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this post was submitted on 07 Jan 2024
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Yes yes, I know. What I'm saying is that there's no way they're going to be sued based on going by the determination of the FEC that anyone is guilty, least of all a politician who's known to be a serial liar.
On the other hand, using "alleged" when she HAS been declared guilty by the government agency implies that they may have gotten it wrong and/or that their ruling isn't legally binding. Either would add fuel to her and the rest of the GOP's martyrdom narrative.
If anything, the FTC should begin to fine every instance of a media outlet using "alleged" when someone has legally been found guilty.
I mean yes I hear you. And agree they shouldn't be sued. Doesn't mean she wouldn't try and cost them money to defend it.
It doesn't cost any money to defend against a suit that no judge would accept.
To allow a suit based on the assumption that the FEC was wrong and Forbes must have known so is the kind of insanity that gets a judge removed from the bench in even the most conservative jurisdictions.
So no, there's absolutely no valid excuse for Forbes to use the word in this case.
I mean. It does. Having lawyers on retainer that would defend it costs money. Money that could be better spent on other legal services. I do agree it would be thrown out. But there are plenty of legal things that cost money just to file. Hundreds of dollars to respond to a petition if you file online. It's not "free".
It really doesn't. Lawyers on retainer are on paid no matter whether they have anything to do. That's what being on retainer mean.
It costs nothing to ignore an unlawful legal request, at least not when you already have lawyers on retainer to do exactly that. A publication the size of Forbes ABSOLUTELY do.
There's no legal or economic downside to ommitting "alleged" and it still sends the misleading message that she might be innocent, which could feed into her false martyrdom scam and actually help "earn" her a lot more money than the fine cost.
In conclusion: there's no potential downside to NOT spreading false doubt like that and there's a ton of potential downside to doing it.
Have you ever paid an attorney a retainer? They absolutely use it for every phone call and email pertaining to anything with a case. A retainer is just a down payment. And they draw from it. They don't work for free.
Even if they DIDN'T have a fixed amount set aside for making frivolous lawsuits go away (again, a publication the size of Forbes definitely do), the cost of having the lawyers draw up paperwork saying "fuck off, you don't have a case", only more professionally, is trivial to Forbes.
You can keep yammering on about how not saying "alleged" about a legal certainty would have them sued to bankruptcy all you want but that doesn't change the fact that it just isn't true.
My only point is and always has been, it isn't free to say no
And my point is and has always been that any tiny advantage of misleading their readers like this is multifold overshadowed by the many negative consequences.
That's not how I read what you wrote. You say several times it will "get thrown out of court" like some TV court drama. It still costs money to have that much pull to have the right people know how to throw cases out of court. There are procedures that need to be followed or you look like you don't know anything about law. And the judge with consider it a folly on either side.
Clearly.
That's just a faster way to say "any judge would approve a motion to dismiss immediately" and as I mentioned before, such a motion is completely routine for their in house counsel.
Not anywhere near as much money as you seem to think. Any lawyer worth his salt knows how to draw up a valid motion to dismiss.
Yes, it's called a motion to dismiss. It's one document that everyone with a JD has written many of.
No, the doctor will not consider filing a motion to dismiss a patently ridiculous case "folly on both sides".
You were wrong. It happens to all of us sometimes.
Now please give it a rest and stop making a Supreme Court case out of what would be a summarily dismissed nuisance suit.
And it would still cost Money!
Yes, an absolutely negligible amount that they already pay often to other people who try to hit them with nonsense lawsuits. It's not anywhere near enough to be worth their journalistic integrity.
Now give it a rest and leave me alone.