By now we all know about the silly little frat boy editor of the American Spectator's having confessed to having been the agent proschlockateur at the Smithsonian the other day.
The question a lot of folks have been asking is: Why? Why did he a) do something so blitheringly stupid and b) compound the stupidity by admitting it in print?
My guesses on this are below the fold.
Here's my take:
The guy is an idiot frat boy and the AmSpec piece is most likely damage control, in my view.
I can just imagine the conversation he had with his bosses afterwards:
FratBoy: Hey, isn't this great! I impersonated a lefty protester and made them all look bad!
AmSpecBoss: Idiot! They got pictures of you, you moron! The pics are all over the place now! They'll soon figure out you're one of us!
FratBoy: ...oh...
AmSpecBoss: This is a disaster. Our only hope is to try and spin this by outing you as one of us before they do. Do it NOW before I decide to fire your stupid ass, dipwad!
FratBoy: ...uhh, uhh, yessir! Rightawaysir!
This is the only scenario that makes sense to me, because to assume that this was planned in advance with the intention of being revealed to the world is to assume that the people running AmSpec are too stupid to know how to breathe. We can't quite rule that out -- wingnut-welfare outfits like AmSpec are known for being dumping grounds for otherwise-unemployable trustfarian kids of powerful right-wing sugardaddies -- but it seems highly unlikely to me.
(Crossposted to Mercury Rising. See also this previous Mercury Rising post on Republican agents proschlockateur.)