Dave Diersen has his comments closed on his GOPUSA news clippings. And those run on Ill Review every day.

This wasn’t a “story unfavorable to Rahm Emanuel”.

This was a complete fabrication based on a misunderstanding of basic property tax info.

Ms. Eaton’s original premise was that Emanuel paid no property taxes at all. She based this on the fact that she was unable to find his home address listed on the Cook County Assessor’s website.

When a staffer from the county assessor’s office tried contacting her she apparently didn’t respond. She also kept deleting that staffer’s comments pointing out that her assumption was wrong.

Today she deleted that original article, after having deleted all the comments to it and turning off the comment function yesterday.

The fact is that Emanuel paid $13,000+ in taxes last year, as Ms. Eaton later acknowledged in her second post (her “update”).

Using her own figures, Ms. Eaton found that Emanuel’s neighbors paid between $3500 and $7000 in taxes. Again, these are the figures Ms. Eaton originally chose to highlight because she thought Rahm Emanuel wasn’t paying any taxes.

Clearly though, Emanuel’s $13,000 tax bill is quite a bit higher than his neighbors’ $3500 to $7000.

Today she also deleted that update post.

The most bizarre part of this whole non-story is Ms. Eaton’s conclusion here: “When our questions are answered and those answers verified, we let our readers know.”

…Actually, the questions were answered and verified yesterday by multiple sources. The answers kept getting deleted and then Ms. Eaton posted two follow-up posts yesterday (both now deleted) complaining about the fact people were answering her questions.

Sad, really.

Getting a surprise call from the Assessors Office about someone elses taxes has to be a first. Wonder why that happened Rob?

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

the right of petition includes asking questions does it not?

Illinois Review was knowingly and willingly publishing false information and knowingly and willingly deleting information correcting their fallacies.

Legal action might very well be an appropriate response in that case.

As for the Assessor’s Office, the staffer originally offered to help correct the story. Instead, Ms. Eaton continuously deleted the corrections.

Doing research and questioning things is fine. People and groups of all political stripes do it every day.

Misinterpreting the data one finds or accidentally not finding all the pertinent info available after doing such research is understandable and forgivable… if one were to simply admit the error and correct/clarify the original content.

The harm here, however, was in the deliberate continuation of such incorrect information — leaving it posted without direct clarification — and the deliberate removal of any and all corrective information subsequently posted by those more knowledgeable on the subject than Ms. Eaton apparently was.

The question Fran Eaton was: “Why doesn’t Rahm Emanuel pay property taxes?”

It’s a fallacy. He does pay property taxes. He pays about double (or more) the taxes of his neighbors (and that’s based on Ms. Eaton’s own published research, though she’s now deleted it).

Again, publicly lying about someone is liable to cause that person harm… and is clearly grounds for a lawsuit.

I have no doubt that Ms. Eaton or her publisher, Jon Zahm, would not hesitate to sue should someone come along and blatantly lie about them.

And while the question “Why doesn’t Rahm Emanuel pay property taxes?” was originally based on Ms. Eaton’s simple mistake, the truth was pointed out to her repeatedly and from several reliable, well-documented sources (including a copy of Rahm Emanuel’s own tax bill). The fact that she left the post up with that erroneous question unchanged, meant she was then knowingly lying about Rahm Emanuel.

Rahm is a public figure. It is perfectly legal to speculate on whether he pays his taxes, much like people might speculate on Luis Guitierrez paying his taxes.

I don’t think small publications such as Illinois Review (or ours for that matter) can afford to be targeted for a lawsuit, so rather than publishing reasonably honest questions, it is cheaper just to pull them down.

JBP

Perhaps you’ve missed the point despite the fact I’ve repeatedly stated in earlier comments for others who also missed it…

Yes, it is perfectly reasonable to question authority, whether Dem or GOP or other.

No, it is not perfectly reasonable (and in some cases may be illegal) to knowingly lie while doing so.

You state that she asked reasonably honest questions.

Her question that started this was premised on a fallacy: “Why doesn’t Rahm Emanuel pay property taxes?”

That was her question.

It was founded on incorrect, incomplete info.

Ms. Eaton didn’t “speculate on whether he pays his taxes.”

She premised her entire question on her (incorrect) assertion that she believed he did not pay any taxes at all.

When given correct info indicating he did pay taxes, she deleted the info and then turned the comments function off in an effort to try and avoid the correct info.

She can play the part of martyr all she wants, but she’s the one who chose to do incomplete research and then to initially, and quite belligerently, ignore corrective information when it was presented to her.

It doesn’t matter if the publication is as small as Illinois Review, Chicago Daily Observer, or Capitol Fax Blog or as large as CNN, Tribune Media, or Clear Channel.

Knowingly peddling a falsehood about another person after being given true info is at the least unethical and at worst potentially illegal… and grounds for a lawsuit.

webofdeception.com/rahmemanuel.html

I think you have run a blog before, so you certainly know that facts are not all that important to litigation. Once you get threatened with litigation, you either back down or face someone with quite a bit more resources than you have, in this case the Chicago Machine vs. a near volunteer organization.

The fact is that the Tribune (Sun-Times etc) did not uncover anything about Emanuel’s taxes. In my experience they miss this sort of thing because they are lazy, and not necessarily because he has a clean slate, much like the Tribune never noticed that Sen. Obama went to the church with the nutty Rev. Wright, until the Illinois Review pointed it out. The Tribune is lazy as hell first, and unethical only when it doesn’t require much work.

The media should question about 100 things in Rahm Emanuel’s remarkable background. The machine shut this one down. Maybe there will be more. I get quite a few e-mails about bizarre things that Emanuel has done, maybe the Tribune does too.

JBP

bizarre emails being sent out. That’s proof for ya.

I heard Obama is actually a citizen of Tajikistan and his “berth certificate” is missing from the Tajik ministry.

Now what kind of intimidation did Ms Eaton receive? Does she believe that merely pointing out her mistake is intimidation?

Is an assessor employee posting a correction intimidation?

Is merely disagreeing with whatever she says intimidation?

She screwed up. She posted bad information. She should have simply said that.

I have no problem with her investigating Emmanuel or any other politician regarding property taxes, but before she posts wrong information she she learn the basics of the system.

If she can’t do that she shouldn’t call herself a columnist or a conservative. She should call herself a “nutjob”. Nutjobs come in all political varieties.

Now if you will excuse me I just received an email stating that Obama wears red underwear and hates America.