"Tom Goldstein's Back": A Musical Interlude

Yesterday, having heard nothing about me from Ramesh Ponnuru in several days -- nothing, that is, since his post of Friday, March 4 -- I engaged a fellow I know to install a recording device in the National Review offices occupied by Ponnuru and his cohort. It was critical, I thought, to get some idea of what was going on over there.

As a result, I now have powerful additional evidence of the conspiracy to destroy me (along with Larry Tribe) in advance of the upcoming hearings on the confirmation of Chief Justice Rehnquist's successor. That way, there will be no one left to oppose the ongoing radical-right plot to alter the existing ideological balance of the U.S. Supreme Court by replacing the Chief Justice with -- imagine! -- a conservative jurist.

The tape, delivered to me this evening, reveals that this morning, as soon as Ponnuru and his colleagues read my new post, titled, "Could this be the end?," Ponnuru's colleagues broke out in song much as the characters sometimes did on the television show "Ally McBeal." Apparently, Ponnuru's colleagues were teasing Ponnuru about the sudden, threatening reemergence of his nemesis (me), Rip-van-Winkle style, after three days of silence (an eternity in the Blogosphere), seeking to reignite my "flame war" with Ponnuru.

Although perhaps part of the song was in jest, I believe if you look closely at the words, some of it constitutes what we lawyers call an “admission of a party opponent" which I can use in my upcoming libel case against Ponnuru, the National Review, and anyone who has posted or who posts in the future on The Corner about me.

(Aside: Erik, you’re wrong to say what Ponnuru and his cohort have done to me constitutes “slander." Because it was in writing, you should have called it “libel” or, more generically, “defamation.” You’re a great friend, but really, you need to be more careful. You don’t want people going around thinking you’re rock-dumb too! Also, talking about “erroneous slanders” seems redundant, don’t you think? Still, I sure appreciate you using your perch on The Volokh Conspiracy to defend me. As everyone knows, if you read it on The Volokh Conspiracy, it must be true.)

Ponnuru's colleagues called the song "Tom Goldstein's Back," inspired quite likely by one of Ponnuru's posts. They sang it to the tune of "My Boyfriend's Back," a 1963 hit by The Angels. I haven't had time to digitize and upload the tape I received this evening, but to give you a quick sense of the powerful evidence I've collected about the conspiracy against me and Larry Tribe, here are the lyrics of the song they sang to Ponnuru. If you want to sing along, there's a MIDI file with the music here. Enjoy!

"Tom Goldstein's Back"

by the editors of the National Review

to the tune of "My Boyfriend's Back"

(Spoken by the editors of NR to Ramesh Ponnuru)

Tom went away, and you hung around
And laughed at him, every night
And when we mentioned his name
You said he stole your websites

(Sung by editors of NR to Ramesh Ponnuru):

Tom Goldstein's back, and you’re gonna be in trouble

(Hey-la-day-la, Tom Goldstein’s back)

When you see him comin', better cut out on the double

(Hey-la-day-la, Tom Goldstein’s back)

You've been spreadin' lies that he was untrue

(Hey-la-day-la, Tom Goldstein’s back)

So look out now, 'cause he’s comin' after you

(Hey-la-day-la, Tom Goldstein’s back)
(Hey, he knows that you've been slimin')
(And he knows that you've been lyin')

He's been gone for such a long time

(Hey-la-day-la, Tom Goldstein’s back)

Now he's back, and he’ll put it on the line

(Hey-la-day-la, Tom Goldstein’s back)

You're gonna be sorry you were ever born

(Hey-la-day-la, Tom Goldstein’s back)

'Cause he's real well liked, and not partisan

(Hey-la-day-la, Tom Goldstein’s back)
(Hey, you know he wasn't cheatin')
(Now, you're gonna get a beatin')

What made you think he'd tolerate all your lies?

(Wah-ooo, wah-ooo)
(You're a big man now, but he'll cut you down to size)
(Wah-ooo, wait and see!)

