Brief Travesty

The weather today in D.C. is arguably the nicest it has been in months -- sunny, clear, and around 60 degrees. All that sunshiny spring goodness is just begging for people of sound mind and body to get out for a hike or a bike ride or a stroll along the shore of the Potomac. But the weather is mocking me, because instead of going out and enjoying this first great taste of spring, I'm sitting inside, hunched over this damned machine, in a death match with my final legal writing/moot court competition brief.

Law school, I curse you.

______
Posted while listening to: Holdin' On - High On Hope from the album "Tuff Jams - Speed Garage" by Various Artists - Ultra Records

Posted 11:15 AM | Comments (1) | law school

Where Are They Now?

Does anyone know where Liable has gone? She was keeping us delighted and updated on her law school progress last summer and early fall in a fairly regular way, and then just stopped. I've left her on the blogroll in hopes she'd return, but alas, it doesn't seem to be happening. Does anyone know if she's doing ok?

And much more recently, what happened to Sue? Did she take the blog down, or what? I didn't comment too often, but I've been visiting her nearly every day for months now, and my daily surf just isn't the same without her updates about classes, papers, and the follies of her peers.

So Sue or Elle, if you're reading this, I hope you're doing well, and I'd love to hear from you...

It's hard to track the blogs that come and go, such as Think, Inc., which was fun for a short while, and Cicero's Ghost, which I thought was gone, but now seems back? Both are (or were?) part of the Michigan law blogs thing, of which there are a growing number -- a short list is available on the links list over at Letters of Marque, which is a definite must-read (and not just because she recently linked to ai, although what more reason do you need?).

Posted 07:20 AM | Comments (2) | meta-blogging

New Wheels

Everyone's getting new cars these days, it seems. Sherry was looking and looking, looking, and thinking and looking and trying to choose between practicality and seduction, and then she bought and loved. You might sift through the comments to some of those posts if you're shopping for a car -- there's some good advice in there, including a link to the Confessions of a Car Salesman. Gotta know what you're getting into.

I was surprised to see that no one recommended the Prius. (Review, specs.)If that's not a dream car, I don't know what is. Wouldn't you just feel great driving a car like that? And isn't that what cars are for? To make you feel good? But ok, even if cars are for transportation and practicality, what's more practical than 60 mpg and super low emissions? Good for your wallet, good for the planet, just plain good.

But perhaps a good (or any) used Prius is hard to come by. They're still pretty new and there just aren't that many of them around, especially out in the wild wild west, where my sister and mother also just got new cars. Sis got a little red wagon, and mom got a little red toy (the 1999 Import Car of the Year!) Both got great deals on cars I would love to have. I've wanted an Outback since I first saw one; it's the perfect vehicle for throwing your bike in the back and going anywhere. And, of course, who wouldn't want a Beetle? And this one's a diesel, so mom's looking at 40-45 mpg. That's not quite Prius-level and there's still the emissions issue, but it's a definite step in the right direction.

Finally, someone else I know is shopping for a new new car, but she has to buy a GM, and maybe specifically a Chevrolet. So if you were shopping for a new car and you were forced to buy GM, what would you buy? If I could get any GM make, I'd probably look closely at the Saturn ION in rain forest green (roomy, cheap, fairly economical at 26/35 mpg w/manual trans.) . If the choices were limited to Chevrolets, I'd have to go for the 5-door Aveo in spicy orange (small, cheap, but sporty; good economy at 26/34 mpg), or maybe the Venture van (roomy and peppy, although it doesn't get great gas mileage at 19/26 mpg).

Of course, I'm not buying a new car or a new used car, which makes me think of the Dead Milkmen song, "Everybody's Got Nice Stuff But Me" (scroll down a bit):

People in nice cars how'd they get em? I close my eyes try to forget em Went out swimming got hit by a jet-ski Everybody's got nice stuff but me I wanna car I wanna jet-ski

Ok, so it's not true. I have lots of nice stuff, but I'm thinking of the song, anyway. It's a fun song.

And but so: Congratulations to all these new car owners (and the future new car owner). Good luck with those wheels, and may they roll long and trouble-free.

Posted 07:08 AM | Comments (5) | life generally

That Marriage Bidness

The other day Democratic Congressman Jim McDermott (WA) made a short, 1-minute speech about the definition of marriage and the proposed amendment to the Constitution. Below is a slightly more extensive version of McDermott's remarks that arrived in my inbox, thanks to some crazy married kids (with kids!) currently lost in the cornfields of the midwest. McDermott said:

The Presidential Prayer Team is currently urging us to: "Pray for the President as he seeks wisdom on how to legally codify the definition of marriage. Pray that it will be according to Biblical principles. With any forces insisting on variant definitions of marriage, pray that God's Word and His standards will be honored by our government." This is true.

Any good religious person believes prayer should be balanced by action. So here, in support of the Prayer Team's admirable goals, is a proposed Constitutional Amendment codifying marriage entirely on biblical principles:

A. Marriage in the United States shall consist of a union between one man and one or more women. (Gen 29:17-28; II Sam 3:2-5)

B. Marriage shall not impede a man's right to take concubines in addition to his wife or wives. (II Sam 5:13; I Kings 11:3; II Chron 11:21)

C. A marriage shall be considered valid only if the wife is a virgin. If the wife is not a virgin, she shall be executed. (Deut 22:13-21)

D. Marriage of a believer and a non-believer shall be forbidden. (Gen 24:3; Num 25:1-9; Ezra 9:12; Neh 10:30)

E. Since marriage is for life, neither this Constitution nor the constitution of any State, nor any state or federal law, shall be construed to permit divorce. (Deut 22:19; Mark 10:9)

F. If a married man dies without children, his brother shall marry the widow. If he refuses to marry his brother's widow or deliberately does not give her children, he shall pay a fine of one shoe and be otherwise punished in a manner to be determined by law. (Gen. 38:6-10; Deut 25:5-10)

So um, yeah. Marriage is sacred and very clearly defined. The Bible says so, and that's "a god-breathed book!" Come to think of it, we should just do everything just like the Bible says! Otherwise we'll go straight to hayell. That silly Constitution thinks it's so darned smart with its separation of church and state and all that nonsense. Well we'll show the Constitution who's boss. Why stop at amendments? Let's just throw the whole thing out and let the Bible tell us what to do! Paradise, here we come!

Posted 09:29 AM | Comments (7) | general politics

Give'Em Enough Rope

One piece of advice I got in my mock trial competition last weekend was to play nice with uncooperative witnesses. Don't press them on their evasiveness or implausible answers. Instead, give them a couple of chances to come clean, and if they don't, just keep moving. The idea is that if you just give some people enough rope, they'll hang themselves.

The same may be true of the Bush administration. Since day one, beginning around the time of its abrupt withdrawal from the Kyoto Treaty, I've been thinking/hoping the Bush administration would press its perceived advantages too far, doing things so outrageous that even its staunchest supporters would be forced to withdraw their support. So far, it hasn't happened. No matter what awful new outrage the administration propounds, it still seems to maintain support from around half the country. However, in just the last few days it's been piling outrage on outrage:

Secretary of Education Rod Paige called the National Education Association (NEA) -- the teacher's union -- "a terrorist organization."

Bush''s chief economic advisor thinks jobs at McDonald's should be reclassified as "manufacturing jobs":

In [Bush's annual economic] report last week, Bush's chief economic adviser N. Gregory Mankiw called the definition "somewhat blurry" and asked whether it should be changed. "When a fast-food restaurant sells a hamburger, for example, is it providing a 'service' or is it combining inputs to 'manufacture' a product?"

Yeah, right.

And now Bush is backing a Constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage. Of course this is a political ploy. One of the best things I've heard from John Kerry is that Bush is "playing politics with the Constitution." But why Bush is taking this position is not as important as the simple fact that he's taking it. The POTUS is asking that discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation be written into the Constitution.

Again I say: Yeah, right.

All of this has caused L's dad to write to our dear POTUS to complain. The last line of his letter pretty much says it all:

President Bush, even if you personally shot Osama bin Laden tomorrow, I still would not vote for you in November.

And this from a man who voted Bush/Cheney in 2000. You gotta love that.

Posted 06:55 AM | Comments (8) | election 2004

What's Happening in Haiti?

Why is the democratically-elected leader in Haiti under attack from armed rebels? And why will no one step in to help settle the issue? From the AP we get general summaries of events that don't tell us too much about why any of this is happening. On the surface, you'd think the Bush administration, with its constant talk of strengthening democracy around the globe, would want to help Aristide. But that's not what we're doing. Instead the U.S. is stalling and more or less saying Aristide should bow to the so-called rebels. Why?

The AP keeps talking about "flawed elections" in 2000 that caused Aristide to lose the support of the international community. Hmm. Maybe. The AP claims that Aristide hasn't been helping the people of Haiti as he said he would. Again, it's possible. But according to this from an apparent Aristide supporter, around 90% of Haitians support Aristide. So why have the "rebels"/"terrorists" been able to make so much trouble? The same source says it's because the U.S. has been funding them. And why would the U.S. do that? Possibly because Aristide's policies aren't good for corporate America.

So what do we believe? There seems to be plenty of evidence in the historical record of U.S. involvement in small developing nations to support the idea that the U.S. has been largely responsible for supporting the trouble in Haiti. Apparently Congresswoman Maxine Waters believes that. Then again, it's always possible that Aristide has become a power-hungry, anti-democratic demagogue. What do you believe? Why?

Posted 06:25 AM | Comments (3) | general politics

Advice for Insomniacs

If you ever have trouble sleeping, try reading about the Rule Against Perpetuities (RAP) in a property law textbook. I guarantee you'll find yourself falling asleep almost immediately. That is all.

Posted 07:33 PM | law school

Owning Precedent

Aside from being today's model of bad writing, Peralta v. Heights Medical Center comes in a line of CivPro reading about dismissing cases (Rules 55 and 41). The reading raises the question:

Who "owns" the judgment of a court? In legal systems in which the judges do the primary investigation of cases (as is true in most civil law systems), the question seems to have a clear answer: The court does. In a system like that of the United States, in which the parties do most of the work involved in presenting evidence and arguing law, do they thereby gain a moral claim to "ownership" of the ensuing judgment? .... The opinion in Bonner Mall rejects such a view, quoting from a dissent of Justice Stevens, in which he contended that "precedents . . . are presumptively correct and valuable to the legal community as a whole. They are not merely the property of the private litigants. . . ." One coudl think of this statement in a number of ways. One would be as a matter of cost accounting: Court "costs" paid by litigants do not come close to paying the expense of operating the judicial system, which is heavily subsidized by tax dollars. What if they did? Should it matter that the parties offer to compensate the system for the full costs of adjudication? Stephen C. Yeazell, Civil Procedure, 5th ed. 601-602, Aspen Publishers, 2000.

What an intriguing set of questions. We already live in a society where an individual or corporation can copyright or trademark a word or phrase, how far are we from private ownership/control over legal precedents? When or if such a thing became possible, it would likely be only a matter of time before huge new corporations sprung up to buy and control as many precedents as they could, licensing them for use at extortionate prices that would increase the costs of litigation by orders of magnitude. Can't you just see this as the basis of some great dystopian sci-fi novel? Blade Runner meets The Firm?

Posted 07:11 AM | Comments (1) | law school

Passive Voice Be Damned!

An open plea to everyone who writes, but especially judges writing decisions and lawyers writing briefs and memos: Please write in an active voice!

Here's just a small sample of the kind of obtuse and just plain sloppy writing law students and lawyers have to read every day, with my increasingly disgruntled questions for the writer (Justice White) in brackets:

In June 1984, appellant began a bill of review proceeding in the Texas courts to set aside the default judgment and obtain the relief. In the second amended petition, it was alleged [by whom?] that the return of service itself showed a defective service and that appellant in fact had not been personally served [by whom?] at all. ... It was also alleged [by whom!?] that the judgment was abstracted and recorded [by whom!?] in the county real property records, thereby creating a cloud on appellant's title, that a writ of attachment was issued [by whom!?], and that, unbeknownst to him, his real property was sold [for great sakes, by whom?] to satisfy the judgment and for much more than its true value. Peralta v. Heights Medical Center, 485 U.S. 80 (1988).

In some cases it's hard for a writer to determine who is responsible for an action, but then, part of your job as a writer is to make yourself clear, and if that means rewriting or doing a little more research to figure out exactly who did what, then that's what you should do. But no, not judges and attorneys. Instead, they just resort to endless strings of passive voice that get so tangled up and knotted that frustrated readers have no recourse other than to throw up their hands and beg for mercy.

I'm begging, but not for mercy, just a some subjects to go along with these verbs, please. Subject, verb, object. Spot is running. Peralta alleged. Heights Medical did not serve Peralta at all. Peralta also alleged. The Texas court (I assume, but I'm guessing) abstracted and recorded the judgment. The Texas court issued a writ of attachment and the sheriff sold Peralta's real property to satisfy the judgment.

It's really not that hard, plus it makes you look smart and clear and precise so that all your readers will love and praise you through the ages. And really, what more could a legal writer want?

Note: Like Three Years of Hell, I'm well into that tired and cranky point of the semester, so if this sounds overly harsh, a slight lack of sleep and generally low levels of patience would be why. Still, please write in an active voice! Thank you.

Posted 06:31 AM | Comments (3) | law school

You Are Rule 8(a)!

You are Rule 8, the most laid back of all the
Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. While your
forefather in the Federal Rules may have been a
stickler for details and particularity, you
have clearly rebelled by being pleasant and
easy-going. Rule 8 only requires that a
plaintiff provide a short and plain statement
of a claim on which a court can grant relief.
While there is much to be lauded in your
approach, your good nature sometimes gets you
in trouble, and you often have to rely on your
good friend, Rule 56, to bail you out.


Which Federal Rule of Civil Procedure Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

[quiz via Three Years of Hell and Not for Sheep]

Posted 06:31 AM | law school

Forget Nader. Draft Moore!

While everyone's in a tizzy about what Nader's candidacy might mean, Howard Dean says don't be tempted by Nader:

Ralph Nader has made many great contributions to America over 40 years. But if George W. Bush is re-elected, the health, safety, consumer, environmental, and open government provisions Ralph Nader has fought for will be undermined. George Bush's right-wing appointees will still be serving as judges fifty years from now, and our Constitution will be shredded. It will be government by, of, and for, the corporations - exactly what Ralph Nader has struggled against.

Those who truly want America's leaders to stand up to the corporate special interests and build a better country for working people should recognize that, in 2004, a vote for Ralph Nader is, plain and simple, a vote to re-elect George W. Bush. I hope that Ralph Nader will withdraw his candidacy in the best interests of the country we hope to become.

Timothy Noah on Slate says Forget Nader. Draft Moore. [link via Scripting News] Sounds like a brilliant idea to me.

Of course, if we'd just follow some of the suggestions at The Center for Voting and Democracy we wouldn't have to worry so much about how a random third candidate could be a kingmaker. Can you say instant runoff voting? I knew you could. Now if that wouldn't give people a great incentive to vote, I don't know what would. Proportional representation would also be a great step in the right direction.

p.s.: Is it just me, or is Nader's website broken in Safari? For me, the header at the top of the page loads as it should, but I have to scroll down about 30 screens to see the rest of the content on the page. It looks fine in FireFox, though. Hmph. Whatever else I might have thought of Nader, I just can't vote for him now. Any candidate who can't make their pages Safari-friendly just won't be getting my vote, simple as that. ;-)

Posted 05:57 AM | election 2004

Log in My Own Eye

Have you ever had anything stuck to your eyeball that you just can't seem to get off? That's what happened to me on Sunday; while biking to school, something -- probably just a little spec of dirt -- flew into my eye and started irritating me to no end. It was crazy; I've biked literally thousands of miles through all kinds of terrain and conditions and never has anything like this happened before. The worst part: I couldn't read because my eye just kept tearing up and it felt like something was constantly scratching my eyeball (which it was). I could see the thing, but no matter what I did, I couldn't seem to get it out. I tried flushing with water, dabbing with Q-tips and tissues, and just rubbing at it with my finger. None of that's fun, since your reflex is always to blink to keep anything out of your eye, and none of it worked, either.

So yesterday morning, instead of attending ConLaw, I lined up at the GW Student Health Center, not sure what they could do, but hoping they could help. And help they did! They saw me almost immediately and the doctor had the speck out of my eye in about one minute from the time she said hello. She simply put some anesthetic eye drops in my eye, then dabbed at the spec with a Q-tip and the speck was gone. Sure, I'd done the same thing, but I'm no doctor. She said the cornea was slightly scratched and would hurt for a while, and she was right, but I still felt a zillion times better immediately.

Regular readers may know that I haven't found much about GW to praise, but that changes now: Thank you GW Student Health Center! You're the best!

While the thing was in my eye, I just kept wondering if it symbolized anything. Specifically, I wondered if there's something especially big or glaring I've been hypocritical about recently. Why would I wonder that? Well, this might be the first time ai has quoted from the Bible, but heck, there's a first time for everything, so here you go:

1: Judge not, that you be not judged. 2: For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. 3: Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 4: Or how can you say to your brother, `Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when there is the log in your own eye? 5: You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye. (Matthew 7:1-5)

This passage was used to great effect in "Iron Jawed Angels,", which, btw, I highly recommend. That aside, it's really pretty good advice to live by. Funny how those specks in your eye seem to bother you more than the logs.

Posted 05:50 AM | life generally

Dean Takedown Update

As a followup to last week's summary of how prominent Democrats helped destroy the Dean campaign, check out Centerfield's, um, inside baseball analysis of the whole deal: A company controlled by NY Yankees owner George Steinbrenner gave $100,000 to the anti-Dean smear campaign.

Worse, according to this PDF file, organized labor (Laborers Int'l Union, Longshoremen, Machinists, and Ironworkers) gave $200,000 all together. It's heartwarming to see this kind of solidarity, isn't it? [link via Scripting News]

Posted 09:33 PM | election 2004

Lessons from a Mock Trial

I spent yesterday (from about 8:30-3:30) inside the DC Superior Court pretending to be a prosecuting attorney. It was fun, exciting, exhausting, and just extremely difficult! I wish I had some great lessons or advice to share after the experience, but probably the best I can do is confirm what you'll hear from anyone who's done it before: There's just no such thing as too much preparation.

I can't emphasize that enough: If you're doing mock trial, you have to know the facts -- every one of them -- cold. I didn't, and I got nailed a couple of times for it. Of course, you should also know the Federal Rules of Evidence pretty much backwards and forwards, as well as how to introduce and use exhibits to the best advantage. Why don't law schools just make this part of the first semester curriculum? I mean, wouldn't an intro to trial procedure, evidence, and advocacy be a good introduction to the law? A school could replace contracts or torts with one a more practical class like this, and I think its students would be well served.

But we don't learn evidence or trial procedures or advocacy in our first year, so we just had to wing it. Over the past couple of weeks, I've watched or participated in about four mock trials based on the same case materials (that's counting scrimmages and participating as a competitor in one instance and a witness in another), and each "trial" was very very different from the others. This tells me that you have to be prepared for anything, and have contingency plans for any approach your opponents might throw at you. So again, the main lesson is: Be prepared.

In all, I learned an incredible amount, but participating in Mock Trial has only deepened my ambivalence about being a trial lawyer. While the preparation part seems enjoyable and satisfying, the actual trial part seems like a crap shoot. Does the judge like you? Do you have the right "style"? Does the judge or jury like it that you cross your witnesses aggressively, or did you lose them there? Did you wear the right clothes? Did you hold your notes in an acceptable manner? All of these things seem so hard to predict or control.

But worse: Can you really think fast enough on your feet to solve all the random problems that might arise in a trial? Can you recover and reroute on the fly when your own witness gives you the exact opposite answer you were looking for and threatens to torpedo your case? Can you remember the exact spot in the deposition where the opposing witness impeached herself? Can you keep in your head the five different points opposing counsel misrepresented so that you can effectively explain and spin them in your close? And even if you can keep them in your head, can you find that effective spin in the two minutes you have to actually prepare that close?

I admire trial lawyers even more after doing mock trial. They have to be brilliant, no "ifs" or "buts" about it. But do I want to be one? Do I have what it takes? For now, I guess that will remain a question of fact to be left to the jury....

