When the Litigious Left Attacks

There were two disturbing occurrences in the blogosphere this week. A Jewish "rabbi" had his attorneys threaten to sue Pamela Geller of Atlas Shrugs for printing unpleasant truths about their Hamas-supporting, anti-american client, Michael E. Feinberg. That's him in the picture to the right, reacting to counter-demonstrators at a "peace" protest. Swell guy.

Feinberg's shysters have demanded removal of the critical material and a retraction on Pam's website. She responded by publishing even more unflattering facts about Feinberg, including pictures and videos. The above picture was one of them. Basically she says, "Sue me. I can hardly wait for the discovery phase." Rightist attorneys are already offering their services to Pam.

The second disturbing leftist attack was by the Associated Press on Brian Ledbetter, the owner of the website "Snapped Shot." The AP has threatened to sue for use of their copyrighted photos that appear frequently on the site. However, the AP photos probably fall under the "fair use" exceptions of the copyright law because Ledbetter publishes the photos to criticize them and show how biased they are. In a lawsuit Ledbetter might have a substantial chance of winning. But lawsuits are enormously expensive and time consuming and few ordinary citizens can afford the cost or time away from work. Bullies like the AP know this - they can afford it but know their critic cannot.

Why are AP and other news photos fair game for criticism? Because they can be used to deliberately create false impressions, and like an editorial that must be reprinted before it can be rebutted, offending photos must be republished.

A couple of cases in point are two photos published recently of Hillary Clinton and Barack Hussein Obama, two opposing candidate for the Democrat presidential nomination. The mainstream press, which includes the AP, are supporting Obama. Or could you tell by looking at the photos on the left?

The Obama photo was taken when Obama's head was directly in front of a bright light, giving him a holy look, as if the light emanating around his head were from a halo. You can almost hear the heavenly chorus, can't you? No bias there.

The second photo was taken of Hillary as she spoke to a high school in the midwest. The high school's mascot is the Red Devil, the same name given to local miners who emerge from the mines covered in red clay. The photo was taken with the devil looking over her left shoulder and gives a very clear impression of evil.

So you have two examples of press misuse of photographs to make editorial statements, namely, that Obama is a saint who has come to save the world, and Hillary is evil and a companion of the devil.

This is why Snapped Shot had a legitimate mission in its fair use of AP photos for purposes of criticism - and it's also the reason the AP wants to shut him down.