Jacob Weisberg writes fondly about Slate's relationship with Microsoft, now coming to an end. Bill Gates takes a lot of heat for a lot of things, but it's hard to be critical of Slate, and Microsoft's contribution to that is (as Weisberg makes clear) not insignificant. (Although: one happy result of all this is that problems like this should go away.)

I wonder though what WaPo Co is paying for the magazine. It's a little unclear what their motivations are in purchasing it -- do they really view it as potentially profitable, or is it part of a larger philosophical attempt to hybridize traditional media content with web content? I was a little uncomfortable reading that on the one hand they want to keep Slate largely intact, but on the other they're trying to come up with a profitable business model. Surely one or the other will have to give...

One thing they don't seem to be after is a revolutionary new approach to online media. Slate may have been a fresh approach 8.5 years ago, but to get to the front of the line today you should probably be buying up big readership blogs, or even looking at some in-the-chute projects like Backfence.com, which is happening right under their noses in DC. These are the kinds of ventures that are going to be transforming the landscape over the next 8.5 years.

The invention of the "consumer" identity has been an important part of a long process of eroding workers' power, and it's one reason working people now have so little power against business. According to the social historian Stuart Ewen, in the early years of mass production, the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, modernizing capitalism sought to turn people who thought of themselves primarily as "workers" into "consumers." Business elites wanted people to dream not of satisfying work and egalitarian societies--as many did at that time--but of the beautiful things they could buy with their paychecks.

Business was quite successful in this project, which influenced much early advertising and continued throughout the twentieth century. In addition to replacing the "worker," the "consumer" has also effectively displaced the citizen.

(By the way, it's odd (and somewhat fishy) that in that quote workers are "workers," consumers are "consumers," but citizens are just plain old citizens. Maybe "citizens" is reserved for somebody else?)
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Question 1: (50 Points)

Afraid of threats of violence by abortion protesters, some Planned Parenthood clinic workers begin carrying handguns and shotguns when crossing through protest lines, in accordance with local laws. After one violent abortion protester is shot by a clinic worker in Oklahoma, many protesters begin carrying weapons as well.

The result is a tense but non-violent standoff, as armed workers cross through lines of armed protesters, often with local law enforcement (also armed) overseeing the standoffs.

However, in December of 2005, a protester in Oklahoma City fires at a volunteer who returns fire. The unfortunate result is a three-way firefight leaving several dead and dozens severely wounded, and attracts national attention.

Despite resistance from an odd Congressional alliance of pro-choice anti-gun politicians and anti-abortion pro-gun politicians, moderates in Congress pass a new federal statute to avoid such armed conflicts in the future. After making findings that armed showdowns threaten the interstate market in abortions, and also that they threaten the ability of individual women to exercise their Fourteenth Amendment Constitutional Right to abortion, Congress passes 18 U.S.C. 249, which makes it a federal felony for anybody other than a licensed law-enforcement official to possess a firearm within 100 yards of a clinic.

After a series of litigation in the lower courts, the Supreme Court agrees to hear the constitutionality of the act. Is it a valid exercise of Congressional power under Article 1 Section 8 Commerce Clause power? Is it a valid exercise of Congressional power under Amendment 14 Section 5? The Court does not grant certiorari on, but might still contemplate, whether the act violates Amendment 2.

How should the Court rule? Please douple-space your answer and type it or write it in a bluebook. Comments open.

One thing that keeps rearing its head in contracts is the notion of "objective intent," which I confess baffles me entirely. (I thought I had some foggy notion of what it was to intend to do things, but I don't know what intent is as separated from one's subjective intentions). I am relieved, though, to learn that I am not the only person confused.

From the oral arguments in FDA v Brown & Williamson:

QUESTION: some of the literature talks about objective intent. I have no idea what objective intent is, but let's assume--

MR. COOPER: That's in the FDA regulation. ...

QUESTION: Has--isn't it possible that there was an--a change in the subjective intent of--of those who marketed the cigarettes, that only at a more recent date was it clear that it was their intent to make physical alterations--

MR. COOPER: Is it possible that there was a change ... in subjective intent?

QUESTION: Yes.

MR. COOPER: Yes. Is there an FDA finding on that? No. Is subjective intent relevant under the statute? I would submit not. The FDA regulation, as you point out, Justice Scalia, requires an objective intent. That's a very unusual term. It didn't say objective evidence of intent. It says an objective intent.