I’ve continued to try and track anti-Republican letter writer “Gloria Elle” throughout the day.  While the omnipresent “Ellie Light” has gathered the big headlines, I’ve been more interested in Elle ever since I discovered that she submitted another Letter to the Editor to the Baltimore Chronicle in July of last year, giving a none-too-flattering opinion of the career of the late Robert McNamara, the former Secretary of Defense who served during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations.

Well, actually, I’m not entirely sure whether or not she submitted it to the Chronicle first or not, or at all.  Their online version doesn’t give dates of submission, so it makes tracking down any one submission very difficult.  What I am sure of is that the same letter was published on July 8 at progressive blog Buzzflash.

I’ve found it yet again, here at a pro-Republican tabloid called the St. Mary’s Today.  I am not sure why such a newspaper would print a letter from an anti-Republican writer.  Unfortunately, I don’t know the context in which it was promoted.  However, I am interested that it’s another Maryland production, making two Maryland papers that Ms. Elle has shown up in for this particular letter.  Buzzflash, on the other hand, is based in Chicago.

I suppose the St. Mary’s Today copy could also have been submitted by Elle, but it’s just as likely it was lifted.  However, it doesn’t seem far-fetched that a liberal such as Elle would visit Buzzflash, and submit the same letter there, as well as to the Chronicle (her letters showed up at both BF and the Chronicle in back then and more recently). I have not found either letter in any other publication, nor have the lead investigators of this scandal, such as Patterico.

All that, and with the Chronicle’s pattern of publishing Letters to the Editor from the same people over time (writer “Chuck Mann” has had at least 10 make it in) makes me think that Gloria Elle may actually be a real person, and that the real Astroturfers are simply plagiarizing her work.

It’s unethical of course, but so was Astroturfing in the first place.  But I think the possible plagiarizing of Elle’s letter is even worse than the Astroturfing itself, because now it’s unfairly raised a perfectly innocent person (no matter what you think of her political views) to a higher spotlight that she probably didn’t want.  Someone like that doesn’t need the inevitable harassment associated with all this furor, just because she sent a single letter to a couple publications.

I don’t blame the likes of Patterico and co., of course.  They’re doing their job, dutifully trying to get the bottom of this.  No, I blame the Astroturfers for resorting to plagiarism to create their face grassroots campaign.  And to think, how many other people have they done this to?

Whoever is ultimately behind this, I have three words: Shame. On. You.