Yawn. Bummer. I would have totally flipped the photographer off.

Yep. Come clean, take your lumps.

Good trigger discipline and good muzzle discipline. Well trained soldier.

CY - I've been looking through my email from a note from you, my apologies, but I haven't followed this at all.

"Well trained soldier"

He's an E-7, a senior non-commissioned officer in the top three. He's a professional leader of men (and women) He's concentrating on what his troops are doing and his mission and trying to keep everyone alive. He probably didn't even give the photographer a second glance after he determined he posed no (immediate) threat

I'm in the school photo business, and we see this kind of stuff all the time. Sometimes what you think you see ain't at all what you see.

"Thomas," went on further to claim that the picture in question was PhotoShopped

No, I did not. I'm not going to apologize for something I didn't say. What I did say was,

Greetings to our lurking moonbats! For your information, this highly photoshopped photo is directly courtesy of the Associated Press. That's right: You caught us. We put a deep mole into the AP so we could arrange to have a photo altered to show some kid flipping the photographer off -- and then our second mole passed it along to the wire service. Great, great, great is our power.

Now, I suppose this might mean that I literally meant that the photo was photoshopped; or, in the alternative -- and I think anyone who reads this carefully, especially the sentences that follow, would think this -- I was being sarcastic (hence, the "deep mole" at the AP).

However, I'm into conciliation, so: I apologize if I was too dry.

NB: I'm a Director at RedState. I never received any email from you, through the Contact Form or through my personal email address.

Sometimes people get too invested in their words. You both write good stuff and it's time to move on...

Sometimes people get too invested in their words. You both write good stuff and it's time to move on..

He's not "invested in his words." Would I be "invested in my words" for pointing out the sun sets in the west to somebody broadcasting that it sets in the east?

Are you "too invested in your words" when you start blabbering on about people being "invested in their words?"

There is accuracy, and there is error. I certainly do hope those who believe in the first remain invested in that belief, as well as remaining invested in the notion that accuracy is more to be valued than error, and that the two are not equivalent.

uhh...so what

Thomas, perhaps someone else is deleting these comments, both of which have been forwarded to Krempasky (I'd checked the "send me a copy" option).

Erick's non-apology apolgy is nice. Very John Kerry.

The "he did it first!" excuse doesn't work past first grade. It's called "accountability," kids.

The point is not "he did it first," the point is that we posted a photograph which was provided by two presumably reliable sources. Upon viewing the same photograph, literally everyone who saw it assumed that it showed a soldier flipping off a cameraman - in fact, the initial reaction was not that the picture did *not* show the Hawaiian good luck sign, the accusation was that we photoshopped it.

So, yeah, we passed along a photo, which we got from someone else (in this case, directly from the AP), and *invited people to draw inferences* from it. It turns out that those inferences were incorrect, and we've indicated that on the front page. But I frankly don't see why an *apology* would be in order for passing along a photograph which by all concessions was accurate and inviting people to draw a reasonable inference from it (which was indeed the near universal inference to everyone who saw the photo, even without our prompting, which is why the AP yanked the photo shortly after posting it - the reasonable assumption here is that even *they* assumed that it contained an obscene gesture).

In other words, you couldn't make out a basic case of negligence here, which is the lowest level of culpability. Therefore, an apology would not be warranted. A correction is, and that's been provided. Why this is "John Kerry" is beyond me.

P.S. I am *very* offended that vanderbilt dot edu is in your site's spam filter. :-)

Thomas, perhaps someone else is deleting these comments, both of which have been forwarded to Krempasky (I'd checked the "send me a copy" option).

I have no idea what you mean. Do you mean emails you sent? Erick is lead dog over there these days; direct any concerns to him. If you mean "Contact Form" submissions, they don't get deleted before hitting our collective inboxes. Erick informs me that we've had problems with that lately; maybe they were lost in queue.

As to the rest:

(1) I accept your apology for misconstruing my words.

(2) I'm so glad you like Erick's work. Perhaps you might consider that He did it first! has a specific meaning, outside the scope of that you seem to give it.

As a Huntsville Resident raised in NYC, I was hoping he was flipping off the AP on behalf of all Americans. It is a universal sign of disgust of a failed news reporting agency. AP is just the brainwashing arm of the DNC.

AP deserves more than just the finger. Perhaps leaving them alone in the desert. They wouldn't truth if it hit them in the face.

Jesus, Bob, take a breather! You got housed by RedState. Time to move on and find another obsession. Hey, that lady wants to buy an orange whistle...

What amuses me is no one tried this on their own weapons to see if it could be done.

I did and it can't.