Can someone explain Patel's defamation lawsuit? I have no reason to doubt the Atlantic story about his drinking. If he sues and publicly loses, that is significantly more humiliating than quietly letting the story be forgotten.

▲

bdangubic 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Suing is highly publicized thing, the "he dropped the lawsuit" or "lawsuit was dismissed" will be Friday news dump not covered by anything or anyone (especially now when one party control most if not all media - including "social" media)

▲

jandrese an hour ago | parent [-]

Exactly right. The right wing media will be all over the lawsuit and the X crowd will take the opportunity to dunk on the "liebral media" and how this proves that journalists can't be trusted because they make stuff up like Kash Patel's drinking.

They will be silent months later when the lawsuit is quietly dropped. The only thing the readers will remember is how the evil liberals got what was coming to them. These are the people who still think the Muller report "totally exonerated" the Trump administration.

▲

throw0101a an hour ago | parent [-]

> The right wing media will be all over the lawsuit and the X crowd will take the opportunity to dunk on the "liebral media" and how this proves that journalists can't be trusted because they make stuff up like Kash Patel's drinking.

After The Atlantic published their story on the military group chats and were attacked by the Administration their subscription numbers purportedly went up:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_government_group...

"There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about." — Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

▲

bdangubic an hour ago | parent [-]

Comparing a drunk FBI Director frivolous lawsuit to military group chat leak is all sorts of crazy. No one's subscription numbers are going up for reporting about should-be-in-AA-meetings-and-not-running-FBI DEI hire (or even worse the eventual drop/dismissal of this case).

▲

fragmede an hour ago | parent [-]

You misspelled DUI hire.

	▲	bdangubic 43 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		He, just like about every single person working in this Administration, is a textbook definition of DEI hire (someone holding a job many other people are more qualified for :) ).

▲

tekla 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Intimidation.

▲

3eb7988a1663 2 hours ago | parent [-]

The calculus still fails for me. If this was a podunk Youtuber, sure, intimidate away. The Atlantic has been in the press business for a long time, and is not going to publish a piece against a vindictive administration without being confident in the reporting. They are prepared to defend themselves against a baseless suit.

▲

tekla 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Well the Government has effectively infinite resources, versus some media outlet.

You also forget that the point is to signal to the base/allies that you are fighting. The fact that the lawsuit didn't immediately get tossed out is a signal that your claims might have merit (even though thats not really how it works)

	▲	throw0101a an hour ago \| parent [-]
		> Well the Government has effectively infinite resources, versus some media outlet. The Atlantic is (co-?)owned by Laurene Powell Jobs, the widow of Steve Jobs: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emerson_Collective * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Atlantic#Ownership_and_edi... I would guess they have some resources too. > The fact that the lawsuit didn't immediately get tossed out is a signal that your claims might have merit (even though thats not really how it works) The Atlantic may have not filed a motion to dismiss so they could go to discovery to dig up more info on how the FBI is being run.

▲

gowld 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Kayfabe for the base and the ignorant middle.