The Curmudgeonly Clerk has done his usual fine job dissecting the trouble with Judge Calabresi's recent outburst to the American Constitution Society. Basically, may have crossed a line of ethical conduct for federal judges by advocating the removal of President Bush.

Now, let's face it, the fact Calabresi wants folks not to vote for Bush isn't the best-kept secret since the location of Saddam's WDM. And suggesting to members of the American Constitution Society that voting for Bush might be a bad idea could be the single most redundant political action ever done by a supposedly non-partisan entity. So I'm not going to go over whether the Honorable Judge dishonored his oaths: the Clerk's accusations speak for themselves. Instead, I want to examine two peripheral issues.

First, let's take one statement he's reported to have made. Like Prof. Volokh, I'm suspicious about how accurate the reporting has been--since I have but one original source of the quotations--but assuming it's correct, try this on for size:

�I�m a judge and so I�m not allowed to talk politics. So I�m not going to talk about some of the issues that were mentioned or what some have said is the extraordinary record of incompetence of this administration,� he said.

Now, if Calabresi were as strictly textualist as Scalia, I'd say he might be able to get away with this with a straight face. Still, Calabresi isn't the name that first springs to mind when I think 'textualist.' I've no Lexis access at the moment, so I'm at a loss for a direct quote from a case, but I remember reading several of his decisions, and I can't imagine he'd have given a defendant such leeway in his own court. The man who wrote that horrible meat grinder tort case we read just doesn't seem to be the textual type. (Happy to be proven wrong on this, of course.)

And that comparison to Scalia brings us to the next point. Remember all the furor over the Duck Hunt of Doom, featuring a Justice and a Vice-President? All over the New York Times for days, right?

Well, as of today, what have we of Calabresi's speech in our 'Newspaper of Record?' According to this search, absolutely nothing. Now, I know, I know, you could say that Calabresi isn't a Supreme, so maybe it's not worth the notice of the Fading Lady. But then, Calabresi does sit on the Second Circuit, with his office in Manhattan; his bailiwick, as it were, is New York; and the honorable judge isn't exactly swiss cheese when it comes to his reputation. It's certainly news, and it's news in New York. Which the NYT sometimes pretends to cover.