I wrote a post this morning about why internal linking it good as far as content theft goes. Someone steals your content, leaves your links on it, and you get SE juice, whether or not you knew the article was copied. Ironically that article was stolen, and I let the blog get off with a warning (I believe in giving people a second chance, plus I added them to my watch list), and I let them leave the article up. Then about an hour ago I saw that another blog had problems with the same splog, and the splog actually used my article as justification for copyright infringement. I mean, can you believe it? So I commented on that dude's blog, stated my stance, contacted the splog and told them that I learned they used my post as justification for illegal acts, and told them to remove it immediately. They are really lucky I don't go after them for defamation. Sorry I just needed to vent. Already gotten about 10 angry e-mails this morning from people who misunderstood my post (so I updated it to make it clearer). Wow... its been a long morning. Edit: I just wrote another blog post about the whole ordeal.
I think it is pretty ironic that you are having trouble with a splog after you posted that there can be benefits (linkjuice) from in-linking. I can see why they are using your article as justification, even if I don't think they are right for doing it. Splogging is so silly. At least you got your link juice out of it, right?
They shouldn't have used it as an excuse to steal content, that is all. Its just annoying, I have to deal with at least 1 of these people every week. Can't even imagine how many issues the big-name bloggers have.