Posted 09:34 AM | Comments (3) | law school

Nader's In

So he's doing it. Nader has officially begun his campaign for the White House as an independent candidate. Okey-dokey.

Here's a thought on that. And here's another.

I agree with Nader on many things, including the fact that the two-party system is broken and undemocratic. However, isn't a run as an independent this year only going to hurt the long-term chances that a third party will ever be taken seriously? I mean, just about any other year, I might support something like this, but this year!? Right. There's always the nagging voice of the revolutionary whispering in my ear: "If not now, when? If not us, who?" But when it comes to whether a third-party lefty should run for President of the U.S. the answers to those questions are clearly: "Any other year" and "Maybe us, but any other year!"

But maybe this will turn out to be a good thing:

Asked if he would withdraw if he concluded his candidacy would merely ensure President Bush's re-election, Nader told interviewer Tim Russert, "When and if that eventuality occurs, you can invite me back on the program and I'll give you the answer."

So do you think Ralph's so sure the Democratic nominee is going to kick W's ass so hard that a lefty independent candidacy won't give the election to the W? Or here's another scenario:

Ralph can just stir the pot, continually reminding everyone how corrupt Washington is and how the two-party system does not work, etc. That's all great, so long as he withdraws and emphatically supports the Democratic nominee by, oh, let's say Oct. 15th. That could be a win win for everyone. Please Ralph, only run 'till October!

Posted 09:24 AM | Comments (2) | election 2004

Asylum for Domestic Violence

The best thing about Legal Writing class as a 1L for me is that it's teaching me a lot about a few small segments of the law. One of those segments has been asylum law, which was the subject of our first memo last semester. I hardly knew what asylum was before that memo, but now I understand the basics, which means I know enough to understand the asylum process can be seriously random and unjust.

Asylum law is in the headlines today because of a big case about whether women who have been victims of domestic violence in their home country should be granted asylum in the U.S. NPR covered the story Friday, as did the print press. UC Hastings also has a site with more information on the case. Here's the gist:

The Department of Homeland Security on Thursday asked Attorney General John Ashcroft to grant asylum to a Guatemalan woman who was repeatedly beaten and raped by her husband for a decade.

The request will determine whether battered women are eligible to receive sanctuary in the United States. The case could have great impact on women in countries where domestic violence goes unpunished.

Ashcroft has the authority to allow Rodi Alvarado, 36, to stay in the country and set a precedent for other abused women seeking refuge. The recommendation was made in a legal brief filed late Thursday. It couldn't be determined when Ashcroft would act on it.

Asylum experts said Homeland Security's endorsement of Alvarado's asylum claim would make it far harder for Ashcroft to reject the plea.

It's incredibly depressing to have to rely on Ashcroft to make a potentially huge decision like this, but here's hoping he chooses correctly and grants Alvarado asylum.

In related news, tonight at 10 p.m. on Court TV: Chasing Freedom, an original movie about an Afghan woman trying to get asylum in the U.S. after being persecuted by the Taliban. Juliette Lewis stars as the young New York lawyer who takes the case pro bono. (Does anyone do asylum cases full time?) This could be just another opportunity for a movie to say, "Hey, the Taliban was really bad; isn't it great the U.S. took over Afghanistan?" But it's on court tv, so instead, maybe it will focus on the broken backwater that is U.S. immigration and asylum law. Although some of you may be too broken up after the series finale of Sex and the City to watch anything else, "Chasing Freedom" might be worth taping to watch some other day.

Posted 08:32 AM | law general

1L Summer Dilemma -- Help?

I expected and feared that the 1L summer job hunt would be long and arduous. Instead, it's looking like it might be short and sticky. Here's the deal:

I've been offered a great summer position w/a nearby public defender's office. This job would give me time watching trials, interviewing clients, collecting evidence, helping to write memos, and even conducting mock trials w/my fellow summer interns. In short, it would give me incredible experience and I'm excited by the opportunity. They've offered me the job and they want to know within a week or so whether I'm going to accept.

However, I was also lucky enough to get an interview with a major labor union offering a summer fellowship through the Peggy Browning Fund. This would also be an incredible, but very different experience. The big trouble is, the interview isn't for 2 more weeks and then I'm sure they won't pick a candidate for at least a few days after that. That means I won't know if my interview could really be a job for possibly three more weeks.

So the question is: What should I do? My options appear to be roughly:

1. Take the public defender job I know I've got and just plan to say "no" to the union if they offer me a job. (I think I should go to the union interview either way for the experience and the "networking.")
2. Try to stall the public defender job for 2-3 weeks until I know whether I'll get an offer from the union, then choose.
3. Say "no" to the public defender job I know I've got in the hope that I'll get an offer from the union.
   

The pros of the public defender job are that I know I have it and it would give me great experience. If I want to be a public defender, it would seem to be the perfect 1L summer job. (Of course, it would probably be great experience no matter what type of law I end up practicing.) The cons are that I'm not sure I want to be a public defender (it's high on the list of possibilities, but I'm still not completely convinced). Also, the position comes with zero dollars so I'd have to find funding through GW or elsewhere. Another con is that it's too far away to be bikeable and it's not very convenient by public transportation (at least an hour each way). Do I really want to have to drive to and from work every day? (Woman of the Law and Stay of Execution have been having car trouble that makes me glad I don't really have to drive at all in my current situation.)

The pros of the union job are that it would be a big step toward a career as a labor lawyer, which really sounds great to me. While I remain unsure about being a public defender, I'm nearly certain I'd be a great labor lawyer and that I'd love doing that. Another "pro" is that the union job comes with money and whatever "prestige" a Peggy Browning Summer Fellowship would grant. Finally, the union is very nearby; I could bike to work in about 5-10 minutes every day. The big cons of the union job: I don't have it yet. I only have an interview, and that's still a long way from a job offer.

So what should I do? Any thoughts or suggestions would be appreciated.

Posted 08:19 AM | Comments (12) | law school

Rule of BadLaw

There's a fascinating discussion going on over at Letters of Marque in response to Anthony's complaint: The "pious guardians of the rule of law" (Anthony targets the NY Times as an example) complained about former Judge Roy Moore's fight to keep the Ten Commandments monument in his courtroom; however, those same "pious guardians" are not now complaining as San Francisco Mayor Newsom allows gay couples to marry. (Incidentally, Anthony's complaint seems to be a right wing meme, although it looks like Anthony posted before Rush did.)

My favorite comment thus far (scroll down) comes from the arbitrary aardvark:

As a government official, the mayor took an oath of office to uphold the constitution and laws of california and of the united states. If california, by initiative, passed a (statute - i think that's the term i want) saying blacks could not marry whites, the mayor would be obligated to ignore that and issue marriage licenses to mixed race couples. Such an initiative would not be law, because it conflicts with the equalprotection clauses of the california constitution and is void. Similarly, the South Carolina constitution until recently banned mixed-race marriages, but this clause was void due to the Supremacy Clause and equal protection under the federal constitution. Our obligation, as lawyers, lawyer wannabes, office-holders, some of you may be veterans, anyone who has sworn to uphold the constitution, is to do so. Now, today, not to wait for a court. I'm under the impression the mayor genuinely believes he is following the california constitution. Failure to do so can be malfeasance in office, a federal felony (18 usc 241?), and a breach of ethics. Moore, on the other hand, as far as I know, was deliberately acting in defiance of the constitution. I deal pretty much daily with government lawyers who seek to enforce unconstitutional statutes. I consider this profoundly unethical, as well as illegal. I am aware that my position is a minority one. But I'm right :).

Brilliant.

In random "blawg" news, enbanc, a group blog with which I was very very briefly associated, has met a mysterious and unilateral end.

Ripping straight from the headlines at JD2B, don't miss the six kinds of law students (Survivors rule!), a rhymed rendition of Marbury v. Madison (also brilliant!), and appellate blawger extraordinaire Howard Bashman's thoughts on how to become an appellate lawyer. Somehow I fear Survivors do not often become appellate lawyers, you think?

Finally, the National Coalition for Students with Disabilities has a new blog and is looking for submissions. They're also looking for interns and volunteer help, so scoot over there if you've got some time to spare or are looking for a good public interest gig for the summer.

Posted 07:32 AM | law general law school

Cold Call Close Call

Only one of this semester's Profs uses the old cold call method to elicit class participation. ProfContracts is sticking with his wonderful method of simply moving methodically up and down each row, calling on each person in turn, so you can always know well in advance if you're going to be one of the people called on in the next class. ProfProperty uses a completely volunteer system, at least until he gets down to that frightened little core that can't bring themselves to ever raise their hands, at which point he's assured us he'll cold call, if necessary. ProfConLaw uses a fairly inefficient row-by-row method, so you can know if your row is going to be "on call" on a given day, but you don't know if you'll get called on that day or not. It's inefficient because she doesn't seem to be able to keep very good track of who she has and hasn't called on, and I don't think we're moving through people at an adequate pace to get to everyone this semester (which is fine by me). But whatever. It's ProfCivPro who's sticking with the straight cold-call method, leaving us all wondering, every single day, if this could be our day to be in the hotseat.

Apparently, yesterday was my day.

Somehow I wondered if it might be. I had a feeling. I don't know why, but it may have had something to do with the fact that I skipped the last class last Friday (there were reasons!) and hadn't looked at the material at all in about a week. That's always a good way to put your name at the top of the cold-call list: Go to class completely unprepared. So I'd prepared a good response if she called on me. It was going to go like this:

ProfCivPro: Mr. ambimb, could you tell us what Justice Harlan was thinking in his Hannah dissent?

Me: Well, um, is failing to read a criminal offense?

ProfCivPro: (baffled) What? Why do you ask?

Me: Because I'd like to plead the fifth.

