There’s a curiosity about rap music, rappers adopting names to make themselves sound tough, like a thug, to establish street cred. What made this curious to me was that there were people who were “tough,” who had street cred, not because they made up rhymes to music but because they were violent and used violence to pursue their ends. In criminal defense, we knew the people who rappers pretended to be. They were tough on the streets, not for show.

Did some rappers act in ways that aligned with their image? Of course. Particularly with some of the early rappers, they were very often the “thugs” they said they were. Indeed, some of the beloved elder rappers today were not the sort of people you wants to come across in a dark alley when they were young street kids trying to establish themselves as tough motherfuckers. Continue reading →

Lawyers are good at many things. Okay, not many, but spinning baseless arguments into rational sounding positions designed to prevail in the face of ignorance is one of our strengths. That was the position in which Judge Carlton Reeves found himself when the case before him argued that the felon in possession statutes, 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1), was unconstitutional under the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Bruen.

As courts have realized, after Bruen, adjudicating the issue presents certain difficulties.1 Bruen instructs courts to under‐ take a comprehensive review of history to determine if Second Amendment restrictions are “consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.” 142 S. Ct. at 2130. In fact, Justice Alito commends the majority for its “exhaustive historical survey.” Id. at 2157 (Alito, J., concurring).

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“You should sand and repaint the deck, honey,” Dr. S. tells me one day last week. “It really shouldn’t take more than a day to do.”

Before I continue, dear readers, let me rattle off a list of things I think I’m pretty good at:

Arguing before a judge or jury
Debating
Pushing through large amounts of paperwork
Sleight of Hand
Hypnosis
Theatrical Pickpocketing Continue reading →

In the aftermath of oral argument in the Harvard and University of North Carolina affirmative actions cases before the Supreme Court, it seems fairly clear from the nature and tenor of questions from the bench that six justices are not in favor of sustaining affirmative action as currently used.

The Supreme Court on Monday appeared ready to rule that the race-conscious admissions programs at Harvard and the University of North Carolina were unlawful, based on questioning over five hours of vigorous and sometimes testy arguments, a move that would overrule decades of precedents. Continue reading →

It would come as no surprise that the Supreme Court of the State of Washington held that racism has no place in our legal system. Indeed, who would argue otherwise? But like most platitudinous proclamations, the devil is in the details, and the details of a very ordinary trial make that very clear and deeply problematic.

In this case, Janelle Henderson, a Black woman, and Alicia Thompson, a white woman, were involved in a motor vehicle collision. Thompson admitted fault for the collision but made no offer to compensate Henderson for her injuries. Henderson claimed that her preexisting condition was seriously exacerbated by the collision and sued for damages.

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Picture a group of people who believe that they know right from wrong taking books from a library and throwing them onto a bonfire to burn them. There will still be plenty of volumes remaining when they’re done, as the books can be found in libraries and private hands elsewhere, but the ones within their reach are burned. They have not, and cannot, eradicate the offending book from the face of the earth, but they have burned books.

Is this not book burning? Obviously it is, and the fact that this performative act of condemnation didn’t result in the books’ total destruction doesn’t make the act of burning books any less a book burning. Perhaps they’re right, that the books are bad, evil even, and conveys ideas that are horrible and, at least in their minds, should not exist. Perhaps it’s not so much the ideas in the books, but the author who is so despised that his books should never see daylight. Does this make book burning any better? Continue reading →

The images of men in body armor, armed and masked in parking lots watching Maricopa County, Arizona drop boxes is pretty hard to stomach. Could there be any conduct more designed to intimidate voters dropping off ballots than masked men with guns? Yet District of Arizona Judge Michael Liburdi refused to issue an injunction.

In his 14-page ruling, Judge Michael T. Liburdi found that while “many voters are legitimately alarmed by the observers filming” at ballot boxes in Maricopa County, there was no proof that the group, Clean Elections USA, had encouraged acts of violence or posted personal or identifying information online. Continue reading →

It’s almost Halloween! Halloween is one of my favorite holidays, a night where the ghouls, ghosts, and things that go bump in the night get a chance to party. I’m in a giving mood, so today’s Friday Funny contains tips to enhance your 2022 Halloween experience.

1) First, disregard any “news” article warning parents of adults slipping fentanyl-laced candy to kids on Halloween. That stuff is expensive, adults pay good money for it, and odds are if they’ve got it they’re not sharing. Especially not with kids. Continue reading →

The New York Times op-ed by Tom Cotton had two major flaws. First, it was written by Republican Senator Tom Cotton, who is despised by the left as a right-wing fascist, Second, it argued for bringing in the military to thwart ongoing riots since it appeared that local government was unwilling to take action.

Some elites have excused this orgy of violence in the spirit of radical chic, calling it an understandable response to the wrongful death of George Floyd. Those excuses are built on a revolting moral equivalence of rioters and looters to peaceful, law-abiding protesters. A majority who seek to protest peacefully shouldn’t be confused with bands of miscreants.

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In an otherwise thoughtful opinion by Judge Ricardo Martinez in the Western District of Washington, the court addressed an Everett city ordinance designed to prohibit “bikini barista bars,” a thing that I didn’t know existed until today, and to establish a dress code for “quick service facilities.”

Plaintiffs Jovanna Edge and others are or were employed by “bikini barista stands.” Plaintiffs challenge the constitutionality of two ordinances enacted by the City of Everett, Ordinance No. 3559-17 (the “Lewd Conduct Ordinance”) and Ordinance No. 3560-17 (the “Dress Code Ordinance”). The Lewd Conduct Ordinance expanded the definition of a lewd act to include an exposure of “more than one-half of the part of the female breast located below the top of the areola,” “the genitals, anus, bottom one-half of the anal cleft, or any portion of the areola or nipple of the female breast” and created the new crime of Facilitating Lewd Conduct. Continue reading →