Zimmerman sues NBC
- Thread starter USFREEDOM911
- Start date
Because that's what you feel? How about when you add in words that I never said, should I be able to sue damo or you over that?
Sure it can be both. As I said, I don't think his lawsuit is frivolous. He definitely has a bone to pick. They may uncover or disclose something in trial that helps their case. But they need more or should need more, Imo.
There is no dissonance grasshopper. Not everything is either all black or all white. Nbc screwed up, but I don't know if it is something the state should punish.
I understand, you think dozens of dead six year olds are a fair price for the second amendment but the reputation of your favorite nword guy is too much for free speech.
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another statement that betrays your false libertarian claim.
You are the one openly calling for limits on free speech and apparently don't care where it might lead. Your basis is not on any principle but simply out of spite.
I have not argued for any limits on our rights under the second or any new laws on that issue at all.
Desh is a liar...
There was indeed a lawsuit filed by journalists Jane Akre and Steve Wilson over their dismissal from FOX affiliate WTVT in Tampa, Florida. After that fact, however, the story is far different than how it is popularly portrayed.
To begin with, the popular portrayal almost always omits the rather crucial fact that Akre and Wilson lost almost every one of their claims at the trial court. As the Florida Second District Court of Appeal noted in their ruling:
Akre and Wilson sued WTVT alleging… that their terminations had been in retaliation for their resisting WTVT’s attempts to distort or suppress the BGH story and for threatening to report the alleged news distortion to the FCC. Akre also brought claims for declaratory relief and for breach of contract. After a four-week trial, a jury found against Wilson on all of his claims. The trial court directed a verdict against Akre on her breach of contract claim, Akre abandoned her claim for declaratory relief, and the trial court let her whistle-blower claims go to the jury. The jury rejected all of Akre’s claims except her claim that WTVT retaliated against her in response to her threat to disclose the alleged news distortion to the FCC.
It is also not correct to claim, as the Gaddy story quoted above states, that the jury ruled that the FOX affiliate had, in fact, found that the station had attempted to force Akre and Wilson to air “a false, distorted or slanted story…”
A careful reading of the jury instruction reveals that the jury was only answering whether they believed Akre had been fired for threatening to lodge a complaint with the FCC alleging broadcast of a false, distorted, or slanted news report, not whether the news report was in fact false, distorted, or slanted.
What is of interest to CCP, however, is that the controversy has seemingly given new life, or at least a fresh story to attach itself to, to the claim that FOX News successfully went to court in order to get a ruling explicitly protecting a First Amendment right to “lie” in its programming. The story is often used to support demands for censorship of the airwaves under the guise of the so-called “fairness doctrine,” along with calls to extend it to cable among those who understand that FOX News is a cable news outlet.
Variations of the story abound on the internet.
Clearly, the story that FOX News got a court ruling in favor of its right to “lie” in its news broadcasts has become something of a talking point among the cable news channel’s detractors. There’s only one problem – the story as popularly told is completely false, and is based almost exclusively on hysteria, hyperbole, and half-truths.
There was indeed a lawsuit filed by journalists Jane Akre and Steve Wilson over their dismissal from FOX affiliate WTVT in Tampa, Florida. After that fact, however, the story is far different than how it is popularly portrayed.
To begin with, the popular portrayal almost always omits the rather crucial fact that Akre and Wilson lost almost every one of their claims at the trial court. As the Florida Second District Court of Appeal noted in their ruling:
Akre and Wilson sued WTVT alleging… that their terminations had been in retaliation for their resisting WTVT’s attempts to distort or suppress the BGH story and for threatening to report the alleged news distortion to the FCC. Akre also brought claims for declaratory relief and for breach of contract. After a four-week trial, a jury found against Wilson on all of his claims. The trial court directed a verdict against Akre on her breach of contract claim, Akre abandoned her claim for declaratory relief, and the trial court let her whistle-blower claims go to the jury. The jury rejected all of Akre’s claims except her claim that WTVT retaliated against her in response to her threat to disclose the alleged news distortion to the FCC.
The St. Petersburg Times reported on the jury verdict and similarly reported on the failure of Akre and Wilson to win most of their claims:
The jury of three men and three women deliberated nearly six hours before finding that Fox affiliate Channel 13 had retaliated against Jane Akre for a story about a controversial hormone manufactured by the Monsanto Corp.
