you taking Lambert’s word for that, as well? I looked it up on ARIN myself and found nothing about Arlington, VA. The closest I did find was a reference to a couple of name servers with the subdomain PA.COMCAST.NET, an unlikely domain name for a server that services Virginia exclusively.

    Assuming the real Michael Fumento was the person who posted a comment on your blog as Michael Fumento, that still doesn’t prove he was also the sock puppet, who didn’t. All it proves is that Tim Lambert knows Michael Fumento’s IP address.

  2. SayUncle Says:

    Sure did, here you go.

    As I said, there are 3 possibilities and one is Lambert’s honesty. Lambert has said he’ll give me access to his wordpress account so that I can verify the IP address there.

  3. Les Says:

    Unc, not that I necessarily doubt Lambert, but that doesn’t prove anything. He could have gone into the database and changed the IP address that WordPress is pulling up.

  4. SayUncle Says:

    You can do that in WP?

  5. Xrlq Says:

    Nice screenshot. Of course, it doesn’t really prove anything that wasn’t proven already. If you believed Lambert all along, then you didn’t need to access his WP account. If you suspected he may have been lying, then accessing his WP account tells you nothing, except that he’s technically savvy enough to tinker with a MySQL database manually. It’s not that hard to do, even for those of us who aren’t C.S. professors.

  6. Captain Holly Says:

    I’m not an expert by any stretch of the imagination, but isn’t the IP address the site for the company that provides internet access, as opposed to the individual who uses it? If so, there might be thousands of subscribers who dial in to that company, and are represented by that address when online.

    Is that correct? Or is this IP address exclusively connected to Fumento’s computer?

  7. SayUncle Says:

    If you suspected he may have been lying, then accessing his WP account tells you nothing, except that he’s technically savvy enough to tinker with a MySQL database manually

    Actually, it tells me that or that fumento is lying.

  8. Tim Lambert Says:

    Actually, Fumento hasn’t denied it. All he’s done is say that I can’t prove it was him, so technically he’s not lying. Of course, you would think that if he was innocent he would have denied the charge, but he hasn’t.

    Some IP addresses shared by many computers, but Fumento’s isn’t. Comcast says that they supply each customer with a unique IP address. It could be another computer in his house if they are sharing an internet connection.

  9. SayUncle Says:

    Tim, does comcast change IP addresses? Because a comment he left on your site in 2004 had a different IP address (69.143.19.172). And a comment he left on my site in 2003 had yet another one (68.49.194.80).

  10. Les Says:

    Not that you can necessarily do it within WP (I have no idea), but WP is just acting as database middleware. You could go into the MySQL database that WP is pulling the information from and change the information there using standard MySQL tools or the SQL command “update comments set ipaddress=’69.143.188.141′ where commenter=’Tracy Spenser'” (I made up the table and field names because I don’t know what they are in WP, but you get the idea).

  11. Xrlq Says:

    Les is right – I don’t think WP enables the user to edit commenters’ IP addresses, i.e., you have to edit the database manually to do that.

  12. SayUncle Says:

    Holly, not sure about every case but Comcast apparently gives users static IPs.

  13. Bob Reynolds Says:

    re: comcast IPs.

    The broad band IPs are quasi-static: You get a 96 hour “lease” on an IP address. If you don’t use the connection for more than 96 hours then your “lease” lapses. When you next use the connection you may get the same IP address you had before or you could get a different IP address. You can also force the router to “renew” an IP address in which case you might get a different IP address.

    I suspect most people access the web within any 96 hour period and therefore appear to have a static address; even not accessing the web within the 96 hours does not guarantee getting a different address.

  14. Marc Says:

    I agree with Bob. Comcast charges you extra to have a truly-static IP address. I guess it’s because you might host a website with it.

  15. tgirsch Says:

    I gotta say, if Tim’s blowing smoke up our ass, he’s (a) putting a ton of effort into it, and (b) doing a pretty good job of making it look credible.

    While Uncle has not tied the IP directly to Fumento, Wikipedia ties that IP to a modification that Fumento acknowledges he made. So, as I see it, our choices are that Fumento is lying or that Tim is lying and scrubbed his MySQL database and spoofed Fumento’s IP to leave a comment on Uncle’s site, just to make his point.

    Occam’s razor ain’t a perfect tool, but it sure makes me lean toward Tim’s (and Uncle’s) explanation…

  16. SayUncle Says:

    Well, Tom, I (who am politically more inclined to agree with Fumento than Tim) could be lying as well.

  17. jfleck at inkstain » Blog Archive » Forensics Says:

    […] Thwack! […]

  18. Xrlq Says:

    While Uncle has not tied the IP directly to Fumento, Wikipedia ties that IP to a modification that Fumento acknowledges he made. So, as I see it, our choices are that Fumento is lying or that Tim is lying and scrubbed his MySQL database and spoofed Fumento’s IP to leave a comment on Uncle’s site, just to make his point.

    You left out a third, far simpler possibility: Fumento left legitimate comments on both sites, giving both bloggers access to his real IP address, which is 69.143.188.141. Lambert, in turn, made all the sock puppet entries, as Fumento alleges, and also alleged that they all were posted by 69.143.188.141. Then, when challenged for proof, he made a very simple edit to his own MySQL database, replacing his own IP address with 69.143.188.141, and invited Uncle to come in and look around.

    Occam’s razor ain’t a perfect tool, but it sure makes me lean toward Tim’s (and Uncle’s) explanation…

    Occam’s razor cuts both ways. In this case, the more alleged sock puppets Lambert keeps “exposing,” citing as proof facts only he himself can verify, the more and more people must all be telling the same lie for Lambert to be telling the truth.

    What about this Fleck guy? I’d be interested in knowing what his IP address is. He seems to be either another sock puppet, or someone who lacks a life.

  19. SayUncle Says:

    That, or to use the razor thing, it’s just so easy to engage in sock puppetry that people do it when they don’t want to be seen engaging in debate.

    I’m with Tom on this one, that’s an awful lot of trouble to go through to call fumento a user of sockpuppets.

    Regarding Fleck, from his site:

    I’m the John Fleck who went to Upland High School in the 1970s, Whitman College thereafter. I’m also the John Fleck who writes about science for the Albuquerque Journal. I’m not the other John Fleck, though I once got his mail.

    If he posts a comment here, I’ll check his IP. He sent me an email and listed his phone number. I could call, I suppose? his email listed a couple of IPs but, with gmail, I can’t figure out which is his as it was routed.

  20. SayUncle Says:

    And, of course, sockpuppetry is made easy because there’s no way to prove to all people beyond a shadow of a doubt that it’s occurring.

  21. Tim Lambert Says:

    In fact, Fumento has not alleged that I made the entries nor has he denied being Tracy. All he is saying is “you can’t prove it”. That doesn’t sound like the actions of an innocent man.

    Xrlq has accused me of using sock puppets even though I have denied it and he has not one scrap of supporting evidence. This is, at best, a reckless disregard for truth on his part.

  22. John Fleck Says:

    I herewith offer my IP address for SayUncle’s perusual. If one looks carefully, one might find my daughter also posting from this address. Or maybe I don’t really have a daughter, just a sock puppet. Though creating a sock puppet with “Fleck” in her name would not seem that bright. But, on the other hand, as Michael Fumento points out, I’m apparently not that bright. Whatever.

    As for Xrlq’s suggestion that I might lack a life, perhaps. But it seems an odd accusation coming from someone as apparently obsessed with this topic as he/she seems.

  23. SayUncle Says:

    OMG! Fleck is posting from Fumento’s house too! No, I kid. His IP is different and originates in New Mexico, like his site says.

