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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

Well, that's not a thing you see every day.

Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

There's also a joke about how people are being increasingly willing to be absolute jerks and ought to be ashamed of themselves, but I guess that's not funny it's just true.

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Reposted by Dave Hoffman

Sam Brody @samuelhayimbrody.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

apropos of this latest round I will just mention that there has been antisemitism on the left since the beginning. the people who invented anticapitalism did so in an environment in which Judaism had been equated with bad economic practices for 600 years already. AND they didn’t know any Jews

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Obviously folks should decide for themselves what they want to hear from their mentors, as I said. And *yale's* particular version of this could be unusually distorted because the mentors perhaps are not always operating on the level given the repeated dance they engage in.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

That sounds so good. How do you police, well, AI?

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

... at the right time can be enormously helpful. As always, in all things moderation and make judgments that fit the situation. But imho advising candidates that they should bunker down is just not correct.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

...is the ability to calibrate and respond to cues. Now, feedback like "Sally thought you didn't cite her and consequently is against you" is bad, because it's unhelpful at best and possibly untrue. But feedback like "you are coming off as a jerk [or too shy, or not dynamic, etc.]" if given ...

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

The entry level academic hiring market is a social institution that's 100% tough to navigate (though easier than lateral hiring in some ways). For sure you will hear unhelpful things. But the job too has all kinds of challenging feedback, and part of the thing people are (fairly!) selected on...

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I can see the argument -- like the good advice, "do not rehash what you got wrong on the final after you take it." But fwiw, I think this is probably not good advice for many job market candidates, some of whom could actually benefit from course corrections.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

What is the product of the seminar?

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

When we write our paper you are going to see that the outline starts "Alexi writes her section about goldfinches here."

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Whatever, the advice stands. If he just thought of his nice little historical bon mots as birds and wrote about them in order all would be well.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

I think if you are writing about, say hypothetically, executive power, thinking of the court as a murder of crows would probably help.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

Just write about the great blue heron and then the little cattle egret and then the g-damned rose breasted grosbeak and you will be done I simply do not think this is so hard.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I can not wait to see what you are like after 25 years of listening to first and last day speeches at law schools.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

The chancery judges are or at least were actively on linkedin. It's a huge part of the story!

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

All the fun stuff is happening on linkedin, to be honest.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

If it's not that, then the claim would be just "when feeder federal appellate judges and supreme court judges talk about their conlaw dockets, we should consider most of what they say in public to contain no useful information" and that's true!

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Yes. I read you to be describing something like 20 people in total, who, knowing you are watching them, are asked to describe their jobs without saying anything interesting. But you are claiming that this represents (i) their true credal views; and (2) what "judges" overall think, no?

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I figured, which is why I'm encouraging you to listen to more people (who are judges) before making up your mind as to what they all hold as a creed.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Basically I think this is just descriptively not what happens at these speeches, having listened to many, even by federal judges. Even at graduation and convocation, where the very goal is to be banal, judges often say true and useful and interesting things!

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Yes, this is my point too. The Democracy Day speeches Beau describes as the norm and reflecting some inherent staleness in judicial culture are, in fact, aberrant and don't even reflect a good account of what someone like Elena Kagan says.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

They are communicating a *ton* in all kinds of settings, including in speeches crisscrossing the country, and even on linkedin. There's zero sense that they are outside and above the tumult. So, it's a counterexample. And no good, I think, to just say "yeah, that's not judging."

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Look at Chancery's reaction to SB21. It's super interesting -- lots of talk about competence, arguments about who is really captured, what the franchise means to Delaware, layers of authority. It's all there!

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I do not think you have Chancery in mind in your Crown gallery, but I'm encouraging you to think more broadly about the actors that are worthy of your attention and thus possibly change your views about the state of the polity!

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

I think my point is that Chancery judges talk a ton about what they are doing & their relationship to the economy, and it's not nearly so woo-woo as your Crown analogy implies is the norm. They'll talk about the DE franchise, though! I think maybe you are selecting on the DV.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

You should read more of what DE Chancery Court judges say. You might have your faith restored.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

I did not use that gif to avoid that exact critique.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

Jokes on me, my hoard isn't a treasure chest after all. bsky.app/profile/kvet...

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Real "we have said what the law IS" energy.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Nah, it's mostly always indulgent and lazy.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

It's true senior yale professors have earned the privilege of saying they are bored.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Don't you want to build society Anthony?

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

The comment is obnoxious but I've heard it so many times!

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

I used to but now the volume is too high. And I'm afraid the public law people are going to pangram my emails and accuse me of abandoning the core academic mission, leading to societal collapse.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Can we at least all agree its morally licit and entirely within bounds to have AI draft noncommital email responses to undergrads seeking legal advice on their startups. Probably not, says @jdmortenson.bsky.social.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Jokes on you people, I have 20 in my tallis bag and I'm set for years.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

It's not puking at you. More the affiant saith not.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

This is a real problem as is sorting signal from noise!

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Tenure rates approach 98% so my prior is "give you tenure." :)

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

AI stuff is amazing for replicability, obviously, since it permits replication to be run at scale across papers instead of being left to a few paladins with often bad social skills.

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Dave Hoffman @hoffprof.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

I don't want to police the bounds of the research community exactly. I obviously think empirical work is scholarship! But I understood your point to be that using AI degraded that as an activity and my view is that this point resonates more for identity-linked normative writing.

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