Blogtown, PDX

Friday, February 29, 2008

Election 2008 Jim Lee Urges His Fellow Candidates to “Keep it Clean”

Posted by Amy J. Ruiz on Fri, Feb 29 at 9:28 PM

In response to this week’s question about renter’s rights, I got this note from mayoral candidate Jim Lee in regards to the by-all-accounts unfounded IRS complaint against Charles Lewis—which led to not-so-veiled accusations that Amanda Fritz was behind it, both from Lewis and from folks at Jack Bogdanski’s blog. Fritz and her campaign staff have firmly denied the charge. But Jack even mused about collecting funds to submit Fritz to a lie detector.

Lee writes, in part:

I have been disturbed by the charge Charles Lewis made against Amanda, but would let the matter ride if it were not for the vulgarity of Jack Bogdanovich in amplifying it beyond all reason. Would you consider publishing the attached instead of a direct answer to your question? It is important to nip tactics like that in the bud…
Bogdanovich easily could do to me what he did to Amanda… So I am trying to preempt his vituperation as well…

P. S. Landlord-tenant relations are governed by state law. Unfortunately there is very little the City can do about it.

He used the word “vituperation.” How could I refuse?

Jim Lee
Position sought: Mayor
Website: blogmayor.com
Public financing status: Not participating

Charles Lewis probably contravened the law of libel by imputing that a routine inquiry to the City’s election office by an opponent was congruent with an attack upon the tax-exempt status of his foundation. That action set off a wholly unnecessary and very distasteful flap by a popular blogger, which could have seriously compromised the good name of his target, a well known political candidate.
Let’s keep our acts clean, people! Here is a brief guide to legal aspects of this sorry episode.

The rest is after the cut!

Libel law apples to everyone. To “publish” in this sense means to convey any defamatory matter to a third party. The conveyance can be the front page of the New York Times, Jack Bog’s Blog, or a private letter from me to you about someone else.
Charles has only one absolute defense against a charge of libel: he must be able to prove his comments true. Never did he attempt to do so; he is on shaky ground.

But his target is a “public figure,” a kind of person about whom certain statements can be “privileged,” and so not subject to libel actions. In the past Charles might have claimed that his charge was not “malicious,” but courts now are tending to replace that word with “negligent.” Charles should have demonstrated a strong connection between his opponent and the complaint to tax authorities before making his accusation; now he is on quicksand.

Jack Bogdanovich took Charles’s unproven and negligent thesis, broadcast it on his blog, then published further unproven and negligent accusations against Charles’s opponent by himself and many others. Evidently neither Bogdanovich nor his commentors checked Charles’s charges: one blatantly scurrilous comment followed hard upon another; some commentors--I and the target among others--tried to stem the tide, but to no avail. The
target’s strong and final denial was characterized by Bogdanovich as, “...tantamount to a confession.”

At that point I told him to shut up and read a good book on libel. Then I axed his site from my browser.

It is impossible to stop this sort of thing once it gets rolling: Charles Lewis never should have made his accusation; Jack Bogdanovich never should have promulgated it. Probably both infringed the law; worse, both seriously denigrated our political process.

But over and above questions of libel is a simple mind-boggling fact: Jack Bogdanovich is a law professor! He is bound not only by the law of libel but by the code of ethics of the Oregon State Bar. Talk about negligence! Moreover, he endangered the fine reputation of his employer, a vital legal resource to our state.

Shape up, Jack and Charles. You are not winning any votes.

Permalink

Comments

I don't understand why people respond to, rather than ignore, attention-seeking provocateurs like BoJack? Lars Larson makes attacks on decency every weekday, but that doesn't compel Jim or Blogtown to document the atrocities. If they're unreasonable and irrelevant, why bother? It's not so different from troll-feeding.

Posted by James X. | February 29, 2008 10:20 PM

Jack displays symptoms of untreated paranoid-schizophrenia.

He goes to his attic and blogs in a darkened room reportedly plastered with tin foil to reflect the "signals" and "rays" that attempt to silently influence him.

He stays up all night and sleeps well into the day.

He makes homophobic remarks that have brought public rebukes from the respected gay blogger, Worldwide Pablo (which explains in part his vitriol towards Sam Adams).

And then there are the "voices". The immutable "voices". No matter where he turns, there is always the "voices".

The "voices" somehow make it through (or is it around) the tin foil. They tell him things. Sometimes bad things.

Certainly his writing infuriates many. But it is still much, much better than the bad things the "voices" want him to do.

Be grateful he has limited himself to just his writing. It could a lot worse. Be grateful for that.

Posted by One of the Voices | March 1, 2008 12:22 PM

Jim and Amy,

Your comments directed against me are misguided. I have never accused Amanda Fritz of filing the IRS complaint. Please point out one instance where I have done so -- it's simply not the case and it's irresponsible for both of you to say so.