Wouldn't that be really funny, ha ha? But of course, when ProfCivPro called on me, I didn't say anything like that. Instead, I read from the book. Luckily, I had read the material she was asking about; it had just been so long since I'd read it or looked at it that I didn't remember what it was about. So ProfCivPro would ask a question, I'd scan the sentences I'd highlighted sometime last week or the week before, and just start reading one that sounded like it might be on the topic of her question. At the end of the sentence, I'd raise the tone of my voice so it would sound like I was asking a question, i.e. "is that the answer you were looking for?" I hoped this would signal ProfCivPro she better not press me too hard because I didn't really know what I was talking about, and mostly it worked. She'd just start talking and fill in the explanation that she'd really been looking for from me. Overall, the strategy worked, and by the time she'd finished questioning me, I actually understood what we'd been talking about. My final bit of luck came when ProfCivPro moved on to her next respondent at precisely the point where my previous reading (and highlighting) had ended. She even congratulated me on a job well done.

Not bad, considering I'd entered class planning to just throw myself on her mercies if she called on me. I'm thinking I better be extra careful for a while because my personal storehouse of luck is now completely empty. I guess that means my mock trial opponents this Saturday are going to have a pretty easy time of it.

Posted 06:59 AM | Comments (4) | law school

Shifting Gears

What is there to say that hasn't been or isn't being said? The Columbia-Union rounds up a number of responses to Dean's withdrawal from the race, and here's the actual withdrawal speech where Dean asks supporters to stick together and do whatever it takes to get Bush out of office. At least two publications (here and here) have published stories entitled "Howard's End." The latter editorial is from John Margolis, who writes:

In Vermont, Dr. Dean was never a very good politician. He was quite a good governor. He was a prudent steward of the state's finances. He expanded social services while reducing taxes. During the debate over civil unions in 2000, he not only kept his word but he also kept his cool.

On the campaign trail, though, Dr. Dean was a dud. Here was a man with neither a thirst for the political jugular nor a sense of timing.

I understand that to some people, this is what made Dean "unelectable" in this race -- he's just not a very good politician. The irony is that this is exactly why so many people like me supported him. Imagine: A politician who's not a politician, but a person. Yeah, imagine that.

I voted Nader in 2000. I never registered as a Democrat before this year. Prior to Dean's candidacy, I detested the Democratic Party only slightly less than I abhored the Republican Party. I thought a third party was the only solution to the hopeless mess that is national politics today. Dean and his campaign made me rethink all that; I started to hope again that maybe, instead of having to rely on something entirely new, we could just fix what was broken -- the Democratic Party -- and get American politics back on a sane path again.

And perhaps we can. Should Kerry get the nomination, I'll certainly vote for Kerry as a lesser evil than Bush. And should Edwards get the nomination, I'll vote for Edwards as a lesser evil than both of them. Neither offers much hope for real change in the Democratic Party, but hey, I guess we'll have to worry about that later. Right now it's back to the bottom line: (all together now) Redefeat Bush.

Posted 06:46 AM | election 2004

Dean Bows Out

We knew it was coming, now here it is:

Today my candidacy may come to an end--but our campaign for change is not over.

From the AP coverage:

Dean exits the active race certain in the knowledge that he will live on in the annals of U.S. politics for shattering Democratic fund-raising records with $41 million collected in a single year — as well as on late-night television and Internet parodies for a high-octane concession speech on the night of the Iowa caucuses that he's likely never to live down.

The former Vermont governor is the political equivalent of a supernova. Once a long-shot candidate, the Internet phenomenon filled his campaign coffers and attracted thousands of supporters through the spring and summer, pushing him to the head of the crowded Democratic field.

The leader in national polls — and more important state polls in the first states of Iowa and New Hampshire — Dean seemed poised to win the nomination in a runaway. In the end, he never won a single state through 17 contests.

***sigh***

Posted 11:19 AM | election 2004

Wisconsin Wrap

Whoop! There it is:

With 99 percent of the precincts reporting in Tuesday's primary, Kerry had 40 percent of the vote, followed by Edwards at 34 percent and former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean at 18 percent.

A big strong second for Edwards. Wonkette sums it up and offers the best line of the night:

Edwards: Still grinning, we're sure. Will this stunning surge break the dread "electability" meme that's propped up the lifeless corpse that is John Kerry? Let's hope. Also the best line of the night: "The voters of Wisconsin sent a clear message -- Objects in your mirror may be closer than they appear."

The lifeless corpse that is John Kerry. Gotta love that. Oh yeah, Edwards' mirror line was good, too, except he's already got the pretty-boy thing to live down -- maybe he should avoid comments that could be read as narcissistic. I mean, the line is "objects in your rear view mirror may be closer than they appear," right?

Kerry's still the only Dem who beats Bush in nationwide polls, but that could easily change. Perhaps Edwards' strong second last night will tip the "electability" scales in Edwards' favor.

So Kerry and Edwards will battle on, while something ended last night for Howard Dean. Was it his campaign for the Democratic nomination? Probably. Last night he told his supporters to maintain perspective:

"I know that some of you are disappointed because we didn't do as well as we had hoped we would do in Wisconsin. But I also want you to think for a moment about how far we have come," Dean said. "Change is tough, and there's enormous institutional pressure in this country against change."

And as the cliche goes, in every end there's a beginning. What will Dean do next? There's lots of speculation, and he's planning an "event" for 1 p.m. this afternoon to put an end to most of it (I hope).

Perhaps the best news of the night for Democrats didn't have anything to do with the presidential election, but instead focused on the special election in Kentucky:

Soundly defeated in last year's governor's race, former state attorney general Ben Chandler on Tuesday easily won the House seat of the man who beat him, ending a long Democratic losing streak in congressional special elections.

Can the Dems win the White House and take back a house of Congress? Kos breaks down the numbers for the House. This Dem turnaround is a realistic possibility, a fact for which we should all thank Howard Dean and his campaign. He won't be our next President, but I don't think history will soon forget what he's done for national politics. I know I won't.

Posted 06:50 AM | Comments (3) | election 2004

You Object Again?

Against most of my better judgment and the requirements of sanity, I'm competing in GW's mock trial competition coming up this weekend and I'm chagrined to report: Mock Trial is hard! For a 1L who has spent a total of about two hours in court and who has never enjoyed watching "Law and Order" type shows,* trying to learn the mechanics of a trial (requests of the court, motions in limine, openings, objections, crosses, objections, directs, objections, redirects, objections, closings), plus the federal rules of evidence, plus the facts of the case -- it's been a huge task.

That said, I'm happy to report: Mock Trial is fun! Although I wasn't excited to play a criminal prosecutor, I've really gotten into the role. It's a fascinating exercise to pore over witness statements and evidence, to plan your direct examinations and prepare your witnesses, and to try to imagine what the other side is going to throw at you. I now understand why trial lawyers can often be great fiction writers -- to prepare for a trial, you have to create the perfect (and perfectly plausible) story to explain how all the facts fit together just right to make your case to the jury. I've literally spent hours just coming up with my questions for a direct examination of a witness, but the time just flies. I'm sure I'd feel differently if real lives and real futures were on the line, but for now, when it's all just make-believe, I'd much rather prep trial than read cases and go to class.

The hardest part so far: Learning how to question witnesses without every question raising an objection, while also learning how to listen to opposing council's questions to know when I should be objecting. My nightmare scenario is that our entire case in chief gets destroyed by the other side's objections so that we leave the jury without a clue of our theory of the case. Competition is Saturday. Isn't going to class optional?

* I just saw my first episode of "Law and Order" a few weeks ago and was completely underwhelmed. Why do people like this show? The acting was flat and monotonous; every line was rattled off as if by rote in a mechanical, the-clock-is-ticking-here style. Plus, the plot was so completely predictable, why bother watching?

Posted 06:22 AM | Comments (4) | law school

Not Mincing Words

Last night in Wisconsin, in what may be the last presidential debate for several candidates (who knows?), Al Sharpton and Dennis Kucinich showed again why they're still in the race: They say a lot of what the other candidates are too afraid to say.

The following is the complete transcript of Sharpton's response to the question of whether Bush lied about the threat posed by Iraq, WMD, etc:

---

HOLT: I'd actually like to let Reverend Sharpton follow up on that very question. Do you think that the president knowingly lied, and if so, why?

SHARPTON: Well, first of all, I think that if he did[n't] know he was lying and was lying, that's even worse.

(LAUGHTER)

Clearly, he lied. Now if he is an unconscious liar, and doesn't realize when he's lying, then we're really in trouble.

(LAUGHTER)

Because, absolutely, it was a lie. They said they knew the weapons were there. He had members of the administration say they knew where the weapons were. So we're not just talking about something passing here. We're talking about 500 lives. We're talking about billions of dollars.

So I hope he knew he was lying, because if he didn't, and just went in some kind of crazy, psychological breakdown, then we are really in trouble.

Clearly, you know, I'm a minister. Why do people lie? Because they're liars. He lied in Florida he's lied several times. I believe he lied in Iraq.

(LAUGHTER)

(APPLAUSE)

HOLT: And Reverend, you'll recognize, obviously, calling someone a liar is a very serious charge. So it does lead to that question...

SHARPTON: I think he lied.

HOLT: So it does lead to the question: Why would he lie?

SHARPTON: Why do people lie? I mean, if in my judgment...

HOLT: I mean, knowing he would be in the position that you're putting him in now, why would he...

SHARPTON: Well, first of all, Lester, let us look at the facts. The facts are that what they presented to the United Nations, what they presented to the world was not so. You can only assume that they had to know if they said that they knew where the weapons were, that they knew they didn't know where they were.

And now to come back and tell us that Saddam Hussein is a cruel, despicable person, which we all agree, but we believed him when he told us he had them. Can you imagine me telling you that I believe somebody that you should never believe, and I brought 500 people to their deaths believing in a man that was as despicable as Hussein, and this is who we're going to have over the troops' lives in this country?

I think that this is absolutely outrageous. Why he lied? I think we should give him the rest of his retirement to figure that out and explain to us.

(LAUGHTER)

(APPLAUSE)

---

I realize there's a lot of controversy over Sharpton's relationship to Republican dirty-trickster, Roger Stone. It's possible that the kind of radical candor Sharpton displayed at last night's debate will work in Bush's favor by giving the GOP a way to paint the Dems as outrageous or unpatriotic or something, but I doubt it. Besides, Sharpton had a great response to the question of patriotism, as well, this one on the subject of the so-called "free trade" policies that destroy the environment and ignore workers' rights:

And the argument used that if you protect American workers it's protectionism, but if you protect American corporations it's patriotism -- I think it's patriotism to protect American workers.

