Letten it be

I found the video of James O’Keefe’s latest Project Veritas venture in this Campus Reform post by Josiah Ryan. In the video former United States Attorney James Letten exhausts his vocabulary of invective in calling out O’Keefe. “You are a nasty cowardly little spud, all of you, you’re hobbits,” Letten shouts. Running a little short of ammo, he adds: “You are less than I can ever tell you. You are scum. Do you understand?” Wait! There’s more! Catching a second wind, Letten asserts that O’Keefe is “a snail,” a “horse’s ass,” and an “asshole.”

Letten was the long-time United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana. The honor looms large in his mind: “I’ve got you on tape here…you are harassing a former U.S. attorney,” he says as he brandishes his iPhone. Letten throws the book at him, literally and metaphorically: “You’re violating federal law. You spend your life as a snail. You do weird little political things. You’re a horse’s ass. Stay away from my family. Stay away from me. Stay from my house, stay away from this institution.”

“This institution” is Tulane University, at whose law school Letten now serves as a dean. This guy is the dean of a law school? Sad but true. He is the assistant dean for experiential learning. It must be another sign of the higher ed bubble, or the end of times. To paraphrase the Cole Porter song: Mr. Letten regrets…not that he’s unable to lunch today, but rather that he’s unable to keep his temper. He has a few issues.

Badger pundit asks: “MOST INSANE HOBBIT HATER: Gollum, or Jim Letten?” Good question!

Roger Kimball provides an after action report in “Annals of intolerance, Tulane edition.” And Patterico adds an interesting footnote: “Jim Letten tells Charles C. Johnson that the decision to prosecute O’Keefe was made ‘at highest levels of the Justice Department.'”

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