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Author: William A. Jacobson

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William A. Jacobson

William A. Jacobson is a Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Securities Law Clinic at Cornell Law School.

He is a 1981 graduate of Hamilton College and a 1984 graduate of Harvard Law School. At Harvard he was Senior Editor of the Harvard International Law Journal and Director of Litigation for the Harvard Prison Legal Assistance Project.

Prior to joining the Cornell law faculty in 2007, Professor Jacobson had a highly successful civil litigation and arbitration practice in Providence, Rhode Island, concentrating in investment, employment, and business disputes in the securities industry, including many high profile cases reported in leading newspapers and magazines.

Professor Jacobson has argued cases in numerous federal and state courts, including the Courts of Appeal for the First, Fifth and Sixth Circuits, and the Rhode Island Supreme Court.

Professor Jacobson has a national reputation as a leading practitioner in securities arbitration. He was Treasurer, and is a former member of the Executive Committee and Board of Directors of the Public Investors Arbitration Bar Association, a professional organization of attorneys dedicated to protecting public investors. He frequently is quoted in national media on issues related to investment fraud and investor protection, and in the past has served as one of a small number of private practice attorneys who trained new arbitrators for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.

Professor Jacobson is co-author of the Securities Arbitration Desk Reference (Thomson-Reuters), updated annually.

Professor Jacobson is frequently quoted in the media on political and legal topics, has authored many Op-Eds in major publications, and appears on television and radio to discuss politics and the law.

A more complete listing of Professor Jacobson's professional background is available at the Cornell Law School website. The views expressed here are his own and not those of any employer or organization,

The best way to reach Prof. Jacobson is by e-mail here.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 31, 2014 10 Comments
NY-23, my home district, is a focus for both parties for 2014 because it is one of only a few competitive districts. The district is geographically enormous, a mostly rural area running along the Southern Tier of upstate New York. Once you leave Ithaca, it's a whole other country. Which is why incumbent Republican Tom Reed should be okay by a few percentage points. 2nd Amendment rights, and opposition to the NY SAFE Act, are big issues. Tompkins County, which includes Ithaca, is the exception. Tompkins County is one of only two upstate counties which has not passed a Resolution opposing the SAFE Act. County Opposition to SAFE Act ao January 2014 Guess who was the Democratic Chair of the Tompkins County legislature: Martha Robertson, the Emily's List-backed challenger to Reed. The SAFE Act is in play in the race because of Robertson's confusing voting record, where she appears to have both voted for and against the SAFE Act. WETM 18 reports:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 31, 2014 29 Comments
That's pretty much the evidence presented in this article by a former TSA employee, Dear America, I Saw You Naked: And yes, we were laughing. It starts with the absurd:
I hated it from the beginning. It was a job that had me patting down the crotches of children, the elderly and even infants as part of the post-9/11 airport security show. I confiscated jars of homemade apple butter on the pretense that they could pose threats to national security. I was even required to confiscate nail clippers from airline pilots—the implied logic being that pilots could use the nail clippers to hijack the very planes they were flying. Once, in 2008, I had to confiscate a bottle of alcohol from a group of Marines coming home from Afghanistan. It was celebration champagne intended for one of the men in the group—a young, decorated soldier. He was in a wheelchair, both legs lost to an I.E.D., and it fell to me to tell this kid who would never walk again that his homecoming champagne had to be taken away in the name of national security.... I quickly discovered I was working for an agency whose morale was among the lowest in the U.S. government. In private, most TSA officers I talked to told me they felt the agency’s day-to-day operations represented an abuse of public trust and funds.
.... and goes on to the disgusting:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 31, 2014 44 Comments
When Elizabeth Warren's fake Cherokee status broke in late April 2012, Warren's campaign went into panic for several days, issuing statements about Warren's ancestry that proved troublesome when compared to the facts. The entire issue was portrayed as a Scott Brown campaign dirty trick, and the Boston Herald -- the city's not-completely-liberal paper -- was attacked. Warren even entertained questions herself initially, reciting tales of her Aunt Bee and high cheekbones which both were laughable and questionable. Not that long after the Cherokee narrative broke, and endangered her campaign, Warren's campaign found a theme -- don't attack my family, I'm not backing away from my parents -- and stuck to it relentlessly. With a mostly sympathetic press in tow, Warren somewhat successfully reframed the issue away from her demeaning usurpation of Native American identity for employment purposes to why people were attacking her family. Warren also went into media shutdown, refusing to answer any questions except when confronted in unavoidable situations. Even then, Warren robotically stuck to the stript of defending her family. Warren avoided one-on-one interviews with anyone other than sycophants until the day before the Massachusetts Democratic state convention, when the Cherokee narrative threatened to derail Warren's attempt to keep her only Democratic rival, Marisa DeFranco, off the ballot. The convention-eve interviews, where Warren of course stuck to script, were enough to quiet party concerns, and DeFranco was kept off the ballot. I don't know if Warren's false narrative ever would have doomed her campaign, considering it was Massachusetts, but the script and press control worked for electoral purposes. Fast forward to Wendy Davis.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 31, 2014 7 Comments
A Resolution passed yesterday by the Philadelphia City Council is a good reflection of how deeply the pushback against the American Studies Association academic boycott of Israel has reached in American civil and political society.  (Full Resolution embedded at bottom of post.)
Condemning the American Studies Association’s academic boycott against Israeli academic institutions and urging the Department of Education, the State System of Higher Education and all colleges and universities in Pennsylvania to reject the academic boycott.

