Today Talking Points Memo publisher Josh Marshall tweeted the following blind item:

So who is Marshall talking about? We couldn’t find any recent columns in a mainstream outlet about “what really counts as rape,” and Marshall didn’t respond to an email requesting clarification. We did come across a few hints, though.

The first hint: If you search Marshall’s Twitter history for “rape” and “columnist,” you’ll find exactly one prior tweet, from February 2014, in which Marshall uses both of those words:

The columnist mentioned in that link, James Taranto of the Wall Street Journal, argued at the time that “what is called the problem of ‘sexual assault’ on campus is in large part a problem of reckless alcohol consumption, by men and women alike.”

The second hint: Earlier today, Taranto mockingly linked to a column of Marshall’s on Twitter (using a picture of himself standing next to the 2014 Mel Bochner painting Ha Ha):

Perhaps all of these tweets are somehow related?

If you have any other theories, shoot us an email.