I wrote here, "I'm willing to give up some freedom to have fire protection and paved roads…"; one of my Twitter correspondents chided me: "He who would sacrifice liberty in the name of safety deserves neither." I don't think that's right. We give up liberty (the freedom to do what we want with our money) by paying compulsory taxes in exchange for things like firefighters, and unless

The first time I got to vote in a presidential election was in November 1988. I was a sophomore at Rice University, registered to vote in Texas. The race was between George H.W. Bush and Michael Dukakis. I voted for Ron Paul, who was running as the Libertarian candidate. I believe that the answer to "how much government do we need" is, and probably always will be,

When I saw this story: The fallout from severe layoffs at the Orleans Parish public defender's office came to an early head Friday inside a criminal courtroom. After a hearing in which Chief Public Defender Derwyn Bunton faced a litany of questions about his budget woes, Judge Arthur Hunter said he would farm out dozens of indigent cases to private lawyers. I thought, "that's not right." Crowded

Lawyers who look at Gerry Spence's Trial Lawyers College often see it as a cult. This is wrong. TLC is not a cult. Here's Janja Lalich and Michael Langone's checklist of cult characteristics, with my thoughts on whether they apply to the Trial Lawyers College: The group displays excessively zealous and unquestioning commitment to its leader and (whether he is alive or dead) regards his belief system,

Patients should be able to decide what happens to them. Doctors should not do things that harm their patients. According to Wikipedia, the principles are autonomy, the patient's right to self-determination; and beneficence, serving the best interests of the patient. Autonomy can come into conflict with beneficence when patients disagree with recommendations that health care professionals believe are in the patient's best interest. When the patient's interests

So I was in Harris County Criminal Court at Law Number 14 this morning waiting for the judge to return from a long break when I saw this (PDF) on the state's table for young prosecutors. This explains some of the objections you hear prosecutors making: they're choosing at random. I was amused. Then I noticed that there were three columns of eight objections each, and I

When I saw that Scott Greenfield had said, "so long and thanks for all the fish," I asked on Twitter, "Any truth to the rumor that this is part of @ScottGreenfield's settlement with Rakofsky?" I was being flippant, naturally, but I've realized that there is a germ of truth in the question. Not that he would sell out, but that with Greenfield not filing three or four

[Dr. Emmette] Flynn stated that he did not ask for Gray’s consent for the proctoscopic exam and that at the time he made the decision, he had not reviewed the search warrant or Gray’s medical history. For Gray’s proctoscopic exam, two sedatives (Versed and Etomidate) were administered to Gray intravenously. Though the doctors later testified at the suppression hearing that the risks associated with the sedatives were

When Anonymous stole criminal-defense firm Puckett and Faraj's email communications, it claimed that the theft (and defacement of the firm's website) was "part of our ongoing efforts to expose the corruption of the court systems and the brutality of US imperialism," contrasting Staff Sergeant Frank Wuterich's reduced charges with Bradley Manning's prosecution. Haytham Faraj, of Puckett & Faraj, commented on Anonymous's theft: Anonymous hacked into my business

What I did does not remotely approach the level of what I would consider an investigation. It was a cursory review of information that exists in the public domain. Any 14 year old with a smart-phone could access more information than I did. Ultimately, we learned more from Mark Bennett’s blog post than I discovered from my inquiry. That's Harris County District Attorney's Office Chief Investigator Don