Politics

Morning Docket: 02.19.13

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A future law student?

* Save for an unintelligible joke made last month, it’s been seven years since Clarence Thomas has spoken during oral arguments, much less asked a question, but with no offense to his colleagues, he’d rather “allow the advocates to advocate.” [Washington Post]

* Sorry, members of the American public, but something like 95 percent of you are too stupid to understand what’s going on during Supreme Court hearings, so there’s no point in having cameras in the courtroom to film them. (Sotomayor, J.) [New York Times]

* “Having an empty bench means people don’t get their cases heard,” but it seems like Senate Republicans could not care less. Obama’s facelift for the federal judiciary is going to have to wait a little while longer. [San Francisco Chronicle]

* A lawgasm for prestige nerds: the Harvard Law Review received federal trademark protection, and with that, the number three law school in the country gained some bragging rights over Yale. [Daily Report (reg. req.)]

* Oh my God, you guys, law school applications are down, no one can find jobs, and recent graduates are in debt up to their eyeballs. This is totally new information that no one’s heard before. [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette]

* Turning to your parents for law school advice is perhaps the worst idea in the world — after all, they’re the cause of your “special little snowflake” syndrome in the first place. [Law Admissions Lowdown / U.S. News]

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Morning Docket: 02.15.13

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* What to do when your federal agency’s website has been hacked by Anonymous and you’re unable to post a major report online for public dissemination? Well, just ask a law professor to do it for you on his blog; that’s not embarrassing, not at all. [WSJ Law Blog]

* The many victims of the Deepwater Horizon disaster can now rejoice, because yesterday, Transocean pleaded guilty to violating the Clean Water Act, and will pay the second-largest environmental fine in United States history to the tune of $400 million. [CNN]

* Money takes flight: eleventy billion Biglaw firms are behind the beast that is this awful airline merger, but taking the lead are lawyers from Weil Gotshal for AMR and Latham & Watkins for US Airways. [Am Law Daily]

* After questioning the validity of one of the NBA players union’s contracts, Paul Weiss is withholding details about it thanks to the government’s intrusion. Way to block nepotism’s alleged slam dunk. [New York Times]

* “When is the last time you took the biggest financial institutions on Wall Street to trial?” Elizabeth Warren took the Socratic method to the Senate Banking Committee and she was applauded for it. [National Law Journal]

* If you liked it, then perhaps you should’ve put a ring on it, but not a Tiffany’s diamond engagement ring that you’ve purchased from Costco, because according to this trademark lawsuit, it may be a knockoff. [Bloomberg]

* “We feel very badly for Megan Thode.” A Pennsylvania judge ruled against the Lehigh student who sued over her grade of C+ because let’s be serious, did ANYONE AT ALL really think he wouldn’t do that?! [Morning Call]

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Morning Docket: 02.14.13

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* She loves me, she loves me not: media darling Sonia Sotomayor used to be in favor of the use of cameras during Supreme Court arguments, but she’s done a complete about-face on the issue, just like Justice Elena Kagan before her. [National Law Journal]

* Everyone and their mother knows what Antonin Scalia thinks of the State of the Union address, but let’s find out what my colleague Elie Mystal thinks about the good justice’s antics — namely, Scalia’s non-attendance for the past sixteen years. [HuffPost Live]

* American Airlines and US Airways will be merging to create the largest (and most awful) airline in the country. Perhaps the DOJ’s antitrust division can save us from this parade of horribles. [DealBook / New York Times]

* It looks like Team Togut is going to have a crappy Valentine’s Day. They thought that their partner problems were all wrapped up, but according to these filings, it seems that they’ve only just begun. [Am Law Daily]

* If Irving Picard, the trustee in charge of the Bernie Madoff bankruptcy case, is able to get his way, money will soon be raining upon the victims of the massive Ponzi scheme at warp speed. [WSJ Law Blog (sub. req.)]

* This probably isn’t just a “distraction” or “silly sideshow” anymore, because Apple now says it will be fighting Greenlight’s attempt to block the tech company from restricting its issuance of preferred stock. [Bloomberg]

* Instragram has asked a federal court to toss a lawsuit over changes to the photo-sharing app’s terms of service because it contests that users still own the rights to all of their fugly Walden-filtered pictures. [Reuters]

* Remember Kenneth Kratz, the former Wisconsin prosecutor who referred to himself as “the prize”? He’s settled his sexting suit with Stephanie Van Groll, also known as the “hot nymph.” [Twin Cities Pioneer Press]

* Go to grad school at Lehigh for free: check. Sue for $1.3M over your C+: check. Get chastised by a judge over your ridiculous lawsuit: check. Whatever, we still beat Duke, and that’s really all that matters. [Morning Call]

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A Lawyer’s Guide to Getting Drunk During the State of the Union

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It’s that time of year again! Time for all lawyers to tear themselves away from drinking at their desks and gather around a television to participate in an Above the Law drinking game.

Where else is there a drinking game focused on Justice Ginsburg AND Ted Nugent?

Remember to follow your Above the Law editors covering the speech via Twitter. See @ATLblog, @DavidLat, @ElieNYC, @StaciZaretsky, and @Joseph_Patrice (because a week after the fact, I realize it’s too difficult to tweet from my usual handle and have people realize who I am).

Unless otherwise noted, take a sip whenever these come up….

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Morning Docket: 02.11.13

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Justice never sleeps… except during Obama’s SOTU addresses.

