I heard an ugly rumor about matt drudge

[mopaul]

You know the one....you've probably heard it too. matt likes to publish every little nasty thing he can that's negative to a liberal, whether it's true or not. The other day, he posted an ugly rumor about a democratic candidate supposedly having an affair with a young lady journalist. Totally untrue, unfounded, but published on the drudge report.

My question is, is this legal? I thought this fell under the category of slander, lies, innuendo, etc. Isnt't this a crime?
Can't someone take drudge to task and shut his lie site down?
Or at least sue the hell out of him for publishing libelous lies.

And why hasn't anyone taken drudge himself to task on his quirky 'lifestyle'? I thought the gop'ers hated homosexuality.
Yet they love matt drudge. Oops....did I give something away?

[Muddleoftheroad]

1. Libel

There is a higher standard for public officials than for private persons. He has kept close enough to that standard that he won't be sued. Besides, if Kerry sues him, Drudge's lawyer gets to depose the hell out of him. Every possible affair or misdead ever could come out then.

[djg21]

11. "Actual Malice"

is the standard for public figures.

However, the young lady with whom Kerry was allegedly involved is NOT A PUBLIC FIGURE! Should she sue, and assuming that the Drudge stories are false, she would only have to show reckless disregard for the truth.

What I can't believe is that, in the face of criticism about his lack of journalistic ethics, Drudge persists in attacking the family of the woman.

This guy is too much!

[Muddleoftheroad]

24. I would argue otherwise

She worked in a senator's office. You can't get much more high profile than that. Doing so, you must accept that you are for that time a public figure.

[qanda]

22. What about the girl?

She isn't a public official. I would think she could sue him for all he's worth. Well, if it's for all he's worth, she may not want to waste her time.

[Muddleoftheroad]

25. She worked for a senator

[dand]

2. Drudge is lower than whale droppings.....

He is making a killing doing his filthy smear jobs on Democrats, the more he smears the more he makes.

[BR_Parkway]

3. He never said there WAS an affair, only that major news was

trying to investigate the rumor of it. Technically, the only people that he libeled would be the other news organizations, not Kerry.

[rooboy]

4. In places like the UK and Australia Drudge would be in trouble...

but the USA seems to have a libel law which allows the maligning of public officials. I seem to recall Thom Hartmann saying that in essence, a paper or radio host can say pretty much whatever they like about a public official...

[Cooley Hurd]

5. Email Matt and ask him what his definition of...

..."fuck-buddy" is. According to David Brock, that's what Matt asked him to be, a "fuck-buddy."

[mopaul]

6. webster's says.....

fuckbuddy: a consenting adult friend of either sex who will submit to casual sexual relations without legal or contractual attachments.

i've never understood the gay men who achieve lofty positions of power in the government, even working against other gay men. j. edgar hoover and clyde colson, roy cohn, matt drudge, or even david brock. why would gay men work for the very people who would see them all hung up on pikes and hanged from scaffolds? very bizarre inside their heads.

[ComerPerro]

10. I think it just's part of being Republican

Why do some homosexuals support the GOP, when most Republicans would just as soon seem them dead or in prison for their "sin".

Why do some Christians support the intolerance, greed, and hatred promoted by the GOP?

Why does anyone making less than $300,000 a year support the GOP, when their policies obviously don't benifit the average American, and in many cases actually hurt them?

Why do some minorities support the GOP, while groups like College Republicans hold rascist bake sales and sponsor white-only scholarships?

Why do some women vote Republican, while Republican lawmakers tell them that their health, well-being, and even their lives are not as important as the "rights" of an unborn fetus?


If you are not a rich, white, straight male, there really is no reason to support the Republican party.

[Touchdown]

7. Drudge did get sued by Sydney Blumenthal.

He details the events in The Clinton Wars. Drudge issued a formal apology.

[ComerPerro]

8. I heard Drudge was having a romantic relationship with a man

That man's name is Ann Coulter

[truthspeaker]

12. I enjoy a good mud-sling as much as the next guy

but I think we should leave Ann Coulter's gender status out of it. I don't understand how she reconciles being a transgendered person with the social and political views she espouses, but ultimately I think that's a private matter for her to wrestle with. Being transgendered is hard enough in this society. We liberals should be helping, not hurting, their cause.

[ComerPerro]

13. LOL

Well said

[jimsteuben]

20. What's the deal with Ann Coulter's protruding Adam's apple?

Is she really transgendered?


---Just morbidly curious in a National Inquirer kinda way.

[bif]

9. I heard he had an affair with a sheepdog.

It may or may not be true, but who cares? It sounds good.

[Viking12]

14. Why do you consider being gay

to be an "ugly" rumor???

