Don West

  • American Bar Association / ABA, Attorney Misconduct, Deaths, Divorce Train Wrecks, Gay, Gay Marriage, Health Care / Medicine, Law Professors, Law Schools, Legal Ethics, Morning Docket, SCOTUS, Supreme Court, Tax Law, Trials, United Kingdom / Great Britain, Video games

    Morning Docket: 07.03.13

    * The Obama administration has decided to delay the employer health care mandate until 2015. What does that mean for you? Well, since you’re not a business, you still have to purchase health insurance by 2014. Yay. [Economix / New York Times]

    * Untying the knot is harder than it looks: Gay couples stuck in loveless marriages they’ve been unable to dissolve due to changing state residency may be able to find new hope in the Supreme Court’s recent DOMA decision. [New York Times]

    * Clinical professors are pushing the ABA to amend its accreditation standards to require practical skills coursework. Amid faculty purges, they’re committed to do whatever it takes for additional job security. [National Law Journal]

    * If you’re heading to a law school recruitment forum and want to get ahead in the applications process, make your mark by acting professionally, not by dressing like a d-bag. [U.S. News & World Report]

    * “As a parent we’re not always proud of everything they do.” Of course there’s a prosecution inquiry being made into the Don West ice cream cone picture that ended up on Instagram. [Orlando Sentinel]

    * Lawyerly lothario Zenas Zelotes has been suspended from practicing law for five months. He should take his own advice, find an ethics attorney, and make her his girlfriend. [Connecticut Law Journal]

    * When you’re arguing about a video game — online or anywhere — you should probably leave talk of murdering children out of the conversation. You could wind up in jail for months like this guy. [CNN]

    * John Tiley, one of the United Kingdom’s most preeminent tax law professors, RIP. [The Telegraph]

  • Alex Kozinski, Clarence Thomas, Guns / Firearms, Law Reviews, Law Schools, Non-Sequiturs, Religion, SCOTUS, Supreme Court, Videos

    Non-Sequiturs: 06.25.13

    * A company is selling pork-laced bullets to “keep Islamics from going to Heaven.” Ever since Denny’s, they’re putting bacon in everything… [CBS Seattle] * Justice Thomas is really terrible. This is probably why #UncleThomas is trending on Twitter. [Jezebel] * A feminist critique of law reviews based on the Russell Crowe film, Gladiator. This sounds intriguing. [TaxProf Blog] * If you wanted to know how the judge decided the audio expert issue in the Zimmerman trial, we’ve got you covered. If you wanted to know when attorney Don West will compile his collection of Greatest Opening Statement Jokes, we have no idea. [The Expert Institute] * TNT has a new show dropping teams in Tasmania and forcing them to endure… a knockoff of The Amazing Race and Survivor. But an L.A.-based attorney is on this Friday trying to win $100,000, or what we used to call “a year-end bonus.” [TNT Newsroom] * Ken White breaks down all the charges against Edward Snowden. To avoid these charges, Snowden is holed up in the transit zone of the Moscow airport, which I hear has a really terrible TGI Friday’s where Snowden will get to eat for the indefinite future. [Popehat] * Anonymous Partner isn’t the only one with advice for summer associates. Here are tips from Grover Cleveland, author of Swimming Lessons for Baby Sharks (affiliate link), and Katherine Larkin-Wong, president of Ms. JD. [The Careerist] * Chief Judge Alex Kozinski and Professor Nicholas Quinn Rosenkranz debate an upcoming Supreme Court case, Bond v. United States, concerning the treaty power. [Cato Institute]
  • Clerkships, Murder, Non-Sequiturs, Patton Boggs, Racism, SCOTUS, Supreme Court, Trials

    Non-Sequiturs: 06.24.13

    * This is interesting, a lawyer for Paula Deen is saying the woman suing the (former) Food Network star has no standing for claiming a racially hostile environment because the plaintiff is white. So… white people can’t get offended by a lunatic running around talking about dancing ni****s? [ABA Journal] * I was going to say, “I think Indiana Jones would be worse if he had a contract lawyer as a sidekick.” But then I remembered the Steven Spielberg ruined an entire movie because he wanted to bone Kate Capshaw and, yeah, I’d have taken a lawyer sidekick over her any day. [Legal Geeks] * I’m constantly amazed at how the SCOTUS clerks don’t leak. I mean, the NSA freaking leaked. [Judicial Clerk Review] * Vance basically means that if you are broke and you’ve been dying to smack your partner’s administrative assistant on the ass, go for it. “Conservatives” think that’s just fine. [Huffington Post] * Of course you can leave Patton Boggs, just don’t let the door hit you on the way out. [Blog of the Legal Times] * At this point, you will believe any sentence that starts with: “Former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi…” [Dealbreaker] * After the jump, watch one of George Zimmerman’s defense attorneys, Don West, begin his opening statement in A FREAKING MURDER TRIAL with a failed knock-knock joke…