Feeling Light Headed?

I guess I should be honored. After all, it isn't every day a national political figure reaches out with a "personal" letter. Let there be Light!

You may have seen the Cleveland Plain Dealer's coverage of "Ellie Light", the prolific letter writer published in dozens of newspapers, all listing local addresses.

Wow, now I'm on the list. Lucky me, I guess.

Ellie's took folks at Gannett in the Dairyland to task for apologizing for publishing her letter. Not even getting into discussion over the content, is it fraud to use false pretenses when using a local address?

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My name is Ellie Light, and Gannett Wisconsin Media has officially apologized to Fox News for publishing my letter. Michele Malkin's website, based in Washington DC, had objected to my letter's publication in Wisconsin media, because it wasn't written by a Wisconsin resident.

Here is the letter I wrote that Gannett felt so ashamed for running:

"A year ago, if we had read in the paper that employers were hiring again,
that health care legislation was proceeding without a bump, that
Afghanistan suddenly became a nice place to take your kids, we would've
known we were being lied to. Back then, we recognized that the problems
Obama inherited as President wouldn't go away overnight.

During his campaign, Obama clearly said that an economy that took eight
years to break couldn't be fixed in a year, that Afghanistan was a
graveyard of empires, and would not be an easy venture for us. Candidate
Obama didn't feed us happy-talk, which is why we elected him. He never
said America could solve our health care, economic and security problems
without raising the deficit. Instead, he talked of hard choices, of
government taking painful and contentious first steps towards fixing
problems that can't be left for another day.

Right after Obama's election, we seemed to grasp this. We understood that
companies would be happy to squeeze more work out of frightened employees,
and would be slow to hire more. We understood that the banks that had
extorted us out of billions of dollars, were lying when they said they
would share their recovery. We understood that a national consensus on
health care would not come easily. Candidate Obama never claimed that his
proposed solutions would work flawlessly right out of the box, and we
respected him for that.

But today, the President is being attacked as if he were a salesman who
promised us that our problems would wash off in the morning. He never made
such a promise. It's time for Americans to realize that governing is hard
work, and that a President can't just wave a magic wand and fix
everything."

As you can guess, it wasn't the letter's origin that got under the big Fox's skin. I'd say it was the content. What do you think? Anyway, feel free to publish or post it as you see fit. If further verification is required, feel free to call me at XXX XXX XXX. If you Google "Ellie Light," you'll be told all kinds of things about me. Or, you could just call.

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Now back to me.

Whatever "Ellie" wants to write is fine by me; there's a great (recent) history of bloggers and commenting from anonymous folks or those choosing a different handle. Does anyone really believe locations listed on Topix? Newspaper letters to the editor, however, supposedly require a bit more since the print edition stakes credibility on publishing public opinion from real people, not automated or "astroturf" campaigns.

Whatever Ellie thinks, fine -- but does lying about who and where you are mean you lie?

Thoughts?