Our Expression of Gratitude
We are grateful to our colleagues Alex Kozinski, Stuart Banner, Rodney Smolla, Leo Bogart, and Sut Jhally for their serious treatment of our Essay and their thoughtful responses to it. We had hoped that Commerce & Communication would prompt new debate and discussion about certain First Amendment issues. Judging from our colleagues' reactions, there may well be more of the former than the latter. But in the scheme of things, who's to complain about "fighting words" and friendly knocks where the First Amendment is concerned?
Happily, Rodney Smolla thinks enough of our work to label it "fresh and provocative," 11 "excellent," 12 and even "ingenious." 13 Equally flattering, Alex Kozinski and Stuart Banner believe that we have raised "questions that deserve serious thought," 14 including "many points upon which we agree." 15 Having "convincingly demonstrated" 16 certain points, we are said to be "no slouches in this arena." 17 In fact, Kozinski and Banner all too liberally label us as "among the most intelligent members" of an entire school of thought dating back to Cicero and perhaps "many millennia before that." 18
Fortuna being what it always is (or what Machiavelli tells us it is), one may see an author "flourishing today and ruined tomorrow, without his having changed at all in character or qualities." 19 True to fate, our three colleagues ran out of kind words. Indeed, they argued so persuasively against us that when they were through with us, we barely recognized ourselves.
