Sure, it's not a quarter million in taxpayer money, it's only $21,500... but hey Maggie Gallagher earned it fair and square by ignoring ethics (maybe you don't have to feel guilt if you don't have a conscience) just like her colleague, Armstrong Williams.
Howard Kurtz (WaPo) is reporting that Gallagher raked in almost $22k from Tommy Thompson's Dept of Health and Human Services to promote, among other things, Bush's marriage policies.
Who's next? And any bets on what they were paid to shill?
Details and links below the fold.
You may not have heard of this issue yet. The Chicago Tribune ran a short report on the WaPo story (no direct info).
The WaPo article is at:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A36545-2005Jan25.html
Here's a pertinent section...
In 2002, syndicated columnist Maggie Gallagher repeatedly defended President Bush's push for a $300 million initiative encouraging marriage as a way of strengthening families.
"The Bush marriage initiative would emphasize the importance of marriage to poor couples" and "educate teens on the value of delaying childbearing until marriage," she wrote in National Review Online, for example, adding that this could "carry big payoffs down the road for taxpayers and children."
But Gallagher failed to mention that she had a $21,500 contract with the Department of Health and Human Services to help promote the president's proposal. Her work under the contract, which ran from January through October 2002, included drafting a magazine article for the HHS official overseeing the initiative, writing brochures for the program and conducting a briefing for department officials.
"Did I violate journalistic ethics by not disclosing it?" Gallagher said yesterday. "I don't know. You tell me." She said she would have "been happy to tell anyone who called me" about the contract but that "frankly, it never occurred to me" to disclose it.
Frankly, it never would've occured to any ethical person to NOT disclose it... nor, in fact, to TAKE PAYOLA in the first place.
Like Williams, Gallagher wasn't paid for her expertise in her profession (that would be a legit contract), she was paid to repeat propoganda in the media (and that's payola). HUGE difference.