ANN ALTHOUSE WANTS THE TRUTH: How stupid/evil was Bill Lueders’s attack on Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice David Prosser? “Lueders needs to tell us whether or not he knew the Bradley-as-the-aggressor story when he presented his original work of investigative journalism under the name of the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism. If he knew it, why didn’t he present the whole context at first? And what was in the ‘reconstructed account’ that got Prosser to decline comment? If Lueders didn’t know the alternate version of the story, in which Bradley was the aggressor, why on earth didn’t he know? The story he presented is so weird that any thinking person would demand to know more of the context.”

It’s as if the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism is just a partisan hit shop or something. Plus this: “Finally, it must be said: If Lueders had the larger context of the story — including the allegation that Bradley was the aggressor — and he suppressed it in his original account, what he did was not only evil, shameful journalism, it was freaking stupid. All sorts of bloggers and tweeters like Millhiser committed themselves to the firm, righteous position that if Prosser did what is alleged, he must leave the court. Lueders’s article lured them into stating a firm and supposedly neutral principle about physical aggression. With that principle in place, they are bound to call for Bradley’s ouster, if Bradley really did take the offensive and transform the verbal argument into a physical fight.”

UPDATE: Professor Jacobson: Applying the Weiner Test to the Wisconsin Supreme Court: “If Bradley has not pressed charges, why not? Inquiring minds want to know.”

On the upside, the Wisconsin Supreme Court is getting a lot of attention from famous law professors. On the downside, this is the kind of attention it’s getting . . .