The U.S. Supreme Court today ruled that school officials violated the constitutional rights of a 13-year-old Arizona girl when they strip searched her based on a classmate's uncorroborated accusation that she previously possessed ibuprofen. The American Civil Liberties Union represents April Redding, the plaintiff in the lawsuit, whose daughter, Savana Redding, was strip searched by Safford Middle School officials six years ago.
"We are pleased that the Supreme Court recognized that school officials had no reason to strip search Savana Redding and that the decision to do so was unconstitutional," said Adam Wolf, an attorney with the ACLU who argued the case before the Court. "Today's ruling affirms that schools are not constitutional dead zones. While we are disappointed with the Court's conclusion that the law was not clear before today and therefore school officials were not found liable, at least other students will not have to go through what Savana experienced."
Scott Drake interviews Adam Wolf
Dahlia Lithwick, senior editor for "Slate" writes:
If the Republican attack on Sotomayor is really going to consist of scattershot claims that she is too female and ethnic to be truly fair or impartial, it will be a losing demographic battle. Recall that 67 percent of Hispanics and 58 percent of women voted for Obama in 2008, along with 96 percent of blacks. Folks across the political spectrum may wish that Obama hadn't opened the door to discussions of the complicated connection between experience and judicial "empathy." But now that we are there, it simply has to be a mistake for her opponents to attack Sotomayor as someone who is just too darn human to sit on a court.
Scott talks with Dahlia Lithwick
Hardly a month after a trademark lawsuit filed in the appeals court against Google's keyword sales, another suit has surfaced in Texas. Search engine titan Google is slammed with a new lawsuit for allowing companies to use competitor's trademarks to trigger their pay-per-click ads. Firepond, a software company in Texas, on Monday filed a class-action lawsuit in federal court in the eastern district of Texas, against Google alleging its AdWords service profits by selling keywords bearing a company's trademark to its competitors.
Firepond, a small software selling company, based in Marshall, Texas, has sued Google, alleging that its AdWords system infringes its trade marks. The plaintiff claims that consumers are “duped into clicking through to a competitor's sponsored link” when they search for Firepond and are served ads for another company.
A corresponding lawsuit involving PC support company Rescuecom was brought back to the forefront in April by an appeals court after initially being dismissed in 2006. If the case gathers enough participants, the suit could cost the search giant dearly.
Scott talks with Eric Goldman. he's an associate professor at the Santa Clara University School of Law and Director of the High Tech Law Institute.
CNBC and Fox Business News financial commentator Jordan Kimmel discusses the AIG bonuses and working with Jim Kramer on CNBC.
Scott Drake and Jordan Kimmel discjuss what it will take to get investors back in the stock market. Consumer and investor confidence are all thats left to jumpstart the economy. They also discuss PBS Frontline's "Meltdown". It chronicles the beginning of the economic collapse and how unsure economic leaders were about not only what to do but what was coming. They also touch on the often misunderstood and shadowy world of credit default swaps.
Could it be? Has the era of greed that began with the election of Ronald Reagan come to an abrupt end? Peter Cohan says, “It appears the seething emotions of greed and envy that come along with bonus time at investment banks will now have fewer dollars attached to them.Talent will now flow to government and academia rather than Wall Street. This could be good for the U.S.!”Cohan says some of the ‘masters of the universe’ in the investment banking industry have seen the value of their stock tumble and many of them are going withoutbonuses this year. For a great discussion on who’s suffering now and what’s coming next to Wall Street Cohan owns a management consulting and venture capital firm and teaches strategy at Babson College. He is a frequent commentator on developments in economics, technology,and finance and has appeared on ABC’s Good Morning America, CNN, CNBC, PBS’s Wall \$treet Week, and New England Cable News (NECN)
Scott Drake talks with Peter Cohan