Who says 30 is scary?

Denise Howell hosts the thirtieth edition of Blawg Review at her Bag and Baggage blog. We celebrate "Howell-o-ween" in style with collected posts covering the entirety of the past week's blawgosphere, from the Harriet Miers misfire to trick-or-treating in an age of sex offender registration laws. Review the submission guidelines and recommend the best legal blogging you see this week; the deadline for next Monday's issue, to be hosted at IPTAblog, is this coming Saturday evening.

TGIS: Thank God It's Schadenfreude! (37)

This week's joy in the misfortune of others comes courtesy of the Associated Press (from Tuesday, October 25; link good at time of posting):

An attorney appealing his second drunken driving conviction was jailed Monday after he came to court intoxicated, officials said.

A Saline County Circuit Court judge ordered 59-year-old Jerry Stewart jailed for contempt of court.

He was ordered held without bail until Thursday, when he is scheduled in court for an unrelated case. It was not known whether Thursday's court appearance involved two pending drunken driving charges.

Stewart faces a total of six years in prison and could be disbarred if convicted of a fourth felony offense, prosecutor Robert Herzfeld said.

[Previous TGIS]

You know, for kids!

I'm sure it's just me being oversensitive, but couldn't the designers of the Buddy Bear Phone find somewhere -- anywhere -- else to place the USB jack?

Life Imitates BASEketball

Between hours nine and ten of last night's marathon World Series game, the obligatory crowd shots of B-List celebrities and Fox Network personalities featured "Journey" singer and VH1 "Where Are They Now" refugee Steve Perry. Of course, the wife and I were reminded of the feel-good family movie BASEketball:

Joe Cooper (Trey Parker): Steeeve Perry! Steve Perry! Steeeve Perry!

Doug Remer (Matt Stone): Dude, I thought we said no more "Journey" psyche-outs.

Truly, those who cannot remember BASEketball are condemned to repeat it; the moment I saw Steve Perry at the game last night, I knew one of those teams would lose. It took a bit longer than usual, but in the end I was proved correct.

29 and Holding (or should that be 29 and Investing?)

It's been said that there's no hosting like self-hosting. Actually, come to think about it, I don't think that's ever been said before. Nonetheless, the ever-mysterious Anonymous Blawg Review Editor pulls double duty this week, hosting both the twenty-ninth edition of Blawg Review and the 107th issue of Carnival of the Capitalists.

While this cross-over between capitalists (Supply-and-Demand) and lawyers (No supply? Demand!) may seem like a stretch to some, for the better part of two years over at Adam Smith, Esq., Bruce MacEwen has been brilliantly reporting on the common ground between practicing law and making vast amounts of cash.

Really, capitalism and the law are really just two aspects of human nature: Capitalism represents our collective desire to win and our natural instinct to celebrate winners, whereas the law represents our collective fear that we may not win and our jealous desire to destroy winners. Capitalism is our abiding optimism that man has the capacity to act rationally in furtherance of rational objectives, whereas the law is our relentless pessimism that people will behave irrationally much, if not most, of the time. The law provides a safe haven for those of us who write run-on sentences and use the word "whereas" ostentatiously, whereas capitalism produces people with the resources to buy and sell those of us who write run-on sentences and use the word "whereas" ostentatiously.

TGIS: Thank God It's Schadenfreude! (36)

This week's joy in the misfortune of others comes courtesy of the Associated Press (from Monday, October 17; link good at time of posting):

Buster the German Shepherd could have had a great career as a British police dog had it not been for one flaw: his complete lack of interest in fighting crime.

The canine cop took early retirement after bosses at South Yorkshire Police noted his poor motivation - and a fondness for making friends with rowdy drunkards, his former handler said Monday.

. . . .

On one occasion, Buster walked straight past a suspected criminal hiding in the garden of a house late at night and went off to cock his leg.

"I searched the garden myself and found the bloke. The dog had walked past the spot where I found him," Stephenson said. "You would have expected him to use his nose to locate him."