Tom Goldstein's back, he’s gonna kill your "reputation"

(Hey-la-day-la, Tom Goldstein’s back)

If I were you, I'd take a permanent vacation

(Hey-la-day-la, Tom Goldstein’s back)

Yeah, Tom Goldstein’s back

Look out now, Tom Goldstein’s back

Well, I can see him bloggin'

So you better get a typin'

Alright now

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

Tom Goldstein’s back now

I know he’s comin’ after you

Because he knows he’s been true now

Yeah, yeah, yeah . . .

Oops!: Turns out David Boies is a loyal Democrat . . .

Exhibit 3 showing I am too rock-dumb to be fairly accused of slipperiness or dishonesty regarding my dialogue with Ramesh Ponnuru is that even though I was one of the first associates at David Boies's law firm, and even though I assisted him in the climatic Bush v. Gore case he argued in the U.S. Supreme Court, until today I had no idea Boies is a loyal Democrat with many years of affiliation with the party. Thank you to the reader who e-mailed me about Boies's strong partisan affiliation, and some of the evidence illustrating it.

This point is not an unimportant one, because as I recounted in my previous post, in my initial attack on Ponnuru's article which I posted on my main blog, here, I listed among my qualifications to defend Tribe against a right-wing attack my absence of partisanship; that is, I was not a left-wing partisan attacking a right-wing partisan. Specifically, I represented: "I am not a person who is at all active in partisan politics."

A commentator on my blog quickly challenged me on this point, observing among other things that I was "one of the first associates at Al Gore's attorney's firm" (that is, David Boies's firm), and I "clerked for a quite liberal judge" and "donated the maximum allowed to John Kerry."

My response? Well, regarding my association with Boies, both in general and on Bush v. Gore, my response was this: "David Boies gladly would have worked for George Bush if he'd been hired."

Well, I must admit it turns out there's really no evidence for that statement, at least based on a perusal of political campaign contribution records and a quick read of Boies's recently published autobiography, Courting Justice. In fact, Boies is a loyal Democrat of long standing, and one reason he took on the Bush v. Gore litigation was the importance he placed on Vice President Gore winning the presidency in 2000.

Go back to that website I told you about yesterday, www.opensecrets.org, and search for the political campaign contributions of one "Boies, David" of New York. Turns out that since 1992 (as far back as the records go), Boies has made more than $50,000 in "hard money" contributions, and more than $30,000 in "soft money" contributions. It looks like every penny of that money went to Democrats.

The book is a great read, and I recommend it. It turns out that, in addition to "dating" the wife of his evidence professor while in law school, working through three marriages of his own, and litigating a string of important cases, Boies took two years off from 1977 to 1979 to work for Ted Kennedy (who I hear is quite liberal) as chief counsel of two Senate committees he chaired, including the Judiciary Committee, and during this time Boies worked with members of the Carter Administration (pp. 17-18). In the book, there's even a photo of Boies at a meeting with Senator Kennedy and President Carter.

In the book, Boies states it was important to him personally that Gore come out victorious, which was a main reason he agreed to work on the case when first approached about it by Walter Dellinger, a top Gore lawyer (page 357):

I told Walter that I was not sure how much I would add, that I needed to talk to Mary [Boies's wife] before making any commitment, but that I would like to do what I could to help. Although I had not been active in the campaign and had met Vice President Gore only once more than a decade earlier, during the campaign I had been impressed with his intelligence and judgment. I was also concerned about what a Bush victory would mean for domestic issues including equal rights, the environment, judicial appointments, and the economy.

Boies's liberal leanings are also illustrated by his role in 2004 in assisting Michael Moore in resolving some legal difficulties holding up the release of his anti-Bush film, Fahrenheit 911 (page 470).

Of course, there's nothing wrong with Boies being a longtime loyal Democratic, and I respect him greatly. I just wish I'd learned more about him when I was working with him, or that I'd read his autobiography sooner, before stating on my blog last week: "David Boies gladly would have worked for George Bush if he'd been hired," and then buying up all those websites with Ramesh Ponnuru's name to gain maximum exposure for my comments.

But let me assure you that I was not being slippery or deceitful in telling you Boies would have been happy to work for Bush to defeat Gore. Remember, I'm rock-dumb. I am astonished to now learn that the founding partner of my former firm, with whom I worked on the Bush v. Gore litigation on behalf of a Democratic candidate, turns out to be a loyal Democrat.