Preach on, Al, preach on.

Posted 09:23 AM | election 2004

Thanks Mr. Gross

Matthew Gross, "the first blogger-in-chief in presidential campaign history," has left the Dean campaign for family medical reasons. In an interview Gross said his experience with the Dean campaign hasn't made him more cynical, but more hopeful:

Obviously it changed my life in ways that I could not have forseen a year ago. But cynical? Not at all. Disillusionment was pulling the lever for the Democratic Party in November of 2002. Cynicism was the leaders of my party voting for George Bush's war in hopes that it would improve their electoral prospects. But look at what people have accomplished. They've transformed the Democratic race. They've put Bush on the ropes. They've given the Democratic Party a spine. And the amazing thing -- the thing I still have yet to see a single pundit get -- was that only 600,000 people in a nation of 300 million did that. 600,000 people shook the very foundation of political power in this country. It was an earthquake felt by both parties, the media, and the special interests. That feeling scared the hell out of a lot of people in Washington D.C. But you know what it felt like to the rest of us? It felt like hope.

Hope dies last. (Gross offers many more thoughts on the Dean campaign on his own blog.)

Posted 08:36 AM | election 2004

Democrats Helped Bring Down Dean

Remember the Club for Growth? That's the anti-Dean "527" political organization that ran the tv ad in Iowa saying that Howard Dean should get his "latte-drinking, Volvo-driving," etc, etc, self back to liberal Vermont where it belongs. (More here on that ad.) That was the "Club's" second ad; the first compared Dean to Mondale and Dukakis as a tax-and-spend liberal.

Those ads probably didn't help Dean's campaign too much, but they were paid for by a self-confessed Republican organization, so they weren't all that surprising. The big question was: Why were the dirtiest anti-Dean attack ads paid for by Democrats?

That's right: According to this story on NPR, monied Democrats helped take down the Dean campaign. The so-called "Americans for Jobs, Healthcare, and Progressive Values," is another "527" group, and its anti-Dean ads were far worse than those funded by Dean's Republican opponents. One of the "Americans for Jobs" ads focused on Dean's gun control positions. But the worst was the one that tried to link Dean w/Osama bin Laden. The idea seemed to be: If you vote for Dean, Osama will get you! (Here's a Windows Media version of the attack ad.) Politics don't get much dirtier than that -- especially when a (hopefully) more subtle version of this line attack will be the main argument Bush uses to try to be reelected.

Which Democrats were funding these ads? On December 16, 2003, the Washington Post connected the dots between the ads and the money:

The machinists union endorses Rep. Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.). The machinists union makes a "significant" contribution to Americans for Jobs, Healthcare and Progressive Values (AJHPV), according to union political director Richard Michalski. The same AJHPV, a new organization, runs television ads in Iowa and elsewhere attacking former Vermont governor Howard Dean. Mr. Dean is Mr. Gephardt's leading rival for votes in the Iowa Democratic caucuses.

With us so far? Then continue: Leo Hindery, a cable television executive, is a national finance co-chair of the Gephardt campaign. Mr. Hindery is also a backer of AJHPV. The organization's chief fundraiser is a former Gephardt fundraiser, David Jones. Its president, Edward F. Feighan, a former Ohio congressman, has given the maximum $2,000 to the Gephardt campaign.

Is a picture beginning to emerge?

Did Gephardt or his campaign really have anything to do with AJHPV? We'll probably never know, and now that Geppy's out of the race, it doesn't matter all that much. Today a slightly more relevant question is: Did Kerry or his campaign have anything to do with AJHPV? Another perspective from last December:

AJHPV's new spokesman is former John Kerry press secretary Robert Gibbs, who left the Massachusetts senator's campaign when his boss, Jim Jordan, was fired. The Kerry camp also denies any connection with the 527 group. Both the Gephardt and Kerry campaigns have gone on the air with positive ads this week, leaving the Dean bashing to AJHPV.

That was December, and much has happened since then, none of which was good for the Dean campaign. Now we learn from AJHPV's recently-released records that a major donor to the group is also a prominent (and ethically-challenged) fundraiser for Kerry -- former U.S. Senator Robert Torricelli:

The website "PoliticsNJ.com" first reported that Torricelli, who abandoned his reelection bid five weeks before the 2002 election amid a fund-raising controversy, donated $50,000 in November from his leftover Senate campaign account to Americans for Jobs & Healthcare. The group ran more than $500,000 in ads against Dean this winter. One ad questioned Dean's foreign policy credentials while displaying an image of terrorist Osama bin Laden.

At the time, the group was suspected of having ties to Gephardt, the Missouri Democrat who was clashing with Dean for primacy in the caucuses. The group was run by a pair of past Gephardt supporters and had a spokesman who once worked for Kerry, but it refused to release its list of contributors. The group's executive director, David Jones, released the list Tuesday.

The Boston Globe story goes on to note that AJHPV also got money from Clark supporters, and also from at least one donor who had previously given the Dean campaign $2000. The suggestion seems to be that the group's donors supported all the candidates. That's ridiculous, considering that Torricelli gave $50k to AJHPV and is raising over $100k for Kerry, but whatever. The point is not to pin AJHPV's nastiness on Kerry or Gephardt or any other campaign, but to point out that:

1) Now that Kerry has taken over the "frontrunner" position, he isn't getting any of this kind of nasty treatment from fellow Democrats, and

2) Dean didn't lose "frontrunner" status because his campaign "imploded" or "self-destructed," he lost that status at least partly because his opponents assassinated his character and terrified voters.

Yes, I'm becoming bitter about the fact that Dean's campaign has come to this point. You can say I "blame the media" for what's happened, and you won't be wrong, but you won't be completely right, either. The media has a great deal to answer for when it comes to their coverage of the Dean campaign, but that will be for the historians to sort out. More important is why and how the DNC, the DLC and supposedly "Democratic" groups like AJHPV tried to stop Dean. And just as important and closely-related, why and how has the Dean campaign so far seemed unable to overcome or break through all of that resistance to reach the people it's been fighting for -- the voters? History will also judge all of that.

Meanwhile, the latest (and only) Zogby poll from Wisconsin shows Dean with double the support indicated by other polls. And regardless of what happens tomorrow in Wisconsin, we gotta do what we gotta do: Re-Defeat Bush.

Posted 08:03 AM | Comments (2) | election 2004

2000 All Over Again

Kerry won big in D.C. and Nevada yesterday:

With almost all precincts reporting in Nevada, Kerry had about 63 percent of the vote, with Dean at 17 percent, Edwards at 10 percent and Dennis Kucinich (news - web sites) at 7 percent.

Across the country, the full results in the D.C. caucuses showed Kerry with 47 percent; Sharpton, 20 percent; Dean, 17 percent; Edwards, 10 percent; and Kucinich, 3 percent.

Chalk up another big win for bandwagonism and so-called "electability." Walking over to the polling place yesterday I saw a few people with Kerry signs and buttons and I just wanted to ask them: What do you see in this guy that could make you want to carry a sign for him? How is this guy any better than Gore was in 2000? How is a Kerry/Bush matchup going to be any different from a Gore/Bush matchup?

[Tangent: You notice how "Gore/Bush" doesn't sound right? That's because you always hear "Bush/Gore" or "Bush v. Gore." Does it matter that everyone (the media) always puts Bush first?]

If there are any Kerry true-believers out there, perhaps you should be thanking Dean and Edwards for staying in the race. According to the New York Times, they're only helping Kerry build "momentum."

But whatever. If Kerry gets the nomination, I see this fall being much the same as the fall of 2000. Lots of Democrats will have to struggle to vote for Kerry because he's such a complete compromise. They'll do it (I hope) by reminding themselves over and over again of one simple truth: He's better than Bush. But will we ever get beyond having to choose the lesser of two evils?

And if you need another reason why Kerry is the Compromise Candidate, here you go: Rather than using Quicktime or Realplayer or even offering a choice, Kerry uses Windows media to stream video from his campaign. George Bush recently released an ad attacking Kerry -- an ad that's, not surprisingly, misleading. Kerry put out a decent response, but just like the Bush campaign video, you have to watch the Kerry campaign video via Windows media. So what? So it's just more evidence of the kind of inside-the-box, establishment, status-quo, follow-the-polls, everybody-else-does-it-that-way-so-I-will-too kind of politician Kerry is. So yeah, vote for Kerry, because, well, everyone else is doing it.

On the flip side, the Dean campaign and its supporters make video available via Quicktime (as well as Real and Windows media formats). That's different, better, more inclusive. But more important are the more substantive reasons why Dean is a better candidate, such as:

As he unapologetically confronts what could be the last weeks of his political career, Howard Dean has not mellowed. The former Vermont governor and defrocked Democratic front-runner still refuses, for the most part, to resort to the insincere platitudes that help other candidates survive their campaign days without uttering an unexpected syllable.

You want insincere platitudes and business as usual? Vote Kerry.

Note: I fully admit that if Dean were in Kerry's position right now, I wouldn't care too much that he was getting a large percentage of votes simply because people were playing empty-headed me-too politics. If that were the case, I'd maintain that it was ok, because Dean offered a real alternative to Bush and therefore all those bandwagon-jumpers would be helping to do something truly new and good for the country. I just hope there are Kerry supporters out there who sincerely believe that Kerry's not just the one getting the most votes, but that he's also the best candidate. I also hope Kerry will work to convince people like me that we're wrong. If he gets the nomination, I'll be ready and waiting to be convinced.

Posted 07:08 AM | Comments (1) | election 2004

DC Primary

DC had a first in the nation "preference poll" on January 13th, which Howard Dean won by a mile. Unfortunately, that didn't really count for a whole lot, so tomorrow DC has its real caucus, which does count, albeit for very little (three delegates, I think). Anyway, find your polling place and please vote!

Better still, vote for Dean! Here's why you should: You gotta believe.

UPDATE: After you vote, why not sign the Million for Marriage petition? It's an easy and painless way to show that the Constitution doesn't need any "marriage protection" amendments, thanks.

UPDATE II: Vote for Dean, Punk.

Posted 12:04 PM | election 2004

Online Good and Bad

The good: Joe Trippi has started his own blog.

