How People Spew Total Falsehoods on TV (Elena Kagan)

[IndianaGreen]

Published on Tuesday, May 11, 2010 by Salon.com

How People Spew Total Falsehoods on TV

by Glenn Greenwald

I appeared on The Rachel Maddow Show last night to articulate the case against Elena Kagan, and was then followed by Kagan friend and defender Larry Lessig of Harvard Law School, who spent five minutes (in my absence) trying to discredit me and what I said (video of the two segments is below). Although I would have preferred an opportunity to address the accusations Lessig was making about me through an interactive exchange, I was glad Rachel presented both sides of the debate. But there is one serious accusation that Lessig spouted that is so blatantly and inexcusably false that I feel compelled to highlight it, particularly since I was unable to respond last night. This is what Lessig said when referencing "this work (Kagan) had written when she wrote this piece for the Harvard Law Review" in 2001:

This is another area where Glenn has just flatly misstated the case. In his piece on Democracy Now (sic) on April 13, he said that in that article, she talked about the power of the President to indefinitely detain anyone around the world.

Now, that article was written before George Bush, before 9/11, and before George Bush articulated anything about this power. It has nothing to do with the power of the President to detain anybody. The power of the unitary executive that George Bush articulated -- this kind of uber power of unitary executive -- was nowhere even hinted at in Elena's article. Yet Glenn has repeatedly asserted that she is George Bush, and that is just flatly wrong.

If I were listening to that and had no familiarity with what I had written, I'd have thought: Wow, that Glenn Greenwald is either completely dishonest or a total idiot; how can he go around claiming that Kagan's 2001 law review article defended Bush detention policies when it was written before those policies were even implemented and had nothing to do with those policies? People questioning the Kagan pick obviously have no credibility. And that, of course, is exactly the impression Lessig's accusation was intended to create.

Except it's totally false. I've never said, believed or even hinted at any such thing -- let alone "repeatedly asserted" it. Lessig just made that up out of thin air and, knowing nobody was there to dispute it, unleashed it on national television. Kagan's comments embracing indefinite detention powers came in her 2008 Solicitor General confirmation hearing when answering Lindsey Graham: please see Law Professor Jonathan Turley's superb analysis on that exchange. Her position on detention was expressed there, not in her 2001 Law Review article, and -- contrary to Lessig' inexcusably false accusations -- I never, ever claimed otherwise.

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/05/11-3

[Vinnie From Indy]

1. I hope Rachel addresses this point by Greenwald

If she desires to keep her show's integrity this point should be taken up again soon. Allowing Lessig to toss out complete falsehoods without proof or rebuttal should be something she avoids.

[NJmaverick]

5. From what I hear Rachel supports the Kagan choice

[ixion]

2. k/r

for the truth!

[izzybeans]

3. Didn't he assert just that thing yesterday?

I think he crawled into a hole inadvertently by writing without doing much homework.

[NJmaverick]

4. Ironic that a dishonest blogger like Greenwald would have the nerve to falsely

suggest someone else is a liar. This guy clearly was born with out a gene for shame.

[Vinnie From Indy]

6. Again with smears and slime followed by no

argument, no facts and no examples.

You address nothing of substance in the OP.

[NJmaverick]

7. Greenwald is guilty of lying about the President Supporters when he called them mindless

this blogger who claims to be a lawyer actually thought the Supreme Court power grab by the Republican 5 was a good thing.. Do you need more?

[Vinnie From Indy]

8. Greenwald is guilty of lying about the President Supporters when he called them mindless

You wouldn't happen to have a mirror handy would you?

[NJmaverick]

9. Yes I have a mirror handy and I am more than happy to lend it to you

so you will have a better appreciation of self.

[Uncle Joe]

10. I do wonder, why they both weren't on at the same time to debate and thus

allow a point/counter point exchange?

Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, IndianaGreen.

[Jefferson23]

11. My thoughts too Joe, I like Rachel, perhaps she can organize

another interview with the two on at the same time.