Oops!: Our $6,250 in political campaign contributions last year . . .

Exhibit 2 showing I am too rock-dumb to be fairly accused of slipperiness or dishonesty regarding my dialogue with Ramesh Ponnuru is that by the time I started attacking Ponnuru last week, I had completely forgotten about all the political campaign contributions my wife and I made just last year.

Recall that in my initial attack on Ponnuru's article which I posted on my main blog, here, I listed among my qualifications to defend Tribe against a right-wing attack my absence of partisanship; that is, I was not a left-wing partisan attacking a right-wing partisan. Specifically, I represented: "I am not a person who is at all active in partisan politics."

Problem is, as one reader of my blog quickly discovered through an Internet search, and kindly posted in a comment on my blog, both my wife and I have made fairly sizable political campaign contributions, with every penny going to candidates of the Democratic party:

Tom, I think you unfairly downplay your liberal bias which underlies your defense of your mentor. Sure you have argued conservative positions in court but anyone who's met you also knows that you were willing to argue anything that provided the chance to appear before the Supremes. That doesn't change your personal beliefs, the fact that you were one of the first associates at Al Gore's attorney's firm, that you clerked for a quite liberal judge or that you donated the maximum allowed to John Kerry. In this light, your critque of Ponnuru's article as a preemptive partisan attack appears to be more a reuslt of your affinity with Tribe and his political outlook than a valid rebuttal of the fact presented.

The commentator was right on target about those political contributions, as you can see for yourself by looking up me and my wife and law partner (Amy L. Howe) on this website: www.opensecrets.org. According to the website, here are the political contributions we made just last year, as I said, with every penny going to Democrats:

1/12/04: $250 to Stephanie Herseth
2/29/04: $500 to John Edwards
3/1/04: $500 to John Kerry
3/31/04: $3,500 to John Kerry
5/20/04: $250 to Stephanie Herseth
7/28/04: $250 to Stephanie Herseth
9/15/04: $500 to Barack Obama
9/30/04: $250 to Stephanie Herseth
10/28/04: $250 to Stephanie Herseth

If I've done my math correctly, that's $6,250 in political campaign contributions to Democratic candidates just last year. Sorry, we couldn't spare anything for Republicans! But let me assure you that I was not being slippery or deceitful in telling you I'm not "at all active in partisan politics." Let me repeat that: I was not being slippery or deceitful. Remember, I'm rock-dumb. I simply forgot about all those political campaign contributions we made last year.

Don't know much about the English language

Exhibit 1 showing it was stupidity rather than malevolence that produced my missteps, which have led the world to heap calumny upon me (I know it's hardly the place of my friends to offer excuses), is that I cannot properly read, write, or spell using the English language. This is powerful proof that I am so rock-dumb I cannot possibly be guilty of being "slippery and dishonest," as Ramesh Ponnuru has so rudely suggested.

Ponnuru has already demonstrated that I cannot read, at least not above a ninth-grade level. As a result, I misunderstood much of what Ponnuru had written in his article charging Larry Tribe with fabricating a good bit of his recent account of his first Supreme Court argument, and in Ponnuru's first post answering my criticisms of his article.

Nor can I write particularly well, as you can see from my various posts attacking Ponnuru. Just to pick the most recent example of my deficient writing, consider the posts I made on two of my other blogs last night. I was concerned that no one else had yet linked to this new blog, and I wanted to stir up some interest in it. So, on one of the other seven web-sites I've created relating to Ponnuru's article on Tribe, I posted this item: "Just a head's up. Someone has set up a fake blog purporting to be by me, that isn't." I posted a similar item on my regular blog, www.scotusblog.com, here.

The idea was, by pretending this eighth blog I've set up relating to Ponnuru isn't actually written by me (plausible enough, because after I set up seven web-sites to draw out Ponnuru, including six using Ponnuru's name, it hardly would be surprising if someone were to set up an eighth using my name to parody me), I'd spur interest in my new blog and people would look for it, thinking it was some sort of "forbidden fruit" I didn't want them to eat. If I'd said nothing at all, probably no one would ever have found this new blog -- just like, if I'd said nothing at all about Ponnuru's article on Tribe, probably almost no one would ever have read that article.

