Two stupid things and one dishonest one

Here's the kind of e-mail you write only if you're a bully and a fool. There are three things that leap out about it.

1. It is an attempt to intimidate a blogger who said basically, "Fletch could be the person who pulled this stunt," by a threat of legal action. This is stupid because all that happens is that the blogosphere passes the link all around the country, thus earning a much bigger audience for the piece you're trying to surpress than it could have achieved on its own without your help.

2. The fundamental criticism is that Fletch is the type of person whose first instinct, upon coming into posession of evidence that a political opponent was preying on young people, would be to use that evidence for political gain, not to try to ensure the safety and privacy of the minors in question. So Fletch obligingly proves this criticism valid out of his own mouth: "You can bet if I had known the depths of Foley's depravity, I would have immediately gone to the proper authorities with the evidence so that an appropriate investigation..." Oops, no, sorry, I'm misquoting him. He actually says -- voluntarily -- "I would simply have made a spot about it."

3. Note the line, "You do not have my permission to publish this e-mail in whole or in part. This is a private communication from me to you and I expect you to honor that." Hey, you know what? You can say that all you want; but if the other person didn't agree to it in advance, too bad for you. If you really do want to tell somebody something in confidence, then you do NOT mouth off and then after telling them say, "Oh, and by the way, you're not allowed to tell people that." Instead, you say, "Look, there's something I need to say to you, but I need for you to agree not to tell anybody else." And then they can either say, "Okay" -- in which case you have a claim on their silence -- or else they can say, "I'll make no such promise." In which case you can keep your mouth shut.

That is, after all, what a confidentiality agreement is all about. Did Fletch get a confidentiality agreement from this lady? No? Then he can forbid her from showing the letter to the whole wide world all he wants. He can also forbid the sun to come up in the east while he's at it; I imagine that the courts will respect the two claims about equally. (It's particularly absurd for you to send somebody a threatening e-mail and then tell them they don't "have your permission" to show it to anybody else.)

What a loser this Fletch dude is. If you're going to be a bully, you ought at least to be a shrewd bully.