Ed Whelan, 'Outer' Of Pseudonymous Law Blogger, Apologizes

This whole big plate of hot mess went down this weekend between these two legal affairs bloggers, and the whole thing ended with the masked blogger getting unmasked, which is a violation of the "bro code" or something.

Over the weekend, there was a bit of an online kerfuffle between a (formerly) pseudonymous blogger at Obsidian Wings named John Blevins (who wrote under the nom de plume "Publius") and a blogger at the National Review Online named Ed Whelan. Most of you probably missed this, because you spent your weekend "living your lives," like citizens who aren't "sad" or "cripplingly lacking in social skills."

Well, this whole big plate of hot mess went down between these two legal affairs bloggers, and the whole thing ended with the masked blogger getting unmasked, which is a violation of the "bro code" or something.

If you want to get the plot of this whole thing, you can read the formerly psuedonymous guy's account, which links to the other guy's account, or you can read Wonkette's summary, or you can just accept my gross oversimplification of what happened:

ACT ONE:
Ed Whelan: Look! I put something on the internet!

ACT TWO:
John Blevins: I disagree with what you put on the internet, and will say so, on the internet!

ACT THREE:
Ed Whelan: RRAAAWRR! ME ANGRY! NOW I MAKE IT SO MAYBE YOU LOSE JOB, CANNOT FEED FAMILY!

Basically, that's it. Well, here's your denouement: the first guy, Whelan, apologizing:

On reflection, I now realize that, completely apart from any debate over our respective rights and completely apart from our competing views on the merits of pseudonymous blogging, I have been uncharitable in my conduct towards the blogger who has used the pseudonym, Publius. Earlier this evening, I sent him an e-mail setting forth my apology for my uncharitable conduct. As I stated in that e-mail, I realize that, unfortunately, it is impossible for me to undo my ill-considered disclosure of his identity. For that reason, I recognize that Publius may understandably regard my apology as inadequate.

The one thing I don't understand is after all this hullabaloo, why is he bothering to use the pseudonym? Hasn't the cat sort of been let out of the bag, here?

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