Luskin v. Atrios: WTF??

Calpundit links over to Atrios - who has received a lawyer-letter from an attorney representing Donald Luskin. The claim is that by claiming that Luskin 'stalked' Krugman, and by allowing commenters who then spun off of that theme, that Mr. Luskin was libeled.

God knows, I'm not a fan of Atrios, who I think is part of the Jackie Goldberg/ suicidal-lemming wing of the Democratic Party.

But this is just embarrassing.

Luskin - who, as far as I know, is a grown-up, writes with pretty sharp elbows himself:

Paul Krugman began his Tuesday column for the New York Times - inevitably, about the blackout - with one of the few truthful statements I can ever recall him uttering: "We still don't know what started the chain reaction on Thursday."

And it seems like pots should be careful about calling kettles black, no matter that the pot has been careful to tread - barely - on the side of the line which divides actionable from exceptionable behavior.

And pundits who use slings ought to be able to take a stone or two, and the fact that Mr Luskin can't - the fact assuming that the letter Atrios posted was genuine (and the lawyer's name does check out on the firm website) - certainly drops him a few kilometers below credible in my view.

Free speech - even hurtful speech - is something the folks at NRO (and others) have championed for some time. It appears that they neglected to mention that it only matters when someone else's ox is being gored.

Personally, I'm hoping it's some kind of prank. In that case, I'll personally email Mr. Luskin an apology. Watching and waiting...

All rights reserved. This article can be found on the Internet at:

http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/luskin_v_atrios_wtf.php

Persons wishing to contact the author of this article for reprints etc. should put a request in the Comments section, or send an email to "joe", over here @windsofchange.net.