During a separate tracking operation, also in the early hours of the morning, Buster gave up while in mid-chase across a golf course . "He just downed tools," Stephenson said. "He just lay down and there was nothing we could do. He has got a very low drive for finding people."

When patroling Rotherham at pub closing times - when the streets are often crowded with drunken revelers - Buster wagged his tail when people came up to him and ate their fries, instead of deterring potential trouble makers, his former handler said.

[Previous TGIS]

28 Blawg Reviews Later

Blawg pioneer J. Craig Williams hosts the twenty-eighth edition of Blawg Review at May It Please The Court®. As Algonquin Round Table member Robert Benchley said, "There are two kinds of people in the world, those who believe there are two kinds of people in the world and those who don't." It seems that our host this week is of the former variety; he treats us to an adversarial, plaintiff v. defendant view of the blawgosphere.

Where were all these intelligent and articulate people before the rise of blogging? Some were probably heard from in other media and other forums, but most were operating below the radar or were too shy to speak up. An exchange between zombie-virus survivors Selena and Jim in the film 28 Days Later probably sums up why many of the folks in this week's issue started blogging in the first place:

SELENA: Why didn't you say anything before?

JIM: Well, because I didn't think you'd give a shit.

That blogging has enabled such a broad cross-section of the legal world -- both from practice and academia -- to make their voices heard is wonderful; that Blawg Review is able to reflect the depth of insight and talent throughout the legal blogging community on a weekly basis is nothing short of amazing. Review the submission guidelines and recommend the best legal blogging you see this week; the deadline for next Monday's issue is this coming Saturday evening.

TGIS: Thank God It's Schadenfreude! (35)

This week's joy in the misfortune of others comes courtesy of Reuters (from Wednesday, October 12; link good at time of posting):

A Chinese man who raised bears to tap them for their bile, prized as a traditional medicine in Asia, has been killed and eaten by his animals, Xinhua news agency said Tuesday.

Six black bears attacked keeper Han Shigen as he was cleaning their pen in the northeastern province of Jilin on Monday, Xinhua said.

. . . .

In practices decried by animal rights groups, bile is extracted through surgically implanted catheters in the bear's gall bladders, or by a "free-dripping" technique by which bile drips out through holes opened in the animals' abdomens.

. . . .

Bear farming was far more widespread before the cruelty involved came to light and Beijing introduced regulations to control the industry in 1993.

[Previous TGIS]

A Banner Day for Divorce

The Associated Press reports the story of a couple of divorce law trail blazers in the UK:

In Britain, JBS wanted a divorce, and he didn't care who knew. So last week he hung a banner from a highway bridge that said "Wendy, I want a divorce. JBS."

She responded yesterday with a new banner in the same place. It said, "No way. You are the cheat. Wendy."

The article goes on to paraphrase a local marriage counselor's view that "the pair are very angry to air feelings in such a public way". Blimey, Guv'nor, do you really think so? Those English are so repressed and inscrutable that I hadn't grasped that this is a couple with marital problems.

Overall, though, I like the idea. If all divorce pleadings were limited to what can be expressed on a freeway overpass banner, would we be any worse for it as a society? Perhaps we should require that all divorces be initiated in the same forum and with as much publicity as the associated marriage proposal. Divorce via sporting event scoreboard message, anyone? Personally, I think that if a couple marries in an ostentatious ceremony in front of hundreds, their divorce announcement should be just as notorious. Captain and Tennille told us that "Love Will Keep Us Together", but the specter of public shame would be at least as effective and, as a bonus if the divorce comes to pass anyhow, would be far more entertaining for the rest of us.

Bondage

The next James Bond has been revealed -- it's Harriet Miers! I'm just kidding, of course; it would be patently ridiculous to select someone without substantial relevant experience for such a high-profile role. The Daily Mail reports that Daniel Craig soon will be named as the next James Bond not to measure up to Sean Connery's:

Scores of others, including [Jude] Law . . . Ewan McGregor, Colin Farrell and Orlando Bloom, were considered but rejected.

In the end a shortlist of two emerged - Craig and newcomer Henry Cavill. The pair were auditioned again and tried on tuxedos to see how they would look in the quintessential Bond clothing.

