The D.C. Circuit reversed Judge Lamberth’s preliminary injunction, which effectively barred taxpayer-funded stem cell research. The majority opinion by Judge Ginsburg found that the challengers are not likely to succeed on the merits, and denied the preliminary injunction. Judge Henderson disagreed in dissent with very strong language:

The majority opinion has taken a straightforward case of statutory construction and produced a result that would make Rube Goldberg tip his hat. Breaking the simple noun “research”into “temporal” bits, Maj. Op. at 5, 6, 16, narrowing the verbphrase “are destroyed” to an unintended scope, id. at 11,dismissing the definition section of implementing regulationspromulgated by the Department of Health and Human Services(HHS) (in case the plain meaning of “research” were not plainenough), id. at 11 n.*, my colleagues perform linguistic jujitsu. I must therefore respectfully dissent.

I’ve used the phrase “judicial jujitsu.” Linguistic jujitsu works well also.

H/T How Appealing