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Taunya Banks at CoOp writes about recent proposals in Texas to create a $10,000 Baccalaureate degree.

But Texas Governor Rick Perry has thrown down the gauntlet by challenging that state’s public universities (and the nation) to come up with a baccalaureate degree that cost students only $10,000. . . .  What is not addressed by either the Coordinating Board or Commissioner Paredes is the long-term consequence of opting for a low-cost degree.  What happens when students with low-cost degrees apply to graduate and professional schools?  Will their degrees be considered competitive or will these graduates be consigned to jobs that nominally require a college degree?  Will they become second-class college graduates – educated cashiers at fast food restaurants?

I am pretty sure there are plenty of educated cashiers at fast food restaurants with first-class college degrees–who also have over $100,000 in student debt. I’m pretty sure there are even educated JDs working as cashiers with $200,000 in student debt. What these “stripped-down” degrees permit is someone to start (a starting job is just that, a starting job, not a final career) their lives and careers without a massive cloud of non-dischargeable debt. That could be a blessing for many.

I’m fairly certain these degrees would be accredited by whatever accreditation bodies exist. Now, some may argue that these accreditation organizations are rubbish. I probably agree. And I’m pretty sure that many “high-cost” colleges, which provide little if any education to students, also receive accreditation. The conclusion that cheaper degrees would automatically be of less quality does not necessarily follow.

Moving onto higher education, Banks concedes that tuition costs are probably too high, and that educators should take steps to lower the costs.

But hopefully few of us want any variation of the Texas two-tier model, for if Texas has its way “low-cost” JD and MD degrees may not be far behind.  I doubt that anyone wants to be treated by a physician with a low-cost medical degree, and I certainly would not want to be represented by a lawyer with a low-cost law degree.

I reject this reasoning. By “low-cost’ JD and MD, I think Banks really means “low-quality” JDs. No one has an objection to a cheap degree in the abstract. The objection is to a degree that is cheap, and is perceived, or in reality, provides less education.

Needless to say, there are many “low-quality” JDs in existence today. Except they are really, really, really expensive. Many unaccredited, and barely accredited law schools charge students over $30,000 a year, and give them almost no prospects of obtaining employment as an attorney. If a “low-quality” JD would also be “low-cost,” at least that may be a deal for someone who thinks he or she can beat the odds. Simply charging a lot of a degree does not make it worthwhile.

Further,  I think Banks conflates “low-quality” school with “low-quality” attorneys. Those need not be the same thing. Which would you prefer? A graduate from a top tier law school who ranked at the bottom of his class, and failed the bar 4 times before passing, or a graduate from a bottom tier law school (“low-cost”) who passed the bar on the first time, and graduated #1 in his or her class? Frankly, if someone from a “low-cost” law school passes the same bar with someone from a “high-cost” (read high-quality) law school, shouldn’t they be peers? Shouldn’t we look at them equally?

A low-cost JD, if such a program can actually prepare someone to take and pass the bar, would be a blessing to the legal profession. Attorneys would no longer graduate with massive debt. Perhaps they can venture into public service work or engage in more pro bono activity? What is the alternative? Graduating with a quarter million of debt, and finding that you are unable to pass the bar or get a job. Working as a cashier? Wouldn’t it be better to reach that end with less debt?

I am all in favor of lowering the barriers to entry to the legal profession. Lowering the price of a JD would be a wonderful way to accomplish this.

I couldn’t give a rats ass about the royal wedding. But, when the Westminster Abbey installs signal-jamming technology to block all wireless devices, I take note. As the official social media coordinator of the libertarian nerd nirvana wedding of the season, I take umbrage to this ludditism.

From Yahoo News:

The royal wedding will be a tweet-free zone on Friday morning after event organizers arranged for signal-blocking technology to be installed at Westminster Abbey.

It was feared that with 1,900 people inside the church, including royals, celebrities, and members of the general public, there would be a risk of guests using their phones to use Twitter to send information from the Abbey ahead of Prince William and Kate Middleton’s nuptials.

The move was suggested by senior members of the royal family and approved by police and security personnel over the last few days, and also met with the approval of television broadcasters keen to avoid any unfortunate sightings of guests on their phones — or even untimely ringtones disrupting the service.

