The treatment following her win against Serena Williams in 2018 was cruel. Naomi Osaka says that her anxiety and depression began with that cruel treatment, and it’s not hard to understand why she would have felt that way.

“I never wanted to be a distraction and I accept that my timing was not ideal and my message could have been clearer,” she added. “The truth is that I have suffered long bouts of depression since the US Open in 2018 and I have had a really hard time coping with that.” She did not indicate when she would return to tournament play.

After winning her first match in the French Open, Osaka failed to appear for the post-match press conference. She was fined $15,000 and then all hell broke loose. She withdrew from the grand slam tournament. Continue reading →

While Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is roundly ridiculed by knowledgeable lawyers for his effort to dictate content to private internet enterprises, a New York state senator from Carle Place is trying her hand at re-imagining the First Amendment, including defining “hate speech.”

§ 394-CCC. SOCIAL MEDIA NETWORKS; HATE SPEECH PROHIBITED.

1. AS USED IN THIS SECTION, THE FOLLOWING TERMS SHALL HAVE THE FOLLOWING MEANINGS: (A) “HATE SPEECH” MEANS A PUBLIC EXPRESSION, EITHER VERBALLY, IN WRITING OR THROUGH IMAGES, WHICH INTENTIONALLY MAKES A STATEMENT ABOUT A GROUP OF PERSONS BECAUSE OF RACE, ETHNICITY, NATIONALITY, RELIGION OR BELIEFS, SEXUAL ORIENTATION, GENDER IDENTITY OR PHYSICAL, MENTAL OR INTELLECTUAL DISABILITY.

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There was outrage in some quarters about Vice President Kamala Harris’ twit last Saturday.

Enjoy the long weekend. pic.twitter.com/ilGOrod4AW

— Vice President Kamala Harris (@VP) May 29, 2021

How dare she? No, not gratuitously twit a pic of herself, because who doesn’t want to see another pic of Kamala as twitted by Kamala? No, because this isn’t just a long weekend, but Memorial Day weekend. It was a dumb grievance, and that’s coming from someone who has never had a good thing to say about Harris. There is nothing about wishing people enjoy the long weekend that precludes remembering our fallen servicemen and women, and it was an entirely normal thing to say, even if the pic was gratuitous. After all, it wasn’t yet Memorial Day and she’s still Kamala. Continue reading →

Mark Bennett gave himself 48 hours to mope, which was 24 more than I would have given him, but he had good reason. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals reversed the ruling of the 12th District Court of Appeals, holding the state’s “revenge porn” law unconstitutional. It’s hard enough to get a court to hold a statute unconstitutional. It’s brutal to see that reversed.

But the hardest part is to have it reversed by a court that ignores the rule in favor of the want.

Whether the State or the defense is right depends on whether the United States Supreme Court really meant it when it said, in 2010’s Stevens, Continue reading →

With the Supreme Court’s grant of cert in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, speculation has run rampant that the Court is about to reverse or significantly undermine its decisions in Roe and Casey. Whether this will happen, and should it happen will place the Court in the very institutional jeopardy that Chief Justice Roberts has gone to enormous lengths to avoid, remains to be seen.

I’m disinclined to join in the speculation, not because it isn’t possible (perhaps even likely) that the Court will do damage to the right to an abortion, but because there is nothing to be done to change it if it’s in the offing, and because there will eventually be a decision that will put the speculation to rest. I will wait and see. Why waste good outrage before you have to? Continue reading →

Here’s the scheme. Open up a business with some sort of quasi-official name, like United States Private Vaults, and install a big, very secure looking vault just like one would find in an old bank. Line the walls with numbered boxes with keys you can hand out to customers with the promise that they could put their valuable belongings into the box and never have to worry that they’ll be stolen should a burglar break into their house. Hand them a key and tell them no one else will have that key and the ability to open that box.

Then wait until the boxes are filled and then…go through the boxes and take what you want. It’s not like they can prove what was in the boxes. It’s not like they can prove what isn’t there after you’ve taken what you want. Brilliant, right? Except I can’t take credit for the scheme, because the government beat me to it. Continue reading →

If you’re reading this post, you probably love words. If you’re reading this and involved in the legal profession in any fashion, you probably love swear words. Lawyers, particularly criminal defense and family lawyers, use swear words more often than they would likely admit.

That’s why the book “Nine Nasty Words: English in The Gutter, Then, Now and Forever” by John McWhorter is such an interesting read. If we’re going to use these words, it would do us well to learn something about them. And who better to teach us than a guy like McWhorter, a linguist and English professor at Columbia University. Continue reading →

At the Wall Street Journal, Peggy Noonan opens her fairly nuanced op-ed with a curious point.

All this happened after America watched the cellphone video of the extinguishing of the life of George Floyd one year ago, by an officer, Derek Chauvin, who posed through much of the tape with his hand on his thigh, the picture of brute nonchalance.

An incident so horrifying can and will stop America in its tracks, causing nationwide convulsion—protests, riots, burning of businesses. Continue reading →

Before the video was revealed, the story was simple and benign. Ronald Greene died in a car crash following his flight from police. Nothing to see here. Then there was video.

To be clear, fleeing from police is neither a good nor acceptable thing to do, even if some would argue that it’s understandable given the perception that the police will treat a black motorist disrespectfully at best or violently at worst. Nobody wants to be pulled over and killed, and regardless of the unlikelihood of that outcome, that is the prevailing perception in the current climate. Continue reading →

Christopher Rufo, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute, has become quite a lightning rod since he’s undertaken to fight what he contends is the neo-racism of critical race theory. Some see him as a racial bomb thrower, while others see him as doing the “dirty work” of saying what few would say given the backlash. That’s not to say that he’s not a serious person presenting serious thought. Indeed, he appeared with Mark Lamont Hill as well as Tucker Carlson.

“What do you like about being White?” I asked this question to anti- Critical Race Theory advocate Christopher Rufo. He stated that Whiteness was always only painted as negative, so I asked him to offer something different. Peep his response: pic.twitter.com/H5IkAyv2Co

— Marc Lamont Hill (@marclamonthill) May 26, 2021

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