Lithwick may be a liberal shill, but she does have a point about Ricci. How many employment lawsuits have you filed? It strikes me this guy can't get or hold a job without suing his employer.

This is bit Delphic. I looked at the two pieces from Lithwick that you linked to, and don't understand even the connection, let alone the inconsistency. Can you elaborate?

One more point. Lithwick would probably say she's not being a hypocrite -- rather, she's saying that the Republicans calling him to testify are hypocrites for supporting him when they would criticize his litigiousness in others. As she says in her conclusion: "When Frank Ricci testifies against Judge Sotomayor, it will be worth recalling that under any other set of facts he would have looked to his GOP sponsors like the kind of unscrupulous professional litigant Rush Limbaugh lives to savage."

The preemptive "hypocrisy" move here by Lithwick is nice, because she not only gets to bring up some unfavorable trait of Ricci's, but she also gets to accuse the other side of hypocrisy. This is a favored rhetorical move these days: you bring up some generally unfavorable fact that is usually flagged by the other side, and then you accuse them of hypocrisy for not flagging the same conduct for those on their side. The Palin thing was a primo example: Democrats were hypocrites for bringing up her lack of eperience when Obama lacked experience, while Republicans were hypocrites for not criticizing her lack of experience like they had criticized Obama's.

I have to confess that I'm getting a little tired of all this hypocrisy talk. It's like the only sin that can be committed on the Internets is that of hypocrisy. Here's my take from last year:
http://prawfsblawg.blogs.com/prawfsblawg/2008/09/hypocrisy-all-t.html

I know, but this is something Kerr said about something she did earlier - I just couldn't find it. The other side hypocrisy thing is kind of lame when you do it too. When Lithwick denounces repeat employment discrimination filers, no matter what kind of claim they file, that's one thing. But if she's the kind of person who wants people to make use of Title VII, then she can hardly complain about people who do it. She's never suggested that it is a problem before.

David, with respect (I like all you Glom folks) I have to say I think this is reaching a bit. I don't think supporting the idea of Title VII in general means you can't without hypocrisy criticize people who you believe overuse it. If this is the best you can come up with, I think Lithwick (whatever she may deserve on other charges) deserves a "not guilty" on this one.

But she isn't criticizing the serial use of Title VII (she would say) -- she's just pointing out the inconsistency of those who DO criticize this serial use of Title VII staying silent when it comes to Ricci. Of course, I think she is sub silentio raising it as a negative factor -- that's the beauty of this particular rhetorical move. But she would say she never actually criticizes it. And I don't think she actually does.

Anyway, I do think pointing out hypocrisy is important. But it's become the uber-rhetorical move. It's the only thing everyone agrees on -- consistency of thought. I guess I wish we could agree on more. And Lithwick should either say that Ricci's conduct is problematic, or she should say that the GOP should leave Title VII filers alone -- and praise Ricci for his filings.

True, perhaps, and of course I'm doing it in this post. But I don't have as much of a problem with it as you do - you can have consistent policy approaches for most things, I think. And I wouldn't trust someone, like Lithwick, who doesn't to be a good judge of these inconsistencies.....