Category Archives: Uncategorized

Wayne County Judge Continues to Defy the First Amendment

by Paul Alan Levy A status conference was held today in connection with Maged Moughni’s motion to vacate the impermissible prior restraint that Judge Kathleen McDonald issued a month ago, forbidding Moughni to discuss in public the class action lawsuit brought against McDonald’s for selling haram Chicken McNuggets that had been advertised as halal, or […]

“Living with ‘ADR’: Evolving Perceptions and Use of Mediation, Arbitration and Conflict Management in Fortune 1,000 Corporations”

That's the name of this article by Thomas Stipanowich and J. Ryan Lamare. Here's the abstract (with my italics added on the reference to consumer and products-liability arbitration): As attorneys for the world’s most visible clients, corporate counsel played a key role in the transformation of American conflict resolution in the late Twentieth Century. In […]

Will New US-EU “Trade” Negotiations Be Abused to Break Down Consumer Protection Standards on Both Sides of the Atlantic?

The Trans-Atlantic Consumer Dialogue ("TACD") a coalition of consumer organizations in both Europe and North America, has fired a shot across the bow of both the Obama Administration and the leadership of the EU, warning that "improving trade" through the proposed Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership ("TTIP") should not be a smokescreen for watering down […]

Illegal foreclosures against service members

That's the topic of this Dealbook article, which explains that banks have foreclosed on members of the military in violation of the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act. Here's an excerpt: The nation’s biggest banks wrongfully foreclosed on more than 700 military members during the housing crisis and seized homes from roughly two dozen other borrowers who […]

DOJ Responds to the D.C. Circuit’s “Noel Canning” Recess-Appointment Decision

We've posted many times about the D.C. Circuit's Noel Canning decision, which held that three putative recess appointments made by President Obama to the National Labor Relations Board were not proper recess appointments. Therefore, the court ruled, the appointments were invalid because they did not go through the Constitution's normal appointments process — presidential nomination and […]

More on the “Big Spring” challenge to the Dodd-Frank law and the CFPB

by Brian Wolfman The Big Spring suit filed in federal district court in D.C. challenges various provisions of the Dodd-Frank Wall St. reform law, including the legality of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, on separation-of-powers grounds. That suit includes a challenge to Richard Cordray's appointment as CFPB director as an impermissible (non-)recess appointment. We last posted […]

Federal banking regulators enter final $9.3 billion settlement with mortgage servicers; borrowers to receive cash and loan reductions

by Brian Wolfman Last month, we posted about a likely settlement between federal regulators and 13 major mortgage servicers — including some of the world's biggerst banks — that would make direct cash distributions to homeowners who lost their homes or went underwater during the financial crisis, in whole or in part because of improper […]