Did Kerry file a lawsuit against the swift boat liars?

[proud2BlibKansan]

I could have sworn I read that here on DU a few weeks ago. Anyone remember that?

[Warpy]

1. I've been complaining bitterly that he has consistently

FAILED to do so. He should have filed that lawsuit the day that damned book came out.

For the lawyers and wannabes here: The point is not whether he would have won such a suit. Sometimes winning the suit is simply not the point. Tying up their resources was the point. Bogging them down in a suit was the point. Gaining subpoena power and following the trail of dirty money was the point. Keeping the fact that he was fighting a PACK OF LIES in the news was the point.

Settling the lawsuit after the above had been accomplished was the point, even if it were for the princely sum of a dollar.

He still hasn't done this. I guess prep school kids never really learn how to deal with organized gangs of bully boys by standing up to them. Now, the tactic will continue and the same group will be behind it.

[Dogmudgeon]

4. A new attack, an new opportunity -- Jack Murtha

"Gaining subpoena power and following the trail of dirty money was the point."

That may not have been possible. There's a ton of case law based on arguments pertaining to political speech, and from what I know of it, it doesn't give Kerry much room -- in which case a lawsuit would have probably backfired. The case would have been dismissed as quickly as possible, and there would have been no authority for further investigations. Without a case to pursue, the trail would have gone cold quickly -- as it did.

Incidentally, there was a Republican filmmaker who sued Kerry for defamation (a bogus, unsupported claim), and tried the same tactics, except that his case was dismissed just a few days ago after a long wait without support from his ratbag friends. Such is loyalty among vermin.

Yes, Kerry should have fought earlier.

And harder.

And WE should have done more. Much more.

And ... and ... and this, that, and the other thing.

The fact is that we got sandbagged. I personally never suspected the oh-so-patriotic Republicans would try to tear down a decorated combat veteran in such a brazen, transparently bogus way, and I was wrong.

But, since they're typical bullies, we can count on the Republicans to try the same thing again and again and again, until we smack them down for it. And they ARE doing it again, this time to Jack Murtha. THIS is our best chance to strike, and we should cut the head off the viper.

Jack Murtha shouldn't be required to swing the scythe alone, all of us should participate in the effort. After all, it's not about John Kerry or Jack Murtha, but about the abuse of military veterans for political gain. It's high time we called these "parlor patriots" on their lies and treachery.

As much as I usually dislike quoting TV shows, there's one quote from Battlestar Galactica that occasionally pops into my mind. As Tyrol, Cally, and Starbuck watch while the Cylons are invading New Caprica, Tyrol asks Starbuck, "what do we do now?" To which Starbuck replies, "we fight them until we can't." And roll credits -- that was the end of last year's episodes.

No, the Republicans aren't quite as bad as the Cylons. The Cylons want to destroy all of humanity, and are fictional; the Republicans just want to destroy America, but they are real, and are following their own script.

So we will have to fight until we can't.

Can we fight for Jack Murtha?

--p!

[proud2BlibKansan]

5. I got an email about a trip to PA

in October to show support for Murtha.

[Davis_X_Machina]

2. As Kerry is a public figure...

...the hurdles such a suit would have to climb to survive its first contact with a judge are so high as to make the exercise pointless.

In practice, the concurrence by Black and Douglas, not Brennan's opinion, has won the day:

"Malice," even as defined by the Court, is an elusive, abstract concept, hard to prove and hard to disprove. The requirement that malice be proved provides at best an evanescent protection for the right critically to discuss public affairs and certainly does not measure up to the sturdy safeguard embodied in the First Amendment. Unlike the Court, therefore, I vote to reverse exclusively on the ground that the Times and the individual defendants had an absolute, unconditional constitutional right to publish in the Times advertisement their criticisms of the Montgomery agencies and officials.

Times v. Sullivan on balance has helped way more than it's harmed.

[Truthiness Inspector]

3. I remember that

but haven't heard any more about it since. Hopefully someone here has an update.