‘Konservative’ Iowa Blogger Calls It Quits

A well known and controversial conservative – or, rather, “konservative” – blog went the way of the dodo Wednesday, as the man known online only as “Hershel Krustofski” (the name of the clown on Fox TV’s The Simpsons) announced the closing of his Krusty Konservative blog.

Krusty was the conservative muckraker of the Iowa blogosphere, frequently posting rumors and interesting tidbits that did not follow the typical Republican party line.  “I enjoyed reading Krusty's blog because it was informative and didn't resort to partisan talking points and attacks,” said ‘noneed4thneed,’ who writes the progressive blog Century of the Common Iowan – also anonymously.

But the need for anonymity can complicate the job of a controversial blogger, and Krusty appeared to value his anonymity above all else.  In an email interview with the National Journal’s Conn Carroll, Krusty refused to answer several questions that had been asked of most of the major bloggers in Iowa and other early primary states.  Krusty explained, “I'm an anonymous blogger, so I will not answer any questions that might lead to my true identity being discovered. I am currently employed, which works out really well because a klown can't live on seltzer water and splattered pies.”

Wednesday, in a post that broke from his trademark practice of replacing all Cs at the beginning of words with Ks, Krusty announced that he would stop blogging.  “Yesterday the ugly side of politics reared its ugly head,” he wrote.

I don’t know if its something I wrote recently that caused it or what the deal is, but there is some nasty stuff going on that center around this blog. I don’t really care what people think of me or like what I write, I never have and never will. I write what is on my mind and what I observe here in Iowa, and I’ll stand by anything that’s ever been written on this blog.

A day before his last post, Krusty incited controversy by calling for the resignation of Mary Lundby, Republican Minority Leader in the Iowa Senate.  “I criticized [former Republican leader Stu] Iverson’s ousters after they made their move at the end of the 2006 session. After the election I was hopeful Lundby, et al would be an effective minority. I was wrong.”  Krusty, a self-proclaimed ‘konservative’ Republican, has taken issue with Lundby’s more moderate positions.

The past days’ events have only served to intensify questions of Krusty’s identity, as it seems clear from his last post, titled “Blackmail and Extortion,” that someone who claims to know who he is may have threatened to release identifying information.

Many wonder whether the Republican leadership in the Iowa Senate was involved, including noneed4thneed: “I think it is rather interesting that yesterday he wrote about what a bad job the Republican leadership in the Senate was doing and now he has been blackmailed and is shutting down,” he said.  Kimberly Steenhoek, Communications Director for Iowa Senate Republicans, did not respond to our request for comment.

One popular theory is that Tim Albrecht, former Communications Director for Chris Rants (Rants served as Speaker of the House until Republicans lost their majority this year) and current Iowa Communications Director for Mitt Romney for President, is the man behind the Krusty's mask.  Before Krusty shut down comments on his blog, anonymous commenters frequently posted “Tim Albrecht is Krusty,” which may have provoked Krusty to stop allowing comments altogether.

But if Krusty is Albrecht, his posts have successfully hidden it.  When Romney’s hire of Albrecht was announced, Krusty wrote this post.  And generally, Krusty’s coverage has tended to favor the lesser candidates over the frontrunners for the Republican nomination.

If Krusty is not Albrecht, many believe that he may be another staffer for the House Republican leadership.  In sifting through over a year of posts, we could not find any posts in which Krusty was as critical of the House Republicans as he has been of other Republican figures in the Iowa Senate and the Presidential Campaign.  Krusty may have been referring to the rumor that he works for Republican leaders in the House when he wrote,

If these threats [to release my identity] only affected me, I’d give this little wimp a piece of my mind and continue business as usual, but it doesn’t affect just me, other people could suffer far greater consequences than I, and I just don’t think its right for the lives of innocent people to be ruined because somebody thinks that they are involved with the creation, maintenance, and content of this blog. As much as I’ve enjoyed this blog and the important conversations it has initiated it’s just not worth dragging innocent people through the politics of personal destruction.

For now, questions will continue to swirl around the Iowa blogosphere until they are answered – particularly in light of Krusty’s apparent admission that the release of his identity might be politically damaging to his employer.  For his part, although Krusty agreed to ‘look over’ my interview questions for him by email (the only form of communication he will accept), he has not yet responded with any comments.