SUPREME COURT NEWS (more than you think)

Corporate Cash:


Does Apprendi apply to the judicial imposition of fines? Oral argument today at SCOTUS in Southern Union Company v. US.   While fines remain the first and usually only sanction a Judge can impose against a corporation (corporations  have special dietary needs that make incarceration difficult),  we predict that fines will become a more standard part of state court sentences for regular Joes and Mary Janes. Diminishing state budgets signal the high point in the incarceration frenzy that began in the mid 1980's. Because we can no longer afford to lock up more of our citizens that South Africa did during apartheid, or the Soviet Union did under Stalin, and because we realize that it just doesn't work, alternative sentences will now become more prevalent. 


Is that a $$$ that you just saw pop up over the head of your favourite robed reader? Lets see if the 
Supremes make it easier to buy your way out of a year and a day. 


DOLPHINS. 
Nobody wants to be the Fins QB. Not Peyton, not Matt Flynn, maybe not even Alex Smith who scampered over to Davie on Sunday because his agent told him to turn down 8 million per year for three years a week ago and now the 49ers are throwing 70-90 million at precious Peyton (whose agent, Tom Condon,  happens to be Smith's agent as well.). 


 When the music stops one team and one QB will be without a chair at the dance. That's your next Dolphins QB. Not a great way to run a team is it? 


Justice Thomas...
For President? 
ATL reports that idle chit chat continues that should the Republican Convention deadlock this summer in Tampa (although a good meal at Berns should help the GOP big wigs settle their disputes) Justice Clarence Thomas could emerge as a compromise candidate. 


Rumpole says: Never happen. 
You have to speak to run for president. 


Enjoy the week.