In an on-going vendetta against Star columnist Antonia Zerbisias, a summer student at the Canadian Jewish Congress named Ben Singer has been more than earning his salary--he's been doing the work of at least three people.
Ben's IP address is 69.77.176.174. That also happens to be the address of commenter "Karen"--and, surprisingly perhaps, commenter "Marty," who left a suggestion here that Kathy English of the Star might be the spouse of Howard English of the United Jewish Appeal Federation of Greater Toronto. Did he expect me to rush foolishly into print on that one?
Some of my blogging pals might recognize the IP address noted here. How many aliases does Ben have? By all means, send me email/comments.
And why is he using them during working hours? So far I've been blessed with nine visits this morning alone. Is this sanctioned by the CJC?
Meanwhile, it seems as though leaving pro-Israel comments on blogs is official Israeli policy. Where did Ben Singer spend his summer vacation?
UPDATE: Singer has blocked access to his Facebook profile, but here's a screengrab from his Wall indicating that he is employed by the CJC:
UPPERDATE: It's been a bit of a time back-channel, but I must, it seems, make a partial retraction, having ascertained that "Marty" is another person entirely, with his own Facebook page, bio and address. Ben Singer, for his part, is adamant that he is simply Ben Singer.
So what we have here may not in fact be sock-puppetry, but meat-puppetry. The notion that several independent people at the Toronto Jewish Community Centre found Yours truly's humble blog and all visited it on the same day is too much of a coincidence to be credible. Just as all Blogging Tories may not be Dr. Roy*, however, it seems that not all anti-Zerbisias zealots visiting/posting here from the JCC are Benjamin Singer. If he genuinely doesn't want all of the credit for this e-blitz, I am happy to retract. It did seem like a lot of work for one man.
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*Comment 8