Take the Pledge

I swear that I have never taken money -- neither directly nor indirectly -- from any political campaign or government agency -- whether federal, state, or local -- in exchange for any service performed in my job as a journalist (or commentator, or blogger, or whatever you think I should be called).

...that's Matthew Yglesias' pledge, which every Republican, Democratic, libertarian, communist, and otherwise ideological commentators should take in the wake of the Armstrong Williams debacle.

Um, I'll take it.

Will Novak? Safire? Hannity? Limbaugh?

The plot thickens with this quote from Williams himself:

"This happens all the time," he told me. "There are others." Really? I said. Other conservative commentators accept money from the Bush administration? I asked Williams for names. "I'm not going to defend myself that way," he said. The issue right now, he explained, was his own mistake. Well, I said, what if I call you up in a few weeks, after this blows over, and then ask you? No, he said.

Like I said before, we should simply assume that anyone mouthing Republican talking points is being paid, based on prior evidence.