Judge Barbara Lagoa (11th Cir.) Criticizes New York Times v. Sullivan

From Judge Lagoa's concurrence in Friday's Dershowitz v. CNN, Inc. (and see also Judge Charles Wilson's concurrence taking the opposite view ):

In New York Times, Inc. v. Sullivan , the Court usurped control over [the] field of speech-related torts and invented "a federal rule that prohibits a public official from recovering damages for a defamatory falsehood relating to his official conduct unless he proves that the statement was made with 'actual malice'—that is, with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not." Three years later, this same rule was extended to "public figures" in addition to public officials…. [In 1974,] the Court held for the first time that falsity and harm were not enough, and even private plaintiffs must show some sort of