Blog P.I.

Stop me if you’ve heard this one: Previously unknown, weeks-old blog makes waves by posting the results of e-mails ultimately leading the blog’s target to vacate office.

This time the target here is not a congressman, but the blogger who first published e-mails exposing the poor judgment (and spelling) of now-ex-Rep. Mark Foley. TPMmuckraker headlines it:

Final Foley E-Mail Mystery Solved (Sorta)

“Sorta” is right, as the blogger behind the original Stop Sex Predators has not been publicly named (though the “final” part remains to be seen). The SSP blogger apparently is — to the satisfaction of Republican Washington — until just now an employee at left-leaning gay rights outfit Human Rights Campaign, and prior to that a Democratic campaign staffer.

Credit goes to the NYT for giving this space in their pages, but of course they don’t credit the blogger who actually uncovered the facts, the pseudonymous GTL of Stop October Surprises.

Until just today, SOS (as we must call it) was linked by and interacting with only a few conservative blogs.

SOS’s first substantive entry, posted nearly two weeks ago, explains quite simply how the anonyblogger was caught:

how to catch an idiot? Start with something simple… Send the moron an email using a tracing tool like ReadNotify, wait until the email is read. This little adventure all started with a simple email sent from an account ‘dcguy191@yahoo.com’. One of the persons behind StopSexPredators, using the email address ’stopsexpredators@gmail.com’, read this email from several network locations. (Don’t think physical location, think network location.)

Contrary to what New Yorker cartoons would have you believe, these days on the Internet people sometimes do know that you’re a dog (provided they sign up for a free trial with ReadNotify). A subsequent post included screen shots from ReadNotify’s tracking history, demonstrating that SSP had read the tracked e-mail from a network address assigned to none other than the Human Rights Campaign.

Before long the HRC was issuing statements, and as the MSM coverage was being readied for publication yesterday, SOS’s GTL added:

I know who this employee is, and have for some time, but I cannot prove that he has been fired. I will let others go after that for now. There is more to this story… It seems to me that the HRC has more work to do in this matter, and I communicated that message to Brad Luna.

SOS has been left out of most MSM and blog coverage up to this point, but blogger Joe. My. God. has a brief e-mail interview with GTL (Mike Rogers makes a special appearance in an update, giving his take on the matter). The transcript includes this possibly meaningful exchange:

JMG: Isn’t it possible that the IMs were leaked internally at HRC without the knowledge of top management? SOS: no comment.

Hmm. Needless to say, HRC may have a PR problem on their hands. At the very least they should release the staffer’s name; if these episodes have taught us anything, it’s that such information is going to come out anyway [Update: Yep. See update below].

Before you’re done with this, make sure you look at these two blogs back to back, Stop Sex Predators and Stop October Surprises. Even a cursory glance reveals that they are identical in almost every meaningful way: Similar titles, subject matter, short duration (though SOS wisely dispensed with the fake history), fraternal twins down to their Blogger accounts — SSP uses the black Minima template; SOS chose white Minima.

So there is at least one more Foley e-mail mystery to be solved: Who is behind Stop October Surprises?

P.S. Looks like Mickey Kaus blogged too soon:

Foley? That rings a bell. I remember there was something about a guy named Foley a while back.

The Kaus Faster Theory (as I call it, considering I’ve never once heard Bruce Feiler weigh in on the subject) may well have a wide range of applications, but there’s still that one thing which can render it inapplicable to an ongoing story — new developments.

Update: There you are, Radar, I knew you couldn’t not follow this one up. At least this time, you’ve actually contributed to the conversation. SSP turns out to be one Lane Hudson. Ace has more.

Of course, did Radar Online mention Stop October Surprises? No, no it did not. No points for you.