However, jurors refused to give any money to Akre’s husband, Steve Wilson, an Emmy-winning reporter who also worked on the story.
And the jury did not believe the couple’s claim that the station bowed to pressure from Monsanto to alter the news report.
Despite the limited victory, Akre and Wilson found vindication in the verdict…
It is also not correct to claim, as the Gaddy story quoted above states, that the jury ruled that the FOX affiliate had, in fact, found that the station had attempted to force Akre and Wilson to air “a false, distorted or slanted story…”
Juries do not write opinions, instead they answer specific questions contained in jury instructions. According to a web site maintained by Akre, the jury question on which she prevailed was:
“Do you find that the Plaintiff Jane Akre has proven, by the greater weight of the evidence, that the Defendant, through its employees or agents, terminated her employment or took other retaliatory personnel action against her, because she threatened to disclose to the Federal Communications Commission under oath, in writing, the broadcast of a false, distorted, or slanted news report which she reasonably believed would violate the prohibition against intentional falsification or distortion of the news on television, if it were aired?”
A careful reading of the jury instruction reveals that the jury was only answering whether they believed Akre had been fired for threatening to lodge a complaint with the FCC alleging broadcast of a false, distorted, or slanted news report, not whether the news report was in fact false, distorted, or slanted.
Akre disputes this interpretation on her own web site, claiming that “The jurors in my case said YES to the fact that Fox was guilty of pressuring me to falsify the news… When you look at the actual jury verdict form, the jury determined it was actually false, distorted, or slanted. In fact, if jurors did not accept that premise, they could not have gone on to find in my favor…”
But the FCC does not share Akre’s interpretation of the jury verdict. In a 2007 decision by the FCC denying a petition by Akre and Wilson demanding that WTVT’s broadcast license not be renewed, the FCC includes the following footnote:
Although there has been much back-and-forth among the parties about whether the jury in the employment lawsuit found that Station WTVT(TV) violated the news distortion policy, the verdict form did not ask the jury to determine whether WTVT(TV) violated the news distortion policy, but rather to determine whether Station WTVT(TV) fired either employee for threatening to disclose what the Petitioners reasonably believed would be a violation of the news distortion policy.
In addition, Akre’s claim that “…if jurors did not accept that premise, they could not have gone on to find in my favor…” is undermined by her own filing with the 2nd District Court of Appeal in response to the appeal filed by WTVT. Akre’s brief states that “Akre had to prove three elements to establish her claim under the Whistle-Blower Act: (1) that WTVT retaliated against her (2) because she threatened to disclose to the FCC (3) conduct she reasonably and in good faith believed was a violation of the FCC’s News Distortion Policy.”
The same brief later devotes several pages to support this contention, stating in part that “WTVT argues that the Act does not prohibit employer retaliation unless the employee proves an “actual” violation of a law, rule, or regulation… [but the] term “violation” as used in the Act has no obvious meaning, and could encompass both perceived violations or proven ones…”
So the trial jury never reached a conclusion on whether the FOX affiliate had violated the news distortion policy, nor did they have to in order to determine she had been fired in response to the threat by Akre and Wilson to file a complaint with the FCC.
More importantly, and more relevant to the examination of whether WTVT actually asserted a”right to lie”in its newscasts, is that there is nothing on record to show that this argument was ever advanced in court. In the “Affirmative Defenses” section of WTVT’s initial filing, the station alleges that “…[station managers'] insistence upon fair, accurate and balanced news reporting does not violate any law, rule, or regulation” and “…The First Amendment [and] Florida Constitution prohibit judicial review of Defendant’s news judgments and the exercise of editorial discretion…
Whatever the truth of the dispute between the two reporters and WTVT, it seems clear that the station did not at the trial court level admit that it had attempted to distort the news story or assert the”right to lie”in its broadcasts. Instead, the station claimed its editorial decisions were based on an effort to air a fair and accurate story, and defended its editorial prerogatives under the First Amendment – editorial prerogatives that are indisputable, if the guarantee of a free press means anything.
Further evidence that WTVT did not assert at the trial court level any “right to lie”or distort the news is that neither Akre’s response to WTVT’s initial appeal brief nor the petition she and Wilson filed with the FCC make any reference at all to such a claim. Surely, had a claim for a First Amendment “right to lie” in news broadcasts been made at the trial court level, some mention of it would have found its way into either of these two documents (Akre’s brief to the appellate court runs 57 pages, and the FCC petition runs over 90 pages including appendices).
