Blogger's Identity Exposed by Lawsuit

Interesting - from Minneapolis Star Tribune:

A feisty anonymous Minnesota political blogger has unmasked himself in the face of a lawsuit that claims his blog defamed a local public relations firm.
The case against Michael Brodkorb and his website, www.minnesotademocratsexposed.com, could break new legal ground in the Wild West frontier of blogging.

Lawyers who filed the suit say that Web logs and other new media should be held to the same standards of accountability as traditional media and journalism. Brodbkorb, a former operative for the Minnesota Republican Party, pledges to protect his source and to keep his website going.

The suit alleges that Brodkorb, citing an unnamed source, defamed the St. Paul-based public relations firm New School Communications when he posted a claim that New School had become publicly critical of the congressional campaign of Coleen Rowley only after Rowley rejected a contract with the firm.

Despite being told that New School does not perform political campaign work, Brodkorb, the suit says, continues to make the claim, even though his source "may, in fact, be a fabrication."

Old time readers here know while I do not have anything against anonymous blogging, I think this is a case where the folks who feel he has wronged them do have a right to face their accuser, so to speak.

But it's a real gray area that becomes more of an issue when you're getting paid for the work. The "former Republican operative" part bothers me a little because it's hard to tell what it means. It also raises questions of whether like a Jeff Gannon, he's taking money to sell his opinion. Former means little; many of the bloggers, particularly on the right, do take very big money to blog nasties about anyone left of Attila the Hun. I do not see the trend anymore near as prevalent among moderates and left of center bloggers and blogs. But the rightie types also are far less likely to disclose the fact that they're being financed to spew.

The Alito Hearings

I'm going to blow a gasket, quite literally.

That Alito - a man who certainly must know how many Americans feel about Italian Americans or "wops" as I spent my childhood hearing - was part of a campaign to exclude women and minorities from Princeton and now pretends - like the Federalist Society - that he did not engage is beyond the pale. It tells you a LOT about how honest a man he is and how privileged he feels himself to be.

And he'll be confirmed because the only ones who can make it onto the Supreme Court under Bush are pieces of crap like Alito with no concern for the truth and no sense that he should be held accountable for his actions. Someone who cannot answer a single question without dancing about doesn't belong in any courtroom, let alone the Supreme Court.

And I'd pay money to see Mrs. Alito hit with a dead fish while she sits there smiling beneficently while her husband dodges questions knowing he'll take the right of choice from women at his first opportunity. After all, women like Mrs. Alito and her fashionable daughter always will have choice. They can go to a private doctor who will do a D&C and write it up as a diagnostic procedure rather than as an abortion. If you aren't well-heeled, that won't happen.

Bush on TV

He's coined a new word: "suicider".

What a jerk.

And the Iraqi police and military will take care of everything because it's their responsibility.. you know, one that Bush forced upon them.

Farris Hassan

What a 16-year-old piece of crap.

His family did well under Saddam before they came here, and did even better as part of the elite Florida rich and then he goes to Iraq on stocks and credit cards expecting the US military to protect him and then comes back to tell us about the glorious democracy he discovered in Iraq (even though he was there for 3 seconds and was a Bush supporter before he left and a bigger one after he came back). Oh, and we picked up a big part of the tab for protecting this little shit.

Why am I mad? He didn't discover democracy there. Listen to the story behind Hassan and you know he had help and went there with preconceived notions and returned to spew same, without any evidence that his notions were true.

He's quite the darling of the right wing in his pink Izod shirts and his declarations to help Governor Bush's campaigns and perhaps get the president elected to a third term. Hey, rich Bushies can overrule term limits, you know.

Poor Bill O'Lielly

My heart bleeds (ketchup):

NEW YORK (AP) — If Bill O'Reilly truly loves a good fight, then he's had quite a week. The Fox News Channel personality's confrontation with David Letterman Tuesday night made for some gripping television. The cranky Late Show host told his guest: "I have the feeling about 60% of what you say is crap."

O'Reilly called Olbermann a "notorious smear merchant" after the MSNBC host awarded him the "Worst Person in the World" prize for the 15th time.
By Jim Cooper, AP

That same night, nemesis Keith Olbermann on MSNBC once again named O'Reilly his "Worst Person in the World," this time for battling with two people at The New York Times. That's the 15th time O'Reilly has been cited since Olbermann began his half-facetious, half-serious nightly "award" to wag his finger at bad behavior.

For whatever reason, it seems more people are willing to step into the ring with the host of cable TV news' No. 1 program.