  24. damnum absque injuria » Deltoid Tim Says:

    […] UPDATE: Uncle thinks I’m wrong because … well, just because. […]

  25. Les Jones Says:

    Fleck: for full verification, you should post a comment to Uncle’s blog saying you’ll post a certain message on your site. Posting that message on your site will verify you are who you say you are. That’s similar to Web sites that require you to acknowledge a verification email sent to the email address you used for registration. That would be proof positive.

    I’m not taking sides in this, just pointing out the technical aspects of authentication. This is why authentication systems like Blogger’s, TypeKey’s, etc., exist. They’re a pain in the ass and I still haven’t set up a TypeKey account, but this is why they exist.

  26. Xrlq Says:

    The guy who admits to being Tim Lambert writes:

    In fact, Fumento has not alleged that I made the entries nor has he denied being Tracy. All he is saying is “you can’t prove it”. That doesn’t sound like the actions of an innocent man.

    Ah yes – “you have no proof” translates into “yup, I did it.” Maybe what passes for criminal justice works that way in Oz, but it doesn’t work that way here. In any event, if “Tim Lambert, thy name is Mary Roush [sic]” doesn’t count as an allegation that you engaged in the very crap you accuse others of, I don’t know what does. Fumento also elaborated on others who appear to have caught you in the act in other fora. Next time you insist on lying, Tim, at least make your lies semi-believable. Denying that Fumento ever claimed the very things he claimed in the entry linked by the lead message in this thread clearly does not qualify.

    Xrlq has accused me of using sock puppets even though I have denied it and he has not one scrap of supporting evidence.

    Nonsense, I have your track record, and your complete lack of credibility. Maybe John Lott, Michael Fumento, and God-knows-who-else all have sock puppets, and for some bizarre reason, their true identities keep surfacing all over the net, while the sock puppets never seem to make it off your blog. Or maybe not. Occam’s razor.

    The Other Tim Lambert writes:

    Though creating a sock puppet with “Fleck” in her name would not seem that bright. But, on the other hand, as Michael Fumento points out, I’m apparently not that bright. Whatever.

    Equally not-bright is maintaining a blog designed to make it look to the naked eye as though you’ve been blogging since March, 2003, when in fact your real entries only go back to October, 2005, and the rest are just dummy entries with bare subject lines. It also doesn’t seem terribly bright to say you are “this John Fleck,” while linking to the Albuquerque Journal home page rather than to the blog of the person you claim to be, which the real John Fleck obviously knows about but a cheap imitator might not. Either you’re a sock puppet, or that you really are what passes for a “science” writer at the Albuquerque Journal. I’m not sure which is worse.

  27. SayUncle Says:

    Equally not-bright is maintaining a blog designed to make it look to the naked eye as though you’ve been blogging since March, 2003, when in fact your real entries only go back to October, 2005, and the rest are just dummy entries with bare subject lines

    If you click the headers on his old entries, there are posts there. Looks like an import issue to me where excerpts are listed and not the entry, rather the way my search page looks (sample).

    Not sure why he doesn’t link to his other blog though.

  28. John Fleck Says:

    OK, down the rabbit hole we go!

    I’ll be brief: this is me linking from Inkstain to the newspaper. (I do it a lot, actually, as a search will show). This is me linking in the other direction.

    Bonus points if you can find pictures on both sites of the same guy.

  29. Nora Heineman-Fleck Says:

    Any sockpuppet with a newspaper circulation of over 100k and a blog that dates back to 3 years ago really deserves at least some recognition. I mean, even if dad–err–Fleck is just Lambert’s dummy, I think by this point he’s developed a fairly distinct and unique personality and therefore has a right to his own opinion. If someone puts so much effort in developing a character, after all, that character tends to develop their own persona, likes, dislikes, etc, and will sometimes even become an alter-ego of that person. (Actually, that’s just me trying to throw more wood on the fire of the whole “Fleck doesn’t exist” argument, which has made for amusing stories at my house)

    I suppose I have the same IP address as Fleck so my opinion doesn’t really count, but I can definately verify that he exists. He helped make me born and stuff. (Would this make me, too, a puppet of Lambert’s?)

