Alexander Vindman Now Threatens Bogus SLAPP Suit Against Fox News & Laura Ingraham
from the can-we-stop-with-the-slapps dept
SLAPP suits and SLAPP threats are flying back and forth these days. The latest is that Lt. Col. Alex Vindman, who is a key player in the impeachment hearings, is threatening a highly questionable defamation lawsuit against Fox News and Laura Ingraham, because she had on a guest who suggested Vindman was guilty of espionage (he's not). The threat letter was sent by David Pressman, a lawyer who works for Boies Schiller Flexner, a law firm which has a history of sending around bogus threat letters to the media for doing reporting.
Even if you think that Fox News is terrible (it is), that Ingraham is not to be trusted (she's not), and that her guests are fools (they are), this threat is still completely bogus and silly.
During their exchange, Ms. Ingraham said, “Here we have a U.S. national security official who is advising Ukraine, while working inside the White House, apparently against the president’s interest, and usually, they spoke in English. Isn’t that kind of an interesting angle on this story?”
“I found that astounding,” Mr. Yoo replied. “Some people might call that espionage.”
The Mr. Yoo in question is John Yoo, whose biggest claim to fame is writing the legal justifications for torture during the Bush administration. I wouldn't trust him to throw a ball to a dog, let alone opine on matters regarding the administration, but that doesn't mean that what he said was defamatory. As Ken "Popehat" White explained in a Twitter thread, even if everything Yoo and Ingraham said is ridiculous (and it is), there's nothing in there that rises to the level of defamation:
/2 Defamation requires a provably false statement of fact. Arguments, characterizations, political rhetoric and hyperbole, and various forms of consciously performative bullshit don't qualify."Vindman's conduct we were just talking about is ESPIONAGE" is opinion, not defamation.
— IWantNothingHat (@Popehat) November 20, 2019
No matter which side of this you stand on, hopefully we can all agree that bogus threats of defamation, and silly cease and desist letters over people stating a (bad and dumb) opinion are not helping anyone.
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Filed Under: 1st amendment, alexander vindman, cease and desist, david boies, david pressman, defamation, espionage, free speech, john yoo, lauara ingraham, slapp, threats
Companies: fox news
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Pride goeth before the fall
There ain't no hurt like butt hurt.
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He needs better lawyers advising him.
I can totally understand the desire to sue.
I can also see how horribly it would end.
Given he is already fending off death threats against himself & his family I can forgive him making an easy mistake cheered on by well meaning but stupid people to try and stop what he see's as the source generating the threats.
We need a Federal Anti-SLAPP law, it might encourage less of these cases moving forward.
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Lawyers
I'm curious how Vindman and Fiona Hill are paying these pricey lawyers at Boies, Schiller & Flexner. Partners at that firm bill out in the neighborhood of $1000/hr. Not easy to afford on a government salary. Pro bono, you say? Well, Vindman is a government employee. There's rules against accepting gifts, especially gifts directly tied to one's employment as this would be.
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I do not like the cable station but I do like the website because it has an RSS feed and gives you a less than 1 minute read of many relevant news stories. It is a lot better than some of their competitors if you want a quick description of ongoing news events.
Espionage. I didn't watch or read and don't know anything about the circumstances to render a valid opinion but I doubt he crossed the line just by going to congress.
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Re: Lawyers
Pressman also works for the government, which may avoid the rules you are referencing. Or, Pressman may be operating on contingency, which would not be a "gift". Finally, I do not believe the rules on emoluments would apply in this case given Vindman's position in the government.
If it was a concern though, id have imagined the republicans would have brought it up instead of trying to kill shot him on being offered a job.
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"A republic -- if you can keep it"
Any democratic structures and freedom of speech rely on an informed and mature populace. As long as it is profitable to send this kind of tripe to a national audience, freedom of speech comes with the obligation to shun misinformation, not pay extra for it.
You can't fix stupid with laws, you can only fix it with education, and the U.S. makes education expensive to the individual while it becomes cheaper and cheaper to peddle misinformation for profit.
Sondland has right now dealt democracy its heaviest blow likely for decades to come: he has told a story about open corruption not just concerning Trump but also Pence. This makes it impossible for Republicans in the Senate to convict Trump since any conviction would equally affect Pence, and the third in command is Nancy Pelosi, clearly not a Republican.
