The man posting as "Buckhead" on the Free Republic board was the first to point out the typography problems with the CBS memos, and set off the avalanche that may yet bury parts of CBS news.

Now, in a righteous storm of vengeance, the L. A. Times has revealed "Buckhead" to be: none other than a Republican activist! Wow...sure don't find many of THEM on the Free Republic website.

Next news flash: many Moveon.org members are--wait for it--Democratic activists!

The identity of "Buckhead," a blogger known previously only by his screen name on the site freerepublic.com and lifted to folk hero status in the conservative blogosphere since last week's posting, is likely to fuel speculation among Democrats that the efforts to discredit the CBS memos were engineered by Republicans eager to undermine reports that Bush received preferential treatment in the National Guard more than 30 years ago.

The Great Right Wing Conspiracy! Like most conspiracy theories, it falls flat under the mildest application of common sense.

To believe that the Buckhead post was part of a Republican plan you'd have to believe that the Republican plotters knew that an obscure post on a thread on a right-wing website would be picked up and spread all around the planet in short order. Not only that, but every expert who has weighed in since then would have to be in on it. Also, the White House would have to assume that CBS was stupid enough to grab onto an anti-Bush story with both hands without looking very carefully. There are many other assumptions required for the "plan" to work.

I'm sorry. The Times is not playing with a full deck any more.

As usual when caught with their hands in the cookie jar, the Democrats yelp about the methods used to catch them, hoping nobody will notice their fists full of cookies. Remember the memos that got out about the Democratic plans to politicize the judiciary selection process, or the Intelligence Committee? The indignation wasn't about the crap they were pulling, but about how they got caught.

Until The Times identified him by piecing together information from his postings over the past two years, MacDougald had taken pains to remain in the shadows — saying the credit for challenging CBS should remain with the blogosphere as a whole and not one individual.

Holy crap, they actually went after him! How many manhours went to finding this guy? For THIS the media will actually do real research.

After Rather and all the rest, is there anyone out there still harboring illusions about which political party the Old Media works for?

BTW, the Freeper talk this over (mostly laughing their asses off) here.