Anyway, you may have noticed that in just the two short sentences I posted last night I managed to commit two basic errors which would have gotten me in trouble in high school English class (if I'd ever gotten beyond ninth grade, that is).

First, of course, is the improper use of the apostrophe. What do I mean by saying: "head's up"? Am I referring to a "head" which somehow possesses an "up" -- with the apostrophe indicating a possessive of a singular noun? Or is that apostrophe functioning to create a contraction, as a short form for: "Just a head is up"?

Neither. What I should have said, and would have said if I could write proper English, is: "Just a heads up." The definition of "heads up," according to one leading dictionary, is this: "Used as a warning to watch out for a potential source of danger, as at a construction site." There's no entry for "head's up." That's just wrong. My use of an apostrophe in saying "head's up" was a significant milestone on the road to punctuation anarchy.

The second mistake in my post last night was my improper use of "that" near the end of the second sentence: "Someone has set up a fake blog purporting to me, that isn't." Of course, the two words after the comma in this sentence are a non-restrictive clause, because they supply additional information about the blog I am describing. Therefore, I should have used a "which," not a "that." A "that" is appropriate for a restrictive clause, a clause which limits, or restricts, the scope of the noun to which it is referring. Let this be a lesson to you all: That is the defining, or restrictive pronoun, which the nondefining, or nonrestrictive. These two pronouns should be used with precision.

Further evidence that I am not much of a writer can be found in my misuse of standard English vocabulary, as Ponnuru has already pointed out. For instance, in one of my missives against Ponnuru, I stated that if you believed a particular aspect of Ponnuru's account of the oral argument by Tribe, "you're going to believe inconsolably that Ponnuru is right about all of this and Tribe is wrong" (middle of page 4, here).

Ponnuru responded: "I do not think that word means what Goldstein thinks it means." He's right of course. "Inconsolably" is the adverbial form of "inconsolable," which is totally out of place here because it means: "Impossible or difficult to console; despondent: was inconsolable after his pet died." A reader who agreed with Ponnura's account, and hence concluded Tribe was all wrong, would hardly be "inconsolable" about having gotten to the bottom of the matter.

What I likely meant (I can't remember for sure, as I'm a bit confused at this point about my interchange with Ponnuru after having set up eight web-sites on it and devoting 17 single-spaced PDF pages to his "profoundly silly" article) is "ineluctably." That's the adverbial form of "ineluctable," which means: "Not to be avoided or escaped; inevitable." That is, what I probably meant to say was that a reader who agrees with this central point of Ponnuru's analysis will inevitably, or ineluctably, end up agreeing entirely with Ponnuru.

Finally, I'm a lousy speller. I cannot even spell the word "rock-dumb" which is my defining trait. Ponnuru used that word to describe me here. In my response, in summarizing what Ponnuru had said about me, I misspelled it as "rock dumb" (here, pages 2 & 5), as if "rock" where an adjective modifying the word "dumb." Which is isn't, of course -- the whole thing is an adjective, one word, which is why Ponnuru hyphenated it, as you can see from this definition from an online dictionary:

Adjective
rock-dumb
1. A person so dumb that his or her intelligence is not appreciably distinguishable from that of a rock.
2. Having the quality or characteristic of being as dumb as a rock.

My problems with reading, writing, and spelling are not my only difficulties with the English language. I also have a tendency to use awkward, even ridiculous, word constructions. For example, I called Ponnuru's article on Tribe "profoundly silly," which led Ponnuru to respond "that what's silly is the use of that intensifier before 'silly'." Ponnuru may have a point. To call something "profoundly silly" seems as silly as calling something "trivially profound."

I could go on (as you well know), but by now my point should be clear. My inability properly to read, write, spell, and otherwise manage the rudiments of standard English is powerful evidence that my missteps result from being rock-dumb, not from being slipperly, deceitful, or otherwise malevolent.

