The other day Matt Yglesias posted this:

Third Way is a neat organization — I used to work across the hall from them. And they do a lot of clever messaging stuff that a lot of candidates find very useful. But their domestic policy agenda is hyper-timid incrementalist bullshit. There are a variety of issues that they have nothing whatsoever to say on, and what policy ideas they do have are laughable in comparison to the scale of the problems they allegedly address. Which is fine, because Third Way isn’t really a “public policy think tank” at all, it’s a messaging and political tactics outfit.

Well this got the powers to be at Think Progress/Center for American Progress a little nervous, which lead to this posting yesterday:

This is Jennifer Palmieri, acting CEO of the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

Most readers know that the views expressed on Matt’s blog are his own and don’t always reflect the views of the Center for American Progress Action Fund. Such is the case with regard to Matt’s comments about Third Way. Our institution has partnered with Third Way on a number of important projects – including a homeland security transition project – and have a great deal of respect for their critical thinking and excellent work product. They are key leaders in the progressive movement and we look forward to working with them in the future.

I think Stoller sums this feeling of weirdness properly

So occasionally someone pulls back the curtain to show how DC actually works, and today we got a little glimpse on a fairly minor scale.

Kos also suggests that CAP not make a habit of doing this.

This is exactly the reason why I keep my blog as me, myself and I. I enjoy the freedoms to say whatever I want, when I want. I don’t have an editorial board leaning over my shoulder with some big brotheresque feel to it. I am free and independent of all that stuff. Do I get the traffic the bigger mob-blogs get? No way, but I still love the fact that this blog is me. I don’t prescribe to the talking points that all the other blogs go by. If I agree with them, I will state my agreement, but if I disagree I am certain to also point that out (ie: Rick Warren).

In other words, this blog will always be me. If it stays at a level of a few hundred readers a day, I am absolutely fine with that. If it grows to thousands of readers a day, cool, but rest assured this blog will always be the rantings of me. Of course I wouldn’t mind a little post help every now and then, and I would extend the same freedoms to them that I have.