Tort Reform

* Nancy Gertner and Laurence Tribe take Alan Dershowitz to task for his unorthodox analysis of the sentencing proceedings of General Michael Flynn. [Boston Globe]

* In this elegant essay, Jane Chong uses two notable new books — To End a Presidency: The Power of Impeachment, by Laurence Tribe and Joshua Matz, and the updated edition of Charles Black’s classic, Impeachment: A Handbook, with a new preface and additional chapters by by Philip Bobbitt (affiliate links) — as the jumping-off point for reflections on impeachment, law, and politics. [Los Angeles Review of Books]

* Judges often struggle when it comes to sentencing — and that’s as it should be, according to veteran defense lawyer and former prosecutor Joel Cohen. [New York Law Journal]

* Yes, more of President Donald Trump’s judicial nominees have been rated “not qualified” by the American Bar Association compared to the nominees of his four most-recent predecessors — but as Patrick Gregory explains, there are some reasons for this (most notably, the Trump Administration’s decision to stop giving the ABA a sneak peek at nominees, which allowed past administrations to simply pull nominees the ABA deemed unqualified). [Big Law Business]

* Jonathan Adler has many problems with the recent ruling by Judge Reed O’Connor (N.D. Tex.) on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act — including the fact that Judge O’Connor ruled in the first place. [Volokh Conspiracy / Reason]

* Former public defender Stephen Cooper flags an issue that many reporters probably haven’t thought much about: “When Will Journalism Grapple With the Ethics of Interviewing Mentally Ill Arrestees?” [CounterPunch]

* As 2018 draws to a close, the U.S. Chamber offers up its annual list of the year’s Top 10 Most Ridiculous Lawsuits.
[Faces of Lawsuit Abuse]

* Looking ahead to 2019, the new year could ring in new legislation that could help lower drug prices by facilitating the timely entry of generics into the market, as Alaric DeArment reports. [MedCity News]

It's a law school issue spotter, but in real life, with tasty fra diavolo.

* While Harvey continues to devastate Houston, Texas Republicans will strip insurance policy holders of most of their protections if they don’t file their claims by Friday. Victims will still have insurance — but if the insurance company delays or otherwise frustrates payouts — which some inevitably will — claims filed after Friday won’t enjoy the same interest penalties to keep insurers honest and will shift attorney fees onto those who lost their homes in many cases, decreasing the likelihood a wronged policyholder can vindicate their rights. So… good job Texas. [Dallas Morning News]

* If you’re looking to put a price tag on Charlotte Law’s demise, this former faculty member says the school defrauded taxpayers to the tune of $285 million. [Charlotte Observer]

* What’s this? Is this a media outlet talking about millennials and the workplace in a fair, even positive light? Preposterous!!! [American Lawyer]

* Apparently “yadda, yadda, yadda” doesn’t get you out of a CFPB investigation. [National Law Journal]

* The effort to recall the Brock Turner rape sentencing judge is back on track. [Law.com]

* Victims of Trump’s Muslim Ban may be nearing a settlement with the administration. At least until some white supremacist group Tweets this story to the President and he demands the DOJ pull out of any deals. [Law360]

* Which 2016 SCOTUS opinions are getting the most love from lower courts? [Empirical SCOTUS]

Home Depot and Menard's face the dumbest class action claim ever.

Local elections matter.

This law firm is changing with the times.

* The top ten most ridiculous lawsuits of 2016. [U.S. Chamber Institute for Legal Reform via USA Today]

* Not the first homeless lawyer we’ve heard about, and surely not the last. [Instagram]

* Jonathan Adler: “Donald Trump has not even been sworn in yet, and it’s already becoming easier for public figures to sue people in the nation’s capital.” [Volokh Conspiracy]

* Congrats to Kellyanne Conway on her future role as counselor — or should that be “counsellor”? — to President Trump. [Althouse]

* Why does defense lawyer Jon Katz smiles when he objects during trial? [Katz Justice]

* Ivanka Trump’s incident at the airport has all the makings of a bar exam issue-spotter. [Instapundit]

* Another in-house lawyer with critical comments about the Great Pay Raise of 2016. [ABA Journal]

Consider this a holiday coping mechanism.

As Republicans take control, let's consider how tort reform would affect the growing litigation finance industry.

The top frivolous suits of the year may be a dumb list, but some of these cases are pretty funny.

Wherein I analogize class action attorneys to condoms.

Superstition is not a good foundation for tort law.

