I wish I had a dollar for every time someone has asked me: “Does Armstrong [Williams] really believe that garbage or is he doing it for the money.” In view of last week’s disclosure about his receiving a $240,000 federal contract that was funneled through a Washington PR company, I believe the answer is: both.

Armstrong is a third-generation Republican, as he will often remind you, and has long been associated with prominent conservatives. Let’s face it, if Armstrong were a Democrat, we’d never know he existed. However, he was astute enough to see the short line of Blacks supporting Right-wing causes and headed for the front of the line. In many ways, he has arrived.

“I first met Ronald Reagan when he was campaigning for president in 1980,” Williams wrote in an admiring column last June 7. “I was the student government association president at South Carolina State University and was in attendance at a political rally organized by Reagan confidantes Lee Atwater and Senator Strom Thurmond. Both had been gracious enough to mentor me. During the campaign, they assured me that if Reagan won, I would have a government appointment waiting for me.”

From a job at the Department of Agriculture at the age of 21, Armstrong decided to Velcro himself to long-time segregationist Strom Thurmond, the senior senator from his native South Carolina. Armstrong became Thurmond’s trusted assistant, so trusted, in fact, that the senator shared a deep secret about having fathered a Black daughter, Essie Mae Washington-Williams, now 79 years old, while stridently advocating White supremacy.

“There was a conversation that occurred at a 1966 Washington Urban League ceremony honoring myself and Senator Strom Thurmond for the growing bonds between black and white Americans, “ Armstrong wrote. “Back stage, Senator Thurmond leaned over and said, ‘You know, I have deep roots in the black community…deep roots.” His voice softened to a raspy whisper, ‘You’ve heard the rumors.’

‘Are they just rumors, Senator?’ I asked.

‘I’ve had a fulfilling life,” crackled Thurmond, winking salaciously.”

That was not the only time that former segregationist shared his, shall we say, dark secret.

“The subject came up again while the Senator and I were attending a SC State football game,” Armstrong wrote. He said that Thurmond disclosed that he had arranged for Williams to attend South Carolina State.

“She’ll never say anything,” Thurmond told Armstrong. “And neither will you…not while I’m alive.”

And, as Thurmond predicted, neither did. Not while he was alive.

In another move that would help bolster his career, Armstrong worked for Clarence Thomas at the Equal Opportunity Commission (EEOC). The two are said to be close friends and Armstrong is one of Thomas’ staunchest defenders.

Because of his willingness to carry water for Right-wing conservatives, Armstrong has been richly rewarded. The Graham Williams Group, formed with Steadman Graham, Oprah Winfrey’s longtime beau, has had an array of well-paying corporate clients. Until now, Armstrong has been a media darling, appearing regularly on CNN and other networks that routinely ignore more thoughtful and credible African-Americans. Conservatives make sure he gets invited – and paid – to give speeches to sympathetic groups.

Now, he’s taking heat for raking in a quarter of a million dollars without acknowledging that he was on the take from the Education Department. Like many Black conservatives, Armstrong is a card-carrying hypocrite. Not because he doesn’t believe what he’s being paid to say, but because he flails about government handouts for the poor and now we see his hands have been deep into taxpayers’ pockets. He dumps on poor people and accuse them of being unaccountable. Yet, when he’s caught taking taxpayers' money to help spread propaganda, he pretends to not know that he was doing anything wrong.

But let’s not stop with Armstrong. The belief by Education Department officials, including outgoing Secretary Rod Paige, that Armstrong Williams or any other Black conservative could sway Black public opinion in Bush’s favor – even for $240,000 – is laughable. On a good day, Black Republicans represent 10 percent of African-Americans and they can only get elected to Congress from districts that are at least 90 percent White. If Bush administration officials were going to hire Armstrong to sway anyone, it should have been to influence White conservatives.

But that would make too much sense. This fiasco isn’t about common sense or ethics. Instead, it’s about rewarding Black conservatives for carrying the GOP’s water and making sure if Republicans are ever out of power, no money will be left behind.