A blogger named "anniesj" at Live Journal criticized Bush the week before the election and received a night-time visit from the Secret Service. She is single and lives with her mother. The agents determined she was not a threat to national security, but she now has her very own FBI file that includes her photo, email, and weblog address.

Now, as to what made them pick her: She wrote a post after the presidential debate critical of Bush. Another reader called it in to the authorities. The Secret Service told her they were following up.

Some advice:

The tale is a lesson to us all. Number one lesson is that what happens on the internet can and will bite you on the a** in real life. We've seen it time and time again with internet affairs and sordid emails - now, you'd better watch where you put your political commentating toes. Number two is that no matter how cool and geeky the community - and LiveJournal is both - there will always be someone that ruins it for everyone else.

Put another way, people need to keep in mind that the internet has no erasers.

Here's Annie's version of her ordeal. [link via What Really Happened.]

Update: Not so clever attempts by Right wing bloggers, including a prosecutor, to post words in the comments to this post that will result in this site being linked to unacceptable behavior when googled have led to a decision to shut the comments down. Their comments have been edited.