- After Gov. Martin O’Malley signs one of nation’s most restrictive gun laws, Beretta says it intends to move out of state [Guns.com]
- Unfortunately, high cigarette taxes promote this sort of thing: “Ocean City cigarette smuggling ring had ties to terror groups, police say” [Baltimore Sun, Tax Foundation]
- Responding to critics (such as), legislature caps the vessel excise tax in hopes of reviving ailing boating industry [Annapolis Gazette]
- New law backed by O’Malley will require educators to pay dues to teachers’ union whether members or not [Trey Kovacs, Open Market and Workplace Choice; Harford County Dagger]
- State has among nation’s highest per capita medical malpractice outlays, behind only five Northeastern states (NY, PA, NJ, MA, CT) and D.C. [Diederich analysis of annual payouts via TortsProf]
- Chronicle of Rogues: Maryland gets a D minus, ranking a dismal 40th among the 50 states, on corruption-rating State Integrity Report Card [Center for Public Integrity via Tom Coale]
- It’ll be held in D.C. this year rather than Annapolis, but that’s no reason you shouldn’t join us for the acclaimed Cato University [Jul. 28-Aug. 2]
- Politicos scramble to defend “correctional officers’ bill of rights” after FBI affidavit blasts measure for helping entrench corruption at Baltimore jail [AP, earlier]
Posts Tagged ‘police unions’
Law schools roundup
- “If a law school held a conference on intellectual diversity and the panels really were intellectually diverse …You can bet your last nickel it was sponsored by the Federalist Society.” [Bainbridge, Nick Rosenkranz and more, Harvard Gazette; my 2011 book Schools for Misrule]
- Washington Law Review takes one step to counter another problem addressed in Schools for Misrule, lawprofs’ conflicts of interest [Bainbridge]
- BC dean: law schools should adopt residency model from medical education [Vincent Rougeau, ABA Legal Rebels via Paul Caron/TaxProf]
- Missouri police union head, under fire for Facebook comments, is also constitutional law prof [Mike Riggs]
- Some say drive for slave reparations is defunct, but U.Va. conference confirms many legal academics still haven’t given up on it [Alfred Brophy via Bainbridge]
- “Academy’s Heavyweights Opine on Law Schools’ Problems” [WSJ via Legal Ethics Forum]
- “Board of Regents to Investigate $5.5 Million in Forgivable Loans to University of Texas Law Profs” [Caron]
More election notes
- Virginia voters overwhelmingly voted to curtail state’s eminent domain powers [Ilya Somin]
- “The most misunderstood Supreme Court decision of the last thirty years, Citizens United, made absolutely no difference in this election. Which is no surprise to anyone who read the case. Let’s hope we stop seeing attacks on free speech based on faulty premises.” [Ted Frank; Alison Frankel, Reuters; John Samples, Cato]
- “A Quick Round-Up on Education Policy and the 2012 Elections” [Andrew Coulson, Cato]
- By 58-42 margin, voters in liberal Montgomery County, Md. curtail county’s obligation to bargain with police union over policy changes with effects on working conditions [Gazette, earlier here, etc.]
- “Double down on social issues” advice wouldn’t have put Romney over the top, to put it mildly [Hans Bader] Medieval obstetrics expert Akin pulled less than 40 percent against Missouri’s unpopular McCaskill [Andrew Stuttaford, Secular Right]
- Entrenchment of union rights in state constitution wasn’t the only bad idea that Michigan voters rejected: they also turned thumbs down on unionization of home health aides and mandates for utility use of renewables [Conn Carroll]
- Louisiana voters strengthened protection for individual gun rights in their state constitution [Volokh]
Public employment roundup
- More intimidation of city councilors by Southern California police unions [Reason, earlier]
- Illinois Gov. Quinn calls for federal bailout of state pension plans [Ted Biondo, Rockford Register-Star, Ivan Osorio/CEI] Illinois Policy Institute launches campaign against idea [Frank Keegan, State Budget Solutions, IllinoisWatchdog.org]
- Former TSA Agent Says Stealing from Passengers’ Bags Is Common [Daniel Politi, Slate]
- “Chicago Teacher’s Strike Illustrates the Need for Choice” [Steve Chapman]
- California’s Potemkin public pension reform [Greenhut, City Journal] Report on political clout of California public service unions [Daniel DiSalvo, MI]
- College example shows how rules that lock in job security for some often leave others insecure [Virginia Postrel]
- Connecticut sweetheart labor deal: “Now, the governor doesn’t exactly report it that way in the press” [Zachary Janowski, City Journal]
“Why Firing a Bad Cop Is Damn Near Impossible”
A brief history of the “law enforcement bill of rights,” pushed for by police unions and adopted in many states beginning in Maryland in 1972, which entrenches problem cops who have not actually been found guilty of a felony [Mike Riggs, Reason]
Labor and employment law roundup
- Maryland: “Montgomery County Police ‘Effects’ Bargaining Bludgeons Public Safety” [Trey Kovacs, CEI, earlier] Time to revisit “effects” bargaining for other employee groups too [Gazette]
- “A New Whistleblower Retaliation Statute Grows Up: Dodd-Frank is the new Sarbanes-Oxley” [Daniel Schwartz]
- Proposal for disclosure of “persuaders” would threaten many employers [Michael Lotito/The Hill, earlier]
- Judge greenlights union suit challenging new Indiana right to work law [RedState]
- “Discovery of Immigration-Status Denied in FLSA Case” [Workplace Prof]
- “Same Song, Umpteenth Verse – No Discrimination, Retaliation Worth $2 Million” [Fox/Employer’s Lawyer; Ithaca, N.Y.]