  30. Xrlq Says:

    You’re right, the entries are legit. Between that and a few American spellings I Googled, it sounds like this Einstein isn’t a sock puppet after all, or at least not Lambert’s. Tim Lambert’s number two fan seems more like it.

  31. #9 Says:

    This blows away this Sharon Cobb thread.

  32. Tim Lambert Says:

    All right, I know what you are all thinking now — Xlrq is my sock puppet designed to make me look good. You are maybe wondering if it is physically possible for someone to be as stupid as Xlrq and still remember to breathe. Well it must be because he’s not my sock puppet. In fact, I don’t have any sock puppets.

  33. Deltoid » Fumento’s sidekick Says:

    […] Anyway, Fumento now has a sidekick, Xlrq, who we last saw furiously denying that Lott used sock puppets. Over at SayUncle’s Xlrq suggested that John Fleck was my sockpuppet. SayUncle pointed out […]

  34. Addison Says:

    http://timblair.net/ee/index.php/weblog/ethical_academic/

    http://timblair.net/ee/index.php/weblog/mr_popularity/

    Now, I can’t say as to Fumento’s honesty – seems to be an ass. But Xrlq is correct that Lambert himself has his own history that calls his judgment into question.

    Might just be a case of 2 people meant for each other. (reposted from Xrlq’s site)

  35. Tim Lambert Says:

    Addison, when a blogger posts criticism of another blogger and doesn’t link to the posts he is criticising and also does not link to the response you should maybe wonder if the first blogger is trying to hide something. Before jumping to conclusions you should perhaps read my repies to those two posts here and here.

  36. Addison Says:

    Tim:
    To be quite honest, I don’t think I’ve “jumped” to anything. I’ve seen many a discussion involving you, and wierd patterns tend to emerge during them. That’s my analysis.
    It’s possible, that it’s just all happenstance. It’s certainly possible that everybody else is out to get you, as well. I’ve got no ability to gather the evidence to know. However, it’s certainly *unlikely*. But possible, sure.
    I don’t know you, personally, or Fumento. Fumento’s past behavior has been less than accomodating that I’ve seen. So has yours. Who’s right here? I can’t answer that. But I can point out that this isn’t the first time that you’ve been on the otherside of some… strange activity.
    I think Xrlq jumped to conclusions. But then, he’s had direct, prior experience with you that biased him. Uncle jumped to conclusions. Because he had direct, prior, exprience that biased him against Fumento.

  37. tgirsch Says:

    Addison:

    Well, that standard certainly puts me in a pickle, since I’m not inclined to agree with Uncle or Xrlq about much, except dogs.

  38. Tim Lambert Says:

    Okay, Addison you didn’t jump to conclusions, you presentation of lnks was deliberately one-sided. If you have some specific problem with anything I’ve done please tell us what it is. Comments are still open at my two posts linked above if you want to discuss those matters.

    Xlrq’s attitude to me didn’t arise because of his experience with me. He’s a big fan of John Lott’s from way back and that’s most likely the reason why he attacks me so vicously. In his very first post where he addressed me (and before we had any interaction) he dismissed my criticism of Lott as “paranoid rantings” and “gratuitous attacks on Lott personally”, calling me “Dim”, “Timwit”, “Timbecile”, “a jerk” and “Dim Lambert”.

  39. Xrlq Says:

    Addision: My “bias” most certainly did arise because of Tim’s track record, not because of any desire to defend John Lott against Lambert’s charges – if those charges were justified. They’re not, of course, but that alone would not have caused me to jump to the conclusion that Lambert is lying about Fumento, as well. What did cause me to jump to that conclusion – and why I stand by it now, for that matter – is the eery similarity between Lambert’s older, clearly bogus charges against Lott, and his newer charges against Fumento. It bears noting, however, that Lyin’ Tim isn’t telling the whole story about the original dust-up, either. It wasn’t just about Lott, but about a pattern of smearing opponents which I had first observed in his paranoid rantings about Lott, but which he was then extending to a third individual, Ian Mackay, who Lambert called “dishonest” for stating the facts as they were, rather than for adding irrelevant facts Lambert considered relevant.

