In a New York Times op-ed, Isaac Butler raised a well-worn complaint.

The American theater is on the verge of collapse.

Granted, it’s the sort of thing someone involved in theater would say when things aren’t going well, and given the impact of the pandemic and the shuttering of America, it should come as no surprise that even the arts suffered. But Butler’s argument isn’t merely that the theater has taken a hit, but that its financial viability is crashing and burning. Continue reading →

While I’m generally against judges writing decisions that contain song lyrics or other cutesy gimmicks as being insufficiently serious about the very serious effect they have on people’s lives, I can’t help but feel Bronx Justice Jeffrey Zimmerman’s pain. I’ve felt it as well, and while I’ve tried to make the best of it from when bail reform was enacted in the dark of an Albany night by people who lacked the knowledge, experience and humility to get it right before making it law, it was never the solution to a very real problem.

Justice Zimmerman had enough.

“Maybe you’ll find direction
Around some corner where it’s been waiting to meet you”
–Phil Lesh and Robert Hunter, “Box of Rain” Continue reading →

When Steve Brill founded Court TV, the idea of law as entertainment was somewhat novel. Sure, there have been tons of law shows on the tube, from Perry Mason to LA Law to some weird show about a law firm with one bathroom and a dancing baby. But they were fiction. Court TV was going to bring the real thing to the people so they could see how the sausage of law was made. Toss in some explanatory commentary by “experts” and how could it miss?

Of course, Court TV is gone now. There were a couple problems with the concept. One was that trials are boring. For every 30 seconds of high drama, there were 30 hours of tedious groundwork laid. Another thing is that there really aren’t that many cases that the public cares about. O.J. doesn’t happen every day. And finally, it takes a lot of time to watch a trial. Unlike a drama, the trial doesn’t start and end in an hour and you don’t usually get to see a video of the actual crime right before the verdict is returned. Continue reading →

Not that anyone, absolutely anyone, was surprised by the complete lack of impulse control. Presumably, his attorneys cautioned him against any public outburst that would either admit guilt or, worse yet, give the government even further ammunition to seek sanctions in the interim, which was summarily ignored by the worst criminal defense client ever. But damn, who could have imagined that even Donald Trump would be stupid enough to post this.

Continue reading →

Welcome to August, dear readers! My mean-ass editor and I have a lot in store for you today.

Wait, what? SHG’s not here? He left me here to entertain everyone?

Well shit. No pressure. So what do you want to talk about today? How about murder? I’m pretty sure there’s nothing funnier than the slaughter of random civilians, right?

It’s just me? Well okay then, we’re going to talk about it anyway. Continue reading →

Among the litany of excuses and defenses for Trump’s actions, the most curious challenge is the claim that Trump actually believed that he won, reality notwithstanding. Making a nostalgic visit to Volokh Conspiracy, Orin Kerr confronts the question of how Special Counsel Jack Smith can prove that Trump was not the White House Idiot.

One of the questions raised by the indictment of former President Trump in the District of Columbia, on charges involving the 2020 election aftermath, is whether the prosecution, headed by Special Counsel Jack Smith, can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump knew he had lost the election.  The narrative of the prosecution is that Trump knew perfectly well what he was told over and over again by his own advisors and GOP officials: He had lost. He was trying to overturn that result, the argument goes, by using political influence on others in his party to get them to declare he won, despite knowing that he lost. Meanwhile, Trump defenders say that Trump legitimately thought he won.  On that view, Trump was told repeatedly that he lost, sure, but those assertions did not persuade him.  On that narrative, Trump was on a quixotic but legal journey to see his rights vindicated. Continue reading →

The indictment, the third as of now, has been revealed, and legal issues of intent and evidence aside, not to mention the fact that the evidence comes not out of thin air but the mouths and writings of Republicans, co-conspirators and witnesses on the White House payroll, should be sufficient for even his most ardent sycophants to take a step back and mutter, “he’s innocent until proven guilty, so let’s see what the trial brings.”

But that’s not how this works when it comes to the oddity of Donald Trump. So far, it appears that his defenders in the past remain his defenders in the present, and likely his defenders in perpetuity. The defense isn’t that he didn’t do it, really. There is no doubt some will believe this is all a lie and that the man whom their deity deigned to save our national soul would do no wrong. But most are more practical about it. Continue reading →

There have been a great many people talking about the success of Bidenomics and how great the economy is doing, and yet how few people seem to believe so. Most argue that the problem isn’t the economy, but the messaging, that people just don’t know the economy is doing swell and so they believe it’s not. Then again, the economy is one of those curious things that requires no messaging. People are either making money or not. Costs are either inflating or not. People are living well or not. If not, no amount of messaging is going to convince them they’re doing fabulous. Continue reading →

For the most part, arguments about policing are based on statistics of crime rising or waning, punctuated by stories of horrific police abuse or horrific crimes. But the view from 30 thousand feet often bears little relation to the view from street level. Statistics don’t change the sense of fear on the street that crime is pervasive, or the loathing on the streets of cops treating human beings like scum. While progressive and conservative views have largely moved in tribal circles, the Oakland NAACP has broken from the fold in an open letter with a plea. They want the cops to protect them. Continue reading →

If you were a bank, would you want to know whether an applicant for a loan has a history of defaulting on loans beforehand? It’s a rather important bit of information since repayment of the loan is kind of a big deal in making your lending decision. Similarly, if you’re a landlord, you want to know whether a person has been evicted in the past before signing a lease with a tenant, since tenants that fail to pay rent kind of defeats the purpose of being a landlord.

But what if it turns out that perfectly rational and reasonable decisions have a disparate racial impact? The ACLU argues that makes it racial discrimination and should be prohibited. Continue reading →