WHAT HAPPENED TO UNDERNEATH THEIR ROBES? . . . As Mike Cernovich of Crime & Federalism noted, Underneath Their Robes is suddenly password-protected. I happened to be looking at the weblog as it happened (see my last entry), and I took a screen shot to illustrate the post titled "This Blog Has Been Taken Offline," which I couldn't get to without running into the password protection.

Very odd. Does it have anything to do with the unkind comments at The Volokh Conspiracy about the author's New Yorker coverage? Does it mean UTR is no more? I don't know.

UPDATE: Part of Underneath Their Robes can still be read (for now) at Bloglines. Link from The World According to Pooh. And the anonymous editor of Blawg Review has a UTR retrospective.

UPDATE 2: I have some more thoughts on David Lat's miscalculation here.

Comments

[Samuel Alito]

The "Free Underneath their Robes" campaign is already underway at:

http://samuelalito.blogspot.com

[Editor]

Anybody else got any classic moments in A3G history?

February 03, 2005

Courthouse Forum: Jeffrey Toobin!

Article III Groupie realizes that she has been neglecting her blog since the start of the new year. To be sure, one of her New Year's resolutions was to spend less time on UTR -- but perhaps she has now moved to the other extreme, spending too little time on her beloved blawg. She has numerous draft posts waiting to be revised and published, countless ideas for posts she hasn't even started drafting, and several weeks' worth of reader mail to reply to.

Part of the blame for her blogging backlog lies with her day job, which has been extremely busy as of late. But A3G is beginning to think that her reluctance to blog and to respond to e-mail -- or even to check her blog e-mail account, where the queue of unresponded-to messages grows longer and longer each day -- may be due to avoidant personality disorder. So please don't be upset at A3G for her inactivity; she can't help herself.

Discussion These days A3G will seize upon any excuse for avoiding UTR-related tasks. She rationalized her recent laziness by telling herself that she needed to give the blogosphere time to digest her last, massive post -- a deliciously dishy take on the Federalist Society's National Lawyers Convention. Unfortunately, to A3G's disappointment, only a brave few dared to comment upon or link to her Robing Room Report. But even though her latest post didn't get much of a public reception, A3G knows -- from her well-placed spies -- that it generated significant buzz among the legal profession's chattering class.

Well, now that over a week has passed, A3G no longer has that excuse. But she is still plauged by blogging lethargy. So she'll do what she does whenever she's feeling otiose: she will take someone else's words and reprint them (with permission) in her blog, in Courthouse Forum: Letters to Article III Groupie.

Today's magnificent missive, which also includes a request for information (a.k.a. a UTR Discovery Request), comes from a celebrity who needs no introduction:

Dear A3G,

I am a fan of your blog. I am writing a book about the Supreme Court, and I wonder if you'd post a note -- or this note -- saying that I would welcome any tips, opinions or leads that your readers may care to offer. I can be reached at [click here for email address].

Many thanks,
Jeff Toobin

No, you don't need Lasik surgery; yes, you read that correctly. A3G just received fan mail from one of our nation's foremost legal journalists, Jeffrey Toobin! For those of you who have been living in a cave for the past decade, Mr. Toobin is the renowned CNN legal analyst, New Yorker legal affairs writer, and bestselling author of several critically acclaimed books.

A3G encourages you all to contact Mr. Toobin with tidbits for his book on the Supreme Court. To kick things off, A3G offers Mr. Toobin her own shamelessly self-promoting suggestion: Wouldn't UTR, and its reception among federal judges, make a great subject for a brief, breezy, brilliantly funny Talk of the Town piece for The New Yorker? Article III Groupie is ready for her close-up -- and insanely jealous of the New York Times write-up received a few weeks ago by the Anonymous Lawyer blog of Jeremy Blachman (who appears to be parlaying his blog into a career as a television writer).*

Turning Prada green with envy,

Article III Groupie

* Speaking of lawyers-turned-writers like Messrs. Toobin and Blachman, lately A3G has been entertaining thoughts of making such a transition (perhaps out of growing frustration with law firm life). To this end, she requests any editors out there who might be willing to give her some freelance writing work to please e-mail her.

More specifically, would anyone be interested in picking up "So You Wanna Be a Supreme Court Clerk"? The piece is a delightful 1,000-word essay containing A3G's advice to law school gunners concerning how to join the ranks of the Elect.

A3G knows what you're thinking: "Dissembling harlot, you are one of the Great Unwashed. I can smell your foul stench through my computer screen. What do you know about getting a Supreme Court clerkship?" Well, even though A3G can't write from personal experience, her article reflects insights gleaned from years of keen, quasi-obsessive observation of those who have made it to One First Street.

February 03, 2005 at 03:50 AM in Courthouse Forum: Letters to Article III Groupie, UTR Discovery Requests: Seeking Sneak Peaks Under the Robes | Permalink