I’m starting to wonder how many times I’m going have to fight this battle.
For five weeks, as our predatory-pricing case against the SF Weekly was in trial, Andy Van De Voorde, the Denver-based hit man who works for Village Voice Media, attacked me, attacked the Guardian, attacked our witnesses and attacked the whole idea that an independent paper had the right to go to court to fight a predatory attack by a national chain.
When a San Francisco jury found (by an 11-1 margin) that VVM and its local outlet, the SF Weekly, had sold ads below cost for seven years with the intent to harm the Guardian – a violation of state law – Van De Voorde attacked the judge, the jury and the law itself.
Then when we started to talk about what the verdict meant, the hit man retailed the same old arguments all over again, in yet another blog post.
And now Matt Smith, the Weekly columnist who is often wrong on the issues but generally has some sense, has jumped in with what appears to be a preview of the arguments we can expect when the Weekly pursues its appeals.