* * *

WHEREAS, The academic boycott of Israeli academic institutions, including colleges and universities, serves to restrict academic freedom and hinders the collaboration and free flow of information between academics all over the world; and WHEREAS, Academic freedom, the free flow of information and ideas and international academic collaboration are crucial factors in promoting progress in all areas of study from the hard sciences and technology to the humanities; and .... WHEREAS, Academic freedom is an indispensable component of a free and democratic society and should be guarded vigilantly; and WHEREAS, The American Studies Association’s call for an academic boycott of Israeli academic institutions threatens academic freedom and should therefore be rejected; now, therefore, be it RESOLVED BY THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA, That the City Council condemns the American Studies Association’s academic boycott of Israeli academic institutions and urges the Department of Education, the State System of Higher Education and all colleges and universities in Pennsylvania to reject the academic boycott.
The Philadelphis Resolution was proposed by Councilman Kenyatta Johnson, who made the announcement on his Facebook and Twitter pages. https://www.facebook.com/CouncilmanKenyattaJohnson#!/CouncilmanKenyattaJohnson/posts/574424249299048?stream_ref=10

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 31, 2014 26 Comments
Kevin Drum at Mother Jones has noticed the obvious -- The NY Times is devoting enormous resources to going after Chris Christie. The Times has found its mark, and now just needs actual news and actual wrongdoing to take him out. As Drum describes it, No Smoking Guns Yet, But the Noose Is Tightening Around Chris Christie:
The New York Times is pretty clearly expending a lot of resources on the various Chris Christie scandals. So far they haven't produced any smoking guns, but they're sure digging up some stuff that doesn't look good for Team Christie. First up is a look at the Christie political team, which was apparently obsessed with winning votes in Democratic-leaning towns. This wasn't because the votes themselves were all that critical to Christie's 2012 reelection campaign, but because winning in these places "would validate the governor’s argument that he would be the most broadly appealing Republican choice for president in 2016" ....
After describing a couple of Times pieces that show no direct evidence of wrongdoing, just a tough politician, Drum concludes:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 30, 2014 24 Comments
WOAI 1200 in San Antonio had an article yesterday about Wendy Davis having her daughters defend her mothering, Involvement of Davis Daughters Seen as High Stakes Gambit in Governor's Race. The article quoted an SMU political analyst as indicating bringing the daughters out was a risky move that might work, but that the campaign should have anticipated the issue:
“Their fundraising numbers went very well, but they seemed to be unprepared by what they should have expected, an assault by the Greg Abbott campaign on the story that Wendy Davis wanted to tell about herself and her rise from difficult circumstances to be a candidate for governor,” Jillson said. “She should have been prepared for this assault and had better answers and responses ready to go.” ... “This is really a new candidate to statewide office being rocked by charges that should have been anticipated,” Jillson said. “It remains to be seen whether she will be taken down by these charges.”
One of the comments to the article caught my eye, because it made a point similar to what I made in Wendy Davis is the Deja Victim candidate, that the public may react negatively to a candidate who has her children fight her battles for her. Here's part of the comment, with the full comment embedded below:
Letting her children fight media political battles for her by sending in "don't be mean to my mommy" letters is just weak. She needs to put on her big girl panties, accept the reality of what she has chosen to do, and stop whining about it or she has given up before she even gets started.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 30, 2014 28 Comments
Scarlett Johhansson has been under attack by the anti-Israel Boycott Divest and Sanction (BDS) movement because she became a "Global Brand Ambassador" for SodaStream, the Israeli company that has factories around the world, including one in the "West Bank." See yesterday's post,  SodaStream wins French court case against boycott group, for more about how SodaStream's factory has become a model of cooperation, employing over 500 Palestinians on the same terms and conditions as Israelis, and providing a boost for the moribund and corrupt Palestinian economy. BDS doesn't care. Palestinians literally are starving to death in Syria, yet BDS is obsessed with SodaStream. Even supporters of the anti-Israel group Anonymous saw the absurdity: Anonymous Israel Johansson Yarmouk As readers know, BDS is not about supporting Palestinians, it's about hating Israel's existence. Johansson also has been a global ambassador for Oxfam International.  Oxfam has an image of a neutral, non-political humanitarian organization that only cares about feeding the poor and improving living conditions. That's a false image.  Oxfam is a BDS supporter as to the disputed West Bank, you just didn't know it.  BDS started harassing Oxfam demanding it cut its ties to Johansson.  When Oxfam announced that it was reviewing her role, Johansson beat them to the punch and resigned last night. Johansson didn't just resign, though, she unmasked Oxfam's support for BDS as incompatible with growing peaceful relations between Israelis and Palestinians, as AP reported:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 29, 2014 9 Comments
