It’s not true that everything I do is about drone warfare, but it has taken a lot of my time lately and, of course, a lot of stuff is happening, both on the operational side as well as legal side. So here’s a little round-up of links, more or less at random. First, the New […]
Archive | April, 2010
“The Rise of the New Paternalism”
My friend Prof. Glen Whitman writes about this — as well as about slippery slopes — in Cato Unbound.
Massive Problems with Anti-Obama Allegations That Have Been Making the Rounds Recently
[UPDATE: I just received a message from the Content Manager for Right Side News, which had posted the article I cite below, saying that the article has been removed (I’ve updated the link below to point to the Google-cached version). The message explained that, “After reading the article written that addressed the errors in an […]
We Interrupt Your Regularly Scheduled Programming . . .
There were a bunch of things I was thinking about blogging today, but I’ve been sidetracked by the trade of Donovan McNabb to the Washington Redskins. For a die-hard Philly sports fan, this is a lot to digest on a Monday morning.
Legal Research Using Google Scholar
Over at FourthAmendment.com, John Wesley Hall suggests that Google Scholar is a very helpful way to find and link to caselaw online. I’ve fiddled with it a bit, and I think it’s a great tip. For example, if you want to read cases on the “reasonable expectation of privacy” test, you enter “reasonable expectation of […]
Legal Clinics Under Siege
The New York Times reports that law school legal clinics continue to spark controversy and political backlash, particularly (though not exclusively) at state-supported schools. The story keys on efforts by some Maryland legislators to defund the clinic at the University of Maryland law school unless the clinic turns over information about its clients and its […]
Conversations with Justice Stevens
This morning there are interesting articles based on interviews with Justice John Paul Stevens in both the New York Times and Washington Post. In each he talks about his time on the Court and his contemplation of retirement.
Is Stimulus Funding Political?
Has the distribution of simulus funds been influenced by political factors? A study by Veronique de Rugy suggested a partisan tilt in the disbursement of stimulus funds; she found a strong correlation, but no definitive evidence of causation. This prompted a response from Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight. de Rugy replied here, prompting a surreply from […]
Sunday Song Lyric
Is the Easter Bunny a white rabbit? I’ve always assumed so. The Easter Bunny may be a white rabbit but he or she still does not have much to do with Grace Slick’s “White Rabbit,” the classic song she immortalized with Jefferson Airplane in 1967. The rabbit of which Slick sang was the nervously late […]
What TSA is doing
The press has been spending a lot of time on TSA’s new policy. This New York Times story is representative (I’ve linked to it here because it has the first ever MSM reference to Skating on Stilts). Despite all the attention, though, there’s a surprising lack of certainty about exactly what TSA is doing that’s […]
“Handicapper”
A very strange bit of legal usage — in various Michigan statutes, for reasons that elude me, handicapped people were called “handicappers” from 1976 to 1998. I have seen no examples of this usage in statutes or cases outside Michigan; there, when “handicapper” is used at all, it’s used only in its standard dictionary sense […]
This is what courts defer to?
So let me explain again how the “judicial restraint” approach to the Constitution is supposed to work. The Supreme Court is supposed to defer to Congress and uphold any law it enacts so long as the justices can imagine a possible reason why Congress might have enacted a law. If the Supreme Court does anything […]
An Act for the Relief of Sick and Disabled Seamen
This 1798 statute (5 Cong. Ch. 77, July 16, 1798, 1 Stat. 605) is currently making the blogospheric rounds as purported proof that the 2010 congressional mandate to purchase health insurance from a private company is based on long-established practice. Incorrect. Sections 1 and 2 of the act impose a 20 cent per month tax […]
What’s Wrong with This Assertion?
From a San Jose Mercury News story, datelined Mar. 31, not Apr. 1: Chocolate was a particularly important trading commodity for Jews in 15th century Spain. When the Jewish population was expelled from that country in 1492, they introduced chocolate to the Netherlands and possibly France. So bittersweet chocolate doesn’t just offer families a chance […]
Editorial Comment in the Annals of Congress
Prof. Brian Kalt reports: I’m researching the legislative history of the Twelfth Amendment and I just stumbled across this great editorial comment from the folks who compiled the Annals of Congress (as the Library of Congress website where I access the Annals puts it, “The Annals were not published contemporaneously, but were compiled between 1834 […]