On Al Gore and civil disobedience in Wise County

According to this propaganda from Time magazine, Al Gore has been telling people to commit criminal acts like the ones for which people arrested lately at the Virginia City plant site in Wise County.

Truth is stranger than fiction

While the outcome is still being written in the Fifth District, speaking of fiction and that part of the Commonwealth, the New Times has a review here of The Wettest County in the World, a new novel by a fellow named Bondurant, about moonshiners in Franklin County.

Who will win Virginia? How will the vote go in the Southwest Virginia counties?

I'll be chatting up some people during the day.

I remember hearing the exit polls during the afternoon, four years ago, and it was all Kerry.

Rare day

The best two stories in today's Bristol paper are this one about roller derby in Johnson City and this one about Billy Wagner.

All stories about roller derby or Billy Wagner are good, but I also like the report on the Haysi game and the Wasps' game. I must be going soft in my old age, when the sports section of the Bristol paper starts looking good.

On registering the poor to vote in Virginia

This report describes efforts to get the government of the Commonwealth to get more poor people registered in compliance with the National Voter Registration Act.

Another provocative Daniel Gilbert story

This story in the Bristol paper lets the reader decide whether the son of a circuit court judge got some kind of preferential treatment in the handling of his DUI case. The odd part seems to be not the outcome - which is credibly explained by the prosecutor - but rather the conduct of the hearing in a different room away from the usual assembly of the huddled masses in district court - that's evidently what caused some editor to put this story on the front page, a decision which in itself is interesting and questionable.

If you write a lot of briefs and use Westlaw and Firefox like I do

You ought to try CiteGenie - it does what it claims to do.

The partial birth abortion case

Here is a Findlaw article on the rehearing in the case over the Virginia partial birth abortion statute, which was also described here in the Richmond paper.

And, I'm guessing the Fourth Circuit will go along with the district court and the panel decision.

When you must plead who

In U.S. ex rel. Radcliffe v. Purdue, Chief Judge Jones made a number of interesting rulings, including the issue of pleading fraud under Rule 9(b).

Should teachers be allowed to wear their Obama pins at school?

Julie Hilden opines here that they should.

She writes:

"Rather than pretending to a false neutrality, teachers should put their views on the table and let students challenge them. Otherwise, we'll be in the anomalous position of having English and History teachers instruct students about how writers and speakers convey their political views, explicitly and implicitly -- while at the same time forcing the teachers to falsely deny that they themselves ever hold or convey such views."

That would be fine, except that the teachers always get the last word - grades, the starting lineup on the ballfield, etc.

Oates, J.

They got John Oates as a last minute substitute for tonight's World Series game.

I wish that Johnny Oates had been there instead.

Wow

Thanks, Paul and Peter and Sherma and Deborah and Alan and the rest at VLW, for a great event.

To the rest of the Virginia blogosphere, especially my friends from the meetings way back when in Charlottesville and Martinsville, I say hey, look, a trophy for blogging!

Going to see some people

Here (again) is the list of people I might see this evening in Richmond - an impressive group:

• David Baugh. Took job as capital defender for Central Virginia.

• Mark D. Braley, Legal Services Corporation of Virginia. Sought filing fees statute to produce money for legal aid.

• Frank O. Brown Jr. Provided advice, delivered lectures on closing a practice.

• Jane Chittom, Appellate Defender. Successful efforts before Supreme Court of Virginia.

• Julie M. Cillo, Hall & Hall PLC. Work in collaborative law, bar activities including presidency of Metro Richmond Family Law Bar.

• Terrence L. Graves, Sands Anderson Marks & Miller. First African-American president of the Virginia Association of Defense Attorneys.

• Frank Kilgore. Community activism and environmental work.

• Gary D. LeClair, LeClairRyan. Firm growth within the past year.

• John E. Lichtenstein, Lichtenstein, Fishwick & Johnson PLC. Work with criminal bar groups, handling of high profile cases.

