America is a writeoff. The needed innovation will take place in other countries. Sure, the once-mighty American giants (Motorola, Kodak, HP) will turn into patent trolls and try to block it, but it will be all for naught. Then they'll come, hat in hand, asking for yet another bailout.

to the military-industrial complex. How many of the 60 million or so uninsured Americans could have been provided with coverage for that money? I'm going to guess pretty close to all of them several times over. And this is just one program. If you'd have just let the Bush tax cuts for the extraordinarily wealthy expire, then you'd be in even better shape.

Personally, I gave up on America long ago. The country is a writeoff at this point, there's nothing left worth saving.

Fine the hell out of the "patriotic" corporations like Wal-Mart that hire illegals. $10,000 per worker per day is a good start.

Or, indeed, selling war materiel to the Nazis.

DHS has recommended dropping the colour-coded terror alert system.

Except that we don't know if it's a frivolous case yet. Why not? Because the complaint didn't give the defendants fair notice of which of their products allegedly infringed the patents in question. I agree that it's probably a dogshit case, but statements like yours are just plain ignorant. If it truly is a frivolous (i.e., completely unfounded, baseless or fraudulent) lawsuit, then Brother Paul will end up having to pay the other side's attorney fees as well as possibly additional sanctions. Make no mistake about it, courts are very well-equipped to deal with truly frivolous cases.

Damn, wish I had mod points.

Word of advice, though: Don't bother. Asperger's-addled coders in their 40s living in their parents' basements don't get that you can't fix the world's problems by recompiling your kernel for the 40,000th time.

Wrong.

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a)(2), a complaint is only required to have "a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief." Prior to 2007, this had been interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court to mean that the complaint would only fail if, on its face, the pleader could prove no set of facts that would entitle him to relief.

In 2007, the Supreme Court tightened up these standards in the two cases Judge Pechman referenced in her ruling. Now, to comply with Rule 8, a pleader must allege enough specific facts in support of his claim so that relief is more than speculative. In other words, "Staples, you infringed my patent, you bastards!" no longer cuts the mustard.

Prior to 2007, though, the type of boilerplate pleading that Paul Allen's lawyers submitted was just fine. They continued to get away with it until, as now, someone decided to call them out on it. The suggestion probably came from a summer associate who mentioned, "argue Twombly and Iqbal" in passing to his boss.

Just doing my part to correct some of the rampant legal illiteracy on /.

Now where are all of the burnout ex-military PTSD cases going to work?

The boy is already dead, don't you get it? Sure, he's breathing, but he's almost certainly in diapers and is most likely being fed through a tube. If your idiotic religion says that preserving this kind of "life" will help you get closer to your nonexistent god through suffering, fine. This boy, however, is being tortured in the name of said idiotic religion and probably has no say in the matter. That is wrong and this doctor should have his licence pulled.

Having such a disease renders the boy ineligible for a heart transplant . . .

your name happens to be Mickey Mantle, eh?

Remember that? He got a new liver after he nearly drank himself to death. Normally a transplant committee wouldn't even open the file in such a circumstance, but money talks.

caused by the Duchenne MD? Yes. Now this poor boy will have to live another 25 years locked in a body he has no control over. I'm sorry, but that's not life, hell, that's not even existence. That sounds more like, well, Hell.

Having such a disease renders the boy ineligible for a heart transplant, meaning almost certain death without an alternative solution.

Well, duh.

Dr. Amodeo found such an alternative in the form of a 90-gram, fully-robotic heart that took 10 hours to fit inside the boy's left ventricle. It is a permanent solution offering as much as 25 years of life and is powered by a battery worn as a belt."

What could POSSIBLY go wrong, eh?

This being very Catholic Italy, I have my suspicions that this whole exercise is being undertaken out of some perverse familial desire to keep the boy alive long enough for him to sire a male offspring, a la the case of the Boy in the Bubble.

This is easily rule 11 territory as any first year law student can tell you . . .

Any first year law student can tell you that Rule 11 is a civil rule, not a criminal one.

I don't know why I waste my time . . .

Also from the court documents:

Ms. Kanae was present at the hearing on this motion and admitted that she had assisted Mr. Smallwood in the preparation of his filing . . . Although she was not prepared to represent Mr. Smallwood at the hearing and argue on his behalf, Ms. Kanae has now appeared in this action, and the Court is confident that she will sign all future pleadings that she prepares (as she properly did for Plaintiff's Second Supplemental Mem.).

He's not pro se, in other words. He's represented by counsel.

You are correct, though, that as a pro se, he would have gotten creamed. The judge initially dismissed his complaint sua sponte for failure to properly allege federal jurisdiction. No way is this guy a lawyer.