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I’ve joked that the Supreme Court needs to get a Twitter Account. If so, today would be the ultimate time to tweet:

@SCOTUS Srsly @SReinhardt, not again, get it right! Epic Fail!

According to Orin Kerr at Volokh, Judge Reinhardt has actually been reversed 3 times on the same case:

As I understand the history, Judge Reinhardt first authored an opinion overturning Belmontes’ death sentence in Belmontes v. Woodford, 350 F.3d 861 (9th Cir. 2003).  The Supreme Court granted, vacated, and remanded in light of Brown v. Payton, 544 U.S. 133 (2005).   To be fair, that one wasn’t really a direct reversal of Reinhardt: He wasn’t on the Ninth Circuit decision reversed in Brown, so the first reversal was only to account for the Supreme Court’s clarification of the law in Brown.  On remand, Judge Reinhardt wrote a second opinion overturning Belmontes’ death sentence in Belmontes v. Brown, 414 F.3d 1094 (9th Cir. 2005).  The Supreme Court took that case and reversed in  Ayers v. Belmontes, 549 U.S. 7 (2006).   Judge Reinhardt then wrote a third opinion overturning Belmontes’ death sentence in Belmontes v. Ayers, 529 .23d 834 (9th Cir. 2008), which the Supreme Court reversed 9–0 in a per curiam decision today in Wong v. Belmontes.

Epic Fail!

From Economix, H/T BlackBoogLegal.

The paper tries to measure the return on investment in a law school education, using three prototypical students (the “Also Ran,” the “Solid Performer” and the “Hot Prospect”). . . . The results are somewhat disheartening, especially considering the surging interest in law school during this tough job market.

Of course, there is also the matter of nonmonetary returns from higher education. Neither the new research paper on law school R.O.I. nor most of the other related studies try to quantify the psychic rewards of additional social prestige, expanding one’s mind, being better equipped to make the world a better place, and so on, that come from earning a J.D. But presumably most people enroll in professional school primarily for less warm and fuzzy reasons.

TaxProfBlog has a full breakdown.

It’s never too early to start looking for Festivus gifts. Underneath Their Robes has a fantastic suggestion:

Given today’s economy and the current reluctance of many to spend their hard-earned/non-existent bonuses on luxury goods, Clerquette suggests this stocking-stuffer for the sports fan-Groupie on your list: a membership in FantasySCOTUS.net, the newly minted Supreme Court Fantasy League. Recent law-school grad and self-described “big Supreme Court nerd” Josh Blackman created the site so that Groupies like you — like us, dear readers — can “play like the Tenth Justice.”  The Rules, Blackman explains, are “simple.”

In true appellate fashion, memberships fees are three-tiered; they range from free (for students and the unemployed) to $10. If you’re a betting man, woman, or Groupie, Clerquette says: Christmas has come early this year! Indulge! If you’re searching for a gift that will keep on giving — at least from October to late June/early July — look no further! FantasySCOTUS.net will keep your favorite groupie busy, away from productive activity, and unable to engage in telephone conversations while formulating bets for months to come. Hey: at least there’s no draft.

From the Onion:

Spurred by an administration he believes to be guilty of numerous transgressions, self-described American patriot Kyle Mortensen, 47, is a vehement defender of ideas he seems to think are enshrined in the U.S. Constitution and principles that brave men have fought and died for solely in his head.

“Our very way of life is under siege,” said Mortensen, whose understanding of the Constitution derives not from a close reading of the document but from talk-show pundits, books by television personalities, and the limitless expanse of his own colorful imagination. “It’s time for true Americans to stand up and protect the values that make us who we are.”

Unfortunately, too many Federalist Society members get lumped in with Pretenders like this satirical guy. Radio hosts and T.V. Personalities know little about the Constitution, and only invoke it when it enables Conservative policies. Yet, they ignore it whenever the Constitution places limits on Conservative agendas. The ObamaCare is only Constitutional if the War on Drugs is Constitutional. Conservatives reject the former, but like the latter. Consistency?

Accordingly, ahem, Mark Levin was definitely not the right speaker for the Federalist Society Convention, Ahem.

But, the Onion pokes fun at the Left as well:

“Dad’s great, but listening to all that talk radio has put some weird ideas into his head,” said daughter Samantha, a freshman at Reed College in Portland, OR. “He believes the Constitution allows the government to torture people and ban gay marriage, yet he doesn’t even know that it guarantees universal health care.”

Though, I suppose a key difference, is that many progressive Constitutional scholars do in fact view the Constitution as guaranteeing Universal Health Care. See my work on the Constitution in 2020.

Professor Krishnakumar has an interesting post at Concurring Opinions analyzing the use of the Rule of Lenity on the Roberts Court:

In their Legislation casebook, William Eskridge, Philip Frickey, and Elizabeth Garrett observe that between 1984 and 2006, the Supreme Court cited the rule of lenity in just over one-fourth of its cases interpreting criminal statutes and agreed with the government’s interpretation in over 60% of those cases. I thought it would be interesting to see how those figures compare to the still-nascent Roberts Court’s cases interpreting criminal statutes.

Between February 2006 (when Justice Alito joined the Court) and the end of June 2009 (Justice Souter’s last day on the Court), the Roberts Court decided twenty-five cases that involved at least some interpretation of a criminal statute. In fourteen of those twenty-five cases (56%), the Court interpreted the statute in a manner that favored the defendant. In only six of the cases did the Court reference the Rule of Lenity—four times in dissent, one time in both the plurality opinion and the concurring opinion providing the fifth vote, and one time in a concurring opinion alone.

Interestingly, Scalia and Stevens were the Justices most likely to reference the rule of lenity, while Justices Alito and Kennedy have not joined a single case invoking the rule. Krishnakumar concludes that the Roberts Court use of the rule of lenity mirrors the usage during the Rehnquist Court.