April 28, 2009

POS 359--The Current Supreme Court Term
In class today, Tuesday 4/28, we started with a discussion of a recent 4th Amendment case, Arizona v. Gant. We watched the c-span stakeout after the oral argument in the Safford case. Then I went over the background of the upcoming case of NW Austin M.U.D. #1 v. Holder, which will be argued tomorrow (Wednesday). The assignment if you are doing the Safford paper is to complete that paper, which is due at the beginning of class on Thursday, 4/30. If you are not doing the paper, I would like you to watch the c-span broadcast of the oral argument, which is the only argument authorized by the Court this term for same day audio release. (Go to c-span.org, and search around for the broadcast.)

CMJ 375--Mass Media Law
In class today, Tuesday 4/28, we began by going over today's Supreme Court decision in FCC v. Fox, which dealt with the issue of FCC regulation of "fleeting expletives". We then discussed the concepts of Chapter 9 of the text, including minority ownership and cross ownership FCC rules. The assignment for Thursday 4/30 is to read Chapter 10 of the text.