Here's a Ninth Circuit opinion that only the hard core civil procedure geeks will enjoy: Whether the filing of a conditional counterclaim in response to a federal declaratory relief action obviates the district court's common law discretion to decline to exercise jurisdiction over such claims.
Exciting, eh?
Okay, but you know what is exciting about the thing? The attorney for the appellant is from a firm in Minneapolis; not something you see in the Ninth Circuit every day. And the underlying litigation, as well as the oral argument in the Ninth Circuit, was in . . . Hawaii.
Going from snowy Minnesota in February 2021 for a Ninth Circuit oral argument in Hawaii. That does not suck.
Even if, as here, you lose.
