I hear that Keith Olbermann declared on MSNBC Tuesday evening that I am "runner-up" for his "hypocrisy award" and also "a fraud."

In case anyone takes Olbermann seriously, I identify below the false and misleading assertions of fact that he packed into his 60-second diatribe.

• Olbermann claimed that I characterized Sonia Sotomayor’s 1974 letter to the editor accusing Princeton University of discrimination as a "decisive" reason to oppose her nomination.

False. I wrote nothing close to that, and I do not see Sotomayor’s letter as disqualifying. I have consistently indicated that debate about this nomination should focus mostly on her judicial decisions and speeches, which I have analyzed at length. My only critical comment in my brief post about her 1974 letter was that "some may see [it] as evidence that she was predisposed to look for the worst, not the best, in the institution that had afforded her such opportunities."

Olbermann quoted that sentence, but then falsely implied that I had been far more damning — while omitting my statement in the preceding paragraph that others may see her success at Princeton as proof of her brilliance in overcoming the discrimination of which she complained.

• Olbermann claimed that Sotomayor’s 1974 letter was "milquetoast and accurate" in complaining "about the lack of opportunities for Hispanics at her school."

False again. "Milquetoast?" Sotomayor’s language — which Olbermann carefully avoided quoting — made Princeton sound a bit like a genocidal dictatorship. She accused the school of "institutional discrimination," of "total absence of regard, concern and respect for an entire people and their culture," and of "an attempt — a successful attempt so far — to relegate an important cultural sector of the population to oblivion."

"Accurate?" Sotomayor did not cite a single example of discrimination by anyone against a single Hispanic student. Nor did she cite a single specific opportunity that had been denied to any Hispanic student. Her entire complaint was that Princeton had no Puerto Rican or Chicano administrator or faculty member; had fewer students of those ethnicities than Sotomayor wanted; and had no "permanent" course dealing "in any notable detail" with the Puerto Rican or Chicano culture.

• Olbermann claimed that in 2006 I characterized then-Judge Samuel Alito’s legal memos of two decades before as "too distant and irrelevant to matter" in the debate over his nomination.

Highly misleading. I never said or implied that Alito’s old legal memos did not matter. I did write (as quoted elsewhere in Olbermann’s rant) that Alito’s critics had "ignored much evidence that his 15 years of steady, scholarly, precedent-respecting work as a judge tell us more about him than a handful of widely (and misleadingly) publicized memos that he wrote more than 20 years ago." I also showed that Alito’s memos (unlike Sotomayor’s 1974 letter) had been both widely publicized and grossly distorted by (among others) The Washington Post and The New York Times.

• Olbermann concocted his "hypocrisy" and "fraud" charges by juxtaposing his misrepresentation of what I wrote about Sotomayor with his misrepresentation of what I wrote about Alito.

Dishonest. My approach to analyzing both nominees has been the same: Old letters and memos are of some relevance but should not be distorted, and actions as a judge are much more relevant.

In smearing me as unfair to Judge Sotomayor, Olbermann ignored the fact that on the day she was nominated I praised her intellect and accomplishments (while expressing some concerns) on his own network (MSNBC), BBC, the "Charlie Rose" show, and "The Diane Rehm Show."

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