The second sentence of Sean Hannity's 12-page letter of pettifoggery leaps at the reader like the Greek god of hypocrisy (if there were one): "We write concerning the New York Times’ blatant and outrageous disregard for the truth in mischaracterizing Mr. Hannity’s coverage of the coronavirus pandemic."
Such blatant disregard is libelous, says the letter from Hannity's attorney; therefore the aggrieved party demands a retraction and an apology. Thus begins a litigious comedy performed by the Baghdad Bob of the American airwaves.
To be sure, that Hannity himself has been an outrageous pandemic of right-wing disinformation for the past quarter century is a sordid reality he hasn't overlooked: To lie and deceive, one must first know the truth — then set out to maul and molest it. So there's something of a Goebbelesque quality to Hannity's threatening letter to the Times and three of its opinion writers, Kara Swisher, Ben Smith, and Ginia Bellafante. In his own little way, Hannity is accusing Poland of initiating hostilities by invading the sacred fatherland of Fox News.
Specifically, his legal action addresses "three [opinion pieces that] dealt in different ways with how Fox News at various points dismissed coronavirus as a political cudgel to whack Trump," observes the Washington Post's Eric Wemple. Reflects the media critic: "What we have here is a media loudmouth whose millions and millions of earnings each year as a radio and TV host come wrapped in the protective gauze of the First Amendment. The very lines that he accuses the Times of crossing are boundaries he fails to observe in his daily ramblings."
But since Sean is raising his righteous voice against three members of what he has elsewhere called the "Democratic extreme radical socialist party," no doubt he feels justified in crossing lines. And in doing so he earns free publicity and deepens his cred among millions and millions of morons.
The starkest line of hypocrisy crossed is etched in the legal action's counterfeit basis: "[The columnists'] false statements do not constitute protected opinion. A statement is not an opinion if 'a reasonable listener ... could have concluded that [the defendant] was conveying facts about the plaintiff.'" By this "reasoning" of the pompous boor's lawyer, not only Sean Hannity but virtually Fox News' entire crew of on-air talent would be liable for the slander of birtherism — and every other phony war cry belched over the years by the Murdoch family's cruel embarrassment to journalism.
Sean being Sean (unfortunately), at some near point he'll silently drop this action on the legitimate basis of having acted stupidly — and never again will he speak a word of it to his audience. Like most other right-wing outrages, Hannity's legal demands will simply flush themselves down the rabbit hole of past indignation.