A review of both the initial brief and the reply brief of WTVT for the appeal also reveals no mention whatsoever of a “right to lie” defense. Not surprisingly, the station’s brief does contain multiple references to the First Amendment supporting the contention that editorial decisions and disputes are beyond the purview of the government.
http://tinyurl.com/b2a5nz6
christiefan915
Catalyst
I agree, georgie can cry me a river. How many times did Breitbart slander, edit and drop context in the ongoing war against liberals? These righties were singing a different tune when Shirley Sherrod had a legitimate complaint about being painted as racist against whites.
I'm calling for "limits on free speech?" Libertarians don't support basic libel or slander laws? are you fucking stupid?
Given that you are a FAKE libertarian that never takes any unique libertarian position, maybe you really don't know.
An yes I am aware of your history, I still don't care. I judge you by the words you say on here, which reveal plenty about you.
Yeah you just make fun of my statements, which are entirely consistent with a libertarians view on the constitution and the second amendment. I just say things more blatantly. I would rather have a terrorist attack than have the NSA spy on americans and I would rather have dead kids than curb the 2nd amendment.
Maybe you can try sitting on the fence with other people on here but I wont have it. I will not let you make these type of insinuations and get away with it. I know exactly what you are suggesting when you say those things.
Go back to being a democrat, which is what you actually are, and quit ruining our party with your policy-creep.
if they legally slandered and libeled, that is wrong. The solution is less, not more. You hypocrite.
Minister of Truth
Practically Perfect
Basic standards such as slander, libel, copyright, and patent existed back in 1787, and the Founders saw them as promoting and defending free speech, rather than as limitations. The trial of John Peter Zenger in the colonial period gave us a standard for free speech, which is that you are not engaged in libel or slander when you are being truthful and can prove it.
USFREEDOM911
MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN
It only seems probable; because you want it that way.
Since you think it was profiling; then tell me what Zimmerman was supposed to say. when the dispatcher asked him:
"OK, and this guy is he white, black, or Hispanic?"
How would you have responded?
Or would you have just said: "OH-I don't want to say anything that might suggest race"?
Many libertarians don't support libel or slander laws. Quit being a fat doughy loser like Zimmerman and read Rothbard or many others. I do support libel and slander laws but not if they infringe to severely on free speech. Here I don't see a clear case where they are guilty of libel. They played a clip of things Zimmerman did say. They separated the comments in text graphics and there is pretty clear audio separation. It is hard to say for certain whether they intended to deceive the viewers.
But you will give up the first amendment if it means vindicating your nword guy hero and spiting Democrats. You are not a libertarian. You are just another knee jerk reactionary.
I don't sit on any fences and you can't identify one position I hold that is not libertarian.
i am not going to respond to your bullshit strawmen suggesting I want to "give up on the first amendment" pm me when you insist on having an honest conversation, you fake libertarian liar.
USFREEDOM911
MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN
you do not support the 2nd amendment. When you say what you said above there really is no other interpretation. It's probably why you also always avoid gun discussions like the plague.
You have inconsistent views on social welfare. You make a big scene complaining about how not giving money to homeless people wont solve any problems, and when called out on it you say "oh well I don't think GIVING money solves the problem either"
You then refused to give any actual solution, of course, because all your solutions would require some type of governmental involvement to be succesful. Unless you want to pretend that private charity would somehow be more successful through the magic of sheer will.
I started reading the thread and got this far. This is the big reason I think it's gonna be close.
USFREEDOM911
MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN
What lawsuit has Damo filed, that you could sue him over?
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I have been discussing it honestly. All you have provided is edits to my comments to build an ad hom that really only applies to you.
Defamation should not be some simple thing to prove against a news outlet or any speaker. They did not add anything to the tape. They dropped context in a way that was not flattering to Zimmerman, but in the clip I posted earlier they did not even make any suggestion about it showing him as a racist.
And again, what are the damages? This would have become a major news story and case with or without that piece. Zimmerman claims they were trying to ride it to higher ratings but that seems rather absurd. Did they advertise ahead of the story about it?
christiefan915
Catalyst
Lol, pot meet kettle. Don't you mean illegally, since slander and libel aren't legal? And why are you missing the point that you can't pick and choose that NBC gets a lawsuit while Breitbart gets a pass. Before you tell me you, yourself didn't say that, some of your conservative pals here did.