The site will mix aggregation with original reporting, much of it done by freelancers, Carlson told David Weigel of the Washington Independent, sister site of the Minnesota Independent:

If there’s a story whose facts are verifiable, and it generates interest, and it comes from Satan himself, I will take it and I will pay him a reporting fee. But if we take a piece from Satan, that does not mean we’re on board with Satan’s agenda. It just means that the provenance of the piece, the origins of the piece, is not the most important thing. People don’t give you stuff because they love journalists. They give you that stuff because they’re pushing an agenda.

Pawlenty’s piece was apparently solicited especially for the website’s big splash today. Weigel writes that

Carlson and his staff are spending the final hours before the launch polishing off content that can break out of the gate — exclusive interviews, lists like the Top 15 Most Wasteful Stimulus Projects, and short features from think tankers and established politicos. Arianna Huffington will have one of the first pieces on the site.

Pawlenty appears directly below a “welcome note” by Huffington in the “Featured” column — and directly above the first installment of a diary by conservative columnist S.E. Cupp, who said last month that Pawlenty “can’t just sort of sit back and be a quiet governor much longer if he really wants to compete in 2012.”

Another post, labeled “DC Exclusive,” is decidedly T-Paw-friendly: “Massachusetts health program, model for Obama’s reform, strains state budget.” Dissing presidential rival Mitt Romney’s home state health plan was the theme of an op-ed Pawlenty wrote for the Washington Post back in August.

MnIndy: Obvious first question, who are you voting for?

TC: Oh I don’t know. I don’t have any clue. I’m not much of a voter anyway.

MnIndy: Are you here in support of the candidate, Ron Paul?

TC: Not the candidate, but the man. His ideas. Not all of his ideas, I disagree with him on a couple of significant things but on most things I agree with his ideas and I think—I’ve covered a ton of politicians and he’s probably the only one I’ve ever met who didn’t have any interest in winning, or in controlling other people, building power.

MnIndy: Probably his most controversial statement during the campaign was during the Republican primary debates, when he said 9/11 was the chickens coming home to roost.

TC: Right.

MnIndy: That seemed to get the Republicans very upset. What was your take on that?

TC: Well I’ve talked to him about this. I think it is completely unfair to blame the United States for 9/11. And so if he was doing that I reject it completely and aggressively. But if he was making a point, as he said he was, that our interventionist foreign policy has consequences, that’s obviously true. Do you see what I mean? I mean blaming the United States for 911 is outrageous. I have certainly interviewed a lot of people, especially in other countries, who think, “You got what you deserved.” And I think that’s a repulsive idea. But that’s not where he was coming from.