The bad: The Washington Post has begun requiring online readers to register. I was going to start subscribing for Sunday-only delivery, but now I'm not so sure. This stinks. I had begun to rely on the Post for a good source of "free" online news that didn't require all the stupid stuff that the NY Times or LA Times or other major papers require. Oh well; BBC and Yahoo are still "free."

Posted 07:56 AM | meta-blogging

What Better Profession?

In response to Transmogriflaw's post about brief-writing, and Legal Undeground's post about Richard Ford, Stay of Execution once again offers a tantalizing gem of insight into what it's like to practice law, and why it can sometimes, well, suck.

Sherry's whole post is certainly worth reading (and it's not long), but here's the heart of it for me: After explaining that the key to a good brief is to separate your own feelings from your client's interests, Sherry writes:

When Evan asks the rhetorical question of what's not to like in this profession, that would be my answer. We stop being principals in the world and act instead as the agents of other people. We defend their positions, not our own. We look out for their interests, zealously. We articulate their arguments, not ours, even though it is we who are coming up with those arguments. It requires something that on one hand is pretty cool -- a precise ability to parse out arguments and set aside emotion, to be extremely clear about just who you represent at any moment and just what is and is not their (and therefore your) concern right now. It is the essence of that mysterious "thinking like a lawyer" phrase that sort of happens to you sometime late in 1L year. But on the other hand it is an abdication sometimes of our own agency, our own voice. And that is something I still struggle with sometimes.

That may be the best argument I've yet heard for doing everything you possibly can to find a legal job that fits you, rather than one that just pays well or gives you prestige or credentials or whatever. Does job satisfaction directly correspond with the degree to which your client's values and interests match your own?

Beyond that, I find this description of lawyers as split selves -- one self that advocates zealously for the clients' interests, one that lives the rest of the lawyer's life -- just a little disturbing at the moment, making me wonder yet again: Is this really the life I want to live?

Perhaps I'm just scared of something -- the debt, the pressure, the stress of practice. But the context of Evan's question (the question to which Sherry was responding) raises two other possibilities. Evan wrote:

But to someone who wants to pay the money and serve the time to get the degree--what better profession is there? A world of possibilities and options are available to lawyers. Only the unimaginative are cut off by their embrace of the “calling of law.”

So maybe I don't really want to pay the money and serve the time to get the degree. Or maybe I'm just unimaginative.

Oooorrrr..... maybe I should quit thinking about things like this and do my reading, brief-writing, and mock trial preparation. Yeah, maybe.

Posted 06:47 AM | Comments (1) | law general law school

She's now a Rockstar

Congratulations to Bekah, who just took what sounds like a dream job.

Posted 05:58 AM | law school

VD

Valentine's Day. Ready or not, here it comes. But there's no need to give Hallmark any more of your money. Instead, download one of the amazing cards at YouYesYou [link via SuperD], or send an e-card from Meish.

Dropping them a couple of bucks via PayPal only takes a few seconds and will greatly increase the chances you'll get whatever it is you're longing for this v-day.

Posted 05:07 AM | life generally

Dubious Honor

Thanks to Falconred, I've learned that ai is currently the number one Google search result for "law school sucks." This is a dubious honor, at best. I mean, law school does, in many ways, suck, I certainly don't think ai is the best resource for people looking for more information on that particular search string. Sure, I do complain about law school pretty much all the time, but I'm sure many other people out there are doing a much better job. Can you recommend any good candidates to which I can redirect these sad searchers?

Posted 06:30 AM | Comments (1) | law school

Not Waving, Drowning

Only a year ago it seems I was already thinking about what I would do if I found that law school sucks. Unfortunately, the helpful comments I linked to on that day over at Nikki, Esq. are gone (scroll down to Feb 7 to see where they were), because Nikki has closed up shop. The problem with relying on blogs (or any web site, really) to save information -- they can disappear any time and without notice. Will ai one day just be a bunch of links to nowhere?

But I'm not finding that law school sucks, exactly, I've just been trying to get some perspective on it. Perhaps that perspective is too much to ask at this point, while I'm in the middle of it, juggling obligations and, to borrow a metaphor from the inimitable Famous P., waiting for the train. So meanwhile, here are two point five questions for anyone with experience in this stuff or an opinion or a thought:

1. Should a 1L really try to write on to law review, or would my time be better spent trying to get a note published? (Part of the context of this question is Stay of Execution's argument that law review is a waste of time, and Legal Underground's counterargument that it's worth it.)

1.5. Can anyone recommend a good online source for journal notes so that I can read some examples before making the decision on #1, above?

2. Do all 1Ls compete in all these damned competitions (ADR, Client Counseling, Mock Trial, Moot Court, um, what else?), or am I just at an insane school? Another option: Am I just insane?

Posted 06:50 AM | Comments (5) | law school

Maine Caucus: First Person

Sherry offers a great first-hand account of at least one of the caucuses yesterday in Maine. Plus, she's going to be a delegate for Dean at Maine's state convention in May. Although I can understand there are plausible reasons for others to abandon Dean, you can still call me mad cow.

Posted 02:26 PM | election 2004

Pants on Fire

You know, I'm trying focus elsewhere, but Bush's Meet the Press interview yesterday was just so full of big fat lies it demands at least a mention. For a blow-by-blow account of just how completely disingenuous Bush was being, see Claim vs. Fact: The President on Meet the Press from the Center for American Progress. As Ron Suskind said the other night on Real Time with Bill Maher, the Bush administration has a big problem with facts. The administration seems to not understand that you can only ignore, deny, or lie about the facts for so long before they eventually catch up with you. At least we have to hope so...

UPDATE: More on the "interview" from David Corn and Katrina vanden Heuvel at The Nation.

Posted 07:01 AM | general politics

Sunday Morning

The weekend supposedly means a chance to breathe again. The pace of this semester has seemed to ratchet up on an almost daily basis, to the point where I spend almost no time with L., no time for proper correspondence, no time to step back and try to see what's happening outside my little world of school and politics and school and school. Even my supposed dog just sniffs at me when I come in the door, "Oh, it's just you," then walks away.

About this time a year ago, I was giddy with relief and pride and happiness because I'd finally been granted admission to a couple of law schools. Oh for those halcyon days of yore! Excitement about law school, where have you gone?

Ok. I can't resist melodrama. Law school isn't bad, exactly, it's just a whole lot more tedium and work than anticipating law school was. To be honest, hardly a day has passed since school started last August that I haven't thought about leaving. "You gotta get out of here" is sort of like a broken record in my head. I'd probably think that meant something if I hadn't lived with some form of it for nearly my entire life. Ambivalence is a curse, unless it's a virtue. ;-)

So today, well into second semester, I don't think it was a mistake to come here (D.C.) and do this (law school), but I don't think it was the right thing to do either. Call me a world-champion second-guesser, but as L. seems to move closer every day toward the kind of writing career I've always dreamed about but thought impossible, I can't help but think how ridiculous it was for me to think law school was a good idea. I think about this for a while every day or so, then I quickly drown it out with the myths or mantras that got me here: "It's only money. It's about doing something meaningful; you get your J.D., and you'll be in a much better position to do more of what needs to be done in this world. The point of a J.D. is the sudden power it brings you." Or something like that. Other times the internal monologue is more pragmatic: "You can't leave now; how would you ever pay off all that debt?"

All that debt, indeed. In a brilliant little post entitled "law school decision time myths," Transmogriflaw lists "it's only money" as numero uno, and she couldn't be more right. The trouble is, if you don't allow yourself to believe this myth, how could you ever start law school?

Here's how: Go to the cheapest school you can get into! That was my plan when I started this adventure. I talked myself into it after seeing a friend earn a full ride to a quality school on the basis of a high LSAT score and a great application essay. I figured, hey, I can do that. Looking back, it seems that was the beginning of a slippery slope I'm still descending. If I can go free, why not? I thought. And if I can't go free, at least I can earn some good scholarships and grants to bring the cost down into the reasonable realm. And if I can't go for free, and if I can't earn enough scholarships and grants, I can always just go to an inexpensive school. And if I can't go for free, and if I can't earn enough scholarships and grants, and if I can't go to an inexpensive school, I can just not go at all. That will be a clear indicator that I shouldn't be going to law school. See: "But I've already decided that I won't go if I have to pay more than $30k for it, so that's a little easier."

Yeah. That's what I thought. Somehow all that thinking morphed along the way into something completely different. Transmogriflaw's Myth Three began to operate, working overtime to make me ignore my nagging doubts. "The debt won't matter so much because I'll be able to get a job that pays well enough I won't notice those big loan payments. And if I don't get a job that pays very well, I'll use my school's LRAP to take care of those big bills. And if my school's LRAP won't take care of those bills..." I never really found an answer to that one, but here I am, anyway.

And somewhere along the way, Myth Four kicked in. Yes, I had to apply to the top schools I could reasonably hope to get into, and yes, I had to go to the best one that admitted me. Looking back, I'm sure Myths Three and Four worked together. When I started thinking about law school, I didn't think this way at all, but it became a sort of inevitable, self-generating process. The more I learned about law school and getting in and all that, the more I had to seriously confront the likelihood that I would have to incur incredible debt to go. And the only way to get my mind around all that debt was to try to believe that whatever job I got would cover it. And in order to get that "job that pays enough," I had to go to the best school I could get into. I had to. There was no other option. After all, isn't that the law school applicant's Prime Directive?

So now, here I am, in law school, in debt, less than thrilled about the whole thing. Not miserable, not thrilled. Just trying to understand where I've been so I can figure out where I'm going. In a comment on the always excellent and inimitableStay of Execution, "tex" writes:

At some point, you've got to quit doing things you don't want to do to get to where you think you want to be -- otherwise, you'll end up somewhere you *don't* want to be...

So true. So true.

Where do you think you want to be? Are you doing the things it takes to end up there? Maybe a better question is: Can we ever really know the answers to these questions?

In addition to drawing thoughtful comments like those from "tex,"Scheherazade, an attorney practicing at a small firm in Maine, also recently posted some thoughts about how dispiriting the practice of law can sometimes be. She writes:

My job is just fighting about money with people who will all, at the end of the day, go home and sleep in their own beds. Partly I do this work because fighting about money is fun and interesting, but I know another reason I do it is because at the end of the day it's not so bone-crushingly HEAVY. And when I get glimpses of what I'm avoiding it makes me really sad, and it makes me feel like a fake and a liar.

