Maggie Gallagher on the Take?
According to Drudge, Howard Kurtz is writing in the Washington Post that Maggie Gallagher was on the payroll of the Department of Health and Human Services for $21,500. And what was she doing? She was defending marriage.
She was also attacking gay marriage. I wrote about her twice: You'd Think the World Is About to End and Maggie's Calmer, But No Less Silly. In the first, I quoted her saying this:
Winning the gay-marriage debate may be hard, but to those of us who witnessed the fall of Communism, despair is inexcusable and irresponsible. Losing this battle means losing the idea that children need mothers and fathers. It means losing the marriage debate. It means losing limited government. It means losing American civilization. It means losing, period.
More info on this new development at Instapundit, who thinks this isn't going to be as bad as the Armstrong Williams situation.
As the Professor notes, she has replied here:
I just got off the phone with Howard Kurtz of The Washington Post. He called me with a very good question: "You had a contract with HHS to do some work on marriage issues in 2002. Should you have disclosed that?"[...]
In 2001, the Department of Health and Human Services approached me to do some work on marriage issues for the government, including a presentation of the social science evidence on the benefits of marriage for HHS regional managers, to draft an essay for Wade Horn, assistant secretary of HHS, on how government can strengthen marriage, and to prepare drafts of community brochures: "The Top Ten Reasons Marriage Matters," stuff like that.
The contract reads: "ACF (Administration for Children and Families, part of HHS) is pursuing research to create knowledge about the dynamics of marriage among low-income populations, and potential strategies states might pursue to strengthen marriage. ACF needs additional expertise to accomplish this work.
"Statement of work: The contractor shall consult with and assist ACF in ongoing work related to strengthening marriage, and provide assistance advice on development of new research activities in this area. The contractor shall perform a variety of activities including (but not limited to) providing information on the programs to strengthen marriage, advising on the dissemination of materials, and participating in meetings and workshops."
The contract did not authorize a general consulting fee. Instead it authorized payment for actual work performed, to be submitted and approved via separate invoice.
By my records, I was paid $21,500 from HHS in 2002.
You know what...the disclosure thing isn't what annoys me. The motivation that someone has to write about something isn't high on my list of concerns when reading a news article or an opinion piece. What concerns me are the validity of the facts and arguments within the writing.
So I also see this things as "tempest in a teapot" situations, because the larger issue for me is, Why the hell is the United States Government engaging in social engineering to change Americans into what it thinks will be better citizens? This shit isn't the purview of anything close to what a proper limited government conservative or Constitutionalist administration or Republican movement ought to have the state doing, let alone what even the most justifiable minimal state might engage in.
The real problem isn't private citizens getting paid to promote government policies. The real problem is the existence of the government itself and the fact that it has the tax money to waste on things like "strengthening marriage."