All of the statements Rush Limbaugh made about the amount of sex Fluke claimed she was having? They were false. Limbaugh's claims that Fluke was a 'slut' were specifically based (by Limbaugh, in Limbaugh's on word) on Limbaugh's erroneous claims that Fluke talked about the amount of sex she was having, or the cost of her contraception.
FR posters who have figured that out have asked on some threads "is Fluke going to sue Limbaugh?" In response, I briefly touch on defamation of a limited public figure.
"Briefly," because I'm as far from an expert on Times v. Sullivan and its progeny as anyone.
They are just playing into the hands of the media, however, since the world today is so twisted, it would not be far fetched to believe both sides are playing the middle for dough. That should be miserable prospect, but not too unlikely given todays growing uneducated populace.
It would also be a vehicle to expose all her ties to the feminazi underground, which is how she was asked to testify in the first place. It would not be a good idea on her part to sue, she and the leftists are better off making as much hay as they can and then moving on to the next effort to destroy America.
Jury,,,,,Nullification
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For what?? Exercising his 1st Amendment rights!!???
For what?? Exercising his 1st Amendment rights!!???
You're required to conducted a particularized determination, according to Bruno & Stillman, 633 F.2d 583 (1980). So not everybody's going to agree on whether Sandra Fluke is a limited public figure.
And the fact that everybody knows who she is now doesn't help Limbaugh. The question is whether she was a limited public figure when she completed her presentation, and before Limbaugh launched into her.
That's because, if the main controversy that made the person a public figure is the alleged defamation itself, then the defendant can't point to that controversy as making the plaintiff a limited public figure. "Those charged with defamation cannot, by their own conduct, create their own defense by making the claimant a public figure." Hutchinson v. Proxmire, 443 U.S. 111, 135.
“The story at the Cybercast News Service characterized a portion of her testimony as sounding like (based on her own financial figures) she was engaging in sexual activity so often she couldn’t afford it. I focused on that because it was simple trying to persuade people, change people’s minds.” - Rush Limbaugh
It’ll go all the way to SCOTUS!
All:
Scoutmaster’s legal analysis is materially incomplete.
Let’s set aside the question as to whether Fluke is a “public figure” in this context, because ultimately it is not determinative of the viability as a practical matter of a claim of defamation.
Rush’s quote: “What does it say about the college co-ed [Sandra] Fluke, who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says she must be paid to have sex? What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex. She’s having so much sex she can’t afford the contraception. She wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex. What does that make us? We’re the pimps — the johns. No, that’s right — pimp is not the right word.”
There are two sets of statements on which Fluke might claim Rush defamed her:
1. Calling her a “slut” or “prostitute.”
2. Claiming that Fluke herself was using birth control pills and paying for them, when in fact strictly speaking Fluke spoke only about unnamed persons, not necessarily herself.
As to the first set of statements, this is going to present difficulties for Fluke for two reasons. First, Rush has a rather solid argument that his use of the words “slut” and “prostitute” were not in the ordinary use of the terms, but were specially defined by the context in which he spoke them to mean someone who demands and receives contraceptives paid for by someone else for use in having sex. People can agree or disagree with the proposition that someone who demands free birth control pills paid for by others in order to have sex makes that person a “slut” or a “prostitute” but that is moving into the realm of opinion and not actionable under defamation law.
Even setting aside that argument, as to the word “slut,” because truth is a defense to defamation, the question of her personal promiscuity would become a relevant issue for discovery and presentation to the trier of fact. One would think it unlikely that she would be interested in having the facts of her sexual life investigated and presented in court.
As to the second set of statements, a necessary element of a defamation claim in these circumstances is a tendency to harm the reputation of the plaintiff. It is simply not tenable for Fluke to argue that the public falsely believing that she takes birth control pills or pays for birth control pills somehow harms her reputation when she has been such a strident advocate for contraception.
We need to factor the above into the legal analysis and they render a defamation claim by Fluke against Rush very problematic.
All of which is not to say I support Rush’s original statements. I think he went overboard here and I don’t like seeing us descend to the level of the nasty Left.
Is Fluke a slut? Might not be to her advantage to drag her one ovary through the mud?
She’s a whore!!!
Rush was being nice calling her a slut!
You get the stupid vanity of the week award.
Was Fluke a political activist prior to her testimony before Congresscritters? Was she the president of some women’s club on campus? I think she’s a public figure. And she’s not a physician. She’s not a scientist. She’s a political activist on a mission to force religious institutions to do something that she wants because she thinks it’s a good thing. If she or her list of victims want to attend a school that has insurance that covers birth control pills for birth control purposes, they are most likely going to qualify to attend other law schools. If money is a factor, then a cheaper law school can settle that problem. No need for federal government intervention. No one forces anyone to attend a very expensive university. Do I wanna keep my ovary or do I wanna attend Georgetown? Do I wanna have a cell phone or do I wanna keep my ovary? Do I wanna push this insurance company into providing the coverage that I am supposed to be receiving according to the policy? Do I wanna lose an ovary?