* If you need advertisements to help point you in the direction of prostitutes in a state where prostitution is legal, then something is wrong with your wang. [The Volokh Conspiracy]

* I think strip clubs should be zoned right next to churches. The patrons frivolously stuffing dollars everywhere would feel slightly ashamed of themselves, and the strip club patrons would just be pissed. [Legal Blog Watch]

* Shocking, but some lawyers need help to avoid picking up work. [The Lawyerist]

* Porteous impeached, unanimously, by the House. [WSJ Law Blog]

* Riding your bike while drunk is a crime, kind of, in Oregon. So, if you are drunk you can’t drive, you can’t bike, next thing you know, they’ll be telling us that alcohol impairs one’s ability to walk. [Bad Lawyer]

* Honest question, why would you even want to be Governor of New York? As NYAG, all of Wall Street fears you, and you can make spurious jurisdictional arguments to bring nearly the entire world under your purview. As NY’s Governor, nobody respects you, you have to live in Albany, and you can’t even get a little side action without the New York Times crawling up your ass. [New York Times]

New York – United States – New York Times – Law – Metro Areas

3 pm ET!

The New York Times is planning to offer its Book Review as a separate digital e-reader product, disaggregated from the rest of the Times content on the mobile devices, according to James Dunn, director of marketing for The New York Times.
…

A backlash continues to build over attacks launched by Sen. Grassley and a conservative organization on Department of Justice attorneys who represented Guantanamo Bay detainees. Politico, Slate and The Blog of Legal Times all have stories on the dust-up over the YouTube video produced by a group affiliated with Liz Cheney (pictured) and Bill Kristol, Keep America Safe, which questions the loyalty of the DOJ attorneys, dubbing them "The Al Qaeda Seven." As noted last week on ACSblog, a growing chorus of conservatives is questioning the organization’s tactics. Now "leading conservative lawyers and policy experts, [and] former Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr," have issued a statement blasting the attacks on the DOJ lawyers as "shameful." Politico has the entire statement here. (Also signing the letter was Charles "Cully" Stimson, a senior Pentagon official who resigned his post in 2007 after he sharply criticized U.S. law firms that had represented military detainees.)

In an article for Slate, Dahlia Lithwick says the methods used by Cheney and Kristol are beyond being over-the-top. Their attacks, especially Liz Cheney’s, are part of the "ever-expanding war on the Bill of Rights." Lithwick maintains that the DOJ attorneys who represented the Guantanamo Bay detainees were doing so on justified grounds.

She writes:

They were defending the U.S. Constitution – the great whomping chunks of the Bill of Rights that Cheney and her friends are so eager to write out of existence. They did it because – as Spencer Ackerman points out – the Military Commissions Act of 2006 expressly provided that detainees get defense lawyers. And they did it, as Jay Bookman notes, for the same reason John Adams agreed to represent British soldiers charged with killing civilians during the Boston Massacre in 1770. Because long before Liz Cheney was born and long after she’s gone, the Bill of Rights requires serious people to take it seriously.

Attorneys at leading national law firms are also joining the fray, as the Legal Times blog reports. Brian Brooks, managing partner of O’Melveny & Myers’ Washington Office tells the Legal Times, "From the perspective of our firm, providing representation for unpopular causes is a long and noble tradition in the law, and that kind of criticism is not going to affect our firm’s commitment to that cause. If the private bar doesn’t step up and show that kind of courage, then I think our whole system of justice is in question." 

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* Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli II tells the state’s public colleges and universities that it’s okay to discriminate against LGBT people? [Washington Post]

* New York doesn’t know what to do with its bad kids… [New York Times]

* … While a Georgia judge has to step down for throwing a party for them. [WSB Radio]

* Switzerland wrote the “dignity” of plant life into its constitution and made a law last year to protect the rights of goldfish and canaries, but Swiss voters stopped short at the idea of appointing lawyers for animals at taxpayers’ expense. [Telegraph]

* Is patent law on the rise? [San Francisco Chronicle]

* Presidential impersonators from SNLs past visit Barack Obama in a dream to give him advice on financial reform, thanks to a collaboration between Ron Howard and Harvard Law professor and Congressional Oversight Panel chair Elizabeth Warren. The Funny or Die video is embedded after the jump. Dana Carvey is amazing. [New York Times]

* “Are you or have you ever been a lawyer?” [New York Times]

* Google’s top lawyer made over $2 million last year, but he’s still a wanted man in Italy. [ABA Journal]

* Kick-off today in Minnesota Vikings vs. the NFL. [Stamford Advocate]

Barack Obama – President – United States – Will Ferrell – Dana Carvey

According to the Los Angeles Times, Tennis legend Pete Sampras and his wife, Bridgette Wilson-Sampras, are selling their new, 20-acre California home for $25 million.

In addition to the 13,000 square foot house, the property features a 2,000 …

The budget crisis forces states to look at whether to continue to fight a failed Drug War that packs prisons with non-violent drug offenders who drain prison budgets. Shame on the Times if this article freezes forward-thinking legislators and state officials in their tracks.