If anyone has other examples to support this aspect of my analysis, either from my posts regarding Ponnuru or from my other work, please e-mail me at rock-dumb@hotmail.com and I'll consider including such examples in a future post.

Please also e-mail me if you think of any other points that support my thesis that I'm too rock-dumb to be fairly accused of slipperiness or dishonesty.

My other 7 Ponnuru vs. Goldstein websites

So everyone has it straight, here are the other 7 web-sites I've set up to try to force Ramesh Ponnuru to issue a more detailed rebuttal to my criticisms of his "profoundly silly" National Review article charging Larry Tribe with fabricating much of his account of his first Supreme Court argument (for more on my plan, see here):

1. http://tribeponnuru.blogspot.com

2. http://www.rameshponnuru.com

3. http://www.rameshponnuru.org

4. http://www.rameshponnuru.net

5. http://www.rameshponnuru.com

6. http://www.rameshponnuru.org

7. http://www.rameshponnuru.net

Mea Culpa: I Am Rock-Dumb

As you'll notice from my most recent update (posted late this afternoon) to the blog I've set up to deal with the substance of Ponnuru's article about Tribe, after "going nuclear" on Ponnuru by buying all those web-sites with his name, in an effort "de-escalate the level of rhetoric" I offered to release the domain names or else turn them over to Ponnuru.

Full disclosure: I didn't make that offer solely out of a desire to de-escalate the rhetoric. As I mentioned in my update, my announcement that I'd bought the web-sites "generated a lot of attention," and someone helpfully pointed out that what I was doing was a federal criminal offense.

Based on all the circumstances, letting Ponnuru have the domain names seemed like the right thing to do.

Problem is, Ponnuru couldn't care less what I do. He's waived any objection to my using the domain names as I've promised to do -- he says go right ahead if I want! Looks like I haven't scared him too much. And now, I look like an idiot no matter what I do with those web-sites.

Which brings me to the subject of this post: my mea culpa. As part of my continuing effort to de-escalate the rhetoric and smooth over the situation with Ponnuru, I plan to address in the next series of posts various attacks Ponnuru and others have made on me. Let me hasten to add it is only a partial mea culpa. I deny Ponnuru's charge that I am slippery. I deny Ponnuru's charge that I am dishonest. But I plead guilty to his charge that I am "rock-dumb." That fact, as I hope to show, fully explains the various actions for which I have been criticized which Ponnuru and others have suggested are the product of slipperiness or dishonesty. I am not malevolent. Just rock-dumb.

Tribe v. Ponnuru: Encore 2

Reacting to my efforts to defend Larry Tribe against charges that Tribe fabricated much of a recent legal journal essay about his first Supreme Court argument, Ramesh Ponnuru of the National Review has recently taken to calling me "slippery and dishonest " -- and rock-dumb" to boot!

According to Ponnuru, my analysis exhibits such "incompetence" it's not worth his time to do more than skim it, at least until I collaborate "with someone smarter". Ponnuru declined to write up a detailed rebuttal to my analysis, or even bother to read the whole thing with care, even after I "went nuclear" on him, by buying up all sorts of web-sites with his name to spread my analysis far and wide into eternity, so there'd be "consquences" for his "reputation" and "credibility" if he didn't issue a rebuttal. Ponnuru just doesn't think my analysis is worth his time, or that of his readers. But Ponnuru couldn't help mentioning his amusement that my thesis was that his original article on Tribe was "profoundly silly," yet it took me 17 single-spaced pages to explain why!

(If you're as confused as I am trying to keep track of my dialogue with Ponnuru, for an outline, check out The Volokh Conspiracy, here, here, and here.)

This blog addresses Ponnuru's charges (and similar charges by others who've posted on various blogs, or might post in the future) that I am slippery, dishonest, and rock-dumb.

Because these are my own personal views, I decided not to post these thoughts on my regular blog, www.scotusblog.com. As I recently said on another blog I run, the one devoted to the substance of Ponnuru's article about Tribe, "hyperbolic statements," in particular, "personal attacks on Ponnuru, Tribe, or me," including those "calling me a liar," don't belong on www.scotusblog.com. That subject matter belongs elsewhere. Hence, this blog.