    Do I know that Fumento, Lott and Mackay are telling the truth? Of course not. But either all three of them are liars, or Tim Lambert is. Occam’s razor.

  40. Tim Lambert Says:

    Xlrq, as usual, misrepresents our earlier exchange. He started off by calling me names and claiming that my criticism of Lott was “paranoid rantings”. It turned out that he had barely read any of it and was unable to prove anything wrong with what I wrote. Nor did I accuse Mackay of dishonesty for leaving things out. I said that he was dishonest because he wrote something that he knew to be untrue — specifically that Hill got a bill instead of compensation, when Hill did not get a bill but did get compensation.

    Note further that the whole Mackay thing wasn’t even about anything I posted on my blog. It was just a brief comment in a long discussion at Hit snd Run. Xlrq only chose to make an issue of it as a way of attacking me for my criticism of Lott, since he is a long time Lott fan. Here for example he is helping to organise a talk by Lott:

    The Federalist Society at UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) will host
    University of Chicago economist and law professor John Lott on Thursday,
    September 17 at 4:00 p.m., in Room 100. Mr. Lott will discuss his research
    on concealed carry laws and his book, More Guns, Less Crime, and answer any
    questions members of the audience might have. The discussion will take
    place in Room 100, with light refreshments served. All are invited.

    In case you wonder why this isn’t a debate, please note that this was the
    original plan. Unfortunately, we were unable to find a law professor
    willing and/or able to argue the other side. Frankly, I can’t blame them.
    It must be hard debating the side that has no facts to support it.

    As for his Occam’s razor notion: A quick look through his archives shows that as well as his baseless accusation that I am lying he has accused Jeralyn Merritt, Scott Lindlaw, Joe Klaas, Maura Reynolds, Matea Gold and Michael McMenamin of lying. Are all of them lying or is xrlq? Occam’s whatever.

  41. Xrlq Says:

    Lambert, as usual, misrepresents everything and seeks to “win” the exchange by making up in volume what his arguments lack in substance. Rather than re-hash everything to death, I’ll simply link to the exchange in which I called Lambert on lying about Mackay, and Lambert responded by repeatedly changing the subject to Lott, and eventually repeating his earlier lies about Mackay (as he does in this thread also).

    I’m not sure what his references to the other, unrelated liars are supposed to prove, but for those curious to know, here’s why I accused them of dishonesty:

    Blogger Jeralyn Merritt claimed a blogger was harassed by the Secret Service for writing a post that was “critical of Bush,” when in fact the post in question had called for his death. Then, when called on it by other bloggers, she tampered with their comments to remove the parts that called her on it (not me, incidentially, so the “who’s lying, Xrlq or Jeralyn” canard won’t work).

    Scott Lindlaw of the Associated Press reported on a campaign speech in which President Bush announced that former President Clinton had had a heart attack, and urged the crowd to wish him a speedy recovery. In that article, Lindlaw falsely claimed that the crowd had booed, and that President Bush had made no effort to stop them. Within hours, other witnesses to the event surfaced, all flatly denying that anyone had booed, and Lindlaw’s lie was removed from the story without a trace.

    Joe Klaas, a long-time opponent of California’s tough three strikes law, took advantage of the popular confusion between himself and his much better known son, Marc Klaas, to falsely claim that he had long supported the three strikes law he was now trying to defeat. He also lied by claiming that the three strikes law sends people to prison for life over petty offenses such as stealing a T-shirt (it doesn’t), and by implying that the new bill would impose tougher sentences for violent criminals (it would have marginally increased the sentences for a few discrete crimes, while gutting them for everything else), and ended with a real whopper that “not one person in prison for a violent crime will have his sentence shortened by a single day” (in fact, at least 3,500 would have been released within months of passage, and, depending on how courts interpreted the vague resentencing provision, possibly as many as 26,000).