. . . .

[Craig] will star in the 21st Bond film, based on Ian Fleming's first book Casino Royale.

I'm certainly no Bond purist -- I liked Pierce Brosnan's Bond as much as Connery's and On Her Majesty's Secret Service is my favorite amongst the Bond films -- but my initial impression of this new guy is not great: "Craig has said he does not like the fact that the films are more about gadgets than feelings." Super -- a Bond of Endearment for the new millenium.

What's been noted most prominently about Craig is that he will be the first blond to play James Bond; that may be, but Craig's Bond will not be the first lighter-haired British intelligence agent to achieve film immortality. In addition to working in the long shadow of Sean Connery, Daniel Craig (below left) will have his work cut out to eclipse the awesome legacy of Basil Exposition (Michael York, below right):

The Settlement Will Be Paid in Singles

Deadspin reports that:

Sports Illustrated announced this morning that it and former Alabama coach Mike Price have "amiably resolved" the lawsuit Price filed against the magazine for a story it ran in 2003.

If you don’t remember it, the story -- which ultimately cost Price his dream job at Alabama -- detailed Price's dalliances with two strippers in a Pensacola, Fla. hotel room.

. . . .

So SI's one paragraph statement today, trying to close the issue, serves two masters: SI hopes people don't pry too much more into their shoddy reporting, and Mike Price hopes people forget that, well, he had a threesome (or foursome) with a bunch of strippers. One hand washing the other . . . .

Blawg Review 27: We're Sell-Outs and We Love It!

Lisa Stone hosts the twenty-seventh edition of Blawg Review at her blog, Legal Blog Watch. This outstanding issue marks the first under the new partnership between Blawg Review and the Law.com network. While some might wonder at the timing of this announcement, coming as it does just two weeks after the Blawg Review protest issue, the Anonymous Blawg Review Editor explains that a brand-new Cadillac filled with cash and parked in his/her anonymous driveway says that this alliance is an excellent opportunity for us all.

I for one welcome our new Law.com overlords, but don't just take my word for it -- see for yourself what fun blawging for The Man can be! Review the submission guidelines and recommend the best legal blogging you see this week; the deadline for next Monday's issue (to be hosted by J. Craig Williams' May It Please the Court blog) is this coming Saturday evening.

Ours is Cindy Sheehan

Reuters reports this morning that "Britain's National Trust launched a campaign Thursday to find the country's ugliest vegetable." I'm sure that somehow this will offend British Muslims.

TGIS: Thank God It's Schadenfreude! (34)

This week's joy in the misfortune of others comes courtesy of the New York Times and the International Herald Tribune (from Thursday, October 6; link good at time of posting):

The worldwide glut of wine has become so huge that for the first time in history, France is distilling some of its higher-rated wines into fuel. It is a painful thing in a land where winemaking is a labor of love and the fruit of that labor is celebrated as much as any art.

France has periodically turned oceans of lowly table wines into vinegar and ethanol. But bottles of quality French wine have been piling up on supermarket shelves and in vineyard cellars across the country, to the point that some of it is now cheaper than bottled water.

By early this year, with some winemakers taking to the streets to protest low prices, France asked the European Union to approve the distillation of 150 million liters, or about 40 million gallons, of Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée wine. By the end of the year, 100 million liters, enough for 133 million bottles, will have been turned into crystal-clear ethanol.

The ethanol is sold to oil refineries, which use it as an additive that they mix into their gasoline, part of a European campaign to increase the use of renewable fuels. French gasoline already contains about 1 percent ethanol, mostly distilled from France's plentiful sugar beets. That percentage is supposed to rise to 5.75 percent by 2010 to meet European Union demands.

Because France exports gasoline and one of its biggest markets is the United States, by sometime next year, some Americans may be pumping their cars full of gas that includes a bit of Chardonnay or Pinot Noir.

[Previous TGIS]

Say Cheesey

The Engadget blog reports that, at its Canon Expo, " . . . Canon introduced a new technology called SmileShot that will only snap a picture when the focused subject is grinning." While smiles are Canon's first priority, I'd imagine that this technology could be adapted to sense any number of snapshot-degrading circumstances.

