(Rachel Maddow discussed the astroturfing a-holes going to the August town halls.)

You can always count on the media and the wingnutosphere to be hypocrites whenever any sort of protest takes place. For Republicans, they usually have to pay for their Zombie Plumbers to show up which is called: Astroturfing.

Astroturf refers to apparently grassroots-based citizen groups or coalitions that are primarily conceived, created and/or funded by corporations, industry trade associations, political interests or public relations firms.

No, it's not the fake grass that was used in baseball and football stadiums, but big cash being paid by corporations to promote conservative philosophy and undermine real change. Matt Yglesias writes: Astroturf vs “AstroTurf”. Read it.

The Malkins of course just love Astroturfing and probably view it as just another tool conservatives have to lie and cheat their way through another tough issue. And the media wittingly comply with their wishes. Think Progress has a whole list of these lobbyist/corporate shills. Even Newt Gingrich is supplying a toolkit for the teabaggers to use to disrupt health care town halls.

Thers at Whiskey Fire explains:

Which brings us to today, where by the miracle of wingnut headcase engineering, the Moral Wall Switch for coordinated attempts to disrupt other people's public events has been hastily and incompetently flipped from Evil to Good. To wit, here's the Tea Party-associated Freedom Works offering advice to Tea-Baggers about how best to disrupt town-hall meetings held by elected Democratic officials who want to discuss healthcare with their constituents:– Be Disruptive Early And Often: “You need to rock-the-boat early in the Rep’s presentation, Watch for an opportunity to yell out and challenge the Rep’s statements early.” – Try To “Rattle Him,” Not Have An Intelligent Debate: The goal is to rattle him, get him off his prepared script and agenda. If he says something outrageous, stand up and shout out and sit right back down. Look for these opportunities before he even takes questions.” Unsurprisingly, this is precisely what the Tea-Baggers have been doing. (Check out the video especially.) And what has been the reaction from those who invented imaginary liberal behavior and are watching as their side actually does precisely the stuff they only pretended liberals were doing and which they denounced as Wicked, Deranged, and Perfidious? Cheering it on, of course. Duh.

How long will it take the traditional media to expose the corporations that are running this con and even mention the word "astrotufing" in a serious way? I know, don't hold your breath.

UPDATE: It's taking Robert Gibbs to try and wake up the media from their slumber over these events:

We have Robert Gibbs openly calling this the Brooks Brothers Brigade. That's a start. Q: Are you concerned at what appears to be well-orchestrated protesting of health care reform at town halls as derailing your message? GIBBS: NO, I get asked every day about the myriad of things that could be derailing our message. I would point out that I don't know what all those guys were doing, what were they called, the Brooks Brothers Brigade in Florida in 2000, appear to have rented a similar bus and are appearing together at town hall meetings throughout the country Q: They seem to be pretty widespread. GIBBS: I seem to see some commonality in who pops up in some of these things. Q: Like individuals? GIBBS: Yeah. Q: Really? GIBBS: Yeah. Q: Can you discuss names or .... GIBBS: I don't have names but I think you can see quite a bit of similarity between who shows up where. He's clearly trying to lead the horses of the press corps to water, not that they'll drink.

I heard some Villager on TV say that Gibbs is making a mistake because he is only making Matt Drudge's website bigger. Really, I thought he already ruled their world.

[H/t Atrios]