- Story of free-range Meitiv kids goes national, cont’d: “Bystanders are forced [sic] to step in and enforce discipline because the parents aren’t around.” [Slate via @bibliographing] Yes, the cited “National Association to Protect Children” is a real group, I looked it up [Washington Jewish Week] “Epidemic of moms getting arrested for leaving children in car 5 mins to run into store.” [Kim Brooks, Salon via @Lorettamalakie]
- What got buried in a WaPo column arguing that standardized tests for schoolkids are “a civil right.” [Ann Althouse] Testing issue allows teachers’ unions to make friends on the conservative side [NYT via same]
- Legal costs exceed $100 per student at some Chicago-area public schools; $23 billed for one lawyer’s phone message [Tribune via ABA Journal]
- Maintenance of Effort laws, meant to insulate school budgets against local voter control, might backfire [Free State Notes post by me, channeling my letter to the editor]
- A dissent on liberalizing school discipline policies [Paul Sperry, New York Post]
- Colorado school shootings: why is GOP leading push for emotion-driven, public-fisc-endangering lawsuits? [John Frank, Denver Post]
- Expensive new playground mandates [Paul Best and Lenore Skenazy, more from Skenazy, Tim Gill via Common Good]
Posts Tagged ‘Colorado’
Colorado yoga teacher training
“It’s fairly stunning that the chief regulator at the state’s Division of Private Occupational Schools is a part-time instructor for a chain of yoga studios at the time she is advocating for more regulation of yoga teacher-training studios that are essentially the chain’s competitors.” But with occupational licensure, conflict of interest comes with the territory, and this Colorado episode is no exception [Denver Post editorial]
January 29 roundup
- Bi-counsel-ar? “Lawyer Defending Congressman’s Wife in Bigamy Case Accuses Client of Having a Second Lawyer” [Slate]
- “Why tort liability for data breaches won’t improve cybersecurity” [Stewart Baker]
- Pennsylvania passes a new gun law, and suddenly liberal standing with attorney fee shifting stops being the progressive position [Harrisburg Patriot-News]
- “Letting a case die like a pet rat forgotten in the garage” [Ken at Popehat on Todd Kincannon challenge to South Carolina state bar discipline threats]
- Getting to it late: hour-long Cato podcast with Randy Barnett on his book Structure of Liberty including Aaron Ross Powell, Trevor Burrus;
- Once a fun party town, New Orleans now will ban vaping in private clubs and while waiting in line at drive-throughs [Christopher Fountain, Ronald Bailey on vaping bans and public health] More: Bailey on exaggeration of risks, Jacob Sullum on California proposal;
- Colorado legislature looks serious about tackling liability reform [Denver Business Journal]
New York Times on bake-my-cake cases
A more balanced treatment than some we’ve seen in the press, including a video interview with Colorado baker Jack Phillips. [New York Times; earlier on forcing small business owners to service weddings against their beliefs here and here].
“Shall guarantee to every State …a Republican Form of Government”
No, the Constitution’s Article 4, Section 4 “Republican form of government” clause doesn’t forbid the voters of Colorado from enacting a ballot measure (the “Taxpayer Bill of Rights,” or TABOR) that bars representatives from raising taxes without permission of a popular plebiscite [Ilya Shapiro and Julio Colomba, Cato, SCOTUSBlog, earlier]
“Colorado, Oregon Reject GMO Labeling”
Free speech roundup
- Consumer non-disparagement clauses lead weight-loss company down bumpy legal road [Adam Steinbaugh, Ken White/Popehat, and more]
- Police union defends St. Louis officer who called business in official capacity to say its employee was criticizing police on Twitter [Scott Greenfield; Elizabeth Nolan Brown]
- “The moral McCarthyism of the war on lads” [Brendan O’Neill, Spiked (U.K.), related]
- “Hey, liberals: Criminalizing hate speech will inevitably backfire” [Elizabeth Nolan Brown/The Week]
- Law professor: what it was like to be sued over what I wrote about someone’s case [Zachary Kramer, Prawfs, more]
- “EFF To NAACP: Trademark Isn’t For Censoring Your Critics” [Timothy Geigner, TechDirt]
- Judge Kane upholds right of Diana Hsieh’s Coalition for Secular Government to express opinion on ballot initiative without registering with state of Colorado [Ari Armstrong, The Objective Standard via Scott Greenfield]
Michael Bloomberg and Colorado gun voters
Oh, Mayor Bloomberg, you’ve gone and done it again.
P.S.: “The fact that they brushed us off really worked in our favor.” How well-roaded Pueblo, Colo. sent Bloomberg’s minions packing.
Of associational freedom, nary a crumb left
A discrimination-law panel in the state of Colorado has confirmed a ruling that Jack Phillips, a baker of wedding cakes, cannot turn away a gay couple’s request based on religious scruples, and further ruled, quoting the Denver Post, that he is “to submit quarterly reports for two years that show how he has worked to change discriminatory practices by altering company policies and training employees. Phillips also must disclose the names of any clients who are turned away.” [Scott Shackford; CBS Denver]
Politics roundup
- NY Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver hangs blame for a retrospectively unpopular position on the *other* Sheldon Silver. Credible? [NY Times via @jpodhoretz]
- Julian Castro, slated as next HUD chief, did well from fee-splitting arrangement with top Texas tort lawyer [Byron York; earlier on Mikal Watts]
- 10th Circuit: maybe Colorado allows too much plebiscitary democracy to qualify as a state with a “republican form of government” [Garrett Epps on a case one suspects will rest on a “this day and trip only” theory pertaining to tax limitations, as opposed to other referendum topics]
- “Mostyn, other trial lawyers spending big on Crist’s campaign in Florida” [Chamber-backed Legal NewsLine; background on Crist and Litigation Lobby] “Texas trial lawyers open checkbooks for Braley’s Senate run” [Legal NewsLine; on Braley’s IRS intervention, Watchdog]
- Contributions from plaintiff’s bar, especially Orange County’s Robinson Calcagnie, enable California AG Kamala Harris to crush rivals [Washington Examiner]
- Trial lawyers suing State Farm for $7 billion aim subpoena at member of Illinois Supreme Court [Madison-St. Clair Record, more, yet more]
- Plaintiff-friendly California voting rights bill could mulct municipalities [Steven Greenhut]
- John Edwards: he’s baaaaack… [on the law side; Byron York]
- Also, I’ve started a blog (representing just myself, no institutional affiliation) on Maryland local matters including policy and politics: Free State Notes.