A reader writes in on the Sex Slaves Debacle:

In the burgeoning case of Radosh v. Landesman, it's difficult for those of us sitting in lawnchairs to know whom to root against. It's easy to dislike Radosh, a self-aggrandizing blogger (is that redundant?) who posts an attack on Landesman, then writes Jack Shafer ostensibly to solicit his opinion, though really, to broaden the distribution of the attack, as though Shafer was some kind of "Page Six" supplement. But I think Landesman grabs the Odious Crown in his email to Shafer, by announcing that while writing the "dangerous and complicated" NYTM story, he was "often accompanied by my pregnant wife." Ah. Well. Your pregnant wife! Why didn't you say so in the beginning? Case dismissed, and here's an extra $1 a word, Landesman! On the wall chart, philosophers point to this rhetorical device as an Appeal to Emotion, though the rest of us might be reminded of Richard Nixon and his Checkers speech. Did Landesman's pregnant wife wear a cloth coat?

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