Posts tagged as:

Massachusetts

Robert Ambrogi at LawSites checks out one recent entry.

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February 15 roundup

by Walter Olson on February 15, 2010

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February 12 roundup

by Walter Olson on February 12, 2010

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February 3 roundup

by Walter Olson on February 3, 2010

Better uses for the $2,000

by Walter Olson on January 31, 2010

On Martha’s Vineyard, the town of Chilmark, Mass. would rather not spend $2,000 per election cycle on federally mandated technology to help its one visually impaired voter. In the past the town has offered voters with poor or no eyesight a range of less costly choices including large print ballots and their choice of a person to read the ballot to them. [Megan Dooley, Vineyard Gazette via Ira Stoll, Future of Capitalism]

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Massachusetts’s highest court thought it a bit much that fees and costs would eat up $800,000 from an estate valued at $1.2 million, or two-thirds of the value at stake. [Robert Ambrogi, Legal Blog Watch; Above the Law]

Incidentally, Robert Ambrogi is hanging up his keyboard after an impressive four-year tenure at Law.com’s Legal Blog Watch, but he’ll continue to maintain his other sites. He has kind words for this site as one to “follow religiously”, too.

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January 20 roundup

by Walter Olson on January 20, 2010

  • Renewed attention to Amirault case contributed to Coakley’s political nosedive [e.g., Jacob Weisberg of Slate via Kaus, earlier] First time a Massachusetts prosecutor has paid a political price over that episode?
  • Many, many Democratic elected officials call for rethinking/renegotiating Obamacare rather than trying to force it through [e.g. Barney Frank] Blue Mass blogger: talk radio fueled ire at Coakley, let’s have FCC shut it down [Graham]
  • “Big Brother and the Salt Shaker” [NY Times "Room for Debate", Food Liability Law, earlier on NYC initiative and more] NYU’s Marion Nestle “loves” being called a nanny statist, so we’ll just go right on calling her that [Crispy on the Outside]
  • Terror suspects win right to seek compensation from UK government over restrictions on their activities [Canadian Press]
  • “Men Without Hats. Meaning no hard hats. Meaning The Safety Dance never met OSHA requirements. No wonder it was shut down.” [Tim Siedell a/k/a Bad Banana]
  • Italian judge orders father to go on paying $550/month living allowance to his student daughter, who is 32 [Guardian/SMH, earlier on laws mandating support of adult children]
  • Two informants vie for potential bonanza of whistleblower status against Johnson & Johnson [Frankel, AmLaw Litigation Daily]
  • “Polling Firm Says John Edwards Is Its Most Unpopular Person Ever” [Lowering the Bar]

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Yesterday’s roundup item wondering whether Massachusetts Democrats had secured the requisite photo permissions for women portrayed as rape victims in a controversial campaign flyer drew many readers thanks to a link from Kathryn Lopez at the Corner.

January 18 roundup

by Walter Olson on January 18, 2010

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Didn’t realize the newsman had covered the story (quite a while back, it would appear from the look and feel of the video):


Via Andrew Sullivan. On Massachusetts AG and Senate candidate Martha Coakley’s role, see this earlier post, as well as critical videos here and here, Popehat, Jury Box, and Radley Balko.

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A late-night binge drinking outing by some high school friends in Norfolk, Mass. ends badly. The mother says her late daughter “is absolutely 100 percent responsible” for what happened to her but is still is suing seven (7) teenagers and adults for their roles. [Boston Globe]

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The Massachusetts attorney general and Senate candidate poses as the guardian of justice and civil liberties. Dorothy Rabinowitz knows better (earlier on the Amirault case here and here; on Coakley’s prosecutorial record here).

More (via Memeorandum): Bronwyn’s Harbor, No Quarter (citing views of Jeralyn Merritt/TalkLeft and Arthur Leonard); Dan McLaughlin, RedState; Dan Riehl (Woodward, Souza cases). Yet more: on Coakley’s offer to a deal to one defendant on condition that the experienced defense counsel handling the deal agree not to represent a second defendant in future, see Scott Greenfield (characterizing the move as “a deliberate effort to undermine the constitutional right to counsel”), Kenneth Anderson/Volokh, and John Steele/Legal Ethics Forum.

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Martha Coakley’s record as a criminal prosecutor. [Radley Balko, Politico] More: Ed Brayton. Update: Dorothy Rabinowitz has not forgotten the Amirault case, nor should we.

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In the latest round in the prolonged controversy over the Nantucket Sound development, Aquinnah Wampanoag Indians who live on the west side of Martha’s Vineyard say that turbines off the east side of the island would spoil their welcome of the morning sun [NYT, WSJ editorial]

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A dismissed teacher’s case against the school system in Lowell is now before Massachusetts’s Supreme Judicial Court. Phanna Rem Robishaw, a native of Cambodia originally hired to teach bilingual programs, had received favorable evaluations for years but received an unsatisfactory rating in English fluency after the state began requiring that teachers be tested on that skill. An arbitrator reinstated her but a state court judge reversed the reinstatement, terming her performance on an interview test tape “utterly incomprehensible”. Robishaw’s lawyer says the arbitrator excluded the tape from evidence and that the judge should not have considered it, and that the judge failed to observe the presumption against overturning arbitration results. “In 2002, Massachusetts’ voters passed Question 2, requiring all school superintendents to attest to the English fluency and literacy of their teachers where ‘the teacher’s fluency is not apparent through classroom observation and assessment or interview assessment.’” [Lowell Sun]

Readers with long memories will recall the 1990s controversy over a hard-to-understand foreign-born teacher in Westfield, Mass. which led Massachusetts voters to adopt Question 2; I wrote about it for Reason here. By coincidence, presumably, Robishaw attended Westfield State College.

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November 18 roundup

by Walter Olson on November 18, 2009

  • “Common sense makes a comeback” against zero tolerance in the classroom [USA Today]
  • Slip at Massachusetts antiques show leads to lawsuit [Wicked Local Marion]
  • Update: Washington Supreme Court takes up horn-honking case [Lowering the Bar, earlier]
  • MICRA as model: “California’s Schwarzenegger stumps for medical liability reform” [American Medical News]
  • “Inventing a better patent system” [Pozen, NYT]
  • Google Books settlement narrowed to countries with “common legal heritage” [Sag, ConcurOp]
  • One way to make ends meet: cash-strapped Detroit cops are seizing a lot more stuff [Detroit News via Business Insider]
  • What temperatures are hot coffee actually served at? Torts buffs (including our Ted Frank) want to know [TortsProf exchange with Michael Rustad and followup, more and yet more]

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Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley nails twenty property owners and real estate agents over “no kids”, “no Section 8″ language in Craigslist ads [Legal NewsLine]

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AlkonISeeRudePeopleSeems to pass for acceptable practice in Massachusetts. [Jennifer Levitz, WSJ, via Amy Alkon, who by the way has a new book coming out momentarily called I See Rude People -- for the benefit of the FTC, I should say I've neither seen nor requested a free copy.]

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