Law School Scam

Is this evidence that law schools are engaged in a cynical attempt to game rankings, rather than caring about the careers and education of their recent graduates?

* Seton Hall Law Professor Michael Simkovic — he of the million-dollar law degree study — is back with a vengeance. Pay no attention to that law school scam op-ed in the New York Times; very few law school graduates are actually defaulting on their crushing loan debt. [ABA Journal]

* The U.S. Senate is finally looking into what’s going on with predatory pharmaceutical pricing at companies like Valeant Pharmaceuticals and Turing Pharmaceuticals, both of which have recently hiked up the price on lifesaving drugs to an absurdly exorbitant degree. [Reuters]

* Judge Arnold Ogden Jones II, a North Carolina state court jurist, has been accused of attempting to bribe an FBI agent with “a couple of cases of beer” in exchange for information. It better have been some damn good beer, Your Honor. [News & Observer]

* Complaints about tuition be damned, because law schools are still churning out pricey LL.M. programs like its their job. Fordham Law’s compliance program may be useful for some, but it comes with a $53,000 price tag. [Big Law Business / Bloomberg BNA]

* Law schools have been in a “death spiral” since applications started to drop along with admissions standards and student debt started to increase exponentially, but some will survive if the ABA steps in and polices accreditation and gainful employment. [Forbes]

* “Cases swing. I don’t.” Justice Anthony Kennedy would really like it if folks would stop referring to him as the high court’s swinger swing vote. In other news, the Supreme jurist thinks Legally Blonde is a “pretty good movie.” [Harvard Gazette]

* Hey, everyone, it’s high time we did something about this law school debt crisis. Have you somehow never heard about or experienced this before (despite reading Above the Law for eons)? Not to worry, because the New York Times is on it! [New York Times]

* “She’ll still be fighting for the things she cares about. But this time, she’ll be asking us to join her.” Irin Camron, co-author of Notorious RBG: The Life and Times of Ruth Bader Ginsburg (affiliate link), thinks we’ll see more Badass Bader this Term. [New York Times]

* The Pennsylvania Senate is trying to kick embattled Attorney General Kathleen Kane out of office because she’s working with a suspended law license. Come on, it must be pretty embarrassing when your AG can’t even refer to herself as a lawyer. [Morning Call]

* According to Professor Paul Campos, the law school scam will keep on trucking thanks to the for-profit institutions — Arizona Summit Law, Charlotte Law, and Florida Coastal Law — that are run by InfiLaw. Well, at least they’re good at one thing, right? [The Atlantic]

* Toke the vote! The next states that will likely legalize recreational marijuana by ballot referendum come November 2016 include California, Maine, Massachusetts, and Nevada. Vermont, on the other hand, may pass marijuana-friendly legislation. [Rolling Stone]

What does the Revolutionary War have to do with the current war over legal education? Thoughts from columnist Shannon Achimalbe.

The law school scam and you. How can you avoid turning your life into a disaster?