Looking over the list of forty journalists — I debated putting scare quotes around that term, but the list is a mix of journalism professors, those who write for liberal publications and liberal bloggers — who signed a letter of complaint to ABC News, and plugging those names into campaign donation databases, I note…

Michael Barube of the liberal blog Crooked Timber donated $300 to Barack Obama in the first quarter of 2008.

(James Galbraith, professor at the University of Texas-Austin, donated $4300 to John Edwards this cycle.)

Ilan Goldenberg of the National Security Network donated $250 to Barack Obama in the second quarter of 2007.

Michael Kazin, professor at Georgetown University, donated $2,526 to Obama in the first quarter of 2008. (That total must be combined primary and general election total.)

Mark Kleiman, a professor at UCLA and blogger at The Reality Based Community, donated $2,310 to Obama in the first quarter of this year.

Others donated to other Democratic candidates in previous cycles. Interestingly, none of those on the list donated to Hillary this cycle.

It’s no surprise that the folks on this list are liberals, and it’s not shocking that those who are less directly involved in day-to-day campaign journalism donated to candidates. But a headline that said, “Obama Donors Slam ABC Debate Tactics” sounds a little different than “Journalists Slam ABC Debate Tactics“, no? They’re trying to pitch the letter’s message as, “you offended us because we’re journalists and we know better about how a debate ought to be run”; when the balance sheet suggests that part of their objection is based upon, “we have a dog in this fight, some of us have put money behind that preference, and the way you ran the debate was bad for our guy.”