Hockey in Fenway Park

Interesting.

If there is one thing that I learned growing up in New England, it is that you can never count on the weather. Well, that and you can never count on anything going right at Fenway.

Extreme Makeover – Nazi Edition

He's never gonna get a good job with that ink (image provided by Tampabay.com)

Flori-duh, the place where due process goes to die, is paying for John Allen Ditullio’s makeup artist so that the jury doesn’t think ill of the boy.

On March 23, 2006, Pasco authorities say, he put on a gas mask and broke into a neighbor’s home, where he stabbed a woman in the face and neck, then attacked a teenager. Patricia Wells was slashed in the face and hands but recovered from her injuries. Kristofer King, who was 17, died. (source)

It is alleged that Mr. Ditullio was motivated by his rage at Ms. Wells for having a black boyfriend and a gay son. Not a good combination when you also live in a Flori-duh trailer park next door to a trailer full of nazi skinheads, I guess.

Now, Mr. Ditullio is on trial for murder, and the state is paying $150 per day for a professional makeup artist to cover up his tattoos. There was some concern that the jury might look at him funny, what with the big swastika on his neck and all.

I’m all for a defendant’s right to a fair trial. But, it would seem to me that unless the state put the tattoos on his neck, then he ought to cover them up himself or live with the consequences.

Turnabout is fair play

The recording industry may be getting a taste of its own medicine. This is a Canadian case, but interesting nonetheless. H/T Evren Seven.

American legal education – scientifically proven to be worthless, law professors jam heads up asses in response

I have written previously on the Worthlessness of American Legal Education. That ruffled a few feathers among legal academics who didn’t like being called a “circle jerk.” In response to that critique, legal academics decided to disband the circle jerk and actually focus on practical training of lawyers in both business, law, and ethics.

HAAAA…. had you going, didn’t I?

No, the legal academy didn’t give a shit about my piece (well, I did get some crybaby emails from do nothing blowhards, but nobody did anything but bitch).

And now… Bob Ambrogi brings us a report that shows:

Sixty-five percent of law students (and 90 percent of lawyers) say law school does not teach them the practical business skills they need to practice law in today’s economy. More than a third say they do not feel adequately prepared by law school to succeed in the marketplace. Given the changes in the market, a fifth of all law students now say they regret going to law school in the first place. (source)

Wow! Lexis Nexis did an actual scientific study that produced data to back up my assertion that American legal education is a ball of shit! And in response, NOW the legal academy is ready to change…

BAAAAA…. Got you again.

No, instead they are ruminating on whether law professors should have PhD degrees… you know, to make legal education even more useless. I’m not saying that PhDs are useless. The best law professor I ever had didn’t even have a JD, he only had a PhD. But, he was something special.

Greenfield had this to say:

For practicing lawyers who think that lawyers fresh out of school lack the skills needed to practice law now, the future may be far more dim. A lawprof with a PhD is likely to be far more entrenched in the theoretical than the practical, and far more likely to have had no experience in the actual practice of lawyering. If you think lawprofs today fall short of the qualifications to teach students to be lawyers, imagine what a future of teachers without any practical experience at all will mean. Oh, the weather outside is frightful.

One shining hope seems like a possibility however. As law schools continue to compete for students, perhaps this will present an opening for those schools that aren’t likely to be the top draw for the brainiest PhDs to counterprogram themselves as the practical law schools, “the law school where you actually learn how to be a lawyer.” We can dream, can’t we? (source)

Yes, Scott, we can dream. But, for as long as the legal academy is run by people who wash out of practice after 16 months, the ABA keeps accrediting every head injury clinic that calls itself a law school, and the government keeps backing loans so that the morons who attend them can sit at the roulette wheel, the market isn’t likely to correct the mess any time soon.

Healthcare reform legislation to include government subsidies for voodoo, zombie repellent, and werewolf patrols

You can rest assured that neither Senator Hatch nor Senator Kerry will ever submit a claim like this.

Okay, not really… but this is just as preposterous.

The “Christian Science” church teaches that we should forget about all that silly medicine stuff. Asking our imaginary buddy, Jesus, to heal us is all the medicine we need. There was a time when Christian Science paraded its children off to the graveyard, rather than admit that dancing around a fire, chanting “ugga bugga” was not the most effective means of treating diabetes or a blocked intestine. (source).

