Posted on 01/11/2011 4:36:29 AM PST by governsleastgovernsbest
I thought Levin was a smarter lawyer than that. Best of luck on that, Mark. You're making your living by giving your opinions in public, I think that's called a "public figure.""Last night Mark Levin suggested he would be initiating law suits against anyone who blamed him for these murders and assaults."
I attempt (as a non-lawyer) to treat this issue in my #32. The point has to be that when Big Journalism is a single, identifiable entity with a single, identifiable (and hostile) POV, there is scant recourse against slander (actually libel) by that entity. And that Big Journalism is such an entity is pitifully easy to show; the membership of Big Journalism unselfconsciously stonewall facts which are inconvenient to its case, and its "case" is always the same - that nobody can be trusted except Big Journalism. Big Journalism, and its acolytes, to whom Big Journalism assigns positive labels such as "progressive," or "liberal," or "moderate."Who is "Big Journalism," and how would you name it in a lawsuit? Simple - Big Journalism is the Associated Press and its membership. Big Journalism excludes from its membership any who would criticize any of its members in any serious way. Thus, a Dan Rather can promote a fistfull of fraudulent "Texas Air National Guard memos" and, after being busted by proofs that those "memos" were fraudulent, double down and refuse to apologize and withdraw his accusations against President Bush43. He did so secure in the knowledge that he would not be seriously criticized, let alone ostracized, by the rest of Big Journalism.
He was secure in that knowledge for the simple reason that all "MSM" journalists have each other's back, and none of them would dare to break that cabal's code. And he was right. CBS conducted a show "investigation" which found that there was no political motive behind a fraudulent October Surprise hit piece on the Republican presidential candidate. A "surprise" which, to go by the advertising which the Democratic Party had ready to launch in an instantaneous followup to the 60 Minutes hit piece, was no surprise at all to the Democratic Party. And the rest of Big Journalism uttered not a peep about it.
Nor is the "TANG memo" hoax unique, or even unusual. Big Journalism turned the Duke lacrosse team "rape" hoax into fodder for almost a year of heated discussion despite the obvious fact that Nifong was trying the case in the newspapers because he was running for election - and that his witness was unreliable and self-interested. It was just a matter of time before the truth caught up with Nifong - but what an experience for those young men to be arbitrarily subjected to!! Another example is the SBVT effort to oppose the election of John Kerry, and the PR effort that Big Journalism launched against them.
Why does Big Journalism go along with the Democratic Party? The question is miscast. To ask the question, "Why would politicians go along and get along with Big Journalism?" is to answer it. Once accept the obvious fact that Big Journalism exists as an identifiable entity with identifiable "follow the money" interests, and the granting of any special treatment to any member of Big Journalism - see for an egregious example the limits on criticism of candidates by anyone except members of Big Journalism during election campaigns - becomes absurdly unconstitutional.
Enactment of any such law is corrupt - and, lest we forget, there were plenty of Republican congressmen willing to vote for the McCain-Feingold monstrosity. And George W. Bush signed it, and Sandra Day O'Connor put the imprimatur of SCOTUS on it. But O'Connor was replaced by Alito and - Kennedy ruling as he did at the time - McConnell v. FEC would go the other way today. So, general tendency notwithstanding, Republicans are not uniformly principled enough to stand with the people and the Constitution against the flattery and derision of self-aggrandizing Big Journalism.
Talk Radio is a format which depends crucially on appearing to represent the public by fairly taking on callers as they come. That stands in direct contrast to journalism, which is inherently a "we're objective and the public isn't," proposition because of its format. And it turns out that, although the soap opera actor says that acting is easy once you've learned to fake sincerity, the public which listens to talk radio can readily tell if the talk show host screens out challenging calls and only answers softball questions. The reality is that claims of "objectivity" - or "moderation" or any other virtue - become unsupportable when subjected to truthful attacks based on facts and logic which must be answered by the talk show host in real time. The consequence has been that people with a "liberal" mindset hear their views reflected adequately by Big Journalism, and people who recognize the limitations of Big Journalism's "objectivity" constitute the audience of Talk Radio.
To return to my starting point, when Big Journalism is a single, identifiable entity with a single, identifiable (and hostile) POV, there is very limited recourse against libel by that entity. Thoughtful people tend to see through the tendentiousness of Big Journalism, but the relative sizes of the audiences for Big Journalism and for Talk Radio certainly give pause to a belief in the adequacy of purely rational argumentation as a basis for PR. The one place where you are supposed to win or lose purely on the facts and logic of your case is the courtroom. That is why I favor a maximum effort to bring the Associated Press and its membership to book in court. And given the slender-reed nature of any hope of support from the Attorney General even in a Republican administration, that leaves only the idea of a civil suit. As far as suing the AP is concerned, it shouldn't hurt your chances to be able to point out that the AP was found by SCOTUS to be in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act back in 1945. And whereas the AP had such an obvious benefit in conserving scarce bandwidth in the days of the telegraph, and seemed to be "too big to fail" in 1945, in the 21st Century the bandwidth required for journalism is practically free. So today a remedy which threatened the existence of the AP would not obviously be counter to the public interest.
Having identified the defendant, however, I am unsure of exactly who the plaintiff should be. Certainly Mark Levin and talk radio hosts generally have an interest in defeating any legal restrictions/prohibitions which the present imbroglio and the present administration threaten. But just as certainly the audience of talk radio has its rights threatened by those same forces. And I would rather the audience be the plaintiff, if that is actually possible.
Journalism and ObjectivityWhy the Associated Press is Pernicious to the Public Interest
The Market for Conservative-Based News
BTTT
You do realize that Big Journalism is the name of one of Andrew Breitbart’s websites?
To that point, your entire screed is in need of adjustment as you constantly refer to Big Journalism in capital letters.
Correct! In war, when they are losing they want to stop fighting and negotiate. After they have recouped and replenished their troops and supplies they will launch a sneak attack and the war is on again. The key phrase here is that now they want the conservatives to turn the other cheek. When they are winning it is an eye for an eye but when they are losing they tell us to turn the other cheek.
Liberalism is a mental disorder.
Thanks for the ping. OUTSTANDING post!
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