The most I have ever said is that it is "pretty darn suspicious" that her camp lodged similar concerns with the elections office in November. See Willamette Week’s article here: http://wweek.com/wwire/?p=10810

The previous bogus claims made by Amanda's treasurer, Tim Crail, were held anonymous by the auditor's office held until I had to file a Freedom of Information Act request after the bogus IRS complaint.

The public can make its own conclusion on who filed the garbage with the IRS. Bojack has his own opinion on the matter and expressed it on his blog. I didn't comment once about the matter anywhere on his blog.

Filing false reports with the IRS is the epitome of negative campaigning. It's a common political ploy that has been used against even Martin Luther King Jr., the NAACP, and thousands of other people who are even remotely connected to a nonprofit organization.

I hope it wasn't Amanda Fritz who filed the bogus complaint with the IRS. It wouldn't be the first time that she has falsely accused me of breaking election laws, however. See her blog here: http://www.amandafritz.com/node/1235

Scott Moore exposed Amanda's previous claims made on her blog and very clearly showed that I wasn't breaking any campaign rules. Evidently, she either didn't understand the rules or just wanted to kick her campaign off with a negative, false attack on me. Nasty stuff in any case.

Like you Jim, I definitely am hoping that other candidates keep it clean. Unfortunately, I have been the victim of a pretty nasty, dirty trick. Having you and Amy wrongly accuse me of dirty campaigning is icing on the cake. Please check your facts before making spurious claims in the future.

Take care,

Charles Lewis

P.S. How did you like my use of the word "spurious"? I did that without even using a thesaurus!

Posted by Charles Lewis | March 1, 2008 1:06 PM

Jim and Amy,

The most I have ever said is that it is "pretty darn suspicious" that her camp lodged similar concerns with the elections office in November. Check out Willamette Week’s article on the subject on WWire.

Take care,

Charles Lewis

P.S. How did you like my use of the word “spurious”? I pulled that one out even without a thesaurus!

Posted by Charles Lewis | March 1, 2008 1:15 PM

Alleging facts is not the least bit evil. The point where it becomes evil is a threat of harm.

If Amy wishes to continue to protect the identity of the filer then you can just presume that it was her. Has she yet said that she does not know the identity of the filer or stated affirmatively that it was not Amanda? Heck, it may never even have been filed. The filer, if they did their job correctly will at least obtain confirmation of receipt of the filing. Maybe Amy could try to find out if there has been such confirmation.

If the filer does still remain truly anonymous they could even post some utterance here or deliver a copy to Amy, with the name and address stuff redacted. If the filer posts a comment here then Amy could assert that it is not her or the Merc that has made the accusation, but Mr. or Mrs. anonymous.

Don't for a second confuse the anonymity of the complaint with lack of merit to the charge. Look up GW Equity LLC v. Xcentric Ventures LLC et al for a nice bit of litigation that distinguishes between an accusation and the speaker that is responsible for the same. In document 7 therein the defendant asserts:

"Furthermore, Defendants did not maliciously publish any information about GW Equity. Instead, third party visitors to the ROR Sites chose to publish information about GW Equity. The actions of these third party visitors cannot be attributed to Defendants pursuant to the CDA, and therefore any claim for business disparagement is not sustainable."

See related case
justia.com/cases/featured/arizona/azdce/2:2007cv00954/344869/
Xcentric Ventures, LLC et al v. Stanley et al

Mr. Lewis, I fed you on a silver spoon (at the other site) two questions that you should ask of Amy, and the Merc. If you are concerned about your reputation then ask them? Amy does not seem willing to volunteer an answer, as far as I can tell. Jack seems to start off with the presumption that folks are good, until they prove otherwise. I start off with the presumption that everyone is a scoundrel until they prove otherwise.

Amy, are you willing to say it was not a stunt that originated wholly from the Mercury? That remains a plausible scenario, in the absence of a rebuttal.

Mr. Lewis, there is nothing holy about "nonprofits." It is just another tax break scheme for the mutual benefit of the donors and recipients alike. It comes with a price, exposure of in-house documents to proper authorities like the IRS, and voluntary constraints consistent with the purpose stated in the articles of incorporation. If you don't want that exposer then simply ask for personal donations, where the donors would instead file 1099's without the benefit of characterization of the donation as a nonprofit donation, and you would declare it as ordinary income. I hope that you would not argue that you would not engage in good deeds in the absence of such tax break gimmickry? Good deeds originate from people, not artificial entities. (Same goes for religions, and "Four County Economic Development Corporation" and its new name and with the City of Portland as its sponsor.)

Believing as I do that the city is not supposed to be giving out gifts . . . you have a grand 145 grand problem that no amount of work can ever repay. It is a corrupt act from the get go. No amount of whining about Amanda or the IRS, or the asserted maliciousness of the same, will exceed your personal choice to accept the illegal gift to run for public office.

If you want to play nice with your opponent by way of some gentlemens agreement should I say that it would be essential to allow anyone to get signatures and fives (on the same terms as you) not for the purpose of running for office but for the express purpose of opposing any or all publicly-funded-candidates? Try answering that question.

Posted by pdxnag | March 4, 2008 10:07 PM

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