Perhaps feelings like these can be reduced by the type of law a person chooses to practice, but the more I learn about it, the more I doubt that's true. It's begun to appear almost inevitable that, no matter what direction I choose to take in law, I'll end up having to represent clients I don't want to represent, who want me to accomplish things I believe are wrong. It may be impossible to know where you want to go in life, but it's generally a bit easier to know where you don't want to go, isn't it?

Posted 07:24 AM | Comments (6) | law school

Saturday Night at Bethesda B & N Cafe

Two women are playing endless and intense rounds of competitive Scrabble. Their board appears to be a custom job, with the top cut from a "deluxe" board and mounted on a wooden turntable (looks a lot like one of these). Perhaps the board belongs to the coffee shop. But what about the Adjudicator 3500? That's right: The Adjudicator 3500. It appears to be a timing device with two lights and two little plungers on the top. When a player hits her plunger and calls out her score, it becomes the other player's turn. Both players write down each others' scores, to keep each other honest, I suppose. Their letters are guarded by the lions and toucans adorning their cloth letter-bag. These two just don't mess around.

At another table, a man reads a thick ream of laser-printed pages (a manuscript of some kind, perhaps?), and a paperback novel, alternately. He also seems to talk on his cell phone a lot, but I've never heard it ring or seen him dial.

Behind me a couple silently signs to each other, pointing at our table and making keyboard tapping motions. Are they signing about how much they covet the coolness that is the iBook? ;-)

Not far away, two men play chess. One of them discusses each move before he makes it. Is that a wise strategy?

At the window, a man on a cell phone calls the movement of traffic below as if he's calling a football game. It seems he's trying to lead someone to an open parking space. We're on the second floor, overlooking a parking lot, so he has a great view of spaces as they open, then all too quickly close again. I imagine this man does this for a living. He's the B&N parking man. For five dollars, you can call him and he'll guide you to a parking spot. He's always here, come any time.

I see a lot of what I would guess are married couples, men and women at that point in life where their kids no longer live at home and their jobs no longer demand long hours. They come to the bookstore on a Saturday night to browse and people-watch, then they drive home in their SUV-variant to watch the evening news on their large but not too large screen tv. Life is good.

One of the scrabble women is slowly making her way through a nice piece of choclate cake. They don't use the rotation feature of their special board; one of them appears to prefer playing upside down.

I know nothing about these people, they know nothing about me. There's a line for coffee, a line to pee, and every table is taken.

Saturday night at the Bethesda B&N Cafe. Who knew?

Posted 06:17 AM | life generally

Public Defender Interviews

Any 1Ls still looking for a job for the coming summer?

I just interviewed for a position with a public defender's office and it sounds like it would be an incredible way to spend the summer. Days would be packed with client interviews, factual investigation, memo-writing, court-watching, and weekly mock-trials with practicing attorneys and your co-interns. If, like me, you hope to use your J.D. to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comforted, there may be no better way for you to spend your time.

My interviewer suggested that the biggest challenge to working as a public defender is managing the moral or ethical challenge of defending people who are often guilty. As a public defender, your job isn't to find the truth, it's to defend your client. (In fact, often you'll work to suppress what appears to be the "truth" because it's prejudicial to your client's goals.) Obviously, it's not for everyone, but our legal system would crumble without people to defend the accused, who, after all, we must presume innocent until they're proven guilty.

Tip: As with any job, if you're going to interview for a public defender internship, think about how you might convince the interviewer that you understand the unique challenges involved with the job and that you're prepared to meet those challenges. Also, be sure to visit the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers so you can sound like you know a bit more about what you'll be getting into. It might also be good to have a clue about recent high-profile criminal cases in your area and who defended the accused in those cases. Finally, is there a well-known criminal defense attorney you admire? Dropping Johnny Cochran's name might not score too many points, but how about Judy Clarke, "the patron saint of defense lawyers"?

I have another interview this afternoon and obviously I'd love to have more in the near future. Any other tips for such things? Even better: What's the best way to get the interview in the first place?

Posted 10:17 AM | Comments (2) | law school

ConLaw "Jeopardy Moment"

Is law school a super-geek paradise, or what? In an attempt to lighten the mood, Prof ConLaw opened class the other day with a "Jeopardy Moment." She said the U.S. has had eight presidents who were born in Virginia. The challenge was to name them all, Jeopardy-style. Prof ConLaw became Alex Trebek, and four students became contestants. This is what passes for good times in law school classes, but now you can play, too! Can you name all eight?

1. This president famously handed in his sword at the end of the Revolutionary War.


2. This president, beloved by all, was actually a rather scheming character.


3. This president started out as a nationalist, but became a state's rights kind of guy, and was the mentee of the lying scheming president we just discussed.


4. This president was only an infant living in VA, a president of the deeper south, always rough and ready.


5. This president was the first really to use federal power for significant internal improvements. He had is own doctrine.


6. There's not much to say about this president because he was only in office for a month.


7. This president was famous for the four principles or something like that. The four freedoms?


8. Lucky for him, this president, who at the time was known as "his ascendancy," was the first Vice President to succeed a president who died in office.

For the answers, click "more."

Answers:

1. Who is George Washington?
2. Who is Thomas Jefferson?
3. Who is James Madison?
4. Who is Zachary Taylor?
5. Who is Monroe?
6. Who is Harrison?
7. Who is Wilson?
8. Who is Tyler?

Oh, and in other "law fun": We glanced at laws governing western water rights in Property this week and Prof Property recommended "Chinatown" (in which people apparently get killed over water rights) and the "Milagro Beanfield War." You know, if you've got some free time...

Posted 06:40 AM | law school

Code v. Common Law

Just a random thought: As we learn about the U.C.C. we get another chance to think about the pros and cons of a "continental" system of law—where every law is written into statutes, or codified—versus a common law system, where the law develops sort of evolutionarily through judicial decisions, each building on the other. My thought is this:

Codified or "continental" systems are very "modern" in the sense of 19th and 20th century modernity and its almost infinite belief in the perfectability of systems and human progress. When you set out to write every law into formalized statutes, you seem to be making a sort of implicit claim that it's possible to eventually write the law down exactly as it ought to be, in its most perfect form, and thereby have a complete and perfect system of law. Codified law assumes solid foundations and fixed rules.

On the other hand, common law systems are actually more "postmodern" in the sense of postmodernity's rejection of the idea of perfectability and certainty in almost every subject. By refusing to write the laws down in explicit, formal form, you're implicitly admitting that you'll never get the law "right" -- you'll never find the perfect statement or formulation that captures the law as it "ought" to be, in its best form; therefore, you're admitting that this decision is merely temporary, applicable to this set of facts only, and subject to change by all future decisions. Common law assumes contingent foundations and differance.

Yes? No? Is anyone familiar with any scholarship on this subject?

Posted 05:11 AM | Comments (3) | law school

Call Me Mad Cow

Yeah yeah yeah, I know. Dean's Dead. Everyone keeps almost saying it, so it must be almost true, right? Well, listen to Jeff Greenfield:

Call me Mad Cow, but suppose you went to these big states and said "isn't it time that the larger states help pick a nominee? Aren't you tired of letting Iowa and New Hampshire run your campaign? You, California, New York, Ohio, Georgia, you never have any power. This is your chance to say to the democratic party, all right, we're going to help pick the nominee." We're talking about a long shot strategy for Howard Dean. But it doesn't seem to me impossible. When people say he's toast, he's finished, forget it, it's the same people often who said he's the definite nominee two months ago, and maybe we ought to look at what the possibilities are rather than saying, "Oh yeah, I know what the future is."

Posted 04:54 AM | Comments (2) | election 2004

That Primary Thing

Kerry wins, yadda yadda yadda. (Full results.) Hooray for Kerry! Hooray for mediocrity and the status quo!

The pundits are singing choruses of "Dean's dead," but according to Open Secrets, Dean's got much more cash on hand than any other candidate, meaning he's well-positioned to carry through with his plan to make a stand in a later state (Washington, Michigan, or Wisconsin). His strategy is definitely risky, and heavily dependent upon other candidates dropping out of the race so that Dean can draw clear distinctions between Kerry and himself. Of course, that's what Edwards and Clark would like to do, as well, so Kerry's got to be loving the fact that more candidates haven't dropped out. It's time for Kucinich and Sharpton to bow out and throw their support to Dean; Dean's the only candidate whose platform even comes close to synching with theirs. Of course, that's not going to happen, but it would be nice.

Posted 06:52 AM | Comments (2) | election 2004

States and Countries

For fun and money, or just because everybody else is doing it: The states I've visited:

(Make your own state map.)

States I've either lived or worked in, include: Wyoming, Montana, Utah, Arizona, Nevada, California, Missouri, Iowa, Illinois, Vermont, Maine, Massachusetts. The others I've mostly just driven through or stayed a few days and nights in here and there.

The countries I've visited are much fewer:

(Make your own countries map.)

I lived in Finland for 9 months, then biked through Europe for a summer, which is how I saw the rest of those European countries. I also spent a month traveling in South Australia many years ago. Someday I hope to bike from the U.S. to Tierra del Fuego, but first I'd like to bike across the U.S. itself. Don't attorneys get lots of time to travel? ;-)

Posted 06:40 AM | Comments (1) | life generally

Lightly Kept in Bounds

We made the acquaintance of the U.C.C. in Contracts this week, and here is what I learned:

It is fair to say that the draftsmen of the Code had an anticodification or antistatute predilection. They did not want to codify the law, in the continental sense of codification. They wanted to correct some false starts, to point the law in the indicated directions, and to restore the law merchant as an institution for grwoth only lightly kept in bounds by statute.

Yeah, I'll bet. Got to give the "invisible hand of the market" free rein to work its magic, right? That invisible hand is sure working well in media markets, don't you think?.

Posted 06:34 AM | Comments (2) | law school

Commissioner Copps

FCC Commissioner Michael J. Copps called for change yesterday in the way federal elections are covered in the media and suggested that the FCC place free airtime for presidential candidates higher on its agenda:

We really need to do something about [free airtime for federal campaigns] because what passes for political coverage in this country is a travesty.

