Is Texas being 'invaded'?

For days now, the conservative blogosphere has been electrified by a persistent rumor: Namely, that members of the Mexican drug gang Los Zetas crossed the border into Texas and seized control of two ranches near Laredo. Local law enforcement denies the story, and the FBI says it doesn't comment on rumors, but some bloggers insist that the Zetas did invade, even if briefly — or that the gang's ongoing occupation is subject to a media blackout. Is something going on in Laredo or is this just a right-wing fabrication? (Watch a Fox report about the Los Zetas)

It's time to end this farce: The bloggers who've "driven the hoax of Los Zetas gunman" need to kill it, says Bob Owens in Confederate Yankee. One of them, Kimberly Dvorak, isn't backing down — "Do you really need a dead body to believe Zetas are crossing our borders?" — but she's missing the point. With "multiple agencies and Laredo media" contradicting her, she has no story, or "reputation," left.

"But will they retract?"

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I trust the bloggers behind the story: Dvorak and "Digger" Dan Amato are "well-established internet journalists," and they broke the story independent of each other, says John G. Winder in The Cypress Times. If they stand by their sources, that's good enough for me. And just because "nothing is currently occurring" at the ranches in Texas, that's not proof the Zetas invasion didn't happen.

"Final update: Los Zetas and Texas ranches"

Right-wing blogs are starting to "embarrass themselves": Unfortunately, this sort of "absurd, entirely fabricated" story is increasingly typical of our "right-wing media," says Media Matters. It's pretty clear that Dvorak and Amato just invented the Zetas invasion as soon as the Shirley Sherrod "smear" dissolved — and other conservative bloggers ran with this juicy tale of gang occupation, until it, too, was debunked. Now they'll move on to the next faux outrage. "Rinse, repeat."

"Right-wing media just can't stop pushing fake stories"