Blogoland

I was curious to see what, exactly, was fueling all the nutjobbery over the "Scott Thomas" affair -- you know, the erstwhile pseudonymous "Baghdad Diarist" for The New Republic. Andrew Sullivan [a former TNR editor] has his thoughts, so does Ezra Klein. And Matthew Yglesias gets cranky. Most of the analysis has to do with worldviews clashing with real-life and etc., etc. All worth a read. But on a purely practical level, this commenter going by the handle "graceyneice" over at Hugh Hewitt's site gets pretty close to the truth of what's really going on here:

If Beauchamp's stories are true, he's screwed for not reporting it, if the stories are lies (which I believe they are) he is screwed.

It's a no-lose! If the claims are true, he's a bad soldier who needs to be punished (if he's not, there'll be hell to pay, believe you me!). If any of his claims are false, we get to claim an Emm-Ess-Emm scalp. Champagne either way.