The Dealer said that Ellie Light is a nurse from California named Barbara Brooks. Now, their findings include an update at the top stating, “A woman claiming to be Barbara Brooks has now contacted the Plain Dealer and said she is not the letter writer; she claims her ex-husband is running a spoof.” Wait, what?

According to Gawker, Brooks’ ex-husband is Winston Steward:

“I’m not Ellie Light,” she told us. “My husband is. I never told anybody that I was Ellie Light. Winston wrote every single letter. He’s been doing it since he saw that the Gulf War was being fought under false pretenses. I told him from the beginning that he shouldn’t write letters under phony names, but he wanted to get them out there.”
…
“That wasn’t me,” she says. “I don’t know how they got that. Maybe my husband was impersonating me.” As evidence, she cites this clip of her husband calling into Michael Smerconish’s radio show to claim responsibility for the letters. Steward called in and spoke in his regular voice, and neither Smerconish nor any other listener apparently caught on to the fact that he was a man. If he can pretend to be a woman on the radio without really trying, Brooks says, maybe he talked to the Plain Dealer’s reporter, too.

Now, copycats are coming out of the woodwork to claim they’re Ellie Light. And yet, we’re still confused how one letter can get picked up by so many unconnected newspapers. It’s quite an impressive feat and a question falling by the wayside! No matter who “she” is, what is this magical power she has over editors? Maybe a newspaper should just hire her to write op-ed columns.

Oh, and “I broke the dam!”:


(photo)

Now, many are wondering what the story is with this prolific letter writer. Hot Air wonders if someone is “doing a little Astroturfing for Obama,” and counts the Light letters in nearly 50 newspapers in 23 different states. Newsbusters used the opportunity to slight newspapers: “It should warm your heart to know that mainstream newspaper editors are so out-of-touch, something can appear in the blogosphere and all of their competitors for three weeks without them even noticing.”

Indeed, if it’s a scam, it is an embarrassment for a host of editors from small newspapers. But there are just as many questions for whatever person or group is behind Ellie Light. Do they really think a Letters to the Editor page still matters in a propaganda campaign? It’s almost quaint.

In the Daily News, Light writes:

Today, the president is being attacked as if he’d promised that our problems would wash off in the morning. He never did. 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.

Not an entirely different message than can be found in more widely read forums across the internet. So, why plant them?

One Plain Dealer reporter has followed the story deeper than most, emailing with Light to affirm her identity. She was eventually told by Light, “I found that editors were eager to present a point of view on the topic that wasn’t so overheated and angry. Indeed, I think the viewpoint that my letter expressed was less important to the editors than the even and non-emotional tone.” No answers there.

But this morning, a woman claiming to be Ellie Light called the radio show of Philadelphia conservative Michael Smerconish. “I’m only me,” she said, according to Politico. “I need to own up – I did misrepresent my home town in some places,” Light continued. “My letter was pretty darn good. It took a long time to write. I took more interest in honing it than most people take today.”

Salon blogger Glenn Greenwald, meanwhile — far from a conservative blogger himself — wrote one possible explanation, if light is indeed being disingenuous. Noted by Hot Air, the Greenwald post describes a paper written by “one of Obama’s closest confidants,” Cass Sunstein. Greenwald summarizes the contents of the Sunstein paper thusly:

Sunstein advocates that the Government’s stealth infiltration should be accomplished by sending covert agents into “chat rooms, online social networks, or even real-space groups.” He also proposes that the Government make secret payments to so-called “independent” credible voices to bolster the Government’s messaging (on the ground that those who don’t believe government sources will be more inclined to listen to those who appear independent while secretly acting on behalf of the Government).

Keep in mind the above Greenwald piece was written before the Ellie Light situation specifically picked up any notice. A scary proposition and the rest of Greenwald’s take is well worth a read.

Hannity had Michelle Malkin — the Hot Air proprietor — on to discuss the matter last night, where she blamed the Obama administration for “spreading a bogus sense of grassroots support.” Hannity asked if Light might be connected to the Democratic establishment, while Malkin turned the blame mostly to the “gatekeepers” allowing the “astroturfing.” See the whole clip below, and check back for updates on this story as it develops:

Let’s consider Meacham’s initially dubious case, which he spells out in a Newsweek article online now, “Why Dick Cheney Should Run in 2012,” to be published in the December 7th issue of the magazine. He begins:

• “[A] run would be good for the Republicans and good for the country.” Insert joke: “The sound you just heard in the background was liberal readers spitting out their lattes.”
• Greenwald? “Jon Meacham tells a funny, original joke: liberals react to his column urging Cheney to run by “spitting out their lattes,” on Twitter. Burn. Get it? Coffee.

Good for the country, you say, Mr. Meacham. Why?

• “Because Cheney is a man of conviction, has a record on which he can be judged, and whatever the result, there could be no ambiguity about the will of the people.”

Nonpartisan evidence  – good start. Then:

• “Three years out, the GOP field does not offer a putative nominee.”
• “In an era of ideological purity within the party, Cheney is among the purest; no one can question his conservative credentials on national security, and his record in the House and as vice president places him beyond reproach from the base.”

But! “He was, it is true, second in command in years of great deficit spending…” So, kind of, Meacham admits. And:

• “A campaign would also give us an occasion that history denied us in 2008: an opportunity to adjudicate the George W. Bush years in a direct way.”
• I’ll take Glenn Greenwald for 140 characters, Alex: “It’s unclear to Jon Meacham what Americans think of Bush — the 2006 and 2008 elections, and humiliating poll numbers, are very ambiguous.”

Lastly:

• “Cheney’s memoirs are due to be published—and thus due to be promoted—in the spring of 2011, not long before the caucuses and primaries begin. I’ll bet you that the Barnes & Noble in Des Moines (there’s a big one at The Shoppes at Three Fountains) is on the book tour.”

Or, as Greg Sargent of The Plum Line put it: Drudgebait. That is, a purposefully counterintuitive online argument meant to get the attention of Big Matt and run up website traffic. Gotta get those pageviews!