[SueRae]

For once, I think a huge lawsuit is in order. TIme has never printed a retraction and Murtha...well, he can be named in a separate civil suit.

[Shirerwasright]

Let’s get all Freepers behind a class action lawsuit on Time and Murtha for leaking unsubstantiated information with the intent to prejudice the case against these young men.
Even we must know some lawyers..

[LS]

Not being a lawyer, I can only guess that "defamation of character" would be extremely hard to prove by any one of the Marines. They would have to show financial harm, ie., that they (say) tried to get a job and were deliberately denied as a result of this; or that there were pay raises and/or promotions denied because of this (do you really think the Marines have kept such paperwork?)

The proper body to bring such a suit is the USMC as an institution---but again, this would require showing direct harm. Are enlistments down? That would be a harm traceable (perhaps) to this---but it would play right into the hands of the leftists to say, "See, the Marines are having trouble making their enlistments". I doubt if that's the case anyway.

Showing REPUTATIONAL harm in America is darn near impossible. My only knowledge of successful reputation suits have been individuals like Wayne Newton against tabloids where you could prove that not only were the lies false but undertaken with malice. Even if Murtha thought the stories he heard were true, and believed them---for whatever reason---he would be off the hook.

In short, I see no successful suit against Murtha and/or Time.