- NLRB on collision course with Indian tribal sovereignty [Fred Wszolek, Indian Country Today]
How some police unions jerk around California towns
Steven Greenhut at Reason summarizes an extraordinary story from Costa Mesa, Calif. broken by Orange County Register reporting here, here, and here. Long and the short of it: if you get on the wrong side of certain police unions politically, be on your guard against trumped-up DUI charges and a range of “gangster cop” behavior.
Labor roundup
- I dreamed someone sabotaged the memory care unit by switching Rosa DeLauro’s name tag with Rosa Luxemburg’s [Fox; Raising Hale, Labor Union Report with more on alleged nursing home sabotage and the Connecticut pols that enable it]
- New York’s Scaffold Law will inflate cost of Tappan Zee Bridge rebuild by hundreds of millions, according to Bill Hammond [NYDN]
- “In Michigan, a ballot measure to enshrine union rights” [Reuters, WDIV]
- Massachusetts voters rejected unionizing child care providers, but legislature decided to do it anyway [Boston Herald]
- SEIU flexes muscle: “Surprise strike closes SF courtrooms” [SFGate, NBC Bay Area]
- If it goes to arbitration, forget about disciplining a Portland police officer [Oregonian via PoliceMisconduct.net] Boston police overtime scandal [Reason] Related, San Bernardino [San Diego Union-Tribune]
- Louisiana teacher union furor: “Now There’s A Legal Defense Fund For Schools The LAE Is Threatening To Sue” [Hayride, earlier]
- As unions terrorize a Philadelphia construction project, much of the city looks the other way [Inga Saffron, Philadelphia Inquirer, PhillyBully.com; via Barro]
Miami-area cop jailed three times, fired six
Accusations against the Opa-locka officer include
cracking the head of a handcuffed suspect, beating juveniles, hiding drugs in his police car, stealing from suspects, defying direct orders and lying and falsifying police reports. He once called in sick to take a vacation to Cancún and has engaged in a rash of unauthorized police chases, including one in which four people were killed.
Although he’s “joked about his record of misconduct,” the “Miami-Dade Police Benevolent Association has successfully fought Bosque’s dismissals.” [Miami Herald via Tim Lynch, Cato Police Misconduct Project] However, we know from Canadian Auto Workers economist Jim Stanford’s recent column in the Globe and Mail that in right-to-work states, which include Florida, unions are “effectively prohibited.” So it seems there’s no need to worry about a Florida police union’s having too much power.
Labor and employment roundup
- Failure to accommodate employee’s religious belief forbidding hair-cutting results in $27K payout by Taco Bell operator [EEOC, North Carolina]
- There’s a reason they call it Government Motors: nonunion GM assembly workers get shaft [Fountain]
- Mayor Bloomberg refreshingly sane on “living wage,” though not alas rent control [Heather Mac Donald, Secular Right]
- “The cost of labor isn’t the main problem, it’s the rigidities,” says French CEO [Bloomberg]
- Maryland governor signs bill softening “workplace fraud” law that bedevils firms that use independent contractors [H.B. 1364, earlier]
- Watch out for ghastly, mislabeled “Paycheck Fairness Act,” they’re trying to bring it back [Diana Furchtgott-Roth, Examiner, earlier]
- “The most infuriating part of this is that it takes five years of litigation to fire a badly behaved police officer” [Josh Barro, Masnick/TechDirt, on cop’s harassment of skateboarder; Baltimore Sun (police union calls officer’s firing “outrageous.”)]