    A few weeks before the 2004 presidential election, Maura Reynolds and Matea Gold of the L.A. Times wrote that John Kerry’s March 2003 op-ed piece “argued for tougher efforts to find and destroy terrorist organizations.” It didn’t.

    Michael McMenamin, a veteran attorney who regularly writes for “Reason” Magazine, claimed that then-N.Y. Times journalist Judith Miller had been “tried, convicted and sentenced to prison based exclusively upon written evidence from witnesses whose identities and testimony were kept secret from her and her lawyers.” In fact, she was held in civil contempt, with no “sentence” at all, merely a standing order to stop asserting a frivolous, nonexistent “privilege” and start complying with the law like everyone else. For an ordinary journalist to have written such crap, as Julian Sanchez did, is inexcusably sloppy, but probably not a lie since the guy doesn’t know any better. But coming from a veteran attorney like McMenamin, however, it is very difficult to accept such a basic error as having been made in good faith. Either it was a bald-faced lie, or Michael McMenamin is the world’s most clueless attorney. I merely gave him the benefit of the doubt.

    In other words, the reason I called Jeralyn Merritt, Scott Lindlaw, Joe Klaas, Maura Reynolds, Matea Gold and Michael McMenamin liars is because they lied. If Lambert wants to be lumped in with them, that’s his prerogative. As is responding to this message, so he can once again “win” in the usual way, by sheer volume.

  42. Addison Says:

    Tim:
    “Okay, Addison you didn’t jump to conclusions, you presentation of lnks was deliberately one-sided.”
    The only time I’ve ever heard of Fumento is here at Uncle’s place, wheras I’ve seen you be involved in many situations involving accusations of dishonesty (For lack of a better label).
    So any links of Fumento’s oddness were already covered in the initial article, whereas I knew there were many involving you.
    My point was, and remains, (unrefuted) that there have been many cases where very odd behavior accompanied online arguments you were participating in. I think that stands without question. I’m glad you felt the need to post your views on those topics – that’s the beauty of the internet, and this whole mechanism. The fact that you replied to those issues is interesting, but does not change my point – that there are many such issues that crop up, and you’re the 1 constant. ( I was unaware if Uncle knew this. I knew Xrlq did (and got my windows mixed up, meant to post here, alone, accidentally posted there, then realised my mistake).)
    What that means is a whole nother question – and one that I did not begin to entertain. As I was clear to say, I don’t have the ability to judge who’s correct here. Although, I might point out, that methinks you doth protest a whole lot. Shakespear had something to say about that, I think.

  43. Tim Lambert Says:

    Addison, your point isn’t so much unrefuted as unfalsifiable since you can’t or won’t give any specific details. And it seems that you have a history of making false accusations against me.

  44. Tim Lambert Says:

    It’s funny how Xrlq accuses me of trying to win with sheer volume in a comment twice as long as mine. True to form he misrepresents our first exchange about Lott. I did not change the subject to Lott: here is how he started (my emphasis):

    Anyone who reads blogs and is familiar with John Lott has probably heard of Tim Lambert, too. He’s the Australian blogger who aspires to do to John Lott what Clayton Cramer did to Michael Bellesiles. Unfortunately, he doesn’t do a very good job; while Cramer uncovered overwhelming evidence Bellesiles’s fundamental research was fabricated, the best Lambert has been able to do is to uncover a few really stupid things Lott has done on a few isolated occasions. The rest of his rebuttals consist of gratuitous attacks on Lott personally. Lambert seems to be on some kind of “jihad,”* so the next time you encounter an op-ed by Lott in any major newspaper, be sure to scan Lambert’s blog for a “liar, liar, pants on fire” rebuttal, with an occasional adult argument thrown in here and there for good measure.