Drudge is a slimebag but his sexuality doesn't have anything to do with his lack of integrity. Making the link between being gay and "ugly" only reinforces the hate-mogering messages of the reich wing. Focus on the reason Drudge is a menace to society.

[mopaul]

17. his sexuality IS an issue

and the issue is, he's a dirty little gossip and republican operative.
like roy cohn, or j. edgar hoover, working for the very people who would have him imprisoned for being a homosexual, given their desires.
j. edgar was a closeted homosexual forever, and he forever harrassed and otherwise destroyed the lives of many homosexual people with threats of exposure and worse.

i never actually said what the ugly rumor was. and it's the republicans who see homosexuality as ugly, not me. they are the ones who would call matt's lifestyle as ugly, not me. i wasn't inferring anything negative about homosexuality in my post.

matt drudge spreads ugly little rumors, and has floated rumors around about heteros and homosexuals. the point is, he's a dirty little gossip, who constantly gets away with his closeted lifestyle just because he works FOR the nazis. remember when david brock finally came around to the good side and left his nazi employers, they turned on him after he was no longer of use as a liar and gossiping journalistic hack. and they outed him pdq.

[Must_B_Free]

15. The return of Yellow Journalism

Religious Fanatic Rupert Murdoch has poisoned the well.

[UTUSN]

16. What About Bill BENNETT and the Dominatrix?

From ROMENESKO http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=45

*******QUOTE*******

"Drudge is even more unreliable, wrong than he used to be" (NY Press)

http://nypress.com/17/7/news&columns/signorile.cfm

I happen to know that several major news organizations have for some time been looking into claims about portly conservative moralizer William Bennett and a leather-bound dominatrix bodybuilder in Las Vegas, a woman who has some very interesting narratives to recount. What news organizations? The top five that come to your mind are on the list. Some reporters have even traveled far and wide on this story.

Does this mean the story is true? No. It is "developing," as our favorite cybergossip character assassin likes to say, and it may go nowhere. ....

Now, with regard to the Bennett rumor, take my word for it (and don’t ask any more questions right now, okay?) that several reporters have communicated directly with first-hand sources–as have I. .....

Oh, and about Bill Bennett: It’s developing…


Michelangelo Signorile hosts a daily radio show on Sirius Satellite Radio, stream 149.
He can be reached at www.signorile.com.

********UNQUOTE*******

[enki23]

18. i heard drudge is really into humiliation

i also hear he's got at least one of uday hussein's old rape and torture sessions on video, through a source in iraq, but that he hasn't reported them because he doesn't want to give them up.

[outinforce]

28. So?

So what if Matt Drudge is "into" humiliation?

WHat of it?

I thought that we, as progressives, had advanced beyond the knuckle-draggers who like to peer into what consenting adults do in the privacy of their own bedrooms?

Our discussion of Drudge (and of his supposed "quirks") only demonstrated to me that some on this board are as titillated by (and judgemental of) some peoples' sexual desires as moralizers on the right are.

Shame on you.

[runamokcomedy]

19. heard an ugly rumor about matt drudge

Why are you using sexuality as a weapon? If I wanted to hear that, I'd go to freeperville. I think we really need to stay focused on what really matters, talking Joe Lieberman into getting back into the race!

[Mr.Green93]

21. something about eggs

[Arbustosux]

23. what assets are there to seize??

he probably lives in his parent's basement

[outinforce]

26. "Ugly" Rumor?

Just what is so "ugly" about this rumor you may have heard?

And I am curious here -- what do you mean by "quirky" lifestyle?

I must say that I am quite shocked to see such things said on a progressive website such as DU.

[maggrwaggr]

33. the thought of Drudge having sex with anybody is "ugly"

nt

[Sparkle]

27. Drudge will one day get what is coming to him.

[David__77]

29. "Quirky?" Only his being closeted is "quirky."

I would object to homosexuality being considered "quirky." That makes me think of a nervous housewife like Edith Bunker.

[ArkDem]

30. .

[swinney]

31. David Brock on Drudge

He is Gay. We toured Gay bars together.

[outinforce]

32. And.....?

And you point is....what, exactly?

As a gay man myself, I find it most objectionable when one gay person takes it upon him/herself to "out" another person.

If Brock has indeed said this about Drudge, I find Brock (and not Drudge) to be the object of my contempt.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

34. I thought it was generally known that Drudge was gay before Brock's....

...book came out.

Brock is actually, IMHO, a pretty courageous figure. He blew the whistle on the Arkansas Project and all of the nasty inner workings of the radical rightwing "hate Clinton" forces, and is still alive to tell about it.

He has also told the world that he himself is gay.

I really don't understand your problem with Brock...maybe you can be more detailed in your next post.