Opinion: Hat tips

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Ahh, how a well-argued opinion ripples across the blogosphere. But then, so do dubious ones. Here’s a sampling of the sites that offered their own gloss to the work of the Times’ Opinion Manufacturing Division:

When news broke that a federal investigation would be launched to determine whether Cardinal Roger M. Mahony committed “honest services fraud” against parishioners by failing to protect children from abusive priests, bloggers took to their computers. Over at Newsbuster.org, Dave Pierre applauded Tim Rutten’s column (1/31/09) for what Pierre called a ‘looooong overdue’ assessment by the Times of the Los Angeles Catholic Church abuse scandal. Over at The National Catholic Reporter, a story on Mahony’s supposed mystification by the federal probe mentions an editorial that questioned the legal strategy of prosecutors.

Professional swimming has its moments in the shamelight, too. One example: photos of stars engaging in recreational drug use. Lowell Steiger looks at the controversy surrounding photos of eight-time Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps taking a hit from a bong. In his blog, Steiger looks back to an op-ed published in April 2008 -- a written debate by Jacob Sullem and Charles “Cully” Stimson -- which looked at the marijuana history of some of America’s most prominent officials.

In assessing Pastor Rick Warren’s invocation at President Obama’s inauguration, Shiloh Musing’s Ellen W. Horowitz referenced what editorial writer Michael McGough called Warren’s ‘explicitly Christian prayer.’

And, finally, over at Cab Drollery, we managed to make blogger “Diane’s” blood pressure rise once more with our editorial that supported the stance that names and address of those who contributed to the campaign to support Proposition 8 should not be kept secret.

AP Photo/Reed Saxon, file