* C. Michael Kamps, the man who filed a pro se suit against Baylor Law with claims that he was denied admission because his GPA predated grade inflation, recently lost his bid to get SCOTUS to review his case. It’s too bad — he seems like a total gunner. [ABA Journal]

* If you thought that Ruth Bader Ginsburg was the biggest celebutante justice on the Supreme Court, then you’d be dead wrong. According to Professor Rick Hasen’s research, it’s Sonia Sotomayor who’s stealing the spotlight at the high court. [WSJ Law Blog]

* Senator Elizabeth Warren, the queen of taking Wall Street to task, now has her sights set on SEC Chairwoman Mary Jo White. In a 13-page letter, the politician called the former Debevoise partner’s tenure “extremely disappointing.” [DealBook / New York Times]

* Ex-House Speaker Dennis Hastert’s arraignment was rescheduled from this Thursday to next Tuesday. No reason was given for the change, but maybe it has something to do with the fact that there’s still “no attorney of record” on the case. [National Law Journal]

* Many doctors are hoping that tort reform will save them from litigating their malpractice cases, but there’s an easy alternative. In order to be sued less often, doctors should try to talk more to their patients. What a novel concept. [The Upshot / New York Times]

When the roads are full of self-driving cars, vehicular manslaughter is going to get real interesting.

* Manny Pacquiao is headed to court after a pair of Nevada fans sued him for failing to disclose his torn rotator cuff before entering the ring. They feel this was dishonest, but Manny is a politician, so… [Bloomberg Business]

* Trial of man who knocked out his lawyer delayed after he… attacked his new lawyer. [Post Star]

* What are the lyrics to “Louie, Louie”? It’s a question that stumped our “top men” back in the day. [The Legal Satyricon]

* Tort reform advocates talk a big game, but the harms they try to cure are mostly non-existent. [LFC 360]

* Could this be another Indiana lawyer behaving badly? [Indianapolis Star]

* Lat will be chatting about his unusual career path — in case you hadn’t heard, he has a book, Supreme Ambitions (affiliate link) — in Denver on May 13. [Federalist Society]

* Speaking of Colorado, a prisoner there serving a life sentence wrote Above the Law the other day explaining that his pro bono lawyer had died and asking us for legal help. We don’t do that kind of work, but if you’re an interested criminal defense lawyer in Colorado, let us know.

No one likes frivolous lawsuits -- especially plaintiffs' lawyers.

* Remember when I said it was a bad idea to drop off a drunk in Ireland? This is EXACTLY why. [The Independent (Dublin)] * Oh, Cooley Law School… don’t ever change. [The Faculty Lounge] * Republican tort-reform advocate settles overblown personal injury suit. Oh the irony. [The Hutchinson News] * Check that, this is even more ironic. [The Chronicle of Higher Education] * The U.S. Postal Service helped kill an innovative, anti-junk-mail startup. You could say a bloated government agency is to blame. Or you could say cutting off the Post Office and forcing them to fund themselves through Faustian deals with junk mail distributors is to blame. Either way, a great idea was smothered. [Inside Sources] * Indicted former Virginia Governor and transvaginal ultrasound enthusiast Bob McDonnell has taken a gig as a visiting professor at an ATL Worst Law School finalist, Liberty Law. Of course. [The News & Advance (Lynchburg)] * Do you need to be on a law journal to succeed? [Huffington Post] * Can you get paid for sleeping on the job? Good question. [The Spitz Law Firm]

* Missouri lawyer is hauled into a disciplinary hearing about his practice of showing a picture of a naked woman to a female client. He says it wasn’t about sex and he was just showing her the kinds of pictures that come up in a divorce proceeding. That sounds like a fine explanation. I mean, every divorce involves autographed photos of strippers. He also commingled funds. That’s less easy to explain. [Inside the Ozarks] * Hey look! They brought back Debtors’ Prison. The prison-industrial complex has gotta get paid somehow. [Bergen Dispatch] * Federal prosecutors in Manhattan are now looking into David Samson, the chair of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and a Christie appointee. If government agencies aren’t for petty revenge and plunder, then what are they for? [Talking Points Memo] * Insurance company cronies threaten that insurance company may have to get out of the business because of all the lawyers winning cases making the insurance company actually pay their contractual obligations. Don’t they understand the purpose of litigation is just to collect premiums? [Legal Newsline Legal Journal] * How ACLU attorney Ben Wizner became Snowden’s lawyer. [Forbes] * “One of the reasons I could never imagine being a lawyer is because you have to account for your time in 15-minute increments.” Thankfully she was corrected and told that lawyers are actually more irritatingly measured in 6-minute increments. [Dear Prudence / Slate] * With all the talk of patent law reform coming from the President, this is an excellent time to look back at eight dumb patents. [Mashable]

A fun new app lets you generate absurd fact patterns with the click of a button.

Is this ruling stupid or sleazy?