La Shawn Barber has a fascinating post titled "How to Avoid a Blogosphere Scandal."

If we bloggers are going to demand transparency from the media and criticize other bloggers for failure to disclose, we must hold ourselves to the same standard. Why should we disclose financial relationships? Because people don’t want to be manipulated. If someone blogs in support of a candidate and encourages your support, imagine how manipulated you’d feel if you found out the blogger was on the candidate’s payroll. He may have been sincere in his praise and really believes the candidate is worthy, but people will wonder if the blogger’s words were his own, or if those words were paid for by a third party.

(Via Brannon Denning, guest blogging at InstaPundit.)

Here's another wrinkle for you. I have sometimes been attacked not for what I have said, but for what I have NOT said. I've also been falsely accused of being in the employ of "the Republicans" (which I am not). But let's just suppose I was being paid by someone, a huge scandal broke, and I just ignored the scandal and wrote posts about stuff like global warming and gun control. I'm just wondering, could my silence possibly be considered scandalous, or is that too much of a stretch?

Do bloggers ever forfeit the right to remain silent?

As an example, I wrote about Mel Gibson's drunken anti-Semitic remarks. But let's suppose I worked for his company. Obviously, if I wrote a post defending him and never disclosed my employment, that would be scandalous. But suppose I worked for him and specifically avoided any mention of his arrest or statements? Would that be scandalous? The problem with thinking this way is that I might just as well have ignored the whole thing anyway, as I'm not much into Hollywood gossip, or Hollywood scandals.

So would my taking money from Gibson make my silence suspicious?

What if I worked for Microsoft, and the company had a huge scandal about which I said nothing. Would it matter that I rarely mention Microsoft anyway?

I've often joked about secretly working for Karl Rove, but let's suppose that I was a very loquacious blogger who sounded off about everything, and Karl Rove (or somebody else) paid me 1000.00 a month never to mention him at all. I think that kind of "paid for" silence would be inherently scandalous, but the level of scandalhood would of course depend on the extent of my readership, and whether I would normally have been expected to say something.

FWIW, I don't like the idea of being bought off to remain silent about anyone or anything, although fortunately I am not important enough for anyone to buy either silence or noise from me.

But let us suppose a politician's ad appeared on my blog. (I notice there's one there right now for Rick Santorum.) Suppose that politician was someone about whom I've long had mixed feelings, but whom I just don't feel like discussing right now. Does the ad suddenly create an obligation to discuss him again, right now? Why? Under what theory? If I criticized the candidate would that have more credibility than if I endorsed him? Do I lose credibility simply because someone ran an ad? Further, does the presence of an ad speak for itself, or does it create an additional duty to discuss the ad? In all honesty, I don't know. It's easy for me to say that I am "not influenced" by an ad that runs here, but doesn't the fact that I am talking about it at all mean that I have somehow been influenced? It wasn't long after I first started blogging (on Blogspot) that an ad for Exodus International appeared on my blog. I immediately criticized the outfit, because I don't agree with them and didn't want to be seen as supporting or endorsing any of their pronouncements. But I didn't ask that the ad be taken down.

Similarly, I disagree with the candidate Rick Santorum (whose ad is running) about a number of issues, but I don't see those issues in his ad. I don't like what was done to one of his aides, and I think he's being smeared, but that does not mean I endorse him. I just don't see why the ad obligates me to say anything. But on the other hand, the longer the the ad there, the more my not saying anything might take on the appearance of deliberate avoidance. I guess that's why I'm discussing it, although frankly it's a pain in the ass, as I don't like the idea of being obligated to discuss anything at all, unless and until I feel like it. I try to see politics the way I might see tubes of paint, and I should be allowed dip or not dip into whatever colors I want, depending on how the spirit moves me -- not because of what some asshole or another might tell me I should think.

On the other hand, when people tell me what I should think, that triggers my tendency to think the opposite as a matter of principle. This too, is influence. It's a bit like stereotypes. I hate stereotypes and groupthink of any kind, so I tend to defy them, to smash them, even. But once I discern the stereotype smashing becoming groupthink, then I want to defend the smashed stereotypes -- even if I once smashed them -- lest the freedom to have them be lost. I realize how hopeless and maddening this is, and even though I'm lost in the contradictions of my own explanation, I don't know how else to explain it.

If we carry this thinking to its extreme, anything that is written or not written can be seen as the product of some type of influence. Disclosure of bias is an attempt to let readers know what those influences are. And I am of course biased -- especially against attempts to manipulate my thinking. The trick is not to allow my natural reaction against manipulation to become a form of self-manipulation.

Freedom from manipulation is a very difficult thing to achieve, and all I can do is try.

(Too much disclosure, of course, is never enough.)

AFTERTHOUGHT: Looking over this, I'm realizing that there are a number of issues about which I feel very strongly, about which I would gladly write, and for which I would be willing to work as a paid lobbyist. My defense of pit bulls is a good example. If I was hired as an official spokesman for a large organization of pit bull enthusiasts, would that in any way diminish the truth or sincerity of what I say? I don't see how. While it is obvious that I should disclose any such financial arrangements, would anyone really be more likely to agree or disagree with arguments I make in this blog because I also made them for money? The scandal would seem to be grounded in the non-disclosure, but I'm wondering . . .

To whom would it really matter? To political adversaries who already disagree?

Hell, this whole thing is so annoying that my perverse side wants to go out and secretly enroll as a paid lobbyist for the tobacco industry, then deliberately not disclose it while vehemently defending the right to smoke and advocating things like the right of non-smokers to keep and bear cigarettes -- and to publicly, shamelessly, brandish them! (Nothing like a good scandal to publicize the Right to Brandish© Campaign, so Big Tobacco, I'm all yours. Go ahead! Corrupt and manipulate me!)