News & Media
Sex offender wins the lottery
I’ve argued that if you go to jail, you should get a bill for that stay, payable from any windfall profit you may get in the future, lottery winnings, or tort awards. Here’s proof that this is a good idea: According to the Corrections Department’s offender profile, [Fred] Topous pleaded guilty to breaking and entering charges in 1984 and 1988 and to assault with intent to commit sexual penetration in 1999. In the latter case, Topous was charged with having sex with a 13-year-old girl, USA Today reported. (source) And in your Beavis & Butthead moment of the day, from
Elder Porn in Japan
CNN reports on a booming niche in Japan — elder porn. Besides his glowing complexion, Shigeo Tokuda looks like any other 74-year-old man in Japan. Despite suffering a heart attack three years ago, the lifelong salaryman now feels healthier, and lives happily with his wife and a daughter in downtown Tokyo. He is, of course, more physically active than most retirees, but that’s because he’s kept his part-time job — as a porn star. While this might seem curious or even offensive when we consider traditional notions of what is “sexy,” the fact is that there is a huge market
The War on Porn
If you have Showtime, at 10:00 this evening, Dr. Marty Klein will be on Penn & Teller’s show. PENN & TELLER: BULLSHIT!: WAR ON PORN (TVMA – SLD) (2003) In episode 601, the sixth season premiere, the duo examines the “war on porn,” a crusade by various special interest groups to restrict free speech and regulate the Internet. Preview here.
Louis Schneider, you don't stand alone
Louis Schneider was an associate at a Las Vegas law firm when he discovered evidence that his boss, who was about to make him a partner, had misappropriated trust funds. Nevada, like most bars, has a “snitch rule” — meaning that if you find out about an ethical violation by another attorney, you are ethically obligated to report it. Schneider reluctantly turned in his boss, and blew his chances at partnership. Schneider told the newspaper some in the legal community have criticized him for filing the ethics complaint, but he relied on lessons he learned from his father, a retired
Celtic Pride – Sweet 17
Somewhere, Red Auerbach is lighting up a cigar. And right here, my inner middle schooler is still recovering from a sleepless night.
Klein on Kozinski
Dr. Klein writes: A judge owns a car and drives it legally. Should she be allowed to preside over a trial that will determine if a car was used illegally? A judge collects guns, even displays his collection on his website. Should he be allowed to preside over a trial that will decide if a gun was used illegally? A judge belongs to a religion which believes that masturbation is a sin, using pornography is a form of infidelity, and sexual purity is the battleground between God and Satan. Should he be allowed to preside over a trial that will
Arrested for Cheering
Seven people were arrested for cheering. Cheering what? An Al Quaeda attack? No. Cheering at the death of a puppy? No. Cheering as a mob of people rape a handicapped person? No. These scofflaws had the audacity to cheer as their loved ones received high school diplomas. When school officials in Rock Hill, South Carolina, tell graduation ceremony crowds to hold their applause until the end, they mean it — Police arrested seven people after they were accused of loud cheering during the ceremonies. Six people at Fort Mill High School’s graduation were charged Saturday and a seventh at the
Quote of the Day
Sex is as important as eating or drinking and we ought to allow the one appetite to be satisfied with as little restraint or false modesty as the other. –Marquis De Sade
Internet Solutions Corporation v. Marshall Update
I blogged about this case a few weeks ago here. The Plaintiff has appealed to the 11th Circuit, and my firm has taken Ms. Marshall’s case, pro bono, to defend the appeal.
Religion as "child abuse" (?)
From a post by Tatiana von Tauber: Seneca the Younger said “religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful”. The rest of her post is just as thought provoking as the quote.
I'm voting republican
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiQJ9Xp0xxU]
A Banana is proof of what?
When I think of things that you can do with a banana, proving the existence of a deity does not immediately come to mind. That’s exactly what this goofball does. If you want a great laugh, watch it once with the volume turned up, and then watch it again with the volume off. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4yBvvGi_2A] Ok, fine, you win. There is a god, and bananas are proof. I don’t think that I need to tell you where this banana winds up. Wow, as a matter of fact, it appears that zucchini, eggplants, cucumbers, and bowling pins all *also* prove the existence
Celtics take a 3-1 lead
And what a game it was! When I was a kid, I used to turn down the TV, and turn my AM radio on. The TV announcers were nothing compared to Johnny Most’s rusty steel gears. I still hear him when watching Celtics games — and I really heard him in this one.
Kozinski "scandal" is a non-story
I wanted to resist writing about the Kozinski porn “scandal”. I simply saw no reason to add fuel to the fire. Feminazis, big surprise, threw a hissy fit, saying: “He is not ethically competent to hear obscenity cases.” (source) Of course, a “real” professor, Lawrence Lessig, explains the facts simply enough that even a critical victim studies theorist can understand (but rest assured, they’ll still scream that the world is flat). Here are the facts as I’ve been able to tell: For at least a month, a disgruntled litigant, angry at Judge Kozinski (and the Ninth Circuit) has been talking
Virginia's "minor solicitation" law not unconstitutional
The MSNBC “to catch a predator” phenomenon has brought internet solicitation of minors into the spotlight. The Virginia Court of Appeals decided a case this week in which the petitioner claimed that Virginia’s anti-solicitation law was Constitutionally invalid. See Podracky v. Virginia., __ Va. App. _ (June 10, 2008). Relying in large part on the logic of United States v. Williams (“Offers to engage in illegal transactions are categorically excluded from First Amendment protection.”), the Virginia Court of Appeals held that the state could Constitutionally prohibit adults from engaging in speech that was intended to solicit a child into meeting
School paper disbanded due to content
From the Boston Globe SACRAMENTO, Calif.—A high school newspaper in California was disbanded after it published a front-page photo of a student burning an American flag, triggering criticism that the administration was stifling free expression. more stories like this Shasta High School Principal Milan Woollard said the school year’s final issue of the student-run Shasta High Volcano was embarrassing. “The paper’s done,” Woollard told the Record Searchlight newspaper of Redding. “There is not going to be a school newspaper next year.”
Should we put people in jail for this?
This from the AP via the Washington Post: It’s the most extreme material that’s ever been put on trial. I don’t know of anything more disgusting,” said Roger Jon Diamond – Isaacs’ own defense attorney. The case is the most visible effort of a new federal task force designed to crack down on smut in America. Isaacs, however, says his work is an extreme but constitutionally protected form of art. “There’s no question the stuff is disgusting,” said Diamond, who has spent much of his career representing pornographers. “The question is should we throw people in jail for it?” Personally,
No separation of church and state at the USPTO
An enterprising individual attempted to secure trademark registration for the term BONG HITS 4 JESUS. Naturally, the USPTO rejected the application on a few grounds. The first was that the term is “merely ornamental” — a position that I agree with. Here is where the USPTO gets really creepy – again! In the Morse case, the Supreme Court also said the phrase BONG HITS 4 JESUS has a “paucity of alternative meanings,” and said that the message was “no doubt offensive to some.” Morse v. Frederick 127 S. Ct. at 2624. While there is no prohibition against offensive trademarks, there
Then They Came For Me… A New Age of McCarthyism and The Witch-Hunt For "Obscenity"
“In Germany they first came for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me – and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me.” – Pastor Martin Niemoller, Dachau, 1944 In 2005, the U.S. Department of