Two North Carolina paralegals, Morag Black Polaski and Shawana Almendarez, have sued to challenge the prohibition against the unauthorized practice of law. It’s not that they want to play lawyer, but to engage in a business helping people fill out legal forms for a lesser expense than a lawyer would charge. They are claiming that the law violates their First Amendment rights.

The plaintiffs filed a complaint in federal court in North Carolina that said the state courts give unrepresented litigants online forms for summary ejectments, absolute divorces, and protective orders — forms that are “not complicated,” but that “can still be confusing.” They said that many residents cannot afford to hire a lawyer to guide them through filling out the forms, and that many who fall into the “missing middle” level of income are too poor to hire a lawyer but not poor enough to qualify for free legal help.

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The New York Times published an excellent editorial about the upcoming election and Donald Trump. It’s not nearly harsh enough for those who despise him and too harsh for those who don’t, and it provides a surprisingly fair appraisal of who and what he is. If you don’t believe the times, believe his former Chief of Staff, John Kelly: Trump is the “most flawed person I’ve ever met.”

But for anyone reading this post, you already know this and have made up your mind about Trump, whether to be against him or wrong. Hey, it’s my blawg and I get to write that. But that’s not the point here. Rather, the point arises from many of the comments to the Times’ editorial which note its pointlessness. The people who need to read the editorial don’t. It’s just words bouncing off the wall of an echo chamber while old people write about what young people should do. Continue reading →

To no one’s surprise, the Supreme Court has granted expedited cert to review the Colorado Supreme Court’s decision to disqualify Trump from the state primary ballot.

The petition for a writ of certiorari is granted. The case is set for oral argument on Thursday, February 8, 2024. Petitioner’s brief on the merits, and any amicus curiae briefs in support or in support of neither party, are to be filed on or before Thursday, January 18, 2024. Respondents’ briefs on the merits, and any amicus curiae briefs in support, are to be filed on or before Wednesday, January 31, 2024. The reply brief, if any, is to be filed on or before 5 p.m., Monday, February 5, 2024.

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Happy New Year, everyone! I thought it would be fun this week to share a couple of ideas I’ve been playing with for a while to amuse yourself at the expense of your friends and family. I make no claim of these ideas being mine—it’s just stuff I’ve been kicking around lately. As I’m not Claudine Gay, I’ll citie at least the people from whom I remember getting some of these ideas.

First, from Harry Anderson: Get a deck of cards. Tell your sucker the two of you are going to play poker with ten cards, but since it’s going to be a really easy game for them to win, you get to pick the cards the two of you will play with. Continue reading →

A few things can be true. Former Harvard president Claudine Gay was not the most qualified candidate for the job, but her race, gender and devotion to DEI trumped the quality and quantity of her scholarship. The targeting of Gay and the scrutiny of her scholarship following her poor and flagrantly hypocritical response under questioning by Rep. Elise Stefanik were a result of her devotion to DEI, which implicates, to a significant extent, her race and gender. It’s not necessarily false to say she didn’t deserve the post and was a serious serial plagiarist, but it’s also not necessarily false to say that she was targeted for her DEI positions.

When she refused to resign like Penn President Liz Magill, she essentially told her detractors, “make me.” They did. Continue reading →

You elect someone to office, and they come with staff. In the past, the staff understood their job to be to serve the person elected. After all, nobody voted for them to be anything. More recently, staff presumed their views to be sufficiently important that they were compelled to express them. Aren’t their opinions worthy of respect, as they were told? But when the elected person, candidate for office or both, decides that he’s going with his views instead of theirs, what is staff to do?

In a letter first shared with West Wing Playbook, 17 current Biden campaign staffers called directly on the president to push for a permanent ceasefire in the monthslong conflict. Continue reading →

Julianna v. United States, better known as the Kids Climate case, at first appeared to be one of those goofy cases that stood no chance of surviving. Began in 2015, the case was about a bunch of young people suing the federal government for violating their right to life by failing to prevent climate change. It wasn’t that they had no issue worthy of extreme concern, or even that they didn’t have a point, but what they never had is standing.

The Juliana litigation began in 2015, when a group of youth plaintiffs filed suit alleging, among other things, that the federal government’s failure to control greenhouse gases violates their substantive due process rights to life, liberty, and property, including a right to a “stable climate system,” violates their right to equal protection, and failed to uphold its “public trust” obligation to hold certain natural resources in trust for the people and for future generations.

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While calling it “artificial intelligence” is somewhat new, the use of algorithms in law enforcement has been going on for a while now, and nobody knows whether the cost/benefit analysis makes it worthwhile.

The Office of Management and Budget guidance, which is now being finalized after a period of public comment, would apply to law enforcement technologies such as facial recognition, license-plate readers, predictive policing tools, gunshot detection, social media monitoring and more. It sets out criteria for A.I. technologies that, without safeguards, could put people’s safety or well-being at risk or violate their rights. If these proposed “minimum practices” are not met, technologies that fall short would be prohibited after next Aug. 1.

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The past few years have been spent believing. Whether it’s believing in the tooth fairy or the reinvented version of reality that allows you to be a welcome member of your tribe, all you needed do was believe. You were entitled to your own truth if only you believed. You could be the good person and still hate as long as you believed. Problems existed or ceased to exist as long as you believed.

How’s that working out? Continue reading →

I looked back at my final post of 2022, Sins of Omission, corrected the typos out of compulsion, and pondered where we gone over the past year. It was a good post, and even today, it felt true. But much as the toxic American political climate hasn’t really changed much over the past year, and offers little promise of change in 2024, the Hamas terrorist attack of October 7th and its ensuing war in Gaza has bubbled up the fundamental differences between a liberal democratic nation and the swell of simplistic authoritarianism of the young.

Others in my position have adopted the woke view of the world, some because they needed the validation that comes from espousing the popular views of progressives, and others because they were never quite as serious as I thought. Or hoped. But how many more marches by  the young and unduly passionate who justify terrorism and suddenly find rape and murder acceptable when done by those their tribe tells them to favor? Continue reading →