A police official confirmed to Yahoo! on Wednesday that the blocking technology will be in place from early Friday morning and will remain switched on for the entirety of the ceremony.

The entire service will be streamed live on YouTube. There will be millions of “media” there broadcasting. Why limit Tweeters? Do you really think anyone important enough to receive an invite to the wedding will forget to put his or her phone on vibrate?

I wonder if satellite based communications (which operate on a totally different frequency from cellular transmissions) will work? I’m sure some enterprising Tweeters will figure this out. In fact, I will follow that Tweeter for his V-for-Vendetta-esque spirit. Call him @GuyFawkesTweets

H/T Gizmodo

 

Evan Brown at Internet Cases blogs about In re Does from the Texas Supreme Court:

The supreme court of Texas has issued an opinion that protects the anonymity of a couple of bloggers who were accused of defamation, copyright infringement and invasion of privacy by another blogger. The court ordered that a subpoena served on Google (who hosted the Blogger accounts in question) be quashed.

In short, the trial court did not make relevant findings with respect to Tex. R. Civ. P. 202 (governing pre-trial depositions), and as such abused its discretion.

However the Court did not rely on the FIrst Amendment, rather basing the opinion on the state procedural rule.

The intrusion into otherwise private matters authorized by Rule 202 outside a lawsuit is not to be taken lightly. One noted commentator, Professor Lonny Hoffman, has observed that there is “cause for concern about insufficient judicial attention to petitions to take presuit discovery” and that “judges should maintain an active oversight role to ensure that [such discovery is] not misused”. Access to Information, Access to Justice: The Rule of Presuit Investigatory Discovery, 40 U. MICH. J.L. REFORM217, 273–74 (2007). We agree.

Interesting development for anonymous bloggers everywhere.

Justice Sotomayor received a well earned (laughter) here. In Nevada Comm’n on Ethics v. Carrigan, she responded to an argument about a vague law, contending that all laws under Respondent’s strict standard would be unconstitutionally vague:

JUSTICESOTOMAYOR: How will we ever write — how will the Congress ever write a law that would be so clear that clients would never have to go to lawyers -46

(Laughter.)

JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR: — or that lawyers couldn’t disagree about? We would have to invalidate virtually every law as vague.

Well said.

Today during oral arguments in Nevada Comm’n on Ethics v. Carrigan Justice Scalia sought to rely on history to establish the proposition that Congress, since the beginning of the Republic, has imposed various recusal rules, consistent with the First Amendment. He even cites a rule from the First Congress:

JUSTICE SCALIA: Mr. Elwood, for me at least we’ve — we’ve jumped way ahead. I’m not so much concerned about the vagueness as I am about the proposition that ethical rules adopted by legislatures for voting are subject to review by this Court or by any court under the First Amendment. This is the first case I’m aware of that we’ve ever had which makes such an allegation or — I’m not even aware of any other case in 220 years in Federal courts. And it’s certainly not because legislative rules have not been vague. The first Congress adopted a rule that, quote, “No member shall vote on any question in the event of which he is immediately and particularly interested.” I don’t consider that very precise. And the rules adopted by Thomas Jefferson for the Senate, “Where the private interests of a member are concerned in a bill or question, he is to withdraw.” “The private interests,” what does that mean? “And where such an interest has appeared, his voice is disallowed, even after a division.”

Now, that’s been around in our Congress forever, but our Constitution provides that — that the rules of the legislature are to be determined by Congress and not by this Court, and I am sure we would not, we would not review those rules. Now, is there a contradiction between leaving those rules to Congress and the First Amendment? Do you really think that -that the two are set in opposition to each other?

The only problem with that question is that the First Congress met from March 4, 1789-March 3, 1791. The First Amendment was ratified on December 15, 1791. Under no set of circumstances would the First Congress, and the rule it passed, have been bound by an unratified amendment.

Now certainly members of the First Congress, James Madison among others, would have had a good idea what the First Amendment mean.t But it’s not technically accurate.

Justice Breyer made the same faux pas during oral arguments in Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization v. Winn. He made a remark about how the First Congress would have acted under the First Amendment:

JUSTICE BREYER: If you go back into history, it could have been the case that the — as long as they were fair to every religion, the first Congress could have funded prayers throughout the nation in churches for anyone to go and pray and that would not have violated the Establishment Clause, or if it had, nobody could have challenged it.