No one in this world, so far as I know—and I have searched the records for years, and employed agents to help me—has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people.
  —H.L. Mencken

Not all the spoils of the Iraqi war will go to the big boys like Halliburton and Bechtel. There's always room for an enterprising piglet to find a morsel or two.

Take Chuck Muth, for example. Few Boulderians would recognize the name, except maybe the hapless municipal employees who were forced to shovel the sludge the Muthman's faithful minions dumped on the City in the form of the hundreds of angry and abusive e-mails during the silly Public Library Flag Flap. Muth, a professional conservative, publishes a dyspeptic right-wing e-newsletter composted mostly from quotes from other angry right-wing mediocrities whose names you wouldn't recognize either (Well, OK...He has quoted Boulderia's own Jon Caldara).

Muth's trademark e-mail attack is something like getting slimed in the movie "Ghostbusters." It's a favored weapon in his war against liberals, insufficiently right-wing Republicans, Hollywood celebs, and uppity minorities, although it sometimes misses its target broadly. See the amusing "Attack of the Right-Wing Pod People."

Mondo Boulder conducted an experiment with Muth & Co. We e-mailed one of the objects of his assaults and tipped them off about the source of all the hate mail they were getting. We said some less than flattering things about Muthman, and we cc'd the message to him. When Mondo Boulder insults someone, we want to be sure they know it. Muth's response was to first unsubscribe Mondo Boulder's correspondent from his e-list, then deliver his best badmouthing, including (without permission) our e-mail address. We got hundreds of angry messages, just like the City and the public library did. Here's our fave:

You are the stupid one you left wing comunist idiot. That was to good for you, you are just the villiage idiot!!!!!!

But tossing muck takes bucks. Chuckles earns a few pennies pushing a phone service, GOP Long Distance, in his crib sheet. In early February, 2002, a group of Native American and non-Indian students of the University of Northern Colorado organized The Fighting Whites basketball team "to have a little satirical fun and to deliver a simple, sincere, message about ethnic stereotyping."

When they started selling T-shirts with the Fighting Whites logo to fund an endowment scholarship at the U of NC, Muth quickly jumped in with a knockoff version Fighting Whities T-shirt of his own, siphoning off a few bucks and pandering to his followers, who seem particularly enraged when Native Americans aren't flattered at being made into comic sports mascots. Recently, the Fighting Whites donated $100,000 to the university to set up a scholarship endowment. How much Muth cleared with his ripoff scheme is not known.

The Iraq invasion offered another opportunity to profit through reflected glory with his "Operation Iraqi Freedom" merchandise. Besides the inevitable T-shirt, there was a coffee mug, lunchbox...and even a special Army or Marine Teddy bear. Awwww...

But Chuck feels he deserves it. Our troops would be hopelessly bogged down without his heroic efforts to keep Susan Sarandon, Tim Robbins and other insufficiently right-wing Hollywood celebs at bay.

Another humorous effort:

Get the HOTTEST bumper sticker in the country today: "Conservatives Are From Mars, Liberals Are From Uranus!"  $2.95 each.  Buy 3...Get 1 FREE.  No charge for shipping.  Limited supply.

Chuck's latest plan is to start charging for his e-letter.

Who knows, maybe he'll clear enough off this one to buy a dictionary and look up "Uranus."