Comment by ceejayoz

Hit pieces aren't a modern invention.

https://blog.oup.com/2014/11/roman-emperor-tiberius-capri-su...

> Stories of this kind were part of the common currency of Roman political discourse. Suetonius devotes similar space to the sexual transgressions of Caligula, Nero, and Domitian – such behaviour is to be expected of a tyrant. The remoteness of the emperor’s residence itself must have fuelled the most lurid imaginations back in Rome.

Suetonius was born in 69 AD; Vitellius was emperor in 69 AD and Claudius was emperor from 41-54. They weren't contemporaries.