Kurtz is a company man to the bone. Any media critic/ombudsman doing his job should have perpetual friction between himself and the reporters he scrutinizes. On the other hand, Kurtz may worry about losing his job if he does it too well. That's essentially what happened to Tony Marcano, a former New York Times reporter, after he became the ombudsman at the Sacramento Bee. See this link: http://www.newsreview.com/sacramento/Content?oid=32006. But since Kurtz operates at the national level, that is a risk he, or anyone else in his position, should be willing to take.

I propose that everyone who buys Glenn's new book buy two copies. The second copy should be sent to the print or broadcast media reporter of one's choice. Choose a local or national reporter and simply have Amazon send the second copy to them.

The price of the book and the shipping to the reporter would be less than $25. Amazon makes it easy to include a brief gift message to the recipient, so include a polite greeting to the reporter. I'm going to send my second copy to a local TV news anchorman with a reputation for a barely concealed right-of-center bias.

I propose that everyone who buys Glenn's new book buy two copies. The second copy should be sent to the print or broadcast media reporter of one's choice. Choose a local or national reporter and simply have Amazon send the second copy to them.

The price of the book and the shipping to the reporter would be less than $25. Amazon makes it easy to include a brief gift message to the recipient, so include a polite greeting to the reporter. I'm going to send my second copy to a local TV news anchorman with a reputation for a barely concealed right-of-center bias.

If 10% of them actually read the book, that will be progress!

Drezner and McArdle are two prime candidates to receive a free copy of Glenn's new book in my Buy-One-Give-One-Free campaign: Anyone who buys a copy of Great American Hypocrites also buys an extra copy and has Amazon send it, with a polite gift note, to a reporter in the print or broadcast media.

http://letters.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/04/05/media/permalink/9639d76719dde41383e47da20a4e43ad.html

And even though Drezner's not a reporter, I say we make an exception. He is, after all, a member of Pajamas Media.

Who wants to step-up and send a book to McArdle or Drezner?

http://letters.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/04/02/book_news/permalink/cd79d555431c76ed2aa5a8e65510dbcc.html

On Sunday, I printed the column and then faxed a copy (with a polite cover page) to Judge Bucklew at 813-301-5757. Interesting to note that that fax number has now been deleted from her listing on the official USDC website. It still shows up in the Google cache of the page: http://209.85.173.104/search?q=cache:SborjZDWfaEJ:www.flmd.uscourts.gov/judicialInfo/Tampa/JgBucklew.htm+bucklew+fax+site:flmd.uscourts.gov&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&gl=us.

I guess I wasn't the only one that had this idea.

I don’t have the exact cite in front of me, but here in California I have periodically seen a case cited in state appellate and supreme court rulings in this type of situation, usually involving prisoner rights or treatment. Despite a change of circumstances (usually initiated by the government to avoid ongoing court review) rendering a given case technically moot, a higher court will still adjudicate the matter on the gounds that the issue presented is “capable of repetition, yet evading review.” Aren’t there any federal cases or standards similar to this that could be used?

Glenn - Thanks for adding the link re the above referenced doctrine. So why aren't the lawyers for Al-Marri invoking this? Is it considered fruitless? And what about in the Padilla case? Has this been attempted in either case, but just didn't make it into subsequent news reports? It sure seems like there would be a decent argument to invoke the doctrine, especially on this second go round with essentially the same issue. I assume the ACLU lawyers know what they're doing. What do you think?