Profess the law or GTFO!

Fcuk u! No u!!1 lolz

You'd think U of W's alleged law professor Ann Althouse has been on teh internets long enough to be aware of the kids' "or GTFO" jokes. But no.

At least Meade Althouse, who once comically retrieved an anarchist's neckerchief from a Capitol sculpture, gets "zOMG pix or it dint happen."

Little GT[F]O

The WJC's other other other investigation

Flashback: Althouse sniffs a turd

Ann Althouse: Recalls are all about MEEEEEEE!

"I am especially concerned about the appropriation of names of people (like me) who did not sign." — Ann Althouse, law professor

Then go apply for one of the temporary jobs with the GAB. The Board is only concerned about "concealed zealots," not openly ridiculous zealots.

Where was all this handwringing about verifying petition signatures when the Republicans were trying to recall Democratic Senators last summer?*

Nowhere to be found, obviously.

* Republican efforts failed on each and every account. Meanwhile Democrats successfully replaced two Republicans in the State Senate, yet it was the latter that was widely characterized as the failure. Seriously.

Alleged law professor Althouse skewered again

Along with our friend Prof. Rick into the bargain this time:

I had always assumed the strength of lawyers was their ability to marshal logic, facts and analysis.[*] Esenberg and Althouse were unable to marshal even one of the three.

By the way, this space addressed Esenberg's nonsense months ago.

* Not to mention professors of the law. It's horrifying.

"The only thing stupid here is Althouse's column."

Bruce Murphy is a little late to the party, but better late than never:

Bill Lueders had three off-the-record sources telling him that Justice Prosser "allegedly grabbed fellow justice by the neck," as the headline of his story noted. And as we now know from Justice Prosser, he had both hands on Justice Bradley’s neck.

Yes, well, try telling that to Mr. Althouse.

Then of course there was this guy too.

Sympathy for the stabber

Audio via the Isthmus.

If I had to listen to Meade Althouse, I'd get pretty stabby too.

Justice Ann Walsh Bradley, relative giantess

Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Ann Walsh Bradley, shown with two representative members of family Hominidae for physiometric purposes. Reportedly right-wing commentators, led by alleged law professor Ann Althouse and Milwaukee radio belligerent Charlie Sykes, are engaged in proposing an alternate theory to Justice Bradley's allegations against Justice David Prosser, that the latter is a frail, elderly man and the former an imposing, aggressive threatenor. Of course it's ridiculous, but what do you expect from them.

h/t Anonymous 8:46 A.M. (Welcome Firedoglake readers!).

Ann Althouse, like Justice Prosser, sniffs a turd

According to alleged professor of law Ann Althouse, Bill Lueders, who broke the story Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice David Prosser allegedly seized a colleague, Justice Ann Walsh Bradley, by the neck with both hands, Governor Scott Walker's momentous budget-singing ceremony "was overshadowed by the gigantic turd Lueders felt moved to drop at exactly that moment." Althouse seems hell-bent on discrediting Lueders's reporting, despite the fact Justice Bradley herself has since affirmed it.

Most rational actors would reverse course at that point.

Perhaps Althouse is too demure to outright call Justice Bradley a liar and instead has been busying herself with attempting to discredit Lueders's confirmed reporting and failing rather spectacularly at that project.*

The alleged law professor's scatological metaphor is especially entertaining when one recalls Prosser's election-time fauxtrage at coming upon a reader post at Supreme Court candidate JoAnne Kloppenburg's Facebook, which read, "Stop the turd, vote Kloppenburg."

"Now, am I the turd?," Justice Prosser had actually inquired.

Apparently so, albeit not Althouse's "gigantic turd," as Althouse also assures us Justice Bradley is "significantly larger" than Justice Prosser.

I've heard students at the University of Wisconsin Law School go out of their way to avoid enrolling in Althouse's classes. That's not surprising.

* WPRI's Christian Schneider lauds Althouse for doing "yeoman's work."

eta 01: Fortunately for the rest of us Ann Althouse is not in charge of the Dane County Sheriff's Office. Justice Bradley's allegations may constitute a felony charge. They need to be taken seriously, contra the alleged professor of law's wild and frivolously idiotic speculations.

eta 02: As they are taken by the Wisconsin Judicial Commission.

As mentioned here previously, the Supreme Court is charged with overseeing the ethical behavior and education of the State's attorneys, an authority that is becoming less and less possible to take seriously.