What about a setting that takes a picture only if the subject's eyes are open (but with an override button for recording those drunken college evenings when someone passes-out and is painted pastel colors and tea-bagged)? Perhaps "bad hair"-sensing technology? Maybe a "lapels too wide" setting? A "nose-picking" sensor would be a must for parents of small children and for school photographers.

The possibilities seem endless, but too much much of this image control technology could easily prove counterproductive. Take those school photographers I mentioned above -- if you set-up a group shot of my daughter's pre-kindergarten class with the "smiling", "eyes open", "hair combed", and "fingers out of noses" settings all enabled, those kids are going to be in junior high before the shutter opens.

It seems to me that, as we're unlikely to embrace our imperfections, perhaps we should just ditch photography alltogether and usher in a renaissance of portrait painting or heroic poem composition. For myself, though, an heroic poem isn't necessary -- a dirty limerick would suit me just fine.

Gee, what could possibly go wrong?

I'm all for scientific understanding, but this gives me the willies (from today's Wall Street Journal [subscription required]):

Two teams of scientists reported that they re-created the influenza virus that killed as many as 50 million people in 1918 and 1919.

. . . .

The findings by Dr. Taubenberger and his team of researchers, published in Nature, follow a nine-year effort to decode the 1918 strain by sequencing its eight genes. The research concluded that the pandemic flu outbreak was most likely caused by an avian virus. The scientists also discovered 10 mutations that distinguish the 1918 virus from avian bugs, suggesting changes that the virus made to adapt to a human host, they said. They also noted that some of those mutations are also present in the currently circulating H5N1 virus, suggesting it could make the jump to humans in a similarly rapid and alarming way.

In the second study, published in Science, scientists from the CDC and Mount Sinai took the decoded virus and re-created it, using a process known as reverse genetics. The virus they created, in a secure CDC lab, was "exceptionally virulent," quickly killing embryonated chicken eggs and mice, said Terence Tumpey, a senior scientist at the CDC who led the effort. The team also found that the 1918 bug had an unusual ability to penetrate cells that flu bugs don't usually reach deep in the lungs, providing some clues as to why its symptoms were so severe.

The article concludes that "[w]hile the research significantly advances scientists' understanding of the avian-flu threat, it also raises concerns about keeping the virus from escaping from the lab or into the hands of bioterrorists." Huh, you think? Congratulations to the entire team on its outstanding achievements; please understand if I don't want to shake your hands.

Who Says She's a Non-Starter?

From the September 2005 issue of ACC [Association of Corporate Counsel] Docket comes this "Corporate Grapevine" item:

Harriet Miers, counsel to the President, was the official starter of the 15th Annual Lawyers Have Heart 10K Run and 3K Fun Walk in June. The event, which benefited the American Heart Association, included more than 200 corporate counsel runners and walkers.

It seems that the path to the Supreme Court is not necessarily through the Ivy League, prestigious clerkships, and judicial positions; sometimes, it's a 3K Fun Walk through Washington, D.C.

First Blawg in October

Tom Mighell hosts the twenty-sixth edition of Blawg Review at his blog, Inter Alia. This week's Blawg Review takes on a Supreme Court theme in honor of the traditional start of the Supreme Court's term. It's timely for another reason as well, of course.

The blawgosphere is alive this morning with discussions of President Bush's Supreme Court nominee, Jill Clayburgh. Actually, it's not Jill Clayburgh, just someone with a judicial track record as lengthy as Clayburgh's. Notwithstanding, along with death and taxes, one other thing is certain -- there will be an abundance of outstanding analysis of the Miers nomination in next week's Blawg Review. Review the submission guidelines and recommend the best legal blogging you see this week; the deadline for next Monday's issue (to be hosted by Jay Williams at his Jaybeas Corpus blog the Legal Blog Watch blog) is this coming Saturday evening.

UPDATE: Thanks to the ever-vigilant (and ever-mysterious) Blawg Review Editor for correcting my mistake of the week concerning the site of next week's issue.