The Price of Defending Bigotry - $520/hour

I want to do a quick follow up on lovechilde's post today on the House Republicans' defense of DOMA. Regardless of what you think about the pressure on King & Spalding to drop the case (and I'm not sure I agree with lovechilde on that point) here is something to get mad about:

Think Progress got their hands on the contract (pdf) the House Republicans signed with Paul Clement, who is still defending DOMA at his new firm (though I'm not sure if the terms are the same). Under the contract, which Democrats have rightly criticized, he is to be paid $520 hour up to a cap of $500,000. The current Federal Rate for attorneys in capital cases, cases in which a human life is on the line, is $178 hour. If you are going to represent the government in defense of the indefensible as budgets for basic human needs, including lawyers for poor people, are slashed it is deeply offensive to get rich doing it.