I think it was Thomas Jefferson who first said ‘Laws are great, in theory, but…’

As his other project, the University of Virginia, gets further backed into a corner on the ‘Hockey Stick’ records it is spending upwards of a half a million dollars to keep from the public (even though the public paid for and has every right to them), we now see what Charlottesville radio host Joe Thomas of WCHV likes to note in this context as “UVA getting its Nixon on”. This time with a little help from its friends outraged that laws would be applied to the academic class:

Delegate David Toscano
211 East High Street
Charlottesville, VA 22902
434.220.1660 PHONE
434.220-1677 FAX
www.davidtoscano.com

******MEDIA ADVISORY******

Press Conference

Richmond –Senator A. Donald McEachin (D-Henrico), Senator J. Chapman Petersen (D-Fairfax) and Delegate David Toscano (D-Charlottesville) will hold a press conference on Tuesday, January 18, 2011, in Senate Room 1 at the Capitol at 10:45 am to discuss their proposed legislation that repeals and limits the authority of the Attorney General to issue civil investigative demands.

Who: Senators McEachin, Petersen and Delegate Toscano

What: Press Conference on CID authority

Where: Senate Room 1

When: 10:45 am

Why: Limit the Attorney General’s authority to issue CIDs

At this press conference someone in the press might ask (hey, stop laughing) why the legislators in unanimously passing this law in both chambers forgot to exempt the academic class when passing the law. Or, did they just think it would be applied to people doing things they didn’t approve of?

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As you can read here, retired Albemarle County (Virginia) Circuit Judge Paul Peatross has ruled that Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli may not have access to records under Virginia’s Fraud Against Taxpayers Act, as he seeks to determine the propriety of Michael “Hockey Stick” Mann’s claims made to obtain research funding. Judge Peatross’s ruling protects Mann, the University, and specifically the Department of Environmental Sciences, at least for now.

Here’s the rub, on which I will have more to say. I attended the hearing a week ago Friday at which the parties argued the University’s motion to dismiss. The Deputy AG Wesley Russell’s arguments dominated, so badly I almost felt sorry for the University. The judge’s queries were puzzling, as he pleaded with the University’s counsel to come up with some argument how he might rule in their favor, as were other comments (continue reading).

Before the hearing commenced Peatross, substituting for the vacationing chief judge, cited his wife’s 1982 degree in environmental science from UVA –  oddly, he then said “but not in global warming” — as part of a rather spare recitation of why he was hearing of this case (which he attested he had never heard about until reading the briefs that morning. A prominent case in the local, state and national news assigned to his old court! This man takes his retirement seriously…), and articulating his history so that counsel might decide whether he carried any conflict such that he should not hear the University’s motion.

That fact of her 1982 degree from Mann’s former Department, apparently, was relevant. Okay. But…

The fact that the judge’s wife had in fact previously worked in that Department of Environmental Sciences — the very Department that stands to suffer should he have ruled in favor of the Attorney General – was somehow not worth disclosing to counsel.

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From the ever-awesome Angus McColloch: