It is to laugh

Jane Hamsher of Firedoglake:

"[Liberal groups] come to us, expecting us to give them free publicity, and we do, but it's not a two way street. . . .They won’t do anything in return. They're not advertising with us. They’re not offering fellowships. They’re not doing anything to help financially, and people are growing increasingly resentful."

But, Jane, dear: I thought you were in it for The Cause? You don't mean to tell me that you expected to get paid to promote the progressive agenda? Those liberal groups are non-profits and, I guess, so are you.

Being a greedy capitalist blogger, at least I don't have apologize about telling you people to hit the tip jar. Unlike poor little rich girl Jane Hamsher, I'm a working writer trying to support a wife and six kids here, so you only have to pay me what you think this stuff is worth. And for 99% of you, that's a big fat zero. OK, thank God for the 1%.

What Hamsher and the other progressive bloggers complain about, of course, is true on the Right, too. A conservative 501(c) outfit would much rather hire a 26-year-old dweeb with a master's degree in political science as a policy analyst -- figuring total cost of annual salary and benefits, at say, $80,000 -- than to give $4,000 a year in online grants to 20 right-leaning blogs. Exactly why that's true, I don't know, since $4,000 annually would buy a lot of linky-love, but it is true.

Hamsher & Co. are just squeaky wheels hoping for some grease, and if they succeed with their guilt-trip shakedown operation it will be one of the sweetest scams of all time. Their pretense of altruistic idealism is certainly exposed as a fraud. They're just a bunch of self-interested hustlers. NTTAWWT.

(Via Memeorandum.)

UPDATE: Jane says right-wingers don't understand business. Right. She's whining for pity ads from non-profits, and we don't understand business.