It couldn't happen to two more deserving people.
It's kind of like watching King Kong and Godzilla square off. You don't know who to root for because they're both threatening, but you're hoping the battle lasts long enough for the monsters to destroy each other.
They lose, the world wins and it becomes a more pleasant place for ordinary people to live. Fade to black, roll credits.
What happened in this particular scenario was that Philip Klein went Coon-hunting, and now Brett Coon's hunting Klein. With luck, they'll both may be hunted down.
The problem is, Klein and Coon can dish it out, but neither one can take the reverse.
Klein once invoked the First Amendment to defend himself against a defamation suit relating to posts on his Southeast Texas Political Review blog. In a separate incident, he subsequently sued Google, et al. to ascertain the names of anonymous bloggers he claimed were posting defamatory comments about him.
Back in 2007, when we first launched the Southeast Texas Record, Beaumont attorney Coon, unaccustomed to having his legal gamesmanship scrutinized, began a campaign of harassment against us that included frivolous litigation. Now he's accusing Philip Klein of engaging in the very same kind of activity against him.
Priceless, isn't it?
Last May, Klein petitioned the court to have Coon included in his suit against Google, alleging that someone at Coon's firm had emailed the anonymous bloggers who had so infuriated Klein with negative attacks on the immense but shoddy fortress of his self-esteem.
Recently, Coon filed a motion for sanctions against Klein because of that petition, calling the litigation frivolous. He's seeking $6,000 in attorney's fees and court costs, plus $4,000 for inconvenience and harassment, and $257.45 in out-of-pocket expenses. Every penny of that 45 cents is important.
Klein insists the petition is not frivolous.
We will wait patiently to see how it turns out. We're looking forward to the sequels, featuring alleged victims of frivolous lawsuits filed by King Coon and Kleinzilla.