Honest mistake vs media libel

So, this morning I retweeted a tweet that someone sent me about the “Nazi Trump supporter”; I think it was a tweet to Louise Mensch. I didn’t just retweet it because it had the fake children’s book “Everyone is Hitler” as part of the image, so I cropped that off, then tweeted the picture of the woman attached to the picture of another woman who looked like the same woman.

Except that woman was a Bernie Sanders activist. Which appeared to prove what looked like a media plant was, in fact, a media plant. Quite a few people retweeted the tweet, including Donald Trump Jr., which led someone to look more closely about three hours later and observe that the two women were different and the “Nazi Trump supporter” was from a Chicago Tribune story.

It was just a simple mistake, not an intentionally dank meme, so naturally I corrected the tweet right away.

Now reports are that the “Trump Nazi” is not pro-Sanders Portia Boulger, but “Birgitt Peterson of Yorkville”.

I didn’t delete the tweet because a) Ms Boulger did not request that I do so, and, b) because I am in the habit of owning up to my mistakes, not trying to conceal them. If Twitter had an edit function with a strikethrough, I would have noted the error that way, just as I do on this blog.

However, the Left erupted with minor outrage, apparently unfeigned, although I suspect it was more because the tweet disrupted their absurd attempt to once more portray Donald Trump’s supporters, and therefore Donald Trump himself, as a National Socialist. Probably the most notable reaction was from Ken at Popehat, apparently off his meds again, as he first insisted that I would need a lawyer, then started babbling something about something called Moon Court. I will leave it to the lawyers, and the mental health professionals, to interpret that.

They kept calling for me to correct the tweet, which I had already done, until, after finally realizing that I had, in fact, already done so, they demanded that I apologize and that I delete the tweet.

Needless to say, I did not apologize. I did, however, assure everyone that if Ms Boulger wished me to delete the tweet, I would do so. I have not, as yet, heard the lady express any such wish.

But wait, there’s more! One Olivia Nuzzi, who claims to be a “reporter” at the Daily Beast, thought that this would be a wonderful time to attack Donald Trump Jr. by also claiming that I am “a white supremacist”.

I reached Boulger by phone on Saturday morning, a few minutes after Donald Trump Jr. tweeted her photo with the caption, “Big surprise. However, the media will never run with this.” As the New Republic’s Jeet Heer pointed out, the user who Trump Jr. got the photo from, @voxday, is a white supremacist.

Naturally, I immediately let Ms Nuzzi know that Mr. Heer’s libelous, and baseless, accusation notwithstanding, I am nothing of the sort.

Supreme Dark Lord ‏@voxday
Actually, Olivia, you’re lying. I’m not a white supremacist. I’m an American Indian. We just made a mistake

Supreme Dark Lord ‏@voxday
I corrected my tweet. Are you going to correct your post falsely accusing an American Indian of being a white supremacist?

Supreme Dark Lord ‏@voxday
You are calling an American Indian – and the great-grandson of a Mexican revolutionary – “a white supremacist.” Retract. Now.

Olivia Nuzzi ‏@Olivianuzzi
I cite another reporters writing on you. If you dispute his story, I’m happy to add that to mine.

Her first response was to add additional information instead of correcting it.

I was not content with that:

Supreme Dark Lord ‏@voxday
Not sufficient, Olivia. Retract. And mention that I am an American Indian and the great-grandson of a Mexican revolutionary.

So she continued trying to finesse it.

Apparently I’ll have to get in touch with her editor on Monday. First VFM to provide me with the contact details for Olivia Nuzzi’s editor wins a free copy of On The Existence of Gods and the Castalia House ebook of his choice. First one with her email wins the latter. The rest of you keep an eye on your inbox.

This week we dine on SJW flesh!

Update: And we have 2nd Law at work:

Olivia Nuzzi ‏@Olivianuzzi
nothing to retract, sorry.

Supreme Dark Lord @voxday
(shakes head) Oh dear. See where it says “Supreme Dark Lord”? You really should have paid more attention.

Olivia Nuzzi ‏@Olivianuzzi
Portia Boulger, the woman inaccurately smeared by @DonaldJTrumpJr and others as a Nazi, just told me she needs time to decide if she’ll sue.

Supreme Dark Lord @voxday
Except she wasn’t smeared as a Nazi. She was mistaken for the woman whom the media smeared as a Nazi.

Supreme Dark Lord @voxday
You lied and called me “a white supremacist”. Then you lied again and said @DonaldJTrumpJr smeared Portia Boulger “as a Nazi.”