… they’re not. Mark Paul of the Sacramento Bee [*] links to this truly appalling Dennis Roddy story [*] from the Pittsburg Post-Gazette about how Sean Walsh, the Gubernator’s chief media spokesman, skirted the very edge of the libel laws in sliming one of the women who accused his boss of sexual battery. The technique couldn’t have been simpler: Walsh just pointed the media towards the criminal recrord of another woman with the same name (though not the same birthdate).
Naturally, Drudge, Limbaugh, Fox, and a bunch of talk show hosts picked it up. Drudge took the accusation off his site, without a retraction, after it was shown to be bogus. The others have simply gone on to sliming their next victims.
I wonder if this story will lead any of Schwarzenegger’s fans in bloggerdom to change their minds. Mickey? Glenn? Andrew?
Author: Mark Kleiman
Professor of Public Policy at the NYU Marron Institute for Urban Management and editor of the Journal of Drug Policy Analysis. Teaches about the methods of policy analysis about drug abuse control and crime control policy, working out the implications of two principles: that swift and certain sanctions don't have to be severe to be effective, and that well-designed threats usually don't have to be carried out.
Books:
Drugs and Drug Policy: What Everyone Needs to Know (with Jonathan Caulkins and Angela Hawken)
When Brute Force Fails: How to Have Less Crime and Less Punishment (Princeton, 2009; named one of the "books of the year" by The Economist
Against Excess: Drug Policy for Results (Basic, 1993)
Marijuana: Costs of Abuse, Costs of Control (Greenwood, 1989)
UCLA Homepage
Curriculum Vitae
Contact: Markarkleiman-at-gmail.com
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