Yesterday the topic was Townhall Press and why it’s obvious, despite explicit FAQ-tual claim to the contrary, that they’re a vanity press. Today I want to talk about the particular sheep they hope to fleece.

Townhall Press is a speciality vanity press scummy scamming liar who lies. “On-Demand Book Publishing For Conservative Authors,” they are, and “A new alternative to liberal [New York] publishing houses.”

[M]ost publishing houses shun conservative authors. Liberal authors get their foot in the door while conservative authors get the door slammed in their faces! But now there is an alternative….

—About Townhall Press

Predictably, such blog communities as Making Light and TBogg are having a field day with this. And it is kind of funny, from a “reality-based community” point of view. Teresa can warn would-be authors until she’s blue in the face (and she’s certainly the one to do it), but, oh noes! Teresa is an editor for a liberal New York publisher! She doesn’t want conservative authors to get published! You can tell that this is so, because she’s trying to warn conservative authors away from Townhall Press! So the more she tries to educate, the more this subset of naive new writers will flee into the teeth of the wolf, sure that she’s the enemy and it’s the ally.

Whaddaya do? You tried, sister. Well done, thou valiant soldier. Go to your pillow with a clean conscience.

But here’s what keeps me from taking more than a very small slice of that schadenfreude pie.

As You Know, Bob, the scam of a vanity press–when the vanity press is a scam–is in attracting authors who would not be best served by vanity presses. It’s in luring naive writers (that is, writers who have not yet learned how the industry works) with claims of Your Book Available In All Major Bookstores! and More Royalties! By the time the author learns that the wolf won’t get them on bookstore shelves, won’t get them read by thousands nor yet bare hundreds of readers, in fact won’t do much more for them than sell them an expensive souvenir from their pen trip from Page One to The End… well, they’re out a lot of money. And the wolf is snickering up his hairy sleeve all the way to the ATM.

But that’s just the honey. These despicable predators also use a stick to drive authors their way. The Stick of Despair. Each thwack of that stick sounds something like this:

“You realize the big publishers aren’t signing new authors anymore? It’s incredibly hard to break in with them if you’re not already a Stephen King or a Nora Roberts. They’re all against you. But not us! We give new authors the chance they deserve….”

There are vanity publishers who use that stick on Christian would-be authors: “You know why you’re not getting published? Those decadent NY publishers want nothing to do with the Word of God. Surely you’re not surprised? But we will help you reach millions with your message of faith.” And now there’s a vanity press who thwacks away at the conservatives, telling would-be authors that big publishers are nasty liberals who wouldn’t–excuse me–wouldn’t make wee-wee on ‘em if they were on fire.

The scum bags take advantage of fervently held beliefs and encourage delusions of persecution in order to keep writers mistrustful of those who would tell them the truth. So they stay ignorant. And scared. And focused on neurotic tribalistic us-versus-them thinking. And in deep credit card debt.

It’s really, really tempting for me to think, “Yay! Better to see their $999 going to Townhall Press than to funding Bush’s successor!” and “Huzzah, one more book full of hateful swiftboaty lies will never get read!”

Except, except, except.

Townhall Press don’t ensnare the persuasive, the malicious, or the effective. They’re not aiding the cause of truth. They’re not preventing lies from flooding the idea market. The predations of Townhall Press don’t stop Ann Coulter and Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly and the Swift Boat Vets from flying off the shelves at Books-A-Million. Townhall Press are out to bilk the victims of the lies, not their perpetuators. Townhall Press is a perpetuator lies.

The enemy of my enemy is not necessarily my friend.

Hell, Townhall Press aren’t even an enemy of my real enemy.

Townhall Press are the enemy. That’s all.