On Friday last, Joan and I watched the debut of “Trolls World Tour” with our three refugee grandchildren from China.[i] Ages five, eight and ten (going on 20). Their mom had gone out to celebrate her birthday, and their dad, a Canadian, was still stuck in Windsor unable to cross the tunnel into Detroit.

It is possible to watch “Trolls World Tour” without removing your eye balls with a spoon. I know because I did it. It is funny, the illustrations are wonderful, the music is great, and the theme is, well, terrifying in a good way. The hard rock queen, Queen Barb, tries to ban all music (including especially funk, country, techno, classical, and pop) except for hard rock. Oh, the horror. In the end, we learn that all genres of music are worthy of preservation. Continue reading →

When Asha Burwell fabricated the claim that she was beaten because of the color of her skin, two things followed. The first was the usual knee-jerk reaction from those who will believe whatever supports their tribe and worldview. The second was a prosecution in Albany County Supreme Court.

In 2016, defendant was charged in an 11-count indictment with assault in the third degree, harassment in the second degree and four counts of falsely reporting an incident in the
third degree for her involvement in an altercation and its aftereffects that occurred on a city bus bound for the State University of New York at Albany (hereinafter SUNY Albany) campus. The indictment alleged that defendant, knowing the information to be false, reported, via an emergency 911 call, that “she was ‘jumped’ on a bus by a group of males, that it was a racial crime, and that she was struck by boys and called a ‘nigger'” (count 4). Continue reading →

Stripped of its rhetoric, the decision of Western District of Kentucky judge Justin Walker, who received his commission on October 25, 2019,* in On Fire Christian Center v. Fischer is likely correct. Prohibiting drive-thru religious observations failed to satisfy strict scrutiny.

The ruling came as Republicans blasted Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear’s statewide plan to order people into quarantine if they attend mass gatherings, including religious ones.

On Fire Christian Church had sued Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer and the city after Fischer announced drive-in style religious gatherings were not allowed on Easter.

Continue reading →

Kansas Governor Laura Kelly issued an executive order limiting gatherings to less than ten people, a not unsurprising order given the circumstances. But tomorrow is Easter.

Kelly issued the order on Tuesday, which included exceptions for clergy and other individuals conducting services. The directive sparked an intense backlash from Republicans, who said it trampled on the constitutional right to freedom of religion.

On Wednesday, the Legislative Coordinating Council — made up of legislative leaders from both parties — voted along party lines to revoke the order. In her lawsuit, Kelly argued only the full Legislature has the ability to overturn her orders.

Continue reading →

Many lawyers, small business owners themselves, have watched in disgust as the rhetoric and roll-out of stimulus monies have somehow managed to avoid them. Trillions of dollars may well be going somewhere, but not to them and not to serve the purposes needed to keep small businesses alive when revenues disappear overnight.

The talk is about keeping employees paid, which to any decent business owner is important. We need our employees. Most of us care about them and are deeply concerned for their survival. And the plan is that when this is over and the doors are unlocked, the phones start ringing again, we want them back in their chairs doing their jobs.

But for that to happen, not only do employees have to survive. So do small businesses. So do small business owners. Apparently, no one in Washington or the media has the slightest grasp of how small businesses function. Continue reading →

[Camera up on a middle aged man in a suit and tie at the news desk]

ANCHOR: Good evening, I’m Chester Montgomery, and this is your PNN Evening News report.

Today members of the press got into a shouting match with the President and members of the COVID-19 Task Force over useless data and meaningless bunkum. The latest bout of name calling started when the President referred to Jim Acosta as a “mean-spirited no-good poopyhead.” No real information came from the briefing, and the same is expected for tomorrow. Continue reading →

It was maybe ten years ago, sitting in a Greek restaurant on the west side of town, eating lunch with Radley Balko, when we talked about how one keeps one’s sanity when one’s job is trying to survive a system that’s stacked against you.

“I make jokes about it.”

“Gallows humor,” Radley replied.

“Exactly. What else can you do? Crying about it won’t change it. You just keep fighting, and so I make jokes.”

You can’t do that anymore. You can’t make jokes about taboo subjects that aren’t funny, which may well be why too many young lawyers are filled with anger, are depressed, and struggle to cope with the life they chose. Continue reading →

Bernie Sanders is out, which doesn’t come as a surprise given that his campaign was doomed to fail except for Bernie’s refusal to accept the notion that he will never be more than a footnote in a socialist history book. Yet, in the minds of his followers, this miraculously gives him greater power than he ever had as a candidate, and they are now flexing their might to make the presumptive Dem candidate, Joe Biden, bend to their will. Will Biden be Bernie’s Bitch?

Bernie Sanders has ended his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, which is a tragedy, because he was right about virtually everything. He was right from the very beginning, when he advocated a total overhaul of the American health care system in the 1970s. He remains right now, as a pandemic stresses the meager resources of millions of citizens to their breaking point, and possibly to their death. He was right when he seemed to be the only alarmist in a political climate of complacency. He is right now that he’s the only politician  unsurprised to see drug companies profiteering from a lethal plague with Congress’s help. In politics, as in life, being right isn’t necessarily rewarded. But at least there’s some dignity in it.

If he was so right, why didn’t he beat Biden? Berniebros will argue that the campaign was rigged, that olds just didn’t get it, that Bernie was, well, Bernie. Continue reading →

The irony is overwhelming, starting with the fact that Joe Biden, despite his many other flaws, has played a lead role in perpetrating discrimination on the basis of sex that’s both obvious and express to everyone except Article III judges. As vice president, he traversed the nation to inform men that “it’s on us” to stop raping, to stop our buddies from raping, women, because men are perps and women are victims.

It was one thing to argue that rape ended at the non-consensual sniffing of hair from behind, but in this digital world, how does one ignore an accusation about Biden’s digits? Continue reading →

Can Rhode Island state troopers really, lawfully, constitutionally, pull over drivers for no better reason than their car has New York license plates? Whatever happened to due process? What about the Privileges and Immunities Clause, you cry? There are two answers to these and similar questions, the first being the one you want and the second being the real one.

Most jurisdictions give significant latitude to emergency orders by the executive to manage an emergency. Not a thing someone calls an emergency, like a vanity wall, but a legit emergency. Immediate survival ranks high on reasons to turn a blind eye toward civil rights.

If you’re wondering if New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio really means “draft” when he calls for drafting medical personnel from around the U.S. to care for COVID-10[?] patients in his hard-hit city, the answer is an unequivocal “yes.” He really does want to drag doctors and nurses from their jobs elsewhere to assigned positions in New York City.

Continue reading →