The Access Grift

Bingo!

By and

As rumors swirl about another Alito leak, David and Sarah examine DC’s corrosive obsession with “access.” They also discuss the appointment of a special counsel for the Trump investigations, and ask whether we should care about law schools pulling out of the US News & World Report. 

Plus: get your bingo cards ready!

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Comments (104)
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  1. Avatar photo
    Patterico

    I am not convinced by Sarah’s argument that there is no conflict regarding DOJ investigating Hunter Biden, because (she says) they are investigating him and the only conflict would arise if they were not investigating him. But even if they do investigate and even if they do prosecute, there are many ways to go easier on him (or harder than usual to avoid the appearance of impropriety, which is a different kind of potential conflict). There is no getting around this obvious conflict with the dodge that “hey we are investigating!” This does not seem like a close call to me, and I was surprised both by the assertion and lack of pushback.

    Also, while I agree that we can’t have a special counsel for every prosecution that involves politics, but need to reserve it for special cases, this is the son of the president! That’s a pretty special case, no?

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    1. Avatar photo
      Patterico

      Put more simply: let’s say a prosecutor files a case against his own brother. Is it your view that there is no conflict there because, hey, he filed the case instead of declining it?? Surely nobody would accept that logic — but it’s the same argument.

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  2. Avatar photo
    Bill Dyer (aka Beldar)

    TOPIC SUGGESTION for AO: Former federal prosecutor Andrew Weissman wants the new special counsel to become Chatty Cathy, doubtless on the Sunday talking heads shows:

    ===begin quote===
    ... Weissman wrote that he sees a role for providing “public enlightenment.”

    “Neither the current special counsel regulations nor Justice Department rules require Mr. Smith to take a vow of silence with the American public. His ability to explain and educate will be critical to the acceptance of the department’s mission by the American public,” he wrote.

    “It will permit Mr. Smith to be heard directly and not through the gauze of pundits and TV anchors; it will allow the public to directly assess Mr. Smith, a heretofore little-known figure; and it will permit Mr. Smith to counteract those strong forces seeking to discredit or misleadingly shape the narrative about the investigations.”
    ===end quote===
    Link: https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/3748533-after-mueller-legal-experts-hope-for-a-more-vocal-special-counsel/

    This strikes me as one of the very stupidest ideas I've ever heard, from a former prosecutor about whom I have very, very substantial reservations and would never put forth as any sort of exemplar or even as competent.

    But I'm keenly curious about Mr. French's and, especially, Ms. Isgur's views on prosecutors who aren't yet ready to file anything in court nevertheless starting to work public opinion toward a conviction.

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    1. Avatar photo
      Patterico

      Prosecutors are supposed to try cases in court, not in the press. Full stop.

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      1. Avatar photo
        Bill Dyer (aka Beldar)

        I concur!

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  3. Avatar photo
    Ben Connelly

    Sarah mentions her son and/or Sarah refers to her son as “the Brisket” should also be on the Bingo card.

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  4. Avatar photo
    Ben Connelly

    Have David Lat on the podcast sometime. I know he was on TD live but that doesn’t count.

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  5. Indy Tim

    If you want a really random opinion to read that I didn't see coming, check outCommonwealth v. Perez Narvaez (SJC 13275) (November 22, 2022)

    https://www.mass.gov/service-details/new-opinions

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  6. Avatar photo
    3ld3r

    Please add the following AO bingo space:

    "David repeats a statement for emphasis"

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    1. Avatar photocircle-angle-nib
      David French vertical-nib Author

      That's a bad habit left over from a good habit :)

      When speaking to juries and judges, repeating points can be critical. It's an important way to make them remember your one or two biggest points. It can be annoying when recording a podcast. Even my family makes fun of me for it :)

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  7. MathewA

    I'm disappointed you still didn't mention getting a firearm if you need to get a restraining order. If you are in that type of situation, get a gun, and get training to use it. A piece of paper won't save your life.

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    1. Acre00

      God created mankind; Samuel Colt made us equal.

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  8. P Satter

    Spouse worked in the federal court system and briefly met--and had pictures with--three of the Supreme Court justices on separate occasions. First, they were all very courteous to the staff during their visits to our city and generous with posing for pictures with many people. They are not elusive celebrities. Given his own experience, seeing anyone in a picture with them should mean little. He even received a nice personal letter from Justice Sotomayor for his role in her visit. In no way does he--at all--know any of them.
    Having spoken with someone who was in a position to actually know much more about them, he was told that people would try to find out the results of cases before the court. This wasn't unusual. It was their practice--he was told--to smile and say nothing at all. This did not vary with their political persuasion, it was what they all did. Spouse worked in this capacity during 2014. Given his experience and information he received at that time, I would personally be skeptical that any of the justices--right, left, or otherwise--would have a compelling reason to change this practice.

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  9. BenP

    I enjoyed hearing about the U.S. New & World Report ranking gaming, which I've seen up close at the lower-prestige level. I'm at a large public university. When administration noticed we were getting hit on # of courses taught by tenure-track faculty, we started seeing more low level 1-credit fluffy courses taught by tenure-track faculty pop up (I like these courses, but they were born of cynicism). Multi-section courses for high enrollment classes will have a tenured professor as "primary" instructor, and a grad student as "secondary" - the grad students are the ones teaching and the professor coordinates, but you wouldn't know that from the description.

    Or, there's the fact that their "class size" ranking category uses bins: <20, 20 to 29, 30 to 39... and boy are there a lot of classes capped at 19 students!

    Retention rates through year 1 is a factor, so advisors are told it's a priority. This doesn't seem like a bad thing until you look at all the 2nd year drop outs who were convinced not to leave after year one despite the signs being there, such as failing most classes and not really knowing why they're in college in the first place. (The other retention metric is 6-year graduation rates, because if you saw the 4-year rates you'd weep).

    But... I don't have any better ideas on how to rank universities. Maybe flawed rankings are still better than no rankings? Maybe quantitative standards that we all know will be gamed and that risk incentivizing unwise policies and behavior are still better than subjective standards? I don't know. I do know that when we take something that is not inherently quantitative and figure out a way to cram a number onto it anyway and then make that number THE MOST IMPORTANT THING, the horse is gonna follow the cart.

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    1. MathewA

      Given the number of credits required it can be pretty hard or sometimes downright impossible to graduate in 4 years.

      I was doing 15+ units a quarter most quarters and summer school to and it still was closer to 5 years. In particular it can sometimes be hard to get in to some of those final classes you need that aren't scheduled all the time.

      I really think 5 years should be the default at most places now.

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  10. Bobby D

    Any update on whether I can get CLE credits for listening to AO? This is far more interesting to the 3 hours I spent today learning about New Jersey municipal court procedure…from someone who’s never set foot in any state court.

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    1. Avatar photocircle-angle-nib
      David French vertical-nib Author

      Stay tuned! We want to make this happen, but it takes time to put together!

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