The US Circuit Court in DC has posted the audio (embedded below) from the recent hearing in the Farah v. Esquire Magazine lawsuit brought by Joseph Farah against Esquire Magazine over a spoof article they published saying the Jerome Corsi’s book Where’s the Birth Certificate? was being recalled.
Good spoofs keep the reader believing their unlikely premise as they stray into gradually wilder and wilder implausibility. This was the case in the Esquire story, and I suppose that someone who quit reading the story after the first 20 words might have believed it.
In oral arguments, Farah’s attorney Larry Klayman, argues that 25% of Americans have doubts about Obama’s eligibility. I don’t think the appellate judges will have any doubts about this case.
Read article at ConWebWatch.
That’s asinine.
As usual, birthers and their ilk seem to think that the first amendment only applies to them.
Want to hear the judges laugh at one of Klayman’s arguments? Start around 7:30 in. Klayman allows that political satire is protected speech, but claims the Esquire article isn’t satire. He continues, “Mr. Farah made a statement himself, off the cuff, that this was poorly executed parody, meaning it wasn’t parody at all.” Here, two of the judges can’t hold back their mirth at Klayman’s shameless attempt to force a contrived meaning onto Farah’s words.
Judges generally do not like logical fallacies in arguments. This ultimately is a logical fallacy. Argumentum ad populum…
The argument would make sense if they were assessing damages, potential loss of sales of a book on a topic that 25% of the population cares about. But that’s not the question. The suit was slapped down because the article was satire.
I think that the lawsuit was a publicity stunt to stimulate sales of the book. I don’t know if Farah took into consideration the DC anti-SLAPP statute. He will have to pay costs to Esquire if he loses the appeal.
`now re-published – the book obama tried to ban!’
the knuckle draggers will lap it up
To birthers and their RWNJ brethren, Obama has tried to “ban” everything.
Why just yesterday the “tried to force” the Redskins team to change their name.
Well if you go by what the toilet that is Free Republic has to say.
In actuality all he did was give his opinion about the name. It wasn’t even a strongly given opinion. I swear, if the man uses margarine on his biscuits instead of butter, Freepers would report “Obama declares war on the butter industry! And supports biscuit special interest groups who are probably funded by Al-Qeda!”
the knuckle
draggersdragging FOX.news.bots will lap it upFox & Friends Host Airs Fake Story About Obama Funding Muslim Museum
I’m expecting an e-mail any minute now from my wife’s cousin claiming that this proves the usurper is a Mooslem.
Ive seen this bit pop up every where on tea party and birther pages. This people are entirely too gullible. It’s like the supposed late military ballots from dueffelblog
Sure. Fox ran the story on TV whereas the retraction was a Twitter post that doesn’t even properly identify the story (“abt a museum closing”) and was made from the reporter’s account, not the official Fox one.
That’s a bit like stealing from a poor guy and then confessing to your shrink, thinking that makes you a good person again. (The Catholic Church invented this MO. Note that absolution only ever required you to repent, not to undo any damage done.)