United States: chaos, turmoil, corruption, new constitutional crisis every other day. Canada: store left unlocked all day, nothing stolen, people who took something left money on the counter with a nice note for the owner.
“In one instance in November 2016, [the lawyer] allegedly winked at a magistrate judge and said, ‘When you get back from your vacation, I better be able to see your tan lines.'” Was that the only instance? Nope. This person has since “engaged in counseling regarding appropriate boundaries,” it says. Was that voluntary? Nope.
The 2020 Ig Nobel Prizes were awarded on September 17. Always outstanding, sometimes overlapping with Lowering the Bar. For example: This year’s prize in the Management category was shared by Xi Guang-An, Mo Tian-Xiang, Yang Kang-Sheng, Yang Guang-Sheng, and Ling Xian Si, the hit men who kept delegating until finally Ling got them all caught. See “Fourth-Level Subcontractor Ruins Murder Plot” (Oct. 23, 2019).
A High Court judge in Liverpool was not impressed by the claim of a woman who said four female officers violated her rights by changing her clothes after she threw up on herself. The case was evidently brought, he said, “to establish the liberty of inebriated English subjects to be allowed to lie undisturbed overnight in their own vomit-soaked clothing.” If so, she did not succeed. And wasn’t that in the Magna Carta anyway?
Fraud-prevention startup NS8 fired hundreds of employees earlier this month, telling them in a letter that it had been forced to downsize due to “sudden and unforeseen circumstances.” What were the circumstances? It’s being investigated for fraud.
“It is fair to say, however, that he conducted himself in such a way as to challenge the Court’s authority…. [T]he Court indicated to the appellant that if he had nothing further to say in support of his case, the Court would hear from the respondent’s counsel. Regrettably, shortly after counsel commenced…, the appellant stood up from the table at which he had been seated, took down his trousers, bent over, exposed his buttocks to the camera and pulled his buttocks apart, [saying]: “[I]f you want to talk to him again, let me know.” … The Court then invited counsel for the respondent simply to rely on his written submissions. He did so.” Vitale v. The Queen [2020] VSCA 237 (14 Sept. 2020).