Nuance.

* One secret to happiness is to make your bed each morning, says Gretchen Rubin, author of the Happiness Project and one of The Elect. (She got Lat to reveal his secrets last year.) [New York Times]

* Hogan & Hartson’s 38-lawyer Warsaw office is defecting to K&L Gates. [Blog of the Legal Times]

* Maybe this guy should have realized she was a dud when she told him “no one flies coach to Australia.” [Gothamist]

* Only net losers can recover money from Bernie Madoff, rules bankruptcy judge Burton Lifland. [Wall Street Journal and Business Week]

* The Supreme Court won’t rule on the Uighurs at Guantanamo. [New York Times]

* Brazil beckons Biglaw. [BusinessWeek]

United States – New York – Supreme Court – Bernard Madoff – Government

Trouble’s a-brewin’!

Returning at 3 pm ET!

* Could Toyota’s problems vindicate a man sent to prison for eight years for a highway rampage? [NPR]

* The Texas State Court of Criminal Appeals throws out the death penalty in the controversial case of Charles Dean Hood before the Supreme Court can get to it. [New York Times]

* “Real People. Real Reviews.” Real Extortion? Yelp threatened with lawsuit for requesting payment to take down negative reviews. [BNet]

* Sarah Palin v. Family Guy. [Time]

* Italy doesn’t like the Internet. [San Francisco Chronicle]

* The New York Times finally reports on the David Paterson scandal. It involves a woman. Paterson did make a move on her, but it was on behalf of his aide. [New York Times]

New York Times – David Paterson – United States – Supreme Court – Government

It looks like the New York Times finally broke the big story it was rumored to be working on about New York Gov. David Paterson, and it does not look good:

Last fall, a woman went to court in the Bronx to testify that she had been violently assaulted by a top aide to Gov. David A. Paterson, and to seek a protective order against the man.

In the ensuing months, she returned to court twice to press her case, complaining that the State Police had been harassing her to drop it. The State Police, which had no jurisdiction in the matter, confirmed that the woman was visited by a member of the governor’s personal security detail.

Then early this month, days before she was due to return to court to seek a final protective order, the woman got a phone call from the governor, according to her lawyer. She failed to appear for her next hearing on Feb. 8, and as a result her case was dismissed.

The aide in question is David W. Johnson, whom the Times recently profiled at length, describing his history of “altercations with women.” A report last fall by Attorney General Andrew Cuomo exposed a decade-long history of improper political interference by the State Police. This track record, among other things, included erasing a police report of a domestic violence complaint against then-Rep. John Sweeney and replacing it with a “phony, sanitized” version. Paterson has asked Cuomo to investigate this latest incident as well.

The Albany Project has posted a statement from Paterson’s office in response to the Times report:

Serious questions have been raised about contact the State Police may have had with a private citizen who filed a complaint against a member of my staff. Any allegation of improper influence must be investigated thoroughly and completely.

Superintendent Harry Corbitt has directed the State Police to conduct an internal investigation into this matter. I have full faith and trust in the integrity and ability of the State Police to conduct a thorough investigation.

Because of the seriousness of these allegations, and the sensitive role of this staff member in my Administration, I am asking the Attorney General to investigate the matter to ensure in the public’s mind that a comprehensive and independent inquiry has been conducted. Pending the outcome of the investigation, I am suspending David Johnson without pay.

President Obama has nominated Goodwin Liu, associate dean and law professor at UC Berkeley’s Boalt Hall School of Law and the former chair of the ACS Board, to a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. The Los Angeles Times reported that "if confirmed, he could be the only full time Asian American judge on a federal appellate court."

Liu (pictured) is the co-author of Keeping Faith with the Constitution, released last year by ACS and set to be published this summer by Oxford University Press. Keeping Faith articulates a vision of the Constitution and an approach to interpretation that is faithful to the words of the document and at the same time has enabled the Constitution to retain its relevance for each new generation of Americans. The Los Angeles Times noted that the book "discusses the shortcomings of ‘orginalism,’ a conservative legal theory maintaining that the Constitution should be interpreted based on its 18th century framers’

In a press statement on the nominations of Liu and Judge Robert N. Chatigny for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, President Obama said, "Goodwin Liu and Robert Chatigny have proven themselves to be not only first-rate legal minds but faithful public servants."

In a statement, ACS Executive Director Caroline Fredrickson said:

Goodwin first became involved in ACS while he was in a law firm representing businesses and pro bono clients as a litigator. Although he began as a regular member of our D.C. chapter, his passion for the law, tremendous judgment and outstanding temperament made him stand out as a leader. He joined ACS’s board of directors, and once again those qualities were recognized by his colleagues, who voted to make him our Chair. We will miss Goodwin, and we congratulate him on this great honor, which he so richly deserves.

The Los Angeles Times noted that Liu has drawn support across the political spectrum, including Clint Bolick, director of the conservative Goldwater Institute’s constitutional litigation arm. Bolick told the Times, "Having reviewed several of his academic writings, I find … Liu to exhibit fresh, independent thinking and intellectual honesty."

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