Looking at my notes from today’s United States v. Windsor argument on DOMA at the U.S. Supreme Court, “$Q” is everywhere. That’s my shorthand for “money quote.” The merits part of the argument was $Q after $Q, moments that made an impact, in some cases if only to show where a justice might be headed.
Here are five. Look forward to bringing you more in-depth analysis of the argument in the next couple of days.
Continue reading “The DOMA Arguments at SCOTUS: Five Money Quotes”
425G – Remembered to lift the seat
* First the law school rankings, now urine-based video games? It’s been a whirlwind week of heavy journalism for U.S. News. [U.S. News]
* Did you ask for a diorama of the Supreme Court? Because I did… [Washington Post]
* What do SCOTUSblog and “Girls” share in common? If you guessed that Tom Goldstein spends most of his day at the office naked, you’re (probably) wrong. [Peabody Awards]
* Casinos have systematically driven men out of the bartending and cocktail serving market. They use a fig leaf to protect themselves from Title VII… apparently literally. [Workplace Prof Blog]
* Dartmouth professor Sonu Bedi argues that same-sex marriage is really about the separation of church and state. You say potato, I say egregious denial of basic rights. [Huffington Post]
* UBS trying to get out of an SEC case. Color me surprised. [Dealbreaker]
* Central New Mexico Community College does not want to hear that sex talk. It makes Sol the Suncat sad. [Popehat]
* As mentioned before, there’s a new legal dispute over whether or not Sherlock Holmes has lapsed into the public domain. Alex Heimbach of Slate puts the case under the proverbial magnifying glass. [Slate]
First, some random thoughts on the legal news of the week:
1) Who gives two ***** if gay folks get married? Or have the same rights as you and me? My goodness, if two people want to get married, God Bless them! And it is a civil rights issue; being told that you can’t have information on your partner’s hospital stay because of HIPAA is downright medieval. The pastor whose YouTube speech went viral after reading from anti-desegregation literature and turning it into an anti-gay marriage diatribe was probably the most brilliant argument in defense of gay marriage. Twenty years from now we’ll be saying: “Gay marriage? Meh, it’s really those damned ______ that we have to watch out for…” Hey, it’s America, **** yeah!!, every group gets a turn at being the downtrodden.
2) Don’t get me started on North Dakota’s draconian steps with regard to a woman’s right to choose what to do with her own body. Now see, it’s Holy Week and I probably can’t take communion.
3) This DLA Piper billing debacle? Makes me sick, and is a perfect segue into finishing my column from last week. I know I know, DLA came out and said, “Heh heh, we were just kidding. Those guys aren’t even around here anymore. Overbilling? Meh. Never happened, we promise.” What did you expect them to say?
I happen to know personally one of those mentioned in the story, and he was just as much a dim bulb back then, so it is no surprise that he wrote that stuff in an email. That he moved on to a partnership at another firm is no surprise either. I will say that he is infamous for leaving one of the funniest and most outrageous drunk emails voicemails on a colleague’s phone early one morning. And he probably can’t figure out who he is from this blind item in any event. But, I digress, back to overbilling…
Continue reading “House Rules The Rates Are Too Damned High! (Part Two)”
[S]uppose a State said that, “Because we think that the focus of marriage really should be on procreation, we are not going to give marriage licenses anymore to any couple where both people are over the age of 55.” Would that be constitutional?
– Justice Elena Kagan, in response to Charles Cooper’s contention that marriage is an institution that’s been historically and traditionally linked to procreative purposes, during yesterday’s oral arguments on California’s Proposition 8.
(This exchange led to a wildly entertaining political ad parody about the dangers of old people marrying, produced by the Daily Dolt. Because if there’s anything that’s “worse” than gay marriage, it’s gray marriage! Please continue reading to see the video; you can thank us later.)
Continue reading “Supreme Ideals on Procreation: Just Say No to Gray Marriage!”
Yesterday, the Supreme Court heard arguments on California’s Proposition 8. Today, they’re hearing oral arguments about the Defense of Marriage Act. If you didn’t already know that, you’ve reached the wrong website, Brazzers is thataway.
High-profile Supreme Court cases attract large numbers of protesters who congregate on First Street, and yesterday was no different. Honestly, I don’t know why. I guess seeing gay people in drag humping each other makes for good television. I guess filming some dour-looking woman who appears to be locked in a loveless, frumpy marriage is a fine way to establish the “conservative” side of the argument. That stuff may work on your average “I must find out where my people are going so I can lead them” Congressperson. But I’m positive that nine unelected judges appointed for life who think this “institution” of gay people loving each other in committed relationships is “newer than cellphones” don’t give a damn about the shenanigans on the courthouse steps.
If these protests are useful, they’re useful to make a point to the media and those watching from home about the issues at play. Towards that end, a group of five law students staged a protest that really added something to the discussion here that even most talking-head court watchers didn’t bring up. Of course, it’s a point that went way over the heads of at least 90 percent of the television audience…
Continue reading “Law Students Show Themselves As The Smartest People Out On First Street”
‘Churn that bill, baby? Dear Lord…’
* With SCOTUS justices questioning standing in the Prop 8 case, and one even stating that gay marriage is newer than cell phones and the internet, you can guess where the decision is headed. [New York Times]
* “This badge of inequality must be extinguished.” With men like Ted Olson and David Boies representing the plaintiffs in Prop 8, at least we can say that they fought the good fight. [Wall Street Journal (sub. req.)]
