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About, please
I just have a simple request: If you have a blog, could you please make an "About" page that tells me just a little, even a teensy weensy bit, about who you are, maybe where you are, maybe what you think you're doing w/your blog and/or w/your life? It's easy to do, and your readers will all appreciate it because it helps put what you say in a meaningful context. Mine's a little outdated, but it gives you the main idea. Oh, and please don't make me navigate to your early posts and sift through them trying to see if you wrote some early "this is who I am and what I think I'm doing here" post. If you wrote one of those, just link to it on your front page with a simple little word: About. Please?
Thank you.
Posted 06:18 AM | Comments (9) | meta-blogging
Sick and Cranky
Welcome to the spring headcold. Your head swells three sizes and feels like it's going to explode. Your nose runs constantly and no drug seems capable of stemming the flow. You cough and sneeze explosively and constantly. Avoid quick movements—they only make your head throb more. In fact, avoid all movement, if possible. Stay in bed. Sleep. Read. Drink juice and tea. Be sick, get better, life will be good.
Oh, but you're in law school. So you go to class. Shall you take some perverse pleasure in the fact that you're likely spreading germs to all those around you so that they can be sick during your moot court competition this weekend, too? After all, if law school is a zero sum game, your reduced capacity is their gain, and their reduced capacity is your gain, right? So yes, you should go spread germs liberally, hoping to decimate the ranks. Then, just when their colds are peaking, yours will be on the mend, and you'll win all the marbles!
See, going to class when you feel like crap and would really much rather stay in bed could have a silver lining!
Meanwhile, maybe it's just that I'm sick and easily amused, but I don't think this will ever get old so even if you've seen it, treat yourself again to the Rumsfeld Fighting Technique.
Posted 06:12 AM | Comments (1) | law school
Not Now, After Finals
It's still crazy time. In fact, recently I've had lots of "oh crap I have so much to do I'm going to suffocate or explode" times. And I even worked hard this past weekend. Er, harder than usual, that is. So if I've got so much to do, why is it so damned hard to concentrate on what I'm supposed to be doing?
I ran a 5k Saturday morning that was a huge amount of fun. It just felt great to be pushing myself hard for a finite, concrete, tangible goal that I was fully capable of achieving. And it felt good to do better than expected at something for once (that hasn't, um, exactly been my experience in law school thus far). I came in at just over 26 minutes for the 5k, which isn't great, but not awful for someone who hasn't been inside a gym or done any sort of regular exercise program in, oh, about a year or more. Yes, I'm a lump, but maybe that's why it felt so good to get my lumpishness moving like that. I don't think I've run a 5k since high school, when for two seasons I was on the "cross-country track" team, always bringing up the rear. I was never much of a runner; I kind of hated it when I started, but the cross-country track team was good training for the cross-country skiing team, and that I loved. I grew to like running, too, and I think maybe I've missed it. Yes, I have.
It's good to be reminded forcefully and unequivocally of things you enjoy. The last thing about which I had such an affirmative reaction was, strangely enough, the journal competition the first weekend of spring break. Before that? I dunno exactly. And that's at least partly because law school has become such a slog. It's work. I'd almost say drudgery. But then, it's not so bad. There are bright spots, sure, but should it really feel this, um, unfun?
It's that question that keeps making me wonder whether I should be here at all. The other day Falconred, who is applying to law school right now, wondered aloud whether going to law school was really a good idea for him. As i considered what advice I might offer (not much, really), I wondered: Does it mean anything that my first reaction was to tell him not to go?
I'm apparently not alone in asking this question. Over at Stay of Execution, Scheherazade recenlty wrote: "Don't Go To Law School." She explains:
Don't go to law school because you're not sure what else to do, or because your parents really want you to. Or, at least, don't go to a really expensive law school for those reasons, unless you have the means to do so without incurring big big debt. Don't go to law school, in other words, to avoid making a decision about your life as an adult and what you want it to be like. Because if you incur big debt and make your peer group an extremely competitive and perhaps atypically unhappy group of people you will limit your ability to make that decision, clearly and well and for the right reasons.
Brilliant, as usual. And so, well, why does that seem to hit me right where I live? Is it just because of all those "oh crap I have so much to do!" moments? Is it simply that the pressure's beginning to mount at the end of the semester and I'm getting anxious about all that I have to do in the next 6 weeks? Or is it because I suspect that really, well, I just came to law school to avoid making a decision about my life as an adult and what I want it to be like?
Which brings us back to running, in a roundabout way, because it's something that woke up my body and brain and said unequivocally, "Hey, this is good." Law school doesn't do that. Almost nothing even remotely connected to law school does that. The journal competition sort of did that, but what does that mean? What does any of this mean? Does it mean I should be thinking of doing something else come Fall 2004?
And the answer to that question is clear: Not now, after finals! The unexamined life may not be worth living, but there will be plenty of time for that examination—after finals! I wish I could go to Florida "to think about where I want to be and what I want to do after this semester." But I can't. I can't even think about it. Not now. After finals.
Posted 06:38 AM | Comments (2) | law school
Property Review
After nearly 7 hours of review yesterday, thanks to the entertaining and straight over the top Professor Paula Franzese, 
I have now reviewed estates in land, conveyancing, recordation, adverse possession, landlord/tenant basics, and a drop of water rights, among other things. I didn't attend any of the BarBri review sessions last semester, so I can't say how this one compares, but if Prof. Franzese comes to your school (via the BarBri video), I'd recommend going to