Jack-tastic update: The Barrister Strikes Back

We've already covered how the National Institute on Media and Family (NIMF hereafter) has disowned Jack. Now Jack is turning his sharp tongue on them, although it's admittedly with a softer tone than that of his childish and insulting responses to the gaming press.

Notice that he's forwarded this email to GamePolitics; it seems if you get in his bad books he'll add you to his CC list for a while, as the VGCats creator can attest. I think this is very bad form. What he says to another person should not be bandied around to unaffiliated contacts. The fact that he's probably doing this so that the gaming press can publish his letters as a now-public humiliation of the target of the email. Bad move, Jack, bad move.

Jack may be a killer laywer, but he's clueless about politics. "I certainly ... [lost] respect for Senator Clinton when she decided, after that, to attend a fundraiser thrown for her by the video game industry and by ESA's Doug Lowenstein."

Now why, Jack, would she not attend a fundraiser when she is its intended figurehead? Many people already think of her as a stupid bitch trying to launder votes from soccer moms er, using dirty politics to gain public favour, and for her to turn down a charity function just because it's run by an enemy would be political suicide; she needs to look good by attending, even if it were run by Satan himself (whom Jack seems to think Doug is an emissary of anyway).

Hillary's campaign is largely tied to the success of Jack due to her own decisions. If he's still in the public's good books by the time her campaign rolls around that's all good for her, but if he keeps doing this kooky stuff she's going to cover up her connections with him faster than a run in her nylons.

Dave seems to get the last laugh, however, by copy-catting Jack's terribly bad-faith forwarding technique to send a copy to, of all people, Bill Gates. Sure enough, Jack gets his knickers in a twist! "[Bill] is a guy whose Halo trained Malvo to kill in D.C." However as a well-read GP reader points out "yes. It was Halo that trained ... [him] It was most definitely not his father ... the military-trained sniper ... who actually performed most of the shootings."

I'm sure Bill was laughing his rich and successful ass off as he read this ridiculous diatribe. What does Jack expect Bill to do, stop producing a game just because someone used it as a lame excuse to try to get a lighter sentence? See that rating on the box, Jack? It's an M. Halo's not for Little Johnny, it's for those definitely old enough to psychologically deal with the content therein. The fact that stupid parents buy it is not Bill's fault, nor Bungie's fault, nor the ESRB's fault. It may be Wal-Mart's fault, but that may soon change as we've just covered.

In other news, a Jack Thompson mod for GTA: San Andreas has just been announced. I'll certainly give this a go sometime soon. Of course as we previously saw Jack can't take a joke, so the next thing we know he'll be calling for a vendetta against "illegal" modding, until of course someone points out Epic's pack-in modding tools and in-depth manuals, at which point just like on ChatterBox he'll make some vague claims about copyright holders who don't prevent "illegal" modification losing their intellectual property rights... I must say, this is Jack's biggest "WTF?" moment yet. Countless people buy Unreal games just to mod them and have created some incredible total conversions... and despite all their so-called IP abuse that ™ on the box ain't going anywhere for a long while yet. Read a EULA some time, Jack, you never know, it might surprise you.

You almost don't have to point out Jack's errors, in a way, he does a good enough job of making a complete ass of himself as it is. Jack, let's have another H₂O toast in your honour! Ah, the spring of '05, 'twas a good year for tap water... —Garrett