Christian Scientists seem to have, at least when their children are involved, accepted that they maybe ought to give medicine a chance. But, now the witch doctors want strands of garlic, wooden stakes, and holy water to be covered by health insurance.

Leaders of the Church of Christ, Scientist, are pushing a proposal that would help patients pay someone like Lewis for prayer by having insurers reimburse the $20 to $40 cost.

The provision was stripped from the bill the House passed this month, and church leaders are trying to get it inserted into the Senate version. And the church has powerful allies there, including Sens. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), who represents the state where the church is based, and Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), who said the provision would “ensure that health-care reform law does not discriminate against any religion.” (source)

Orrin Hatch, who never found a superstition he didn’t like, and John Kerry, who still has yet to be treated for his “lack of a sack” syndrome, want to raise all of our healthcare costs by allowing witch doctors to submit claims for eye of newt. Of course, this is not without some existing legal support. The IRS already allows you to deduct “prayer treatments” as “medical expenses,” and military insurance pays for it as well.

USPTO Jumps in Line to Provide “Green” Initiatives, Ignores Climate Gate

by Jason Fischer

“Awe!  Come ON!  I made a movie about it.  That proves it’s true.”

Director Kappos, of the United States Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO), writes on his blog this week about how the Office intends to fast-track the examination of patent applications that deal with so-called “green” technologies.  Great headline for a month ago, when the popularized position was that anthropogenic climate change (formerly known as “global warming”) was a *proven* phenomenon.  However, recent developments have put those findings in serious doubt.

In case you haven’t been keeping up, as Director Kappos clearly hasn’t, emails were leaked last month from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit – a world-renowned climate change research center – which reveal a “trick” being employed by researchers to massage temperature statistics (source).  Seems that a decline in temperature didn’t fit into the doomsday scenario that’s being thrown about to justify new grant money, new cap-and-trade legislation, and new taxes.  The emails openly discuss the deletion of historic source data and ways to discredit scientific journals that have published skeptic papers, as a couple of examples (source).

Moving back to the IP tie-in, the USPTO is continuing to drink the climate change kool aid by proposing that so-called “green” patent applications should be given priority treatment in examination.  Kappos’s announcement of the policy was timed to coincide with the start of the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark.  In that announcement, the Director explains the impetus for such an initiative:

As I have often said, the USPTO is committed to dramatically reducing the backlog and average patent pendency time across the board.  As we work toward this goal, we are going to pilot a program that will give priority to applications that combat climate change and foster job creation in the green tech sector.  The Green Tech patent pilot program will decrease the time it takes to obtain patent protection for green tech innovations by an average of 12 months.  (source)

One has to wonder what other types of applications will be “de-prioritized,” in order to let climate-change-fighting inventors skip the line.  It seems clear that this initiative would do absolutely nothing to improve the average pendency time across all patent applications.  It is truly odd that, at the Patent Office, where a science degree is required to prosecute or examine applications, they’re not letting a silly thing like the absence of a scientific foundation stop them from disparaging the majority of the inventing community.  It certainly isn’t stopping the charlatan proponents of climate change theory from generating a city-sized carbon belch to gather and talk about how to reduce carbon emissions.

Once again, the Director concludes his blog post, claiming that he welcomes comments and feedback, but somehow my comments thereto on this subject failed to clear moderation.

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This article was originally posted on GaneshaFish.com

N.C. Constitution Bars Atheists from Public Office – group of redneck morons thinks that the ban is valid.

Cecil Bothwell is a city councillor in Asheville, North Carolina. That in itself is not remarkable, but Bothwell ran as an openly-atheist candidate.. Well, ol “Ain’t no gawd Cecil” dun tickery won the dag gum election. It seems that now, his opponents are seeking to have him stopped from taking office, because he doesn’t believe in an imaginary magic space zombie jew. (source)

Article 6, section 8 of the North Carolina Constitution says: “The following persons shall be disqualified for office: First, any person who shall deny the being of Almighty God.” And it isn’t the only state that has such a requirement. (source).

