1. You’re concerned with informal bias, not the formal kind that, you know, actually might require recusal from a case. Some of us call these silly formalistic distinctions “facts” or, in some cases, “laws.” Nevertheless, you in fact write in your post about . . . recusal from a case. Like it or not, recusal requires that certain conditions be met. You imply in your post that those conditions are more than met. The reality is that those conditions were not even barely met. Intimation to the contrary, even in the service of stamping out your supposed “informalistic” bias, sure seems like a petty hit job to me.

2. The “Kirkpatrick Antitrust Conference” you refer to was one of the most laughable and transparently-biased efforts at self-justification I have ever seen. The entire conference was a series of post-Chicago and/or lefty academics and commentators–oh, no, I’m sorry. Richard Schmalensee was included for balance against the other 15-odd participants–asking answer-begging questions (“Is It Valid to Assume that Vertical Arrangements (Merger and Distribution) Can Very Rarely Injure Consumer Welfare?” Gosh, I wonder what their answer will be? . . .) to put forth their own pet theories along with some finger wagging at evil “conservatives” whose only justification for their misguided theories to the contrary must be bias because, who could disagree with little old me?

3. Where, exactly, in your post to you discuss this much-vaunted biased antitrust policy? It is kind of you to point to the substantive criticisms made in the Georgetown conference, but I’m just not sure your analysis quite rises to that level (“1. Majoras has worked for a law firm. 2. There she represented oil companies. 3. She is not fit to hold public office. QED.”). I’m sure you are concerned with the conservative economic influence on US antitrust policy. But your post employs knee-jerk claims of guilt by association and not a substantive assessment of antitrust economics. So you’ll have to excuse my having missed that as “evident in your post.”

Geoff, I highly commend to you a listen to the “Kirkpatrick Antitrust Conference: Conservative Economic Influence on U.S. Antitrust Policy,” available on iTunes or the Georgetown law school website. That’s the type of bias I’m interested in–not formalistic distinctions between whether someone is an equity partner or not. And that concern should have been evident in the post.