Last year, readers of The New York Sun met Mr. X, the conservative who lives in the bastion of New York liberalism: the Upper West Side of Manhattan. He wrote anonymous oped pieces on the difficulty of being a pro-Bush Republican living among fire-breathing Bush-haters in an election year. His essays provoked a flood of letters from other Mr. Xs and Ms. Ys who identified with the necessity of disguising their political affiliation in this city.

I recently met Dr. X, a Manhattan psychiatrist who is also an anonymous conservative blogger. At the biography section of his Web site, at Shrinkwrapped.blogs.com, he writes: “I am a practicing Psychoanalyst, Psychiatrist, with four children, living with my wonderful wife in the suburbs of New York, and trying to make sense of the unreality around us.”

I cannot disclose where Dr. X’s office is located, what he looks like, how old he is, or any other tiny hint that might jeopardize his practice. I’m hazarding a guess that the majority of his patients are not conservative because, Lord knows, we right-wingers are so well adjusted that we don’t need psychiatrists. I’m joking.

Dr. X is a medical doctor – not a Dr. Phil-type psychologist – and that further confounds his liberal friends, who admit to his intelligence but think he’s crazy because he’s conservative. In the conservative blogging community, however, many consider him their favorite psychoanalyst.

I asked Dr. X why he started his blog. Not surprisingly, he answered, “It was 9/11, the day that the world changed for everybody. I was frustrated because I wasn’t getting the real news from the usual sources, so I went to the Internet and that turned everything around. There I could even access what was being reported in the Arabic press.”

Blogging is a great way for the average person to put in their two cents on current events, but many of the bloggers are far from average. Often, they are professionals like Dr. X who can provide expert analysis on important issues. From the comfort of their homes, the personal bloggers can expound, expose, or merely opine in varying levels of expertise on any subject. They have become known as the “pajamahadeen,” and their most significant achievement has been bringing about the demise of the CBS anchorman, Dan Rather.

A Georgia attorney, later disclosed to be Harry W. MacDougald, logged on under the ID “Buckhead” to the forum atFreerepublic.com. He questioned the authenticity of the 1972 Killian documents Mr. Rather was asserting were genuine evidence that George W. Bush went AWOL from the Texas National Guard. “Buckhead” insisted that the font used in the document was not available in typewriters back then and that clearly this memo was a forgery. We all know what happened then. Byebye, Mr. Rather.

My niece, who lives in Georgia and is a Democrat, called me soon after the Katrina disaster. While she knows I am a supporter of the president, she remains open-minded. Nevertheless, she commented on the horrors being reported in New Orleans and asked whether I agreed that the administration had blundered terribly. I then asked her where she was getting her news, and she listed every local liberal newspaper and the New York Times as her sources.

“If you want the facts,” I advised her, “log on toLucianne.com.” This is the biggest blog produced in New York City. According to Lucianne Goldberg, who owns and operates the popular site, as of August it received a monthly average of 23,516,902 hits. This is the site I rely on to get the truth on all the issues because the registered Lucianne posters, known as Ldotters, post news articles from all over the world, regardless of political affiliations or inclinations. The site has strict guidelines requiring legitimate news sources – foolish rants are not tolerated by Ldotters or the Lucianne staff.

In my opinion, what distinguishesLucianne.com from other major forums such as Freerepublic.com and Powerlineblog.com are the witty and frequently hilarious comments regarding the posted news items. Clearly, Ldotters are highly intelligent and have an irreverent sense of humor that lightens the day for many of us who’ve sometimes found it difficult to laugh since September 11, 2001.

For instance, Ldotter “Nattering Nabob” posted an article from a Scottish paper with the headline “Bill Clinton Charms Indian Actress.” In the comments section, the poster added, “Love means never having to stain your sari.” Now that’s funny.

But – most importantly – all the significant news gets a thorough vetting from a community of inquiring minds, like our own Dr. X, who are anxious to ferret out the facts, not the spin. The truth is out there and it’s online.

acolon@nysun.com