    I gave examples of his habit of accusing people of lying to show what was wrong with his Occam’s razor argument, but it’s also instructive to see how frivolous and unfounded his charges are. Look at the first example. The second comment to Jeralyn’s post has a link to the post that caused all the fuss and we can see how grossly misleading Xrlq’s description of it was. He made it sound like it called for Bush’s assassination, when it was a satirical prayer for God to strike Bush dead. Jeralyn (or “this dishonest bitch” as Xrlq likes to call her) explained why she editted the comments:

    Not so clever attempts by Right wing bloggers, including a prosecutor, to post words in the comments to this post that will result in this site being linked to unacceptable behavior when googled have led to a decision to shut the comments down. Their comments have been edited.

  45. Xrlq Says:

    It’s funny how Xrlq accuses me of trying to win with sheer volume in a comment twice as long as mine.

    It doesn’t take all that many ones and zeroes to throw a list of six individuals I’ve identified as dishonest. It takes far more for me to explain why each of those accusations was 100% justified. That one of those dishonest individuals, Jeralyn Meritt, later compounded her original lie with another lie is not a mitigating factor. That crap about having to edit the comments to avoid angering Google is just that, crap. If she had been genuinely concerned about Google searches, she could have edited out whatever individual words she thought to the be problem, while preserving the basic argument. Instead, she removed all references to the fact that the blogger’s “criticism” of Bush had anything to do with a potential death threat (albeit in the form of a HHOS “prayer” – everyone in the world except Lambert knows that the Secret Service has investigated stuff far more innocuous than that), or otherwise identifying the fact that her original story – that the SS had investigated a blogger for mere criticism of the President, rather than merely doing what everyone knows is his job – was bunk. Then she shut down comments altogether so that to this day, anyone who reads her false allegation will not find a rebuttal.

    The prosecutor in question is Patterico. I suppose Tim is going to question his honesty, too? Between his laughable defense of Jeralyn Meritt’s dishonesty, and his earlier, even more laughable defense of the transparently political Lancet “study,” I’m amazed how quick this guy can be to accuse honest people of dishonesty, while giving a pass to those who are truly dishonest.

  46. Addison Says:

    Tim:
    “And it seems that you have a history of making false accusations against me.”

    Not seeing any false allegations there. Hey, does that make you a … liar?

    Eh, it’s not worth it. Xrlq just kicked your ass, and you’re still claiming you won on points. Tim, this is why I don’t bother with your invitation to post on your site and “discuss” it. (You accuse X of calling people liars, he then proves that he was correct, and you don’t say “Ok, you’ve got a point”, but instead you attack him for the *length* of his refutation. Also note, he *refuted* what you said. *)
    Thanks, because I think you’ve proven beyond any reasonable doubt why I’m leery of taking your opinion/analysis without substantial references and backing – and why I made the initial post that I did.
    Sorry that you feel slighted by the historical record… but it sounds like a personal problem to me. There’s really nothing much to say beyond that.

    *As to the Talk Left issue – X is _completely correct_. She edited it, initially denied it, changed it to she “had to to avoid the Secret Service”. There is *no* good explanation for her behavior, other than sheer dishonesty, and character assasination. As other people have noticed, her “reasons” for editing that comment weren’t good enough for her to edit the many other times that phrase (that she was forced to edit, remember) appeared on her site. Her explanation (that she edited Patterico’s comment, when he was directly quoting a comment above his, thus it’s his fault) is laughable, insulting, and I think if you’re going to take her word on that, with the evidence before you… Well, this is why I don’t trust your judgement. That’s the long and short of it. I don’t know how much plainer I can make it, and I don’t think it’s worthy of any more. Again, if that offends you, well, I’m not going to change my mind the more you attack me, so, sounds like a personal problem. Good luck with that.

  47. pdb Says:

    I have IP data that proves that addison is an XRLQ sockpuppet!!! Tim, email me asap plz.

Remember, I do this to entertain me, not you.

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