Of course, those who seek to keep Bothwell from taking his seat seem to have forgotten that North Carolina was on the losing side of the War of Northern Aggression. Therefore, its Constitution, when it conflicts with the Constitution of the United States, doesn’t mean diddly. Article VI of the U.S. Constitution says: “no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States,” and in Torcaso v. Watkins, 367 U.S. 488 (1961), the United States Supreme Court unanimously held that the First Amendment bars all such requirements for office.

We repeat and again reaffirm that neither a State nor the Federal Government can constitutionally force a person “to profess a belief or disbelief in any religion.” Neither can constitutionally pass laws or impose requirements which aid all religions as against non-believers, and neither can aid those religions based on a belief in the existence of God as against those religions founded on different beliefs.

I’d really love to see this one come to a head.

H/T: Friendly Atheist

Bitter Lawyer Profiles Randazza

Bitter Lawyer has been one of my favorite legal humor sites for some time. Thus, imagine my joy when they emailed me asking to do a profile on me. Well, it came out today. Here it is. Enjoy.

Flawda

Nuff said?

And next, on stereotype theater...

H/T: Jeremy

Congratulations to Gloucester High – Fishermen are Super Bowl Champs Again!

Last night, the Gloucester Fishermen defeated Bridgewater-Raynham 33-13 in the Massachusetts Division 1A Super Bowl at Gilette Stadium.

This victory caps a perfect season, and GHS’ second title in three years.

See Gloucester Times coverage.

Man “finishes” World of Warcraft

What’s with the “hugging”?

‘Little Gray” beat the game after killing 390,895 creatures, administering 7,255,538,878 points of damage, completing 5,906 quests (averaging 14 quests a day), raiding 405 dungeons and hugging 11 players. I believe we can safely add another statistic to the numbers — he has had sex 0 times during this period. (source)

The Bread Hunter

Totally off topic… but totally awesome. The Bread Hunter.

The author’s book is here. I want it. When I lived in Sicily, my friends had an outdoor stone oven. Talk about bread from heaven.

Indianapolis … at it again

Brought to you by the City of Indianapolis

Yes, the city that brought you MacKinnon’s anti-pornography ordinance (struck down by American Booksellers Ass’n. v. Hudnut, 771 F.2d 323 (7th Cir. 1985)) now brings us a public school internet content filtering policy, which includes this little gem.

Alternative Spirituality/Belief: Sites that promote and provide information on religions such as Wicca, Witchcraft or Satanism. Occult practices, atheistic views, voodoo rituals or any other form are mysticism are represented here. Includes sites that endorse or offer methods, means of instruction, or other resources to affect or influence real events through the use of spells, incantations, curses and magic powers. This category includes sites which discuss or deal with paranormal or unexplained events. (source) (link courtesy Freedom From Religion Foundation)

The way I read that, it would seem that it should ban all Christian themed websites. However, I’m pretty sure that the Indianapolis School District only meant to ban access to websites about “bad religions.”

H/T: FFRF

Don’t let truth get in the way of your superstition-politics

“It is the ultimate Grinch to suggest there is no God during a holiday where millions of people around the world celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ,” said Mathew D. Staver, founder and chairman of the Liberty Counsel, a conservative religious law firm, and dean of Liberty University School of Law in Lynchburg, Va. “It is insensitive and mean.” (source)

This coming from the same fucking scumbag who has fought tooth and nail against both gay marriage and gay adoption – preferring to see kids ripped from the homes of gay foster parents. Of course, if I was married to a bitch that looked like an Amish man, I’d be a bit screwed up too.

ABA Blawg 100 Voting Update

I was perusing the ABA 100 voting, and I see that the front runners are pulling away from the pack. But, there are a couple of blawgs that are still in the running that I personally think deserve a blast of support.

New York Personal Injury Law Blog is written by Eric Turkewitz, one of the Lions in the Blawgers Den, and should have a hell of a lot more support. Click here and please toss a vote to New York Personal Injury Law Blog. Don’t confuse it with that other New York Personal Injury blog.

Then cast your attention to Simple Justice. My only critique of Greenfield is that he cranks out so damn much content, that I have to take breaks from his blog. Click here and toss a vote to Simple Justice.

If you’ve got a vote left over (you can vote for ten), and you haven’t tossed us one yet, click here and vote for the Legal Satyricon. We’re doing well, but the voting goes on til December 31, and the second place guy in our category is not too far behind us.