Monthly Archives: October 2018

Clarity

Posted on October 20, 2018 by Michael Froomkin

Really the Kevin Drum post, Saudis: Khashoggi Committed Suicide By Cop, Sort Of is so much easier to follow than the NYT version. Drum summarizes it like this:

The Saudis now say that they intended to negotiate a return to Saudi Arabia with Khashoggi, so they sent a 15-man team to meet him at the consulate. Fifteen men! Unfortunately, a fistfight broke out during the negotiations and one of the negotiators accidentally killed Khashoggi.

It seems odd that a 60-year-old man would pick a fight with 15 guys, doesn’t it? But that’s what happened. At that point, the Saudi team apparently went rogue and decided they had to cover up what happened. Luckily, they had come equipped with a bone saw and a forensic pathologist, so they were able to dismember the body and dispose of it. However, everyone on this rogue team has been arrested now, so the case is closed.

I’m pretty sure that a six-year-old could come up with a better story if he had two weeks to work on it.

Contrast the NYT:

Posted in Politics: International | Comments Off on Clarity

Student Debt Growing Quickly

Posted on October 19, 2018 by Michael Froomkin

I never used to worry about the morality of teaching in a private law school. But as the debt burden grew on students, I began to worry, and charts like this one from Naked Capitalism make me worry even more.

Unfortunately, many public law schools now charge comparable tuition (but some still don’t).

In any case, student debt of this magnitude is not sustainable, and even if it were the drag on people’s futures and life choices seems excessive. I think the first part of the answer is to bring down the cost of public college: we should return to the era, not so long ago, where you could pretty much finance your college education from a summer job.

Law school prices may still be too high even in that scenario, but at least the overall consequences for students wouldn’t be as bad.

What we do with the debt overhang, meanwhile, is a wicked problem. To simply forgive the debt would be a windfall for the debtors. As a taxpayer, I could live with that; the problem that bugs me is that it seems so unfair to the people who didn’t borrow or who paid down their debt, and those who made sacrifices to finance education or chose less-expensive and perhaps lesser alternatives…or who chose to forgo education entirely.

Posted in Econ & Money, Law School | 3 Comments

A Very Illuminating Chart

Posted on October 18, 2018 by Michael Froomkin

I knew there was a big difference, but not this big:

It’s even more striking when you consider that historically the FBI and other federal law enforcement bodies were strongly Republican. And in my lifetime, the GOP has made much more noise about ‘law and order’ too.

And of course we can reasonably expect the Trump number to balloon…

Posted in Politics: The Party of Sleaze | 3 Comments

I Saw This Ad Just Before the Heat Game Started

Posted on October 17, 2018 by Michael Froomkin

This ad by VoteVets about Rick Scott is a lot better than anything I’ve seen by the Nelson for Senate campaign:

Of course, Scott has more money, and has been flooding the airwaves with warm and fuzzy stuff.

Posted in 2018 Election, Florida | Comments Off on I Saw This Ad Just Before the Heat Game Started

Push Here to Sue

Posted on October 17, 2018 by Michael Froomkin

New App Lets You ‘Sue Anyone By Pressing a Button’ was the headline. I thought it was the Onion, but it’s apparently real.

Do Not Pay, a free service that launched in the iOS App store today, uses IBM Watson-powered artificial intelligence to help people win up to $25,000 in small claims court. It’s the latest project from 21-year-old Stanford senior Joshua Browder, whose service previously allowed people to fight parking tickets or sue Equifax; now, the app has streamlined the process. It’s the “first ever service to sue anyone (in all 3,000 counties in 50 states) by pressing a button.”

Can’t test it though, as it’s only available for the iPhone, not Android.

Posted in Onion/Not-Onion | 1 Comment

John Major on Brexit

Posted on October 16, 2018 by Michael Froomkin

Former UK PM John Major unloads on Brexit:

We know the post-Brexit world will be very different from now. It cannot be otherwise, because no form of Brexit will remotely match up to the promises made by the leave campaign in the referendum: they were vote-gathering fantasies, not serious politics.

I have no constituency vote clouding my view of Brexit. I have no ambition driving my support for it. I have no party whips demanding loyalty before conscience. I have made no false promises about Brexit that I must pretend can still be honoured, even though – in my heart – I know they cannot. I am free to say absolutely and precisely what I believe about Brexit. And it is this:

I understand the motives of those who voted to leave the European Union: it can – as I well know – be very frustrating. Nonetheless, after weighing its frustrations and opportunities, there is no doubt in my own mind that our decision is a colossal misjudgment that will diminish both the UK and the EU. It will damage our national and personal wealth, and may seriously hamper our future security. It may even, over time, break up our United Kingdom. It will most definitely limit the prospects of our young.

And – once this becomes clear – I believe those who promised what will never be delivered will have much to answer for. They persuaded a deceived population to vote to be weaker and poorer. That will never be forgotten – nor forgiven.

Yet the train rolls on.

Posted in Politics: Brexit | Comments Off on John Major on Brexit