Last week I watched a webcast for my CLE, certain it would be a big yawn. But an interesting lawyer spoke about how corporate clients should handle unfavorable blog postings and comments on the internet.
His sage, nay prescient advice? Leave bad enough alone and, in most cases, put down the big stick, oh ye who feel grieviously harmed. Because a heavy-handed response almost always backfires. Almost always.
When what to my wandering eyes should appear, but a miniature TSA agent and one burgeoning blogging deer.
After Amy Alkon endured an excruciatingly invasive, we'll-show-you-who's-boss-you-loathesome-ignorant-citizen "pat-down" at LAX (now, those adjectives are just my opinion), Amy demanded to know the TSA agent's name and exclaimed, "You raped me!" Moreover, Amy told the TSA agent that she'd raped her IN A LOUD VOICE. AT THE AIRPORT. IN FULL VIEW OF THE TRAVELING PUBLIC. And, Amy SOBBED. LOUDLY. Can you believe it? The nerve! Oh, the ravishing, rapturous nerve!
Then, (after consulting a lawyer and being told she likely had no legal recourse -- sovereign immunity and the sheep mentality would be my guess) Amy took the First Amendment into her own hands. And by God, she blogged about it.
And that would have been that. Except our TSA heroine Thedala Magee hired a tiny law deer. (My opinion -- just my opinion!)
Ms. Magee then proceeded to demand $500,000.00 from blogger Amy, begat and issued henceforth a "cease and desist" letter, and threatened to sue her for defamation IN A COURT OF LAW.
Thedala, Thedala! You're breaking my heart. You're shaking my confidence daily. Once snuggled up anonymously in your warm government cocoon, safe and obscure with a government pension waiting, you've gone and thrust yourself sharply into the blinding glare of Google, the cold public eye. The horror, the horror. How harsh the bright lights.
Still, 'tis better, my dear, than a putrid, public, labia-parting, full-bore, hands-on genital inspection by a government power-hound. Of that you can be sure. 
So, umm, cheers, Thedala. Cheers.All views expressed herein are the opinions, and merely the opinions, of the Lawyer Mom. Not valid with any other participating offers, to employees, or in Puerto Rico. Not legal tender. All rights reserved.
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3 comments:
TSA folks sing this song,
"FEEL 'EM! FEEL 'EM!"
The TSA line's five miles long,
feelin' 'em up all day...
;-)
I guess TSA can come after me for that lyric.
Anyway, I reckon we shouldn't necessarily dump on the TSA for their current "hands onjunkology"; there are a number of folks who go thru that process for the single purpose of trying to relive a high school after-prom-date, to remember what it felt like...
Thanks so much for this post as I have read the links and was encouraged by what I read. The blogger is intelligent and her lawyer's letter is fantastic. Unbelievable that a TSA agent got upset because after she abused the woman (the advice columnist blogger) and the blogger mentioned her name, that the TSA agent felt smeared. The TSA agent's atty asking for $500,000 is a joke and I am laughing that the TSA agent's name has now gone viral as a result.
However, I am still waiting for our most elevated politicians to put an end to this. Am so sick of these TSA agents getting away with taking out their aggression on people who exercise their right to refuse the body scanner.
Another example of a "box" checking monkey. Hope that's not too crude a way to put it.
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