Legal Aggregate

Cruel and Unusual Punishment: The Shame of Three Strikes Laws

Excerpt from Rolling Stone‘s March, 2013 feature on Stanford Law’s Three Strikes Project: On July 15th, 1995, in the quiet Southern California city of Whittier, a  33-year-old black man named Curtis Wilkerson got up from a booth at McDonald’s,  walked into a nearby mall and, within the space of two [...]

Turn Right at the Cerebellum: President Obama Maps the Brain

This week, the New York Times reported on a new Obama initiative that, in comparison to gun control or the economy, might seem a little frivolous. It’s called the “Brain Activity Map.” Three Billion Dollars The name of the project says it all: The goal is to map the connections [...]

CLC Students Appear in Court on Behalf of Client Facing Eviction

Congrats to Stanford Law students Kristen Bell  (’13) and Angela McCray (’14) who made the Community Law Clinic’s first  court appearance of the quarter!  They appeared on behalf of a  low-income tenant in an eviction case and filed a Motion to  Quash the summons on the basis of a fatal [...]

| Issue 87

Let’s Go Back to Patenting the ‘Solution,’ Not the ‘Problem’

We already know the patent system is broken. And it desperately needs to be fixed: Patents affect and will continue to affect nearly every technology business or product we use. So for the next few weeks, Wired is running a special series of expert opinions – representing perspectives from academia [...]

| Issue 87

Getting More Bang for the Fed’s Buck

The following excerpt is from The New York Times opinion piece published on Oct 24: Instead of a third round of so-called “quantitative easing,” known in the financial markets as QE3, maybe it’s time for a QE-Muni. Here’s why. State and municipal bonds help finance new infrastructure projects like roads [...]

From the DNC: First Night’s Speakers

Sept., 4, 2012. Charlotte, N.C. The evening progressed as a veritable Where’s Waldo of high-profile politicians and celebrities, with Michael Dukakis bumping into John Leguizamo on the stairs next to me. But the Where’s Waldo effect is somewhat ruined if everyone is a Waldo, which can happen very quickly. If [...]

From the DNC: Day One

Tuesday, Sept. 4, 2012. Charlotte, N.C. The same tent served as the delegation’s new morning meeting location, and everyone was invited in—the press loudly and clearly, so all delegates could hear the invite. These state morning meetings give the Party a chance to circulate big Democratic names and former Vermont [...]

From the DNC: First Impressions

Monday, Sept. 3, 2012. Charlotte, N.C. Each convention day begins with an Oregon delegation meeting at the hotel. There are convention credentials to be distributed, information to be passed, and (because it is a Democratic convention) suggestions to be made from the delegates. Leaving the morning meeting, I was reminded [...]

From the DNC: On the Road to Charlotte, North Carolina

Sunday, Sept. 2, 2012. The ultimate irony of my journey to Charlotte as a delegate for President Obama from the state of Oregon is that it began on Sunday from Los Angeles, California’s LAX airport. It will no doubt be my dark convention secret—one that might have prevented my election [...]

Inside the Political Conventions: Last Reflections on the RNC

Tampa, Florida. Thursday, August 30. I was again able to watch the RNC speakers from the Romney-staffer box, so I managed to experience some interesting reactions from some of those involved in planning the day’s events. An added bonus was meeting Governor Bob McDonnell (VA) and former governor and presidential [...]