Caveat: For the intellectually challenged, nothing that follows raises or addresses the merit or efficacy of a solution (such as, oh, Medicare for All), which is an entirely separate problem and issue. Remember, the alternative to bad isn’t necessarily good. It can always get worse.

Do you have the ‘Rona? If your symptoms are “right” and sufficiently severe, maybe the government will deem you worthy of being tested, and the president has said that  Seoul has 38 million residents the Chinese flu will magically disappear tests will be free. Isn’t that wonderful?

Within minutes, he got a call from the heads of a hospital emergency room and infectious-disease department where he lives in upstate New York: He should come right away to the E.R. for newly available coronavirus testing. Though they offered to send an ambulance, he felt fine and drove the hour. Continue reading →

There’s an old saying, that god answers all prayers. Sometimes the answer is “no.” Was that the message Rev. Rodney Howard-Browne should have taken from coronavirus, or was the First Amendment right to the free exercise of religion paramount?

Before the Rev. Rodney Howard-Browne, the pastor of a Pentecostal megachurch in Florida, held two church services on Sunday — each filled with hundreds of parishioners — lawyers from the sheriff’s office and local government pleaded with him to reconsider putting his congregation in danger of contracting the coronavirus.

The pastor ignored them, proceeding with the services at the River at Tampa Bay Church and even providing bus transportation for members who needed a ride.

Church services were held, and Rev. Howard-Browne was arrested for his troubles. Continue reading →

Before he was thrown off the island, B.McLeod would participate in the ABA Journal’s Easter “Peeps” contest with the creation of a diorama plus a song. Since the ABA Journal went woke, and B.McLeod did not, he needed a new home for his handiwork. How could I say no?

I leave it to B.McLeod to explain the method behind his madness. Continue reading →

Richard Epstein taught at the University of Chicago for 38 years before retiring,* then promptly came out of retirement to take a chair at NYU Law, while being a Fellow at Stanford’s Hoover institute. He seems like a smart guy, and his name gets thrown around as being a legitimate voice in support of something whenever it suits the thrower.

So why is he a pariah today? He wrote that the coronavirus predictions were exaggerated, that the models were flawed and that it wasn’t going to be anywhere as severe as commonly thought.

The Hoover Institution’s Richard Epstein also waves a flag of caution regarding the COVID-19 dashboards that many news networks and online sites now prominently feature. Epstein’s analysis shows that COVID-19 deaths in the U.S. and worldwide will be dramatically fewer than many have predicted — possibly even fewer than the Hong Kong flu of 1968, the swine flu pandemic of 2009-2010 or seasonal influenza, which can claim hundreds of lives a day.

Continue reading →

Wills testamentary. Living wills and health care proxies. Durable powers of attorney. Testamentary trusts. You know all about this already, but what often eludes people is that their affairs are a mess. Since most of us have a little more time on our hands at the moment, and some of us harbor a dull concern about impending death, this would be a good time to prepare your “cheat sheet.”

Create a document for your kids, your heirs, whoever, that helps them to know what you have, where it is and how to get at it. Also, there are things today that won’t find their way into their hands, like your social media accounts. This is a non-exhaustive list to give you an idea what I’m talking about. Continue reading →

There likely is no one with a more apolitical resume than Dr. Anthony Fauci, who has quietly served a nation as its foremost expert in infectious diseases since 1984, the Reagan administration. Watching him during the daily press briefings, Dr. SJ and I were highly impressed with his savvy in stating medical fact without making Trump look like a simplistic blustering fool.

He’s been around politicians and political appointees for a very long time, and presumably survived by threading the needle between ignorance and ego. You don’t last in government, no matter what your role, by pissing off those in power. Continue reading →

When he was a Texas Supreme Court justice, Don Willett twitted. His twits are exceptionally witty, and he was adored for them by the many, even if too many were mere judicial sycophants. But what they were not was insightful, other than illuminating the fact that Judge Willett, now of the Fifth Circuit and his twitter account all but abandoned, was a very funny guy. But his judicial philosophy? His view of legal issues, lawyers, the law? His twits offered nothing.

So why was Judge Willett twitting? Maybe he just enjoyed making funnies. Or maybe he enjoyed the validation that came of it. Playing to an audience has become something of a national past time on social media, but as thrilling  as it may be to bask in the warm glow of 10,000 “likes,” it can turn into a prison. Continue reading →

When the Sixth Circuit ruled in Doe v. Baum, following up on its decision in Doe v. University of Cincinnati, the law appeared settled: The male students accused of sexual misconduct were entitled to cross-examination in Title IX sexual misconduct proceedings. Problem solved, right? So why then didn’t the University of Michigan’s president get the message?

In its desire to be a mecca of political correctness, the University of Michigan continues to prioritize the rights of some students over others.

And that does not fly in the courts, thanks to the U.S. Constitution, which demands free expression and due process for everyone.

UM’s resistance to ensuring its codes of conduct abide by that framework keep landing the university in court.

It got slapped once again by a federal judge this week.

Continue reading →

What you’re about to read is the written version of a weird dream I had a couple of nights ago while my wife held our TV hostage with a binge session of “Dharma & Greg.”—CLS

 [We open on the exterior of a big box grocery store. At the store’s entrance are Glen the Greeter and Travis from Atlas Security.]

[Glen is a white middle-aged man wearing the traditional store attire: a blue smock with his name emblazoned on the lapel, khaki pants and a white polo shirt. Travis wears a black and gray Atlas Security uniform that looks very similar to a cop’s, complete with badge and gun. He’s also wearing black sunglasses, surgical gloves and a face mask.] Continue reading →

If America had a pause button, we could push it. But it doesn’t and we can’t, so we’re constrained to figure out some other way to deal with exceptional circumstances. And whether the coronavirus pandemic constitutes circumstances so exceptional as a health crisis may be subject to some debate, what is undebatable is that the Senate passed a $2.2 trillion stimulus bill by 96-0 (which will almost certainly pass the House and be signed into law) and there were 3.3 million new applications for unemployment.

Remember when the gig economy was the newest, coolest thing ever? Remember when being an independent contractor gave people the freedom to pursue their dreams in whichever way they chose? These choices might present a problem now that unemployment is the new black. The stimulus package says they might be eligible for federal relief, but saying so and being so aren’t the same, a point many people just can’t wrap their heads around when reading headlines that make them feel better. Continue reading →