Crap, Sandra D, Crap!

1. Look at me!
   I'm Sandra D!
   And I can retire!
   Hee hee hee!
2. I'm Sandra Day O'Connor.
   You can call me “Your Honor.”
   From the Court I'm a goner.
   Neener neener nonner!

What's in your rhyme box today?

Posted 06:39 AM | TrackBack | law general

Did You Consolidate?

A month ago I was all about consolidating loans. Divine Angst offered lots of helpful information about the process, but did I do anything about it? Of course not! Not until yesterday when I hurriedly filled out an online form at Access Group. The form said that it was sufficient to lock in the lower rates—filling it out was all I needed to do at this point and Access will process everything in the next few weeks. I'm skeptical, to say the least, but I guess that's what I get for waiting until the last minute. Damn! I've got to stop doing that!

On a lighter note: I must regretfully decline your invitation to appear in court on July 28. Shane! Shane! Come back, Shane!

Posted 07:37 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack | law school

Lost Liberty Hotel

You've probably heard about this, but just in case you haven't, you better hurry if you want to be among the first to reserve a spot at the Lost Liberty Hotel.

Very smart. As I said before, I also disagree with the holding in Kelo, but I suspect I also disagree with most of the goals and values of its most outspoken critics. Do most of the people mocking the decision really care that it allows the government to take from the poor to give to the rich, or do they only care that it allows the government to take?

Caveman review of Kelo: Taking good. Taking to give to rich bad. Grrr.

Posted 06:16 AM | TrackBack | law general

Death Not Worth Discussion?

Amidst all the hullaballoo about Grokster and the ten commandments cases and Kelo v. New London, no one seems to be talking about Bell v. Thompson. You can see from this brief discussion that it was an insanely complicated case, procedurally speaking, but let me see if I can simplify it: Thompson was sentenced to death, he lost his state-level appeal, he filed a habeas petition in federal court and it was dismissed and the Sixth Circuit affirmed the dismissal. Thompson then filed for cert. with the Supreme Court and was denied, and finally he filed another habeas petition. Sometime after the Sixth Circuit dismissed the first habeas, it found new evidence that convinced the court it had made a mistake, so the Sixth Circuit tried to change its previous decision to correct its mistake. The Supreme Court said no, you can't do that. Kill him!

To put it even more simply: The Supreme Court said in America we don't care if we screw up and kill people by mistake.

Awesome, huh?

This decision is outrageous, but no more so than the fact that intellectual property or ten commandments issues seem to be more important to Americans than their own complicity in state-sponsored killing. Priorities? Not so much. Oh, and you know those people who care so much about the ten commandments? I'm pretty sure one of them says something about not killing.

Funny, for some strange reason the chorus of this song just popped into my head.

Posted 06:45 AM | TrackBack | law general

Hearsay Exception: Blawgcoop Throttled!

In a first, Dreamhost, my host for this domain, blawgcoop.com, and others, sent me an email today that said in part:

This is just to let you know that per your request, we have now “throttled” your domain blawgcoop.com.

I was sort of expecting that, since earlier I'd noticed a certain Hearsay Exceptions Movie was getting a lot of hits. It turns out someone named “Will” at MSNBC found it interesting (scroll down a bit), and apparently, lots of people follow links from Will's site. Will was kind enough to link to another version of the movie hosted elsewhere, and after a bit of adjustment, things are now back to normal. (I had the “throttle” threshold set pretty low and simply raised it to accommodate the extra traffic.)

For the record, this cool movie originated with Energy Spatula—one of her classmates made it for evidence class and was kind enough to share it with her, then I posted it on Blawgcoop because she wasn't sure where to host it. I'm telling you, this guy should make a whole series of Law Schoolhouse Rock videos! His audience wants more!

Being the geek that I am, I only hope that someday I will create something remarkable enough to shut down this website. You know you might be a web geek when...

Posted 10:32 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack | meta-blogging

Running & Fundraising: T-Shirts All Around!

Things I've learned by this point in my marathon training:

• Hydration is a process, not an event.
• Bodyglide is no longer optional. Ouch.
• Great running/workout song: Skydive by Nuspirit Helsinki.
• Getting out the door in the morning is the hard part; once you've run for about two minutes you're always glad you're doing it.

The running is going well, actually; the fundraising is a different story. But since I like you so much I'm going to give you another chance to help out and this time you get a great t-shirt out of the deal! That's right: If you buy one of these two shirts below from Law School Stuff, a percentage of what you pay will go to the Whitman-Walker clinic and my marathon fundraising efforts. But be sure to buy by clicking the links below; if you buy directly from Law School Stuff (or if you buy any other shirt) you'll still get a great shirt, but you won't be helping out the whole marathon effort. Mmmkaay?

Buy a shirt, support the marathon imbroglio!Yay! Thanks!

Posted 06:34 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack | marathon

Thanks GW Class of 2005!

This just in from the GW law school student body president:

This year was the first time a graduating class of our law school has done an organized gift from the law school graduates. The Class of 2005 selected its donation to go to the Loan Repayment Assistance Program (LRAP) to benefit graduates going into public interest jobs.

The 2005 Class Gift had 52% of the class make a donation, raised over $10,000, and had an alumni donor match the gift 4 to 1 because the class reached 50% participation. In addition, this year's Graduation Speaker, Senator Harry Reid, donated $3,000 to the gift. In total, this year's class provided $56,250 to directly provide assistance for the LRAP program.

Color me impressed! I'm hoping to make GW pay for most of my student loans through this LRAP dealio, so thanks to everyone who donated—and especially to that alum for the 4-1 match! You people rock!

Just because I'm curious, does anyone have any anecdotes about other schools doing things like this?

Posted 06:21 AM | Comments (7) | TrackBack | law school

All Eyes on SCOTUS (Blog) for 10 Cs and Grokster

Today is the big final day of this term for the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS), and with such huge decisions coming down today there's no better page to refresh in your browser than the SCOTUS Blog. To get ready, here's a preview of the decisions coming down today.

The first note on one of the Ten Commandments cases is up:

Splitting 5-4 in the first of two rulings on government displays of the Ten Commandments, the Supreme Court on Monday upheld a federal court order against a display of the religious document on the wall of a courthouse in Kentucky.

Grokster will come soon, I'm sure...

UPDATE: Grokster loses big:

The Supreme Court ruled unanimously that developers of software violate federal copyright law when they provide computer users with the means to share music and movie files downloaded from the internet.

Crap.

UPDATE II: Now that the term is over, Half-Cocked is handicapping the retirements.

Also, from the ongoing discussion it looks like maybe this wasn't necessarily a huge defeat for Grokster. The Court merely remanded for reconsideration of what was previously summary judgment in Grokster/Streamcast's favor.

Posted 10:20 AM | TrackBack | law general

11 Gdunka Dunk

Hey, it's Sunday and it's been a little while since we had a list, so:

1. Blawg Wisdom today features a new Weekly Law School Roundup filled with hot profs, cocktails, getting baked, and surviving needles—none of which are probably what you're thinking.
2. imapd has quit her job and is getting married—congratulations! Her initial reflections on working as public defender are excellent:

   I will say, however, that since I stopped working there, I feel sure that a part of my identity has gone dormant. When people ask me what I do, I say, “I used to be a lawyer,” and as I say it, I feel a distinct sense of emptiness in not being able to talk about the law, my clients, or our society in the way that I used to--as someone who felt herself to be on the front-lines of the law. It is a rare and precious thing that a job can challenge you and change you on a daily basis in a way that makes you feel both alive and useful to the world. That is what being a public defender was to me.

   I hope she'll keep us all updated on where her great experiences lead her next.
3. And speaking of being a public defender, how much would it suck to work in a courtroom where the DA is sleeping with the judge? As if judges didn't sympathize with DAs enough already! And how much would it suck to be the guy sitting on death row after being tried in that court? Justice? What?
4. Hooray! Monica is back!
5. Denise has a new car and it sounds awesome. I want one, too! More importantly, Denise seems to be recovering nicely (for the most part) from her recent life-changing surgery. Congratulations and best wishes, Denise!
6. I've obviously been a little out of touch for a while, but I just noticed that DJ Sui G. has announced he's not going to law school this fall. (How many of us wish we could say that?) Maybe he'll be trying again next year, but for now, he's having a lot of fun with bikes. What is it about the single speed that makes it so cool these days? For the real cache, I hear you've got to go for the fixed gear. And if you check out a few of these pics, you can see why.
7. Unblague is a blog (imagine that!) by a 3rd-year law student who has been blogging for almost a year now. Who knew?
8. The Bitterness Strikes Back is another new-to-me law blawg. Although I'm not sure, I'm guessing its author is a rising 2L (U of MN, I believe) and she seems to be working in some capacity that lets her observe lots of criminal trials this summer, so that's cool. Her post titles rock.
9. Ambivalent kicks imbroglio's butt in a GoogleFight.
10. Ahem:

    If you work as an intern, whether in government or business, and you are interested in posing for Playboy, please send pictures...

    [Via Blawg Review #12] Two forms of ID required. Thanks!
11. I ran 12 miles this morning. Thank goodness for Advil. The pain will decrease with every dollar you donate. ;-)

Posted 02:06 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack | lists