Department of Justice

* Justice Clarence Thomas for president? Hey, it could happen. Lat and Kash’s 2010 proposal is getting a second look. [Daily Beast]

* Speaking of presidents, the Arizona and Michigan primary elections are today. I know folks on the coast often don’t pay too much attention to those middle-of-the-country states, but it will be interesting to see what the Illegal Immigration State and Crippled American Auto State have to say about our ragtag bunch of Republican presidential candidates. [New York Times]

* Emails published yesterday by Wikileaks appear to show that Pakistani military intelligence knew where Osama bin Laden was hiding in the months before Seal Team Six raided his garrison and killed him. I hope Wikileaks has juicier material in the pipeline? [Telegraph]

* Congratulations to Tony West, who will become acting associate attorney general, the No. 3 post in the Justice Department. [Chicago Tribune]

* Interesting report on tensions between the White House and the NSA, which has tried to get permission to monitor private web activity, perhaps at the expense of privacy. But Google knows everything you do on your computer, so why shouldn’t the government? [Washington Post]

Bradley Manning, the American traitor or human rights champion depending on your perspective, was back in court yesterday. His court-martial officially began, and he now faces 22 serious charges that could carry a life sentence, if he is convicted. The 24-year-old Army intelligence analyst allegedly gave more than 700,000 classified documents to Julian Assange, the […]

Judge Carlos Bea is one of Lat's favorite members of the Ninth Circuit. He's refreshingly conservative, on a famously (or infamously) liberal court. He has a fascinating personal history, and he tools about town in a vintage Rolls-Royce (which, rumor has it, he received as payment for legal work before he took the bench). Well, it looks like one assistant U.S. attorney has some expensive tire marks on his back. Check out the epic benchslap that Judge Bea just dished out -- not just to the poor prosecutor, but to the United States Department of Justice....

* Obama has officially nominated William Baer, an Arnold & Porter partner, to run the DOJ’s antitrust division. Get ready for an election year confirmation showdown between the parties. [New York Times] * Newt Gingrich has dropped out of the Virginia ballot lawsuit that was originally filed by Rick Perry. What does this mean for […]

* Are you still trying to make sense of the conflicting opinions in United States v. Jones, the GPS tracking case recently decided by the Supreme Court? Professor Barry Friedman has this helpful round-up. [New York Times] * Elsewhere in law professors opining on SCOTUS, what do Professors Richard Epstein and John Yoo predict the […]

* The people at the Department of Justice really don’t want you to see Osama bin Laden’s death photos, but don’t they realize that the internet needs pics or it didn’t happen? [Blog of Legal Times] * Déjà vu: Hustler Magazine’s nude photo spread of Nancy Benoit was back on the Eleventh Circuit’s docket this […]

U.S. Attorney's Offices around the country have been posting unpaid Special Assistant United States Attorney positions for some time now. We covered them last May. David Lat defended the SAUSA gigs, arguing that the nonpaying jobs might not be as bad as they seem. It's fun, exciting work, and it provides valuable experience and serious professional credibility. There is a crucial, ominous difference between then and now, though. Previous SAUSA jobs were generally aimed at entry-level or fairly junior attorneys. Now we've got a recent opening that's asking for more.…

* Time for a Biglaw battle: William Baer of Arnold & Porter is the front runner to take over the DOJ’s antitrust division, but could he lose the spot to one of O’Melveny’s finest, Richard Parker? [Blog of Legal Times] * It’s about time people remembered there’s no such thing as privacy anymore, but in […]

While the Internet was throwing itself a party for taking down the Stop Online Piracy Act, getting drunk off its own power and shooting pistols into the air like a Mexican fiesta, the Department of Justice was already throwing up a big middle finger to offshore rogue websites, or whatever they're calling pirates now. Everyone's favorite hacker collective, Anonymous, struck back in revenge almost immediately. The group launched massive denial of service attacks against every media and governmental website their deranged hive mind could think of....

* Listen up, internet pirates: if your license plate says “GUILTY,” it’s almost like you’re doing the DOJ’s job for them. More on this later. [Blog of Legal Times] * Say cheese, because you’ll want to catch this first on camera. Sullivan & Cromwell is serving as lead counsel on Kodak’s bankruptcy case. [Am Law […]

* Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s lawyer has a challenge for you: “I defy you to tell the difference between a naked prostitute and any other naked woman.” [Dealbreaker] * It’s not often that Cravath partners leave for other firms, but it happens. Jeffrey Smith, former head of the environmental practice at Cravath, recently decamped for Crowell & […]

It’ll take some time before a court rules on the legality of Barack Obama’s recess appointment of Richard Cordray to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. In case you haven’t been paying attention, Obama nominated Cordray two years ago, but the Republicans have refused to allow his nomination to come to a vote. Obama then wanted […]

The former military intelligence analyst accused of leaking hundreds of thousands of documents to WikiLeaks has spent the last four days in a Maryland military court, undergoing a hearing to determine whether or not his case will proceed to court-martial. For those new to the party, 24-year-old Bradley Manning is accused of committing the biggest […]

* It’s about freakin’ time. Guess who’s jumped on board the ever popular “blame the ABA” bandwagon? None other than David Segal, the New York Times equivalent of the law school scam blogger. [New York Times] * Newt says that as president, he’d ignore SCOTUS decisions. Raise your hand if you want to elect someone […]

[T]his Court is compelled to find that the Government team allowed a key FBI agent to testify untruthfully before the grand jury, inserted material falsehoods into affidavits submitted to magistrate judges in support of applications for search warrants and seizure warrants, improperly reviewed e-mail communications between one Defendant and her lawyer, recklessly failed to comply […]

Let's discuss the hiring freeze, and the state of Honors Program offers.

Congratulations to the 2012 Bristow Fellows, who learned of their selection earlier this month. These one-year fellowships in the U.S. Solicitor General's Office, awarded to recent law school graduates with outstanding academic records and top clerkships, are generally regarded as second only to Supreme Court clerkships in prestige. Let's take a look at the next crop of Bristow Fellows....

* The AT&T/T-Mobile antitrust suit is so big that not even Big Government law can handle it. The DOJ is bringing in even bigger guns with a partner from Biglaw firm Munger Tolles. [Bloomberg] * Obama has nominated former Kozinski clerk, Paul Watford, to the Ninth Circuit. Way to go, because he’s kind of cute. […]

Many of you have been following the story of Anwar al-Awlaki. He's the American-born radical cleric who was targeted and killed by a U.S. drone strike in Yemen. Many have questioned Obama's authority to assassinate an American without due process of the law. Today's news is that President Obama did seek and receive legal justification for this strike from the Department of Justice. But you won't get to see it. That's because the DOJ issued Obama a secret memo that purportedly explains why Obama is allowed to kill Americans now....

* Now that DADT has been repealed, the Ninth Circuit has tossed the Log Cabin Republicans case. How does that Paula Abdul song go? Two steps forward, two steps back? [Los Angeles Times] * Is this a new way of protecting taxpayers? In early 2012, Bank of America is going to start charging $5 a […]