* “You just sit there, looking stupid.” The justices of the Supreme Court aren’t required to show up and look like “potted plants” at the State of the Union address, but some of them do every year. [CNN]

* Well, thanks to the DOJ’s fraud lawsuit filed against ratings agency Standard & Poor’s, it’s starting to look a lot like a litigation gang bang up in here as far as the states are concerned. [Bloomberg]

* Dewey know whether D&L’s retirees are still kicking (legally speaking) or if they’ve decided to send their claims to hospice? We certainly do, and we’ll have more on this later. [Am Law Daily]

* That “death and taxes” thing may be true, but when you’re trying to navigate the U.S. tax code as a married same-sex couple and the government won’t even recognize your union, there’s an uncomfortable air of uncertainty. [New York Times]

* “Have we seceded already? The execution is faster than I thought.” Guess which state in the Deep South accidentally raised a Confederate battle flag over the building that houses its Supreme Court. [Clarion-Ledger]

* Mama said knock you out: if you’re trying to figure out how to get a job after graduating from New England Law School, moonlighting as a champion boxer will help you beat down the competition. [Boston Herald]

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Justice Ginsburg Swats Down Paul Clement’s Latest Attempt To Blow Up Recess Appointments

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Now there’s a cover boy for the conservative Tiger Beat.

Paul Clement must still be stinging from that Obamacare loss. The celebrated conservative lawyer and former Solicitor General seemed unbeatable after he managed to secure constitutional approval for the government to hold prisoners indefinitely while blasting Barry Manilow if the Vice President’s office says so.  People actually described him as the Michael Jordan of the law.

And then the Court upheld Obamacare. Even Jordan needed Pippen.

To reestablish his conservative street cred, Clement filed a petition with Justice Ginsburg to jump the line and put his case complaining about NLRB recess appointments, currently residing in a Connecticut district court, in front of the Supreme Court ahead of the high profile Noel Canning v. NLRB decision from the D.C. Circuit (discussed by Elie here).

Justice Ginsburg told Clement to pound sand.

What a diva!

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Blood-Soaked White Paper Outlines Legal Reasoning Behind Drone Assassinations

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Mmm… so peaceful…

In a stunning attempt to redefine the concept of “imminent,” a leaked white paper from the Department of Justice outlines circumstances where America can assassinate terrorists, Americans living abroad, pretty much anybody important enough that the President wants to have him killed.

Oh, you think I’m engaging in a bit of hyperbole? Read the 16-page white paper for yourself. You’ll think Brutus and Cassius wrote it before stabbing Caesar.

According to the paper, the U.S. can undertake “self-defense” assassinations without any evidence of an actual specific threat…

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Non-Sequiturs: 01.31.13

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* Rand Paul “doesn’t really understand” gay marriage. Let me help him out: it’s something that’s none of the government’s business. HTFH. [Huffington Post]

* And neither does Aaron Schock. [BuzzFeed]

* “Just how crippled is the legal job market? Utterly.” The Atlantic added value to the law school application story that the New York Times just posted without linking to anybody. [Atlantic Wire]

* I can see how Budweiser buying Modelo raises antitrust concerns. But since it’s a potential monopoly over “crappy beer,” I don’t really care. [Dealbook]

* Sorry, but I don’t see Manti Te’o suing his gay lover mean persecutor, Ronaiah Tuiasosopo. [The Volokh Conspiracy]

* If Hitler got royalties. [The Schwartz Report]

* The man suspected of shooting Arizona attorney Mark P. Hummels has been found dead. And after earlier optimism, Hummels is now not expected to survive. [ABA Journal]

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Lawyer’s Rape Evidence Law Should Probably Be Aborted

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This is the New Mexico State flag. Maybe state legislators should do something with this instead of making things harder for rape victims.

On last week’s episode of “Republicans Say The Darndest Things,” we had a female Republican legislator out west proposing a bill that would criminalize abortions for victims of rape or incest.

But now New Mexico legislator Cathrynn Brown says that it was all a big mistake. She wanted to charge rapists who convince their victims to have abortions with tampering with evidence. Because apparently holding rapists accountable for their rapes isn’t enough?

Brown is an attorney and claims a drafting error caused all this confusion. If you believe her, that’s one hell of a typo that nine other New Mexico Republicans also missed….

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Morning Docket: 01.28.13

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* So, this happened over the weekend: Anonymous hacked the U.S. Sentencing Commission’s website and is threatening to release government secrets about the DOJ (and possibly all nine of our Supreme Court justices) unless the legal system is reformed. [CNET]

* A spoonful of sugar makes the lawyering go down? Apparently the best way to remind lawyers that they need to act civilly is through song. Or through Above the Law posts, but we aren’t in the habit of hosting sing-a-longs like the New York Inn of Court did. [Wall Street Journal]

* “[U]nless there are major changes in the legal industry,” law school administrators shouldn’t expect people to apply in droves, especially when they’re now fleeing like rats from a sinking ship. [National Law Journal]

* Arizona’s Supreme Court will allow people to take the bar exam after two years of study, but come on, the justices don’t want to jump the shark by allowing online law grads take the test, too. [East Valley Tribune]

* Tim Tebow got to trademark Tebowing, so why shouldn’t Colin Kaepernick get to trademark Kaepernicking? All the San Francisco 49ers quarterback wants to do is sell some inevitably overpriced t-shirts. [NBC Bay Area]

* An appeals court threw out two of Casey Anthony’s convictions, but her legal drama is far from over. The ex-MILF filed for bankruptcy to escape nearly $1 million in liabilities, including Jose Baez’s legal fees. [CNN]

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