Speaking at George Washington University Law School, Copps also said that recent media controversies -- including CBS censoring MoveOn.org, Janet Jackson's bare breast at the Superbowl halftime show* and the censoring of the Dixie Chicks -- are "smoking guns" that prove that media concentration has gone much too far. Copps explained that most of America's media operations (including (tv stations tv networks, tv production operations, radio, cds, internet portals, movie studios, movie theatres, concert venues, etc) are owned by a handful of big media companies.

They own the methods of production and distribution. If that's not the classic definition of a monopoly, I don't know what is.

The event was entitled "Is Media Concentration in the Public Interest?" and was sponsored by the American Constitution Society.

Copps began with a brief overview of recent developments in media deregulation and the situation as it stands today. According to Copps, it's not a pretty picture. Last June the Commission voted 3-5 to relax media ownership rules, giving already huge corporations a chance to get even bigger. Copps called this a "tectonic shift" across a whole range of media issues, saying that with this and other recent actions, the Commission seems to be "rushing pell-mell toward breathtaking change" -- all while doing everything it can to keep the citizens who own the airwaves (you and me) from having any input in the process.

Copps argued that media concentration matters to regular citizens because it threatens the free exchange of information and ideas necessary for democracy to function.

According to Copps, the FCC has been and continues to face a choice about how American media will function. On the one side are the free-market cheerleaders, friends of big media who are pushing for more media control by fewer corporate giants, as if the media is just like any other business: Chairman Powell (son of Colin, yes, the Secretary of State), Kathleen Abernathy, and Kevin Martin. On the other side are the friends of democracy and American citizens, the Commissioners fighting for more local control, diversity, and competition in media markets: Copps and Jonathan Adelstein .

While, Copps said the free-market advocates have recently been winning the fight, there's still hope that their rush to deregulate the media can be turned around. That hope comes in the form of an unprecedented coalition of citizens and advocacy groups who have joined together to stand against media concentration. That coalition helped encourage the Senate to pass a resolution of disapproval against the FCC's changes last June. The resolution has been bottled up in the house by Republicans and the President who don't want it to come to a vote.

But Copps said the best way to save the media is to get involved. For more information, read anything by Robert McChesney, one of the founders of MediaReform.net, where you'll find all the information you'll need to understand the problem of media consolidation, including ten things big media doesn't want you to know. NOW with Bill Moyers also reports frequently on the issue.

* Note: I personally think the brouhaha over Jackson's bare breast is insanely ridiculous; we have much larger things to worry about. Why didn't we hear this much public and official outrage when CBS censored MoveOn and PETA? Why were there no official inquiries and condemnations when Clear Channel censored the Dixie Chicks? We unleash all the indignation and anger we can muster when a breast appears on tv, but we hardly bat an eye when the complete disregard for freedom of speech threatens our very democracy. Sad.

Also, think for a minute about the ad CBS refused to run It's simply a reminder that huge deficits are probably bad for America's future. But CBS refused to run it because CBS would rather subject Superbowl fans to ads about crotches and fart jokes (the Budweiser ads, for example). At this rate, crotch and fart jokes will be the future of our country. Or are we already there?

Posted 06:27 AM | Comments (8) | general politics law school

Jobs and Journals

Now is the time in our law school careers when we despair.

As DG notes, the process of applying and interviewing for 1L summer jobs is in full swing, and there's nothing like this process to beat all hope and self-confidence right out of even the least neurotic law student. Case in point: I had a mock interview Friday, so I went to school in my monkey suit, which prompted the following conversation w/a fellow 1L who spent several years working in some business-related pursuit before coming to law school :

Fellow 1L: Why the suit?

Me: Mock interview.

Fellow 1L: Oh, do you have any interviews scheduled for the public interest interview program?

Me: Yeah, but just one -- out of 15 bids!

Fellow 1L: I didn't get any, but I don't really care about public interest.

Me: That's surprising, since you have some good work experience that I figured employers would love.

Fellow 1L: Yeah, but I didn't try to hard w/those applications. What about you? Don't you have some work experience?

Me: Sure, I spent the last four years teaching college English classes. I figured more employers would like to see that, that I'd get more than one interview out of 15 apps.

Fellow 1L: [frowns] Yeah, right. No one's going to want to hire you when they see you've never been in the real world.

Me: Oh. Yeah. Sure.

See? Conversations like that just make your day! I mean, what a great confidence builder! And I don't think the guy had a clue what a callous and ignorant insult he'd just delivered. But whatever. I went to my mock interview with a great guy from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. When it was over he said I did fine, and that the message my resume sent wasn't "academic who has never been in the real world," but "this guy sure has done a lot of things" or something like that. He said I had a good "story" that tied everything together and made my choice of law seem like a logical progression from my past work experiences. Like I said, he was a nice guy, but even if he was just trying to build my confidence, I appreciated it. For most of us, I don't think law school comes with nearly enough confidence-builders.

So now is the time on Sprockets when we dance! Not.

I mean, it appears that now is the time in law school when everyone gets incredibly pissy and jealous and neurotic about grades and jobs and did I mention jealous and anxious and scared? So people lash out at other people, maybe. Like a few people lashed out at Glorfindel last week, and more recently, the Ghost. Jealousy is an evil mistress, but I do hope Adam will reconsider: Don't give up the Ghost!!

As I glance at my bank statements and write yet another huge check for the huge amount of rent I pay in order to live close to school, the thought of possibly not getting a job this summer is, frankly, terrifying. The thought of getting a job that provides legal experience but no paycheck is only slightly less terrifying. But that's just the thing about this law school deal: If you happen to be lucky enough (or work hard enough, or whatever) to get a piece of good news like a good grade or a job offer, even then you don't get the props you deserve. Grad school was the same way -- an elaborate system of ritualized hazing.

And speaking of lack of confidence-builders and elaborate systems of ritualized hazing, GW's journal write-on competition is next month. I started law school thinking I'd try to write on to a journal for sure; now I'm much less certain. Luckily I don't have to decide in a vacuum: Stay of Execution says law review seems seriously overrated, while Notes from the (Legal) Underground says it was a great experience. I'll probably maybe give it a whirl. Probably maybe. Shockingly, I'm pretty ambivalent about it. ;-)

The next few weeks promise a furry of extracurricular confidence-busting opportunities. Next week includes my first oral argument for the brief I turned in last week (only 5 minutes under very relaxed conditions), an interview, a "Client Counseling Competition for the ADR Board, meetings for mock trial preparation, watching the final round of the upper-class moot court competition , and probably some other things I'm forgetting. The mock trial competition itself takes place in three weeks, and that journal write-on competition will be in about a month. I feel like Three Years of Hell: Where did January go? Is it just me, or does every 1L at this point feel like classes and reading are just something you do in your spare time?

p.s.: Happy (late) Birthday to Bekah!

Posted 05:57 AM | Comments (4) | law school

Elections and Audiences

As you may have noticed, the content at ai has recently leaned heavily toward discussion of the Democratic primary process. This wasn't intentional, but yeah, I've gotten a little caught up in it. Now it seems that at least one reader thinks I've gone too far. So, for anyone who would prefer their ai to be more law school, less election, I humbly direct your attention to this page, which collects only those posts that relate to law school in some way. Bookmark that page, and you'll get all the ai law school goodness and you won't have to hear another peep about elections from me. (Unless, of course, I screw up the categories on accident sometime, which has been known to happen.)

Short of reading only the law school category page of ai, you can always skip posts based on their category marker, which now appears in the upper-left corner of each post. (The category for this post is "meta-blogging.") If you don't enjoy reading long and possibly boring posts about the current presidential election process, please skip all posts marked election 2004.

However, while I am a 1L, I never intended ai to focus exclusively, or even primarily, on law school. Nor do I intend to proselytize for Howard Dean (or any other candidate or cause) or convince anyone of anything. I try not to flatter myself by thinking I could really influence anyone on anything meaningful. Instead, my posts about the campaign are simply accretions of data I would like to save for myself, for future reference, because I find them interesting, etc. In fact, that's what this whole blog is -- a bunch of annotated links and thoughts I think are interesting and which I'd like to remember and save for whatever reason. Ninety-nine percent of the time I have very little idea of who my audience is, or why anyone reads any of this, or if anyone even is reading it. But your comments do expand what I know about my audience, and whatever else you decide to comment about. I appreciate every one of them.

In addition to the new category tags that give you more flexibility in filtering your posts, ai has undergone a few other tweaks recently. As Sam noted, the countdown has finally been updated; the one that counts to doom (final) is counting down to the precise start time of my own first final, while the GW finals study period actually begins 5-6 days before that. The blogrolls on the right have also been reorganized. I've updated the "must-see tv" category to more accurately reflect my most frequent reading patterns, and I've added a new section of blogs and other sites that I've found especially helpful in following the election. The many many more excellent blogs that I enjoy very much but can't visit every day can still be found on ai quick & dirty. Finally, down on the right there's a new section called "ai past posts at random." It's driven by the MT Most Visited plugin, and it's supposed to show the top 5-10 most visited posts on ai , but it's pretty obviously not working for some reason (I think the way my server puts logs into zip files is making it hard for the script to properly see all logs so it can know which posts have been visited the most). If you have any secrets for making this plugin work, please let me know.

Posted 05:26 AM | Comments (1) | meta-blogging

Why do you support __________?

I have an open question for anyone who supports anyone besides Howard Dean for the 2004 Democratic nomination: What evidence do you have that your candidate will keep his promises? Now that all the candidates are repeating themes that Howard Dean established over the last year, what makes you think any of them are doing more than mouthing what the people have shown they want to hear?

Here's another piece of information to consider: On his Sunday morning talk show, George Stephanopolous was interviewing Terry McAuliffe and both agreed that "Washington insiders breathed a huge sigh of relief when Kerry won again in New Hampshire." Now why would "Washington insiders" be so relieved to see Kerry doing well? Do you want a candidate that pleases the "insiders" and is himself the consummate insider)? Have the "insiders" been doing such a great job for you?

Again I ask: If you're not supporting Howard Dean, what evidence do you have that your candidate will do, or even really try to do, anything he has promised?

Posted 11:07 AM | Comments (6) | election 2004