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Blog Postings Are Going To Be Very Scarce Today; Early Professional Duties Take Over. Check Back Later. Thanks.

Yes, check back later. Thanks.

Blogging Will Be Non Existent Until Later, As Professional Duties Take Precedence Today.

So come back later in the evening for more.

Stay tuned.

Thanks.

BLOGGERS BEWARE: Lawsuit Between [Shirley] Sherrod [And Andrew] Breitbart Might Make Bloggers Actually Do Their Homework. AMEN, To That!

An interesting case
Lawsuit between Sherrod, Breitbart might make bloggers actually do their homework
By CLARENCE PAGE

If a courtroom trial is a contest between dueling narratives, Shirley Sherrod’s lawsuit against Andrew Breitbart reads like Little Nell taking on Snidely Whiplash.

That is, unless you’re hearing about the case in conservative media. There Little Nell grows fangs and bites poor Snidely while he’s saving the world from government bloodsuckers.

Sherrod is suing the conservative blogger Breitbart for a misleading video clip that Breitbart posted on one of the websites he owns.

As you may recall, she lost her job in July as the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s director of rural development in Georgia as a result of the clip. It purported to show Sherrod, an African-American, delivering racist remarks to an approving crowd at an NAACP dinner in Georgia. “In her meandering speech to what appears to be an all-black audience,” Breitbart wrote, “this federally appointed executive bureaucrat lays out in stark detail, that her federal duties are managed through the prism of race and class distinctions.”

In what appears to have been a ham-handed attempt to avoid castigation by the carping prime-time conservatives at Fox News Channel, Obama administration officials fired Sherrod by cell phone on her way home from work without any opportunity to defend herself.

Alas, after the NAACP released video of the rest of the speech, Breitbart’s description turned out to be stunningly false. Instead of encouraging racial discrimination, her speech condemned it. She also was backed up by the white family she described in her speech. In interviews, they praised her as a “hero” who helped them to save their farm.

The family had helped Sherrod to learn through experience to judge her clients by their needs, not their color, Sherrod said. If that’s what Breitbart means by managing “through the prism of race and class distinctions,” it doesn’t sound so bad to me.

Her bosses agreed. They offered apologies and a new job, which she has not taken. On Feb. 11 she filed suit in federal court in the District of Columbia against Breitbart for defamation, false light and infliction of emotional distress.

Since defamation is generally defined as a statement that falsely holds someone up to ridicule or condemnation, she would appear to have a good case. Yet, in the interest of free speech, libel law gives wide latitude even to erroneous statements that are made without apparent malice, legal experts say.

Plus, Sherrod as a public official has an extra high burden of proof. “(Sherrod) has to demonstrate not just that he did it, but that he knew what he was doing was false (or) would leave a false impression about what she had said,” Floyd Abrams, one the nation’s top media rights lawyers, told a Salon website interviewer, “or (that he) had some serious doubts about what he was doing.”

That’s tricky. Having known and followed Breitbart for several years, I have not known him to have serious doubt about much of anything that he ever does, even when I happen to think he’s dead wrong.

Should bloggers be held to lower expectations of accountability than those of us who toil in the old-school mainstream media? Questions like that could make this a landmark case, if it gets to trial.

When I contacted Breitbart by phone, he understandably declined to comment on the substance of the pending legal action, but he was delighted to raise suspicions about Sherrod’s timing. Although he had no hard evidence to back it up, he raised the possibility that Sherrod might only be suing to distract attention from another issue Breitbart has been pursuing, a lawsuit called Pigford v. Glickman that black farmers filed against the Agriculture Department.

Sherrod has not been charged with wrongdoing, but Breitbart and documentary filmmaker Lee Stranahan, with whom Breitbart is working, have interviewed black farmers who complain that she could have done more to help them before she left her government post.

But could Breitbart be latching onto the Pigford case to distract from his own blunders with Sherrod? He denied that. Instead, when I asked him what he might personally have learned from the Sherrod experience, he said after a long, thoughtful pause that he had learned a new respect for investigative reporters and the “really hard work” that they do in nailing down facts. Good. I hope their example makes him a better reporter.

OsiSpeaks! Was The FIRST In The Nation To Reveal That POTUS Barack Obama Will Pick Solicitor General Elena Kagan To Replace Justice John Paul Stevens.

You have to stay tuned to find out what else I will reveal next!

Jake Takes On Rand Paul, Wondering If "[He] Has Anything To Hide"; And, "Why [Trey Grayson] Doesn’t Have Competent People To Give Him Advice?".

Read about Jake's Rand Paul and Trey Grayson, with an invitation to "see [Youtube video] for yourself".

(H/T: Jake)

Sorry, I have been Out Of Pocket Lately. I Am Away From America. I Will Resume Blogging When I Get Back. Thanks.

No Postings This Morning. Professional Duties Call. Come Back In The Afternoon, Will Ya?

I will have no postings this morning as professional duties have called early today. Come back this afternoon and I'll make sure you have all the news you need.

See ya.

You Have To Hand It To The Guys At Page One, As They Call For Kentucky Democratic Party's (KDP's) House Cleaning.

Click here to read Page One's breaking news, and click here to read about the complaint against the Kentucky Democratic party.

You can also follow Ryan Alessi at Pol Watchers for more.

Below is a short excerpt from Page One:

We call on Governor Steve Beshear and the Kentucky Democratic Party’s State Central Executive Committee to clean house at KDP Headquarters immediately.

