Well, ain’t that just a fine kettle of fish Random House and Creepy Joe McGinniss have done opened all over themselves with Creepy Joe’s book about Sarah Palin. As a lot of us noted, there was a lot of material that lent itself to a libel lawsuit. And the best part was only about half the material was in the book; the best stuff was the stuff that came out when they were defending the book.
Apparently, Sarah Palin and her lawyers agreed; they’ve sent a letter to Random House demanding they correct the mistakes and the unsubstantiated allegations. Robert Stacy McCain, former professional mainstream journalist, explains the legal niceties as only one who’s lived through such crap can.
Further, in the letter, Palin’s lawyer says that Creepy Joe has forfeited his lawyer-client privilege with Random House’s lawyers by divulging those discussions with a third party — namely, noted Palin-hater Jesse “Gryphen” Griffin, who was so thoughtful to confirm that the e-mail Andrew Breitbart obtained and published was legitimate.
As I said before, this is the genius of Andrew Breitbart — he doesn’t destroy people, he just enables them to destroy themselves. And the harder you fight against him, the more damage you do to yourself.
So here’s how things stand: this letter is Palin’s lawyers telling Random House “put up or shut up.” They have been told that they better retract the nastier, undocumented stuff or prove it, otherwise Palin’s lawyers will be looking for some serious bucks. And they’re showing that they are deadly serious, with the pre-emptive shot at any claims of “lawyer-client privilege” by noting that Creepy Joe had done things that normally toss that in the crapper.
The more I think about it, the more I think that my description of Breitbart fits Palin even better. The more someone hates her, the harder someone tries to destroy her, the more damage they do to themselves. Creepy Joe and Random House are merely the most recent example — Pervy Jesse Griffin Palin-hated himself right out of his job. That teenage punk who cracked Palin’s e-mail hated himself right into prison.
I am so relieved that I’ve managed to keep my own passions in check enough to avoid going to that extreme.
