« The Socratic Method | Main | Google Blog Search »
Wednesday, September 14, 2005
Blog Spotlight
Recent discussions here brought to my attention a blog by a Michigan law student called "Letters of Marque." Heidi, the student in question, is astute as well as wickedly funny. Take, for instance, her post on reading cases about poultry:
Bad things a-comin'
Every time I see another case name that has "poultry" in the title, I feel a sudden twinge.
You see, it doesn't matter if the plaintiff wins or the defendant wins. No matter what happens, it's going to be bad for the chickens.
In A.L.A. Schechter Poultry Corp v. United States, bafflingly enough, the US government was unhappy (among other things) about people picking out individual chickens. On the one hand, I'm enthusiastic about people looking at chickens as individuals, not just members of some flock. On the other hand, as hard as it may be for readers of this blog to believe, they weren't picking these chickens out for the sheer love of poultry. No; those chickens were singled out for nefarious purposes. Think soup.
Shockingly, nobody tried to argue that allowing the slaughter of thousands of chickens was arbitrary or capricious in the first place.
Posted by Dave Hoffman on September 14, 2005 at 10:52 PM in Blogging | Permalink
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
https://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00d8341c6a7953ef00d834a2c96b69e2
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Blog Spotlight:
Comments
Ah, again with the sick chickens.
My favorite paired cases were in Admin Law, where the Prawf taught two distinct Hot Fish cases - the Vermont Yankee nuclear power waste water case, think hot fish; and the whitefish case, US v Nova Scotia Food Prods. Corp. (2d Cir. 1977).
Posted by: Eh Nonymous | Sep 18, 2005 8:14:18 AM
It wasn't consciously lifted from Man of La Mancha, but I have no doubts it had gestational origins there. When I was eight or so, we listened to the sound track to that damned thing hundreds of times. I know, to the exact millisecond, when the shout occurs in "onwards to glory --- OOOH!"
Posted by: Heidi | Sep 17, 2005 7:45:28 AM
Yes -- but were the chickens broilers or fryers?
Posted by: Anon | Sep 15, 2005 11:15:07 AM
"You see, it doesn't matter if the plaintiff wins or the defendant wins. No matter what happens, it's going to be bad for the chickens."
Isn't that a line from Man of La Mancha? ("Whether the [water] pitcher hits the stone, or the stone hits the pitcher, it's going to be bad for the pitcher.")
Posted by: Anon | Sep 14, 2005 11:51:16 PM
The comments to this entry are closed.