And I don't believe it was ever possible to take Ann Althouse seriously.

Ann Althouse's famous "NIG" pajamas

I believe these are pajamas that say "good night" all over them, but the letters "NIG" are set apart by a fold in the fabric.

— top Wisconsin blargher Ann Althouse

h/t Mutaman.

Top blogger Ann Althouse gets her source

Inexplicably popular blogger and alleged professor of law Ann Althouse "tweeted" yesterday that reports Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice David Prosser seized a colleague, Justice Ann Walsh Bradley, around the throat were "unsourced." However they were not unsourced but anonymously sourced, a crucial distinction that should have been immediately apparent to a self-styled media critic such as Althouse and furthermore one who is surely familiar with the traditional discretion of the justices' law clerks, who are often privy to the court's private conferences.

The alleged professor of law went on to warn "you people" on Twitter they may be subject to a defamation action, apparently either unaware or forgetful of the substantial burden imposed on public figures (e.g., Prosser) which requires proof a defendant acted in "actual malice."

And all of that addlepated nonsense packed into one "tweet."

Anyway, now Althouse has her source:

"The facts are that I was demanding that [Prosser] get out of my office and he put his hands around my neck in anger in a chokehold," Justice Ann Walsh Bradley told the Journal Sentinel.

Prosser denies everything.

Following which report Althouse adds, "From what I have heard, Bradley is significantly larger than Prosser." What, she's never even seen them?

It's strange that Althouse, who allegedly professes the law in Madison, Wisconsin, has not attended a hearing at the State Supreme Court, which also sits in Madison (just a brief sashay down State St. in fact).

Justices Prosser and Bradley sit side by each (second and third from the left,* respectively, where the latter appears no larger than the former).

And damn near everybody is "significantly larger" than Chief Justice Shirley Abrahamson,** who Prosser previously threatened to "destroy."

Althouse could measure their physical attributes as they ascend the bench, in order to confirm her own "unsourced" assertion that "Bradley is significantly larger than Prosser," whatever that's supposed to mean.

Did not David slay Goliath?

Moreover, Althouse might do well to revisit the law of self defense, if that is indeed among the topics she allegedly professes to law students.

You don't get to strangle somebody who merely raises their hands.

* Conservative hero Mike Gableman is on the far right, where he invents the Supreme Court's jurisdiction from whole cloth and forward slash.

** Not only have I seen the Chief Justice, but I have met her, more than once, and I'm not even an alleged University of Wisconsin law professor.

eta: Much, much more from Wis. Atty. Briane Pagel.

Scott Walker loses UW history professor to

Freakin Texas:

After 10 years of teaching at UW-Madison, history professor Jeremi Suri announced Friday that he will leave the university due to pay cuts faculty will face as a result of Gov. Scott Walker's proposed budget repair bill. "I love this place and am very sad about leaving, but it's been a really hard year here," Suri told The Capital Times. "I think with the political attacks on the university and the budget cutting, it's hard. And that's not the fault of the university, but it's the environment that we're operating in."

He's going to Texas, where the history books are written by David Barton. He's leaving Wisconsin. For Texas. Thanks to Scott Walker.

(Yet fear not, Althouse is staying.)

Althouse "festival of misogyny and homophobia"

Funny (and also deeply pathetic) stuff, via Brian Leiter.

c/w linkage to another hilarious Lawyers, Guns & Money thread.

Posts tagged Althouse.

Wisconsin BREAKING: Please give generously

How shall we go on?
Althouse troubled Kloppenburg "consuming [Althouse's] precious time"
Is greatest personal tragedy since Herb Kohl bored Patrick McIlheran

Glenn Grothman vs. the Atheistic Socialists

This character is a parody of a conservative . . . please? (.pdf)

And here's Wis. Sen. Glenn Grothman telling the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel that education "can have harmful psychological effects."

Sen. Grothman himself has a law degree [!] so maybe he's correct, although Grothman's attendance at the University of Wisconsin law school apparently predated the tenure of top blogger/law perfesser Ann Althouse, thus mitigating the harmful psychological effects.

For years Grothman has served the good people of Washington County, where his many admirers compare him favorably to Louie Gohmert, and his detractors disfavorably to a block of softwood.

RT'd by @edroso #notworthy

in re This afternoon's AFP Tea jamboree:

#wiunion Hope Prof. Althouse got some good footage of an anarchist placing a doily on a balustrade.

In case you haven't had the pleasure, @edroso is the Village Voice's Roy Edroso, proprietor of one of the best things on the internets.

#notworthy

UW law prof Althouse "remains birther-curious"

Via Lawyers, Gun$ and Money.

In related news, concerned parties sought a permanent restraining order against celebrated online personality Meade Althouse, enjoining him from trolling internets discussion boards. "He's clearly a hazard to himself and to others," said a source close to the investigation.

By the way, this here is one of the funniest threads of all times.

Law profs & wing-nuts gone noticeably wild

Further to this prior quick note ...

In an unwarrantedly abusive and ultimately embarrassing (for her) column, former legal counsel and chief of staff to the Assembly speaker and current chief of staff to the Waukesha County executive Ellen Nowak went off yesterday on both Dane County Circuit Court Judge Maryann Sumi and on the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel.

Do not be fooled: Ms. Nowak's screed is bogus to the core.

As currently featured on the Instaputz

Unsurprisingly, local wing-nuts Charlie Sykes* and Patrick McIlheran fell for it. More surprisingly, so did Marquette University professor of law Rick Esenberg (by whose blog post the inexplicably popular Ann Althouse was duped, thus returning us to unsurprising territory).

Since then Ms. Nowak's intemperate accusations — which would be at least low comedy if they weren't so gobsmackingly negligent — have gone wing-nut national, all the way into the Prof. Instaputz Pajamas.

Anyway, advises Ellen Nowak: "Let's focus on the heart of the defendants' (and the unions [sic]) dispute: whether the conference committee meeting was properly noticed." "It was," claims Nowak.

She goes on: "The rules governing procedure of the legislative houses are also set at the beginning of each session. Those rules include certain procedures when a special or extraordinary is called."

Now pay close attention, because these are Nowak's money quotes:

Here, the relevant rules are Senate Rule 93(3) [sic] and its counterpart, Assembly Rule 93(3). They state: "no notice of hearing before a committee shall be required other than posting on the legislative bulletin board."

Except that isn't what they state at all. Firstly, the two Rules are not identical, they're merely similar; and secondly, even if Nowak was offering a paraphrase — which she obviously isn't, as her faux rendering is enclosed in quotation marks — it's still wildly inaccurate.

State's top law enforcement officer should know

I suppose we can all forgive a former Assembly counsel for providing the incorrect citation to a Senate rule but no counsel can be so easily absolved of completely misquoting or presenting obsolete renderings of both of the Rules. That is appalling, truly. What they do read are as follows, respectively, according to their most recent adoptions:**

Senate Rule 93(2):
A notice of a committee meeting is not required other than posting on the legislative bulletin board, and a bulletin of committee hearings may not be published.

And:

Assembly Rule 93(3):
A notice of hearings before committees is not required other than posting on the legislative bulletin boards, and a schedule of committee activities need not be published.

That also happens to be the version of Senate Rule 93(2) that Wisconsin's attorney general cites and quotes in his petition for leave to appeal, filed with the court of appeals yesterday (see the AG's Footnote 11: the AG, it must be "noticed," represents both the current Senate Majority Leader and the current Assembly Leader, the Bros. Fitzgerald, so presumably they're all up on the current Rules).

Thus is Novak's hyperbolic tirade not only itself obsolete, but arguably ... I'm not going to say it, out of professional courtesy, exactly the sort of courtesy not extended to Judge Sumi by Ms. Nowak (Judge Sumi "ignored the law" and "assault[ed] ... the judiciary and the legislature," asserts Counselor Nowak, leading the wing-nut parade).

In short, the alleged inconsistency is entirely manufactured

Of course "notice" has more than one meaning. Even lawyers know this; that's why their dictionaries contain multiple definitions for the same term. In one sense, "notice" has a temporal element, as in, "I'm giving you (fair) notice," where the notice precedes some event.

And in another sense, it doesn't: a notice is a printed message, a bulletin. And the latter is what's meant by the legislative Rules indented above. Therefore does the claim fail that Wis. Stat. §19.87(2),*** which resolves conflicts between legislative Rules and other Wisconsin statutes, is in play, because there is no conflict.

That is, the Open Meetings Law command contained in Wis. Stat. §19.84(3)**** that "in no case may the notice be provided less than 2 [two] hours in advance of the meeting" is perfectly consistent with the legislative Rules, which direct where the — physical, not temporal — notice must be affixed: "on the legislative bulletin board(s)."

Notice (pun intended) that in both Rules, it's "A notice." Not just "notice" or, as Ms. Nowak puts it, "no notice," whose remarkably irresponsible inaccuracy purports to imbue the Rule with the temporal element required by Nowak's (alleged) argument, a temporal element that simply is not there. It's a shameful performance all around.

And, as noted earlier in this here space, the assistant attorney general representing the Brothers Fitzgerald et al conceded in court not only that the defendants Fitzgerald cannot demonstrate the two-hour requirement was met, but admitted the likelihood that requirement was not met, specifically by as much as three minutes.

That does not bode well for the FitzWalkerAG's case. And neither does this. Hence the spreading desperation, is what I suspect.
________________

* "See Ellen Nowak's excellent piece at SykesWrites. It addresses the kind of fallacious logic advanced by Free Lunch." — George Mitchell.

Hilarious and sad. Free Lunch is a frequent visitor and commenter at this blog and is hardly known to employ any kind of "fallacious logic."

** A fact confirmed this morning by the Legislative Reference Bureau. That's how much I couldn't believe my own eyes, to the extent I actually had to pick up the phone and call somebody for directions.

*** "No provision of this subchapter [subchapter V] which conflicts with a rule of the senate or assembly or joint rule of the legislature shall apply to a meeting conducted in compliance with such rule."

**** "Public notice of every meeting of a governmental body shall be given at least 24 hours prior to the commencement of such meeting unless for good cause such notice is impossible or impractical, in which case shorter notice may be given, but in no case may the notice be provided less than 2 hours in advance of the meeting."

Appendix:

Judge Sumi: We're not talking about the legislature enforcing its own rules, we're talking about the legislature obeying a law that gives people public access to government.

AAG Lazar: Correct.

Judge Sumi: It's not an internal rule, it's a vastly external expectation — [a] right — that people have under the Open Meetings Law.

AAG Lazar: Absolutely correct. [Momentary discussion of §19.87(2) and the Senate and Assembly Rules 93] [W]hen they're in special session, all that is required is a notice on the bulletin board and that is what was done and they are able to drop it down to that two-hour from 24-hour and we would contend in this case that that was met ...

Emphases added.

Both the judge and the AAG are in accord, together with Rules 93: "A written or printed announcement." — Black's Law Dictionary, 7th ed.

Ann Althouse's legal research 101

Ruh roh: Inexplicably popular Wisconsin blogger/reported professor of law Ann Althouse is in horrified semi-dudgeon over a remark made by State Supreme Court candidate JoAnne Kloppenburg:

At a forum at the Waukesha County Courthouse [Thursday]:

"Justice Prosser has sent a clear message that he will favor the agenda of Gov. (Scott) Walker and the Republican Legislature," Kloppenburg said. "I will apply the law to the facts of the cases before me and decide them without prejudice."

What is her basis for attributing a "clear message" like that to Prosser? If she doesn't have a solid basis for that statement — and I can't see what it is — how is that supposed to jibe with her self-image as a dutiful applicant of law to fact?

Ever the keen observer, Prof. Althouse* proceeds to link to a column by the Isthmus's Bill Lueders which clearly describes Kloppenburg's "basis" and further provides Kloppenburg's own statement:

In a press release on 12/8/2010, the Prosser Campaign promised that returning the incumbent to the bench would "[protect] the conservative judicial majority" on the Court which would then be able to "act as a common sense compliment [sic] to both the new administration and legislature."

Twice, right there in Althouse's own link, yet: "I can't see what it is."

It's old news anyway.

Pro Tip: Read own links before engaging the fauxtrage.

* That comments thread is hilarious.

Blaska if you love that corporation so much

Then why don't you marry it?

Madison, Wisconsin's lonely wing-nut* David Blaska is weeping o'er the plight of courageous Justice Samuel Alito. Puffs Blaska:

The President crossed the line of propriety in his [SOTU] address last year. And violated the separation of powers.

Such a violation occurs when one branch of government unlawfully usurps the power of another. Only the Good Lord knows how Obama's remarks fit that bill in the columnist's roiling right-wing amygdala.

Blaska is defending Citizens United v. FEC, in which a majority of the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed that corporations are persons, that speech is money, and that the former may "speak" the latter without limit, exactly as the First Amendment has always plainly instructed.

Anyway here's Obama:

Last week, the Supreme Court reversed a century of law to open the floodgates for special interests — including foreign corporations — to spend without limit in our elections. I don't think American elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests, or worse, by foreign entities.

And here's Justice Stevens:

If taken seriously, [the majority's] assumption that the identity of a speaker has no relevance to the Government's ability to regulate political speech would lead to some remarkable conclusions. ... More pertinently, it would appear to afford the same protection to multinational corporations controlled by foreigners as to individual Americans: To do otherwise, after all, could "enhance the relative voice" of some (i.e., humans) over others (i.e., nonhumans).

Follow the logic, is what Stevens is saying. It's the majority's own logic, the Court's own logic where corporations = persons and money = speech. That's where it leads, because the other laws only forbid participation by foreign individuals, not corporations.

And obviously the dissent contains any number of references to reversing a century of law, which Obama was also repeating.

Blaska's is the perfect example of right-wing obsession with Obama gone far beyond either rational or healthy, where simply paraphrasing an opinion of the Court becomes a separation-of-powers violation.

More concerning is Blaska's derangement-of-senses violation.

* Ann Althouse is mainly just an enabler of wing-nuts.

Liberals in denial: The Orin Kerr Affair

"[I]t is intercourse." — Chief Justice John Marshall

Yesterday liberals went bananas, pursuant to a post by Prof. Orin Kerr at the Volokh Conspiracy, in which Kerr accused U.S. District Judge Henry E. Hudson, the author of Monday's PPACA opinion, of making a "significant error." Brian Beutler at TPM therefore called Hudson an "amateur," and MSNBC's Keith Olbermann made Hudson his "worst person in the world." Many others bowed to Kerr's apparent authority, including the inexplicably popular Madison blogger Ann Althouse.

None of them bothered to check Kerr's work before pounding out their screeds. But what should have been immediately obvious to anyone who had read the opinion — including Kerr — was that the passage Kerr was criticizing was not part of the judge's "ruling" but rather that portion of the opinion that was reiterating the arguments of the two parties, in this instance a claim made by VA's AG Ken Cuccinelli.

The following comment appears below this excellent rebuttal to Kerr:

Hudson got it right and Kerr got it wrong, and embarrassingly so for a law professor. The [necessary and proper] clause does not establish [its own] substantive legislative authority. The substantive constitutional hook must come from a separate constitutional authority, in this case the interstate commerce clause. This much Kerr seems to get right.

Kerr’s analysis seems to imply that the N&P clause can render constitutional a specific statutory section that is otherwise unconstitutional because the section is part of a larger legislative scheme. This is incorrect.

In this case, the challenge is specifically that the individual mandate provision of Obamacare is unconstitutional. The S.Ct.'s analysis in Gonzales, Lopez, and Morrison* demonstrates that the specific statutory provision(s) being challenged are subject to scrutiny by the Court. The mere fact that a specific statutory section is part of a larger legislative framework is not sufficient to support the constitutionality of that specific provision.

In layman's terms, the mere fact that Congress possesses the power to regulate the broad field of health care under the commerce clause is not sufficient to rebut a challenge to the specific statutory section that requires individuals to obtain insurance. Congress must establish that it has authority to legislate the specific provision.

The absence of economic activity cannot be regulated by Congress under the [interstate commerce clause], regardless of whether the absence of economic activity is part of a larger legislative scheme. It is unconstitutional for Congress to impose an individual mandate to purchase insurance or otherwise engage in economic activity. Unconstitutional acts of Congress cannot be rendered constitutional by virtue of the N&P clause.

Hudson's opinion could perhaps have been more explicit on this point, but it is hardly necessary.

Comment by Aged Attorney — 12/14/2010 @ 5:38 pm

Good stuff.

* Gonzales v. Raich (at issue: growing medical marijuana) stands for an expansive view of Congress's interstate commerce power, while U.S. v. Lopez (gun-free school zones) and U.S. v. Morrison (1994's Violence Against Women Act) both stand for a more restrictive application. These three Supreme Court cases (and a handful of others) provide much of the doctrinal grist for both supporters and opponents of the PPACA's individual insurance mandate.

All three cases, however, are addressed to deliberate activities.

eta: Think Progress issues a thoroughly ad hominem objection.

We're aware Henry Hudson is a Republican. As is John E. Jones III.