• Darrell Tillar Mason. Chaired Virginia State Bar mandatory insurance study committee.

• Jennifer McClellan, Verizon Corporation. Work as a member of the House of Delegates and as chair of the VSB Young Lawyers Conference.

• Wiley F. Mitchell Jr., Willcox & Savage. Pro bono work on behalf of a client in the wind farm case before the State Corporation Commission.

• David A. Oblon, Albo & Oblon. Community activities and firm development.

• W. Taylor Reveley III, College of William & Mary. Selection as the new W&M president, work on War Powers Commission.

• Carol Schrier-Polak, Bean, Kinney & Korman. Led effort to change therapist testimony statute.

• Mark E. Slaughter, Troutman Sanders LLP. Work on behalf of the Virginia Beach Bar Foundation, including organization of Law Day gala.

• Stephen E. Smith, Brain Injury Law Center. Leadership in field and work on behalf of brain injury clients.

• Rodney A. Smolla, Washington & Lee law school. Developed innovative third-year program at W&L.

• Thomas E. Spahn, McGuireWoods LLP. Chaired Virginia Bar Association Commission on Professionalism.

• Jacob P. Stroman IV, Spotsylvania County Attorney. Chaired committee that published pro bono manual for Local Government Attorneys.

• John L. Walker III, Williams Mullen. Work to establish Nuremberg courtroom at the Virginia Holocaust Museum.

• Jay M. Weinberg, Hirschler Fleischer. Work to establish Nuremberg courtroom at the Virginia Holocaust Museum.

On the case in the Sixth Circuit

In the case I argued for a Title VII plaintiff last month in Cincinnati, the Sixth Circuit has now issued its decision, reversing the District Court and sending the case back for trial.

The opinion by Judge Clay is here.

Someone asked me which did I prefer, the Sixth Circuit or the Fourth Circuit. And, the answer at least for this week is the Sixth Circuit, but that will wear off.

On representing plaintiffs

Here's an opinion by Judge Turk in a Title VII case denying in part the defendants' summary judgment motion, where we represent a fellow from Pulaski who has become a good friend of mine.

Oh, well

I talked to my mom this morning and she said they were going to what I understood her to say was an "Artesian center" wherever it is they are this week, but she seemed pretty cheerful about it.

I thought, hmm, maybe Dad is carrying his long-time hobby of getting water to the farm at Jonesville a bit too far, if he has found some kind of hydrology museum.

Mom went on to say, however, it's a crafts place, like Tamarack in West Virginia. Ah, that kind of artesian.

Fun items

Liberty's law school is bragging on its 90+% bar passage rate from this summer, as shown here.

The Episcopal Church vows here to endeavor to persevere, meaning more church law for the rest of us.

This post describes an ERISA case that went to the Fourth Circuit over a $40 dispute.

This post says John Fishwick is talking up a run for Attorney General; imagine a race between Fishwick and Brownlee, Roanoke v. Roanoke. I met John Fishwick just the other day in Charlottesville.

This article on Jim Gilmore says that when he was in high school, all he cared about was music. It is well-known that band geeks make better Senators.

On biking in the Shenandoah National Park

This piece says - don't ride two abreast in the Park.

No problem, I'm sure there's no one I could keep up with anyway.

On the J. Dickson Phillips Distinguished Professor of Law

Here the UNC Law School makes an announcement of the new J. Dickson Phillips Distinguished Professor of Law. Judge Phillips chaired the panel in my first federal appeal, fifteen years ago or more, and made me a fan.

More on the timber case

Here is the Bristol paper's report on the opinion from Magistrate Judge Sargent in our Wise County timber harvest case, including what strikes me as absurd statements from a Sierra Club lawyer.

In this case, the state agency was bypassed, and suit was filed to get the federal court to second-guess the federal agency's determination, and then plaintiffs' counsel accuses the defendants of taking advantage of a loophole in the law? I mean, really.