Morning Docket: 09.20.23

* Federal courts have two weeks of funding if the government shuts down. So there's a silver lining to a shutdown? [Reuters] * Joshua Wright's accusers respond to his massive defamation suit against them noting that the complaint fails to include any defamatory statements and... kind of admits to everything. [Law360] * Former Obama administration officials tell FCC not to pursue net neutrality because conservatives in the judiciary might strike it down. At that rate, just go ahead and preemptively stop enforcing all laws because Sam Alito once read a medieval scroll that he thinks applies to the Chevron doctrine. [Bloomberg Law News] * Sid and Cheesy get to interview grand jury members who returned their indictments. But with some key conditions. [Fox Atlanta] * Lawrence Lessig is unimpressed by the Fourteenth Amendment case against Donald Trump. Not for the loony "just because the presidency is an office of the United States doesn't make the president an officer of the United States" stuff from Mukasey, but because lowering the bar for insurrection all the way to January 6 would open up a dangerous precedent that bad actors could use to shut down dissent. [Slate] * The Supreme Court specifically excluded military academies from the latest affirmative action cases, reflecting in part the military's stance that national security requires a diverse officer corps capable of managing an increasingly diverse enlisted force. The folks who brought that case have now sued West Point because they care way more about bigotry than national security. [Reuters] * Temple's acting president, former law school dean JoAnne Epps has died after collapsing on stage. [NY Times]