Payola Pundits

Via The Corner (whose theme song is probably the CCR classic, since I'm assuming they wouldn't want to appropriate Genesis' "Man on the Corner"), I see that The Nation's David Corn had an interesting exchange with Armstrong Williams, recently in the news for taking a cool quarter million to sing the praises of the No Child Left Behind Act:

This happens all the time," he told me. "There are others." Really? I said. Other conservative commentators accept money from the Bush administration? I asked Williams for names. "I'm not going to defend myself that way," he said. The issue right now, he explained, was his own mistake. Well, I said, what if I call you up in a few weeks, after this blows over, and then ask you? No, he said.

I agree with both Corn and the Cornerites—which is probably some kind of strange planetary alignment heralding the fall of civilization—that if Williams isn't just BSing, he should name some names. Not to defend himself, mind you, but because it's both unethical for even pseudo-journalistic commentators to be pitching opinions for rent to a public that thinks its getting sincere opinions, and because this nebulous "I have a list" dodge casts a shadow on the credibility of everyone on the right.