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"You know who's on the panel, right? Do you think it's going to have much of a chance of surviving? I wouldn't bet on it," Judge Harry Pregerson said in an interview.

When you appeal something to a federal court of appeal, I thought the outcome of the appeal wasn't supposed to depend on who you get on your panel. </snickering off>

"Judge Paez, Judge Thomas and I ? we did the right thing," Pregerson said. "We're there to protect people's rights under the equal protection clause of the Constitution, no matter who's involved, and a lot of people don't like it. That's their problem, not mine."

Pregerson was having a snit, wasn't he? And he's wrong about his job description too. He's not their to "protect the people's rights." The judge is there to uphold the rule of law. The rights of the people are best protected by the jury - the true representatives of the people in the legal system.

This is a case where, hopefully, judicial activism will be tossed right into the wate basket, where it belongs.