So Republicans need to justify their decision not to convict Trump and the only way to do that is alternate facts. The White House will put up a fight against "fake media" unparalleled since historical fascism and the next election will face a split populace believing in utterly incompatible versions of reality.
And whoever gets elected president will only be able to speak for and with half the populace.
Defending freedom of speech takes more than defending the right to talk. It also takes giving the listeners the means to tell right from wrong. And this is spiraling downwards.
I cannot blame the powerless all too much for thinking that it can't be right for the truth to go down like that.
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What’s the problem with him suing if the guy in Thailand can sue for being called peudo
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Re:
Ah, no. The accusation is the security expert on Ukraine occasionally spoke in Ukrainian with the Ukrainians instead of English and therefore he was committing treason.
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If it's good enough for the Cheeto in charge...
If the President can file bogus law suits to annoy, harass, and make false statements about people, why can't the peons?
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Re:
The specifics of the case.
The original pedo guy comment was likely protected opinion, but Musk later stated that he had evidence gathered by a PI that the British Ex-pat met and married a 12 year old girl in Thailand, a false statement of fact. The PI actually reported his wife was 18 when they met and married, and his wife argues she was even older. The later statement has the strongest case, as Musk seemed to be clearly arguing facts at that point, not merely opinion based on prejudices
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Look man
Alex look you cant sue people ever things you yourself are most likely guilty of.
That’s like borat calling out twitter.
Which he did.
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Re: Re:
Okay that sounds like hyperbole and is completely ridiculous, not something that can be subject of a lawsuit.
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Furthermore, the court recently said the man suing Musk was a private citizen, not a public figure — which means the bar to proving defamation is much lower.
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Re: "A republic -- if you can keep it"
Not so. If they convict Trump, the argument could then be made that while pence was aware of the crime, and may have contributed to it, his actions did not rise to the corrupt action necessary for impeachment. Its the argument Republicans should have been arguing from the beginning. We don't need to further impeach Pence, unless I missed the part where Sondland confessed Pence was VP Agnew 2.0. Impeach Trump, and maintain oversight, but don't start impeachment against Pence. Impeaching Pence would be using Impeachment as a political tool.
Issues of the president speaking to half the populace predate trump, and will continue with our without impeachment.
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Re: Lawyers
Maybe he knows how to manage his money better than you do and is sitting on a huge savings account with which he could use to hire a top lawyer, even if it is for dumb reasons.
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Re: Look man
So what facts and proof do you have that he is most likely guilty of espionage?
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Re: Re: Look man
He testified against Trump so clearly he must be guilty of something! They say it so it must be true. If they can't find a smear that sticks, they'll just photoshop a slice of pizza into his hand so the drooling cretins of 8chan have something to make long youtube videos and twitter threads about.
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Re: Lawyers
That is almost certainly a valid question and not a sad appear to smear the mans good name. I mean it’s not like he’s earning 6 figures a year with free healthcare,
housing, food, and travel. How could he possibly afford a ham sandwich, much less a two hours of a lawyers time?
And do tell us how very concerned you are, while totally coincidentally wink parroting Fox News latest batch of bullshit talking points.
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Re: Re: Lawyers
Two hours? You think all the depositions, interrogatories, and multiple appearances before House committees only took two hours?
Well, you're good for a chuckle, if nothing else.
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Re: Re: Lawyers
What contingency? Vindman isn't suing for anything. He's not asking anyone for monetary damages. He hired this firm to represent him in his appearances before Congress throughout this whole impeachment process. Basically, to advise him what to say and what not to say to legally protect himself. There's no way to work a client like that on a contingency. Either you get paid upfront or you do the work for free (pro bono).
This has nothing to do with emoluments. It would fall under statutory and OPM rules on the solicitation or acceptance of gifts by government employees.
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Re: Re: Re: Lawyers
I was speaking just to write the letter to Fox. For the rest of it, as another AC said. “Maybe he knows how to manage his money better than you.” In the mean time let’s all really pretend to be so concerned who’s paying for his lawyers until we get our next set of talking points.
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Trustworthy..??? Really
FoxNew is terrible and laura can't trusted then I can only assume someone's been sucking too hard on the CNN and MSNBC Kool-Aid straw. Liberalism is a dangerous thing. It is comforting to see another side to the monolithic liberal media
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Re: Trustworthy..??? Really
The brand of conservatism that thinks liberalism as a whole is "a dangerous thing" is even more dangerous. It's convenient to categorize everything in US politics as black & white, good & bad, liberal & conservative but those views are really far-right and far-left. Everyone else, admittedly what seems to be a minority these days, is capable of viewing both "sides" with a healthy dose of skepticism and form their own thoughts. You do not appear to be among them.
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Yeah, pretty much. Fox News carries water for the GOP, with all that phrasing implies, and Laura Loomer is a professional conservative grifter.
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The article’s parenthetical statements are spot on (they’re not).
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Re: Trustworthy..??? Really
Fox give the other side of things? Well, I suppose fantasy is the other side of the coin to reality. Must be comforting to have a sea of white faces confidently state that the real reason your life is crap is some conspiracy involving some 'other', minorities, liberals, immigrants, they're all plotting to take what you want to have.
Nothing dangerous about winding up your audience for years, telling them to buy guns, giving them an enemy then pretending that conservatives/christians/white people are under attack, nope. There's no chance that's ever going to result in innocent people being murdered.
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I think what’s most confusing to me is how Ingraham is liable. She didn’t say, publish, or broadcast anything defamatory.
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White and Masnick have such similar points of view.
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Re:
Paul Hansmeier lost his appeal. Get over yourself, John Smith.
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So what?
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Re: Re:
Leave it to trumpaloons to view competence as something foreign and dangerous.
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Re:
I believe that John Smith has claimed that Masnick and multiple lawyers, including Ken White, are engaged in a conspiracy to... something or other, so he might be implying that them having very similar points of view is evidence of that conspiracy. A conspiracy to what, exactly? Well, according to John Smith, he's still in the process of getting all his ducks in a row, crossing all his T's and dotting his I's, and so on, so that when finally reveals all he'll be 100% certain of winning any defamation cases against him. I think he's been claiming this for a least a year now.
He's also recently claimed to have inside information that Masnick, White and co-conspirators are already under investigation by the Feds.
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Re: Re:
Ah the incoherent ramblings of a deranged and/or trollish lunatic... truly, they are the gift that keeps on giving, or at least the report function stress-tester that keeps on giving anyway.
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Re: Trustworthy..??? Really
Howdy Ivan. You just now find the password to this account?
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Re:
Chris and Jhon have such similar points of view.
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Re: Re: Re:
Sounfds like someone's trying to take the Deranged Cyberstalker title away from billy boy. (Who also happens to share many similarities with Jhon Smith)
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Re: Look man
Even if he were guilty of espionage (that is if you're too stupid to realize Trmpz and his ilk are gonna try every smear no matter how obviously false) it wouldn't change the fact that Trump DID try a quid pro quo.
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Re: Re:
Pretty much. Though the claim about Masnick and White is not nearly anything recent. John Smith's hateboner for White goes all the way back when Popehat was covering the Prenda Law saga.
Since any IP enforcement coming under scrutiny rustles John Smith's jimmies harder than a Richter 9 earthquake, he's held a deep-seated grudge for White ever since. You can check out Smith's diatribes over Techdirt's coverage of the Prenda saga when he was still posting under his "horse with no name" moniker. Starting from this one, where he shakes his fist in outrage at Otis Wright.
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Re: Re: "A republic -- if you can keep it"
It's basically during the impeachment inquiry that the bulk of the remaining news anchors of Fox News left, leaving the political coverage to shows. The step from giving the facts a particular spin to just not bothering with them in the first place is a comparatively new one. We are no longer talking about different views of reality but different realities here.
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maybe my favorite sentence from your writing
I really can't say enough how much I like this sentence.
applause
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Re: If it's good enough for the Cheeto in charge...
You can file all you want, it's still stupid.
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Re: Re: "A republic -- if you can keep it"
Well, it's the same train wreck. Having a draisine in the tender isn't enough to stop bothering about the consequences of impact.
Particularly if that decrepit engine is going to explode and insist on taking down the whole train.
You've seen the "Never Trumper" rhetoric that is applied as a normal propagandist would use "unpatriotic" and "scum" for Republicans not unconditionally backing Trump. Trump would have to be locked away from Twitter for this to work.
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Re: Lawyers
There's rules against accepting gifts, especially gifts directly tied to one's employment as this would be.
Well, it's not a big deal really. If he is accepting it as a gift, I'd argue why it's inappropriate in this case but not with respect to the president.
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Re:
Trump and Putin have such similar points of view.
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Re: Lawyers
Enforce them against trum then you can have everyone else down the chain until then your "concern" is flat out dishonest and borderline trolling.
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Re: Re:
Love those nutterz that scream "talk american!"
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Re: "A republic -- if you can keep it"
"Sondland has right now dealt democracy its heaviest blow likely for decades to come"
Truth hurts ... better to deal with it now than later.
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Re: Re:
Ooh ooh, does that mean he's going for RICO? grabs popcorn
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Re:
Agreed on both points. I'm guessing the accusation of espionage is especially infuriating to an active duty military officer, and he certainly doesn't deserve that. But that doesn't make it a good idea to sue.
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Re: Lawyers
"I'm curious how Vindman and Fiona Hill are paying these pricey lawyers "
Is that is your take from the impeachment hearings?
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Re: "A republic -- if you can keep it"
Regardless of what testimony is offered, Pence cannot be just automatically swept up in the articles of impeachment against Trump. The House would have to also draft articles of impeachment against Pence, and there is no way they would do that. They know what a political crapshow that would be, just like you say.
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Re: Re: Re: "A republic -- if you can keep it"
Shep's gone; he was the best newsman they had. Now that title falls to Wallace, who's been doing a pretty good job but he's just one man. The network's always been run by the pundits like Hannity, but that's more the case now than ever.
Not for nothin', Roger Ailes created Fox News for precisely the purpose of making sure that the next time a Republican president had a scandal like Watergate, it wouldn't bring him down. Fox News is doing exactly what it was designed to do.
The biggest difference between now and the Bush Administration is that there's a feedback loop now. Fox certainly took its cues from Bush, but now Fox is taking its cues from Trump and Trump is taking his cues from Fox. There's a symbiosis there that wasn't there when Bush was president. (Trump is a man who makes Bush look smart and statesmanlike by comparison.)
The biggest irony of all is that Trump is now facing impeachment because he believed a conspiracy theory he heard on Fox; all this "the DNC server is in Ukraine" business is bullshit he heard on the teevee. Which is, arguably, how he rose to political prominence in the first place (as a birther).
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Re: Re: Look man
Well, quid pro quo is the bread and butter of politics. That's a red herring. The question is just what quid pro quo we are talking about. The president is the highest executive responsible for the decisions of the moment. He certainly has the authority to hold up foreign aid, even for putting some quid pro quo in the interest of the United States in effect.
But this authority and the reasons for executing it are subject to oversight. He can't just do it for better reelection chances even if he imagines that to be in the interest of the United States. That's putting the cart before the horse. He is perfectly entitled to improve his reelection chances by furthering the interest of the United States, but not the other way round.
So the real problem is not that there was a quid pro quo. The problem is just what the "quid" and "quo" are. And why they had to be hidden from plain sight. Sure, sometimes you need to do secret diplomacy, but "secret diplomacy" is not synonymous to "dirty deals".
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Re: Re: Lawyers
No, that's my take as a result of Mike bringing up Vindman's lawyers in this article.
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Re: Re:
It's unprovable in any case, because sexual orientation cannot be determined as a matter of fact. No illegal actions were alleged until Musk started to double and triple down.
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dear Mr. Vindman..
Considering your rank and location in the Gov..
what would it take to talk to a gov/state agency and have Some one knock and raid a persons Home??
There are enough Dumb Judges out there that would sign anything for you, Probably..
Knock and rummage thru a house and take all electronics based on an anon complaint..(I love ANON he/she/it is sooo cute)
then have his Stuff Sold in 7 days.. Or scan the spit out of it, and Find something stupid..(his porn accounts would be great)
ANd you can add to that request by telling them NOT to tell anyone of have the cops/police/idiots return and do it again..
(Who needs the Mob)
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That's exactly how Fox "News" games the system: they frame outright lies and attacks as conjecture or "opinion", knowing very well that such insinuations are just as effective at persuading a gullible public yet protected from legal repercussions. One can't shout "FIRE!" in a crowded theater, but they can light a fat stogie, waft it about unseen in the dark, and then scream about the smoke to imply there's a fire. The end effect is the same, as most in the theater who can see the smoke would be to far away to smell that it's from a cigar. I'm not a lawyer or legal scholar, so I don't know how to best deal with this without trampling on legitimate free speech, but one doesn't need to be either to see how erosive such prevalent fake "news" is to the social and political stability of our nation. And more specifically in Vindman's case, endangers lives. We've already seen that these propagandists are not above using hateful rhetoric to not only paint targets on perceived enemies but provoke violent attacks on them.
Some argue that one must fight speech with speech. In the previous example, someone would need to shout down the provocateur with the fact that the smoke is from a cigar. However, that would require someone to effectively persuade the crowd in the narrow time frame before panic sets in. While events tend to evolve over much longer timescales in actual public discourse, the time required for an effective response to propagate can still be relatively short. "Better education" is another proposed solution. While I don't disagree that is required, we're already generations into that downward slide; it would take another generation or so for formal education to begin to effect our social course. While today's net-native youth may be more savvy about social media, they still don't do well against fake "news". https://www.forbes.com/sites/prudygourguechon/2018/05/13/think-you-can-tell-fake-news-from-real-new- study-says-think-again/#6bb94fe228e7
What's the solution? I don't know... But to shrug of Fox "News" style attacks and refuse to recognize how they game free speech laws to intentionally harm others is dangerous and simply unacceptable.
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Re: Re: Re: Lawyers
and those are the only clients Vindman has?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Lawyers
and those are the only clients Vindman lawyers have?
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Re:
Stop that.
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Yes, you can. But it’s not about whether you can — it’s whether you should.
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FYI, pedophilia is not a sexual orientation. Only homophobes with a vested interest in linking pedophilia to LGBT people for the purposes of legal (and social) marginalization sincerely believe otherwise.
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Re:
Go argue with the prosecutors at nuremberg. Techdirt can't change that international law for you.
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Re: Re:
What in the world are you talking about?
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How many times..
CAN a news channel post opinion/... And NOT be considered protected..
HOW many idiots do they Run across the screen, saying the SAME BS, And its..We didnt say it..
How much do they Pay others to State, BS, and get away with it,cause they DIDNT SAY IT..
Love, get Paid for your comments. even if you are told what to say. Hinted at what to say..
At one point is was the same persons up there More then any others..
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Re:
In other words, you have nothing substantive to add so you're going to play the pedantic police card.
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Re: Re:
It's not pedantic. People using the (false!) "fire in a crowded theater" claim tend to get all the other details wrong about the 1st Amendment.
https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/11/its-time-to-stop-using-the-fire-in-a -crowded-theater-quote/264449/
https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-hackneyed-a pologia-for-censorship-are-enough/
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/08/free-speech-cli ches-media-should-stop-using/596506/
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Re: Re:
Thank you for clearly labeling your strawman.
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Re: Re: Re:
With all due respect Mike, it should be quite well understood by now that the metaphor about shouting "fire" specifically refers to cases where there isn't an actual fire and that doing so could have consequences. Arguing otherwise, such as trying to make the metaphor about a literal fire, is being pedantic.
Trying to twist that mischaracterization of my comment as support for censorship, even I already stated the opposite, is another matter.
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Re: Re: Re:
Replying without understanding what I was talking about doesn't add much to the conversation. Continuing to do so adds even less.
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Re: Re:
This John Smith guy sounds a lot like that O'Keefe character.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
[Projects facts not in evidence]
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Re: How many times..
worst part of this is papers and sites can say..
"THEY posted it",. we only reported what THEY SAID..
No Proof of anything is needed.
That AINT NEWS.
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Re: Re: "A republic -- if you can keep it"
However, the involvement of Pence would make a Gerald Ford kind of deal "resign voluntarily and I'll give you my presidential pardon for everything you did" politically untenable. Not that Trump would resign voluntarily anyway.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
With all due respect, that is not how those three sources or Mike are characterizing your argument. The fact of the matter is that, even if there is no actual fire, the First Amendment does protect your right to shout, “FIRE!” in a crowded movie theater without legal consequences. No one is mischaracterizing your comment there.
They weren’t characterizing your argument as support for censorship per se. They were merely noting that a) it was mistaken and b) it is most often used by people who do use it to argue in support for censorship. They also provided sources backing these claims up and asked you to stop using that particular argument.
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Re: Re:
Please explain what the f&¢k the prosecutors at Nuremberg have to do with any of this.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
The 'clear and present danger' test in the Schenck case (which is where your fire/theater metaphor comes from) was overturned by the Supreme Court in Brandenburg vs. U.S. and is no longer an accurate statement of 1st Amendment jurisprudence.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
I agree.
You should really stop talking until you understand what you're talking about.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
In other words, you didn't actually read any of the articles he linked.
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Re: Re:
I don't think it's fair to hide baseless allegations behind "opinion." If that were true I'd be legally able to accuse everyone of the vilest crimes and get clean away with it by tacking "In my opinion" on to the end of every lying sentence. That doesn't seem right to me.
Yoo accused the man of espionage. He should be sued into the bloody ground.
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Re: Re: Re:
Even if he just came out and said, "Vindman is guilty of espionage" (which he didn't quite), proving slander would be a high bar to clear. Since Vindman is now a public figure, he would need to prove "that the writer or publisher acted with actual malice by knowing the falsity or by reckless disregard for the truth." There's no way he's going to be able to prove that.
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Re: Re: Re:
That's not really true. It takes more than saying "in my opinion" to make a statement a statement of opinion. If I said "In my opinion, Joe Blow walked into the bank at 4:30 PM, pulled out a gun, and shouted 'Everybody on the ground!'" that's not a statement of opinion, it's a factual statement that could potentially be defamatory, even though I put "in my opinion" in front of it.
He didn't, though, any more than Techdirt accused Shiva Ayyadurai of fraud. "Espionage" is a word that people frequently throw out as rhetorical hyperbole; like "that's treason," "he's a fraud," or "copyright is theft," saying "that's espionage" is not a statement that a reasonable person would understand to literally mean that the party is guilty of the statutory crime described by that name.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
Yoo accused the man of espionage.
Espionage is one of those laws written so broadly it would probably be unconstitutional if fully enforced.
I would guess that most people have violated that statute if they live very far into their adulthood and many children do also.
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Re: Re:
"I believe that John Smith has claimed that Masnick and multiple lawyers, including Ken White, are engaged in a conspiracy to... something or other, so he might be implying that them having very similar points of view is evidence of that conspiracy."
It's far simpler than that.
Popehat went after Baghdad Bob's big heroes, the stalwart copyright trol...err, "defenders". As did Masnick.
To old Baghdad Bob anyone who dissents with the skewed views he himself finds in the la-la land emerging from his crack pipe must be an abject rarity so I'm guessing he's simply started down the "logical" road of trying to prove to himself that White and Masnick are one and the same person.
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More specifically, Yoo’s statement is based on disclosed facts - the very facts that Vindman attested to.
Yoo’s opinion (and ignoring the “some might say” part because it’s immaterial) is that based on what Vindman said he did, he committed espionage.
That’s not an allegation of fact (Vindman did X), but an opinion that an undisputed fact (X) met a particular definition (espionage). An opinion based on disclosed facts is always protected.
However, had Yoo said, “I’ve also heard from the intelligence community certain things about Vindman that would raise the espionage to treason” it would not be protected, because his opinion on treason would be based on an implied fact, so his statement implies a fact (Vindman did something that’s treasonous) in addition to his opinion.
Note: this is the law in the US, whether you think it’s the right law or not.
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And pedophiles who want to benefit from the demarginalization of those groups.
Just see the massive growth of MAP and NoMAP discussion on platforms such as Facebook.
Notes: MAP = Minor-Attracted Person. Growth = change in size, not absolute size.
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