This is a small win, but a win is a win. We need a lot more such legal challenges to anti-Israel boycott groups, who  are propagandists and have no compunctions about lying and making up accusations in the worst tradition of Pallywood. Whether it's hummus, coffee cafes, or academic scholars, there is nothing Israeli that the deranged Boycott, Divest and Sanction movement will not attack. SodaStream has been under attack for years, with BDS groups trying to keep the product out of stores and commercials off the airwaves. The BDS movement is so obsessed with SodaStream that it even uses a term, Greenwashing, to complain about SodaStream touting the environmental benefits of its product. SodaStream has a compelling story to tell, however, as a bridge for peace, one we have focused on before: SodaStream just won a case against a French BDS group, getting a small amount of damages but also an order that the group stop claiming that it is illegal for stores to sell SodaStream products. As reported by Haaretz:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 29, 2014 26 Comments
Wendy Davis' core political narrative was one of overcoming victimhood -- an abandoned single teenage mom  who struggled to raise her family in a trailer park and overcame the odds to work her way through college and Harvard Law School, and on to a successful law career, through grit and determination. Only problem was, the narrative was misleading, at best. Davis was a single mom of a single child for only a short time (from ages 21-23), had family to help, only lived in a trailer park for a short transition period, and quickly married a wealthy older man who paid her way way through college and law school and brought her into his business after she graduated. She had another child with that man, Jeff Davis, and he was the primary custodial parent, so much so that when they divorced he was awarded custody of their minor child, and even Wendy's first child from her prior marriage, then in college, chose to live with her step-father.  Jeff Davis was quoted, as to Wendy Davis leaving her 9th grade daughter in his custody:
“She did the right thing,” he said. “She said, ‘I think you’re right; you’ll make a good, nurturing father. While I’ve been a good mother, it’s not a good time for me right now.’”
Wendy moved out the day after Jeff paid her last student loan bill. The firestorm of controversy has set Davis back on her heels.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 29, 2014 3 Comments
We previously have mentioned that the Speaker of the NY State Assembly, Sheldon Silver, is backing an Assembly bill barring use of state funds to support participation in organizations -- such as the American Studies Association -- that conduct academic boycotts, and cutting off state funding for higher education institutions that violate the prohibition. Silver's backing virtually guarantees it will pass the Assembly. Now the NY State Senate has passed a similar, but not identical, bill, as reported by Capitol Confidential:
The state Senate by an overwhelming majority voted for a bill introduced by Sen. Jeff Klein that would prohibit any public or private college or university from using state funds to support through funding any academic entity “if that academic entity has undertaken an official action boycotting certain countries or their higher education institutions.” The bill is in reaction to the American Studies Association’s controversial boycott of Israel over that nation’s treatment of Palestinians. While almost entirely symbolic, the ASA’s action is viewed by Israel’s supporters as a potential camel’s nose under the tent (if you can say that about a controversy involving the Middle East) for broader divestment efforts. Klein amended his original bill, which would have used the bazooka-vs.-fly approach of denying all state funds to any school that supported such an organization. The revised bill includes several carveouts:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 28, 2014 20 Comments
As have many people, Bristol Palin weighed in on the Wendy Davis narrative, and took issue with what she called the "Made-for-TV-Movie-Type-Tale." When Davis was asked about it, she took the bait (video at bottom of post), generating headlines that must make seasoned political types and progressive Davis supporters in the media cringe, such as: NBC Wendy Davis Bristol Palin Palin was less harsh towards Davis than many have been.  But really, why is Davis responding to any individual's criticism? Those who hate the Palins already are voting for Davis. Bristol Palin is not Wendy Davis' problem, Wendy Davis' narrative is Wendy Davis' problem. Here's the video:
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