Editor's comment: You have to hand it to the guys at Page One. Like me, they call it as they see it -- at least most of the time. ;)

Is It Just Me, Or Is CENSORSHIP At Work In Kentucky.

I have ALWAYS received email press releases from all Governors since I have been in Kentucky -- from Paul Patton to Steve Beshear -- until recently; I NOW NO longer receive ANY press releases from Steve Beshear's office.

Could it be that I wrote something that someone there found objectionable?

I do NOT know, but I wonder if anyone else out there has had something like this happen to them.

It kinda reminds me of when his predecessor asked the Courier Journal and the Herald Leader reporters to submit their questions in writing -- I IMMEDIATELY sent word to Ernie Fletcher that the policy needed to be SNUFFED out, and thankfully it was.

Of course, anyone working for the Governor in the communications office OUGHT to know that the WORST thing to do is to ALIENATE the press -- including people who blog.

I do NOT know how many friends the Governor has, but I would think that he CANNOT, politically, afford to lose some.

Tomorrow will be a s-l-o-w Blogging Day, So Check Back In The Late P. M. . Please Sign Up For Email Updates In The Box Located On Your Right. Thanks.

That's all, for now, until this P. M. .

Blogger Conference Call Tonight With Former Congresswoman Anne Northup.

I'll be on a Blogger conference call TONIGHT with former Congresswoman, Anne Northup. If any of you have any questions you desire answers to, please email them to me or post them here.

Thanks.

Editor.

You Can Blame The Blogosphere For This News.

Read about it here.

There is NO time for me to "rest on my [blogging] laurels", so let us start by blaming this one on the blogosphere.

Blame the blogs, ya'll.

***** OsiSpeaks! named Kentucky's BEST Political Blog! *****

Today Washington Post's Chris Cillizza, who blogs politics as the Fix, has named this blog, OsiSpeaks.com!, as the BEST of Kentucky State's Political Blog.

Thanks to ALL of our readers. Since you made this award possible, the HONOR belongs to you.

We PROMISE to keep bringing you the BEST political news in the world -- NOT just from Kentucky -- TRUTHFULLY and WITHOUT BIAS, if you PROMISE to keep coming back for more.

Some make a big deal out of Steve Beshear standing on stage with "BILLARY" Clinton, but what should we have expected Beshear to do -- snub her?

Some who predicted that Governor Steve Beshear will endorse "BILLARY" Clinton on Saturday were disappointed when he made it clear that he won't. Now the same folks are making a great deal out of the fact that Governor Steve Beshear went on stage with "BILLARY" on her visit to Madisonville (NOTE: that Governor Steve Beshear had NO choice. He had to be there for the Democratic event for Ruby Buffoon day. Guess where the Governor's Chief of Staff was? Yep, you guessed it. Jim Cauley was at the opening of Barack Obama's headquarters in Louisville).

But we expected the Governor to do what he did -- that is, not snub the former first lady on her visit to Madisonville, Kentucky, where the Governor was already appearing anyway.

And of course we expect Beshear to extend the same courtesies to Obama when he comes to Kentucky that he extended to "BILLARY".

But I guess some do NOT want to believe Steve Beshear when he says he's not going to endorse anyone, and want to fan the flames of disunity amongst Kentucky Democrats.

I can't say that's a bad strategy, if your SOLE interest is in spreading disunity amongst your political enemies, rather than presenting the facts as they are.

Kentucky government reverses ban on blogs.

The administration of Governor Steve Beshear has made another good move and reversed the ban to access certain blogs on state computers that was put in place by former Governor Ernie Fletcher.

The ban initially targeted Bluegrassreport.org, but slowly expanded to others. The lawsuit against the state for selectively targeting the blog site is still pending in Federal Court.

Stay tuned.

Update: Page One wants us to know they first broke the story, so I'm letting you all know.

Obama/Clinton feud causes a "strike" at DailyKos.

The "strike" at DailyKos suggests Democrats are feeling the pain as their primary persists, much to the delight of competing Republicans.

Until further notice, an every Monday event: Redbox promo code.

Many of you have seen those ubiquitous Redbox kiosks at McDonald's' restaurants where you can rent a movie for a BUCK -- Redbox will soon expand to Walgreen's stores.

That's right, a BUCK!

Well, I am starting a new blog service which will post a code that will allow you to rent any movie on MONDAY ONLY for FREE -- you MUST return movie the next day.

Where else can you get something for nothing?

And today's code is what?

PROMO CODE: PL96QA

Enjoy your FREE movie!

***** New blog Comments policy. *****

After listening to many people, considering the implications of the newly introduced House Bill 775 dealing with penalties for anonymous blog comments postings ( I guess you can say it's my way of fighting the bill), and in response to people who say the reason they post anonymous comments is because of their jobs, employment situations and the like, I have decided to try two things and see which one works best.

I have NOW decided to allow ANONYMOUS postings, but retain the IP addresses of commentators. That way we can keep track of who is being anonymous. This way, I will be the ONLY one who will know the identity of the commentator(s), which I will keep PRIVATE and CONFIDENTIAL. This way we can keep the FREE flow of information going -- especially if it helps expose corruption and crime in our state.

If the comments become TOO "abusive", I shall institute a policy of approving them PRIOR to publishing them on this blog.

So let's try and keep it CIVIL, guys and gals. ENJOY.