Da Techguy's (no longer backup) Blog

There is one thing about what’s going on in Canada that doesn’t make sense to me.

Unlike the US system where elections are scheduled for specific intervals without interruption in Canada there is a parliamentary system which means that the opposition can call for a vote of “No confidence” in the government which would mean an election.

If Trudeau’s handling of the crisis is as unpopular as polls indicate and the crackdowns as egregious as they seem I can’t understand why the opposition has not made such a motion?

It may be they figure there is more capital to me made from Trudeau making an ass of himself but it might be something worse. It might be there are enough people in the Canadian government who like the idea of crackdowns.

I hope I’m wrong but I suspect that is the case.

By Christopher Harper

The news media are scared to death of Sarah Palin and her lawsuit against The New York Times for libel.

Although the former Alaska governor won’t win the first round of the battle, the case is likely to make it to the U.S. Supreme Court, where the justices may overturn the almost-invincible protection the press have against public figures and officials.

The case centers on a 2017 editorial in The Times that basically accused Palin’s political action committee of encouraging someone to shoot Arizona congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords.

James Bennet, who wrote the editorial, has testified that he made a serious error. But his defense and that of The Times is that he did not act with malice or recklessly disregard the truth.

This standard comes from a 1964 decision, The New York Times v. Sullivan, which made it exceedingly difficult for a public official to win a libel case. The decision later was extended to public figures like sports and entertainment stars.

At the time, the ruling made sense since politicians were using libel laws to sue news organizations covering the Civil Rights movement. Without the malice protection, news organizations could be sued for any error, however small.

In recent years, however, news organizations have used the malice standard to fend off nearly all comers irrespective of the errors made in the commission of journalism.

In a New York courtroom, both sides have presented their arguments over the past two weeks in the Palin lawsuit, with media mavens sweating the outcome.

The Wall Street Journal referred to The Times and Bennet as using the “oops defense,” making it nearly impossible to win a libel case against media companies.

In a bizarre announcement yesterday, Judge Jed Rakoff, a Clinton appointee, decided that Palin and her attorneys had not convincingly reached the summit of proving that the news organization acted with malice.

But the jury was still sequestered, trying to reach a decision. If the jury decided for Palin, the judge would set the verdict aside.

Nevertheless, the judge made it clear that The Times had made a serious error in the editorial. “Ms. Palin was subjected to an ultimately unsupported and very serious allegation that Mr. Bennet chose to revisit seven years or so after the underlying events,” the judge said. “I think this is an example of very unfortunate editorializing on the part of the Times, but, having said that, that’s not the issue before this court.”

The case will likely wend its way toward a likely hearing at the U.S. Supreme Court.

There, the justices may well find in Palin’s favor.

Last summer, Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote a stirring defense of truth and accountability in the public arena. His opinion harkened back to a time many years ago when news organizations employed “legions of investigative reporters, editors, and fact-checkers,” before the proliferation of “falsehoods by means and on a scale previously unimaginable.”

Then Gorsuch aimed at the Times v. Sullivan standard that has blocked many plaintiffs from winning lawsuits even if the errors were as egregious as the one against Palin.

Justice Clarence Thomas joined the dissent, leading many to speculate that the court might want to take a new look at the malice standard.

Although I have defended freedom of the press for many years, news organizations have gotten away with too many misdeeds under the malice standard. It’s time for the U.S. Supreme Court to examine whether a 1964 decision is still relevant today.

Back in my youth when there was such a thing as sane Democrats Tip O’Neill the congressman and later speaker of the house from Massachusetts was famous for two specific phrases:

1. All Politics is local
2. I’ve always known how to count

These two principles are basic. One must make sure you are keeping the local voter happy and be sure to know if you have to votes before advancing any position.

The sudden about face by Democrats both locally and nationally on COVID restrictions reflect both of these realities.

The anger on the local level, particularly at school boards reflect a real problem for the left. Once conservatives are engaged locally all of their attempts to mold society become placed in danger and awakes voters to the dangers of their policies. The longer these restrictions go on, the more danger they are to the media/left.

But even more importantly are the poll numbers. Tip always maintained the most important thing a pol needed to know was how to count and while matchmakes are not encouraged in schools where Democrats are in charge, if you want to win elections without theft or sometimes even with them, you have to make the numbers close enough so they are within the margin of fraud.

2022 looks like a liberal disaster. Moving the COVID goalposts is the Democrats best shot of nudging the numbers back into a range where their problems might still be critical but not insoluable.

Tip would approve.