If you spend half your life on the internet, as I do, you have probably come across an article or column published in Tech Central Station. As it turns out, according to the Washington Monthly, far from being a web-journal of disinterested political commentary, it is, in fact, little more than an internet version of "astroturfing", a technique popularized by conservative lobbyists to generate the appearance of grassroots support for an issue:

On closer inspection, Tech Central Station looks less like a think-tank-cum-magazine than a kind of lobbying practice. Which makes sense: Four of the five co-owners of TCS are also the co-owners of the DCI Group, the Washington public affairs firm founded by Republican operative Thomas J. Synhorst. TCS's fifth owner is Charles Francis, who is also a senior lobbyist at DCI and is listed on TCS's phone directory. And as it happens, three of TCS's sponsors--AT&T, General Motors, and PhRMA--have also retained DCI for their lobbying needs.

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TCS, for its part, includes a disclaimer on its site noting that "the opinions expressed on these pages are solely those of the writers and not necessarily those of any corporation or other organization." But it is startling how often the opinions of TCS's writers and sponsors converge.

Last July, for instance, PhRMA retained DCI to lobby against House legislation that would permit the reimportation of FDA-approved drugs from Canada and elsewhere. The same month, TCS put out a press release announcing that it planned to cover an upcoming bus trip taken by Canadian patients to "access prescription drugs and medical treatment" in the U.S. (The trip was sponsored in part by the Canadian subsidiaries of many of the same pharmaceutical companies that belong to PhRMA.) A few days after the press release was issued, TCS columnist Duane Freese published an article touting the bus trip and attacking the legislation; other contributors also wrote columns for the site attacking reimportation.

The articles on Tech Central Station address a broad range of issues, some of concern to its sponsors, many not. And most of the site's authors are no doubt merely voicing opinions they have already reached. But time and time again, TCS's coverage of particular issues has had the appearance of a well-aimed P.R. blitz. After Exxon-Mobil became a sponsor, for instance, the site published a flurry of content attacking both the Kyoto accord to limit greenhouse gasses and the science of global warming--which happen to be among Exxon-Mobil's chief policy concerns in Washington. [link via TalkingPoints Memo]

Combined with the GOP's success at building a political machine amongst business lobbyists of K Street, the use of a front magazine to influence opinion throughout the internet, as well as the wholesale purchase and sponsorship of ideologically-correct bloggers, is a chilling indicator of how far the Right is willing to go to shape the acceptable range of debate in this country. Anyone interested in how the Medicare and energy bills will fare in the court of elite opinion can read the tea leaves first at Tech Central Station.