* OMG, remember when DLA Piper allegedly overbilled a client and got dragged through the mud over scandalous emails? Now the firm says they were totally joking. So cray. [DealBook / New York Times]
* Less than a month after handing out pink slips across multiple offices, Patton Boggs named a new managing partner in New York who just so happens to be a Dewey defector. Ominous. [Am Law Daily]
* These are great tips on negotiating financial aid, but try this: tell admissions you’ll happily enroll elsewhere, and watch them throw cash at you. [Law Admissions Lowdown / U.S. News & World Report]
* It looks like Paul Ceglia’s zany misadventures in being fired as a client by Biglaw firms and suing Facebook may finally be at an end thanks this scathing 155-page recommendation of dismissal. [CNET]
The scene outside One First Street after the argument.
Dearly beloved, we were gathered together at SCOTUS today to argue about these fourteen words: “Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.”
But we talked a lot about standing. And we did a lot of standing.
What time did I get to the Court?
Continue reading “The Proposition 8 Supreme Court Arguments: Standing and Standing”
Ed. note: Lawyer and journalist Michelle Olsen, a member of the U.S. Supreme Court bar, attended today’s oral arguments in Hollingsworth v. Perry, the constitutional challenge to the Proposition 8 ban on same-sex marriage in California.
Her write-up of the proceedings will appear shortly. In the meantime, check out the photographs she took while at the Court, after the jump.
Continue reading “The Proposition 8 Supreme Court Arguments: A Photo Essay”
* Illinois rules that young people’s tweets are not statements of fact. Are you suggesting people aren’t really rolling on the floor laughing? [IT-Lex]
* One Manhattan financial firm thinks Ally McBeal’s unisex bathroom is a good idea. Or they’re sexist dicks. One or the other. [Jezebel]
* The owner of the Boston Bruins is completely terrible, placing a small, but wealthy town in the middle of litigation costing hundreds of thousands of dollars… all so he can promote horse dancing. What is it with Massachusetts people and dressage? [SB Nation]
* Shoplifter busted with earrings swallows the evidence, but is ultimately foiled by Marie Curie. [Legal Juice]
* GULC students protest standards of review outside the Supreme Court, an important and overlooked issue. But it’s also throwing down the biggest legal dorks gauntlet to other law schools. [DCist]
* And as the legal world parses the transcripts of a big day for the Supreme Court, we also lament the loss of the man who basically created Supreme Court coverage. R.I.P. Anthony Lewis, sometimes called the “Tenth Justice.” [New Yorker]
Don’t try to answer my question with your own question.
– Justice Antonin Scalia, in response to Ted Olson’s attempt to ask the justice a rhetorical question during today’s oral arguments on California’s Proposition 8 at the Supreme Court.
(We’ll have additional analysis of the Hollingsworth v. Perry proceedings later today, courtesy of Michelle Olsen of Appellate Daily. You can follow Michelle’s real-time coverage on Twitter.)
In a land that is right here and in a time that is right now, a technology has arisen so powerful that it can replace basic human document review. Is it time to bow down before our new robot overlords?
First, here’s a little story about me: my life in the legal world began as a paralegal. My first case was a GIANT patent infringement case that was already six years old and had involved as many as five companies, multiple US courts, the ITC and an international standards committee. I knew nothing about any of this.
On my first day, my supervisor (a paralegal with at least eight other cases driving her crazy) sat me down in front of a Concordance database with a 100,000+ patents and patent file histories. “Code these,” she said. I learned that “coding”, for the purposes of this exercise, meant manually typing the inventor’s name, the title of the patent, the assignee, the file date, and other objective data for each document. I worked on that project – and only that project – for at least the first six months of my job. After a week or so, time began to blur.
What I know, in retrospect and with absolutely certainty, is that as time began to blur, so did my judgment. So did my attention to detail. If you could tell me that I did not make at least one mistake a day – one inconsistent spelling, one reversed day and month, one incorrectly spaced title – I frankly would need to see your evidence. I would not believe it. The human mind is trainable but it is not a machine.
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We currently have a number of active openings for associate roles at US and UK firms in HK / China, Singapore and two new in-house openings. As always, please feel free to reach out to us at asia@kinneyrecruiting.com in order to get details of current openings in Asia, as well as to discuss the Asia markets in general and what we expect for openings later this year. Our Evan Jowers and Robert Kinney will be in Beijing the week of March 25 and Evan Jowers will be in Hong Kong the week of April 1, if you would like to meet them in person.
The US associate openings we have in law firms are in the usual areas of M&A, cap markets, FCPA / white collar litigation, finance, and project finance. The most urgent of our top tier (top 15 US or magic circle) law firm openings in Asia (among many other firm openings that we have in Asia) are as follows:
• 2nd to 5th year mandarin fluent M&A associates needed in Beijing and Hong Kong at several firms;
• Korean fluent 2nd to 4th year cap markets associate needed in Hong Kong;
• 2nd to 5th year Japanese fluent M&A associates needed in Tokyo;
• 4th to 6th year mandarin fluent cap markets associate needed in Hong Kong;
• 2nd to 4th year M&A / cap markets mix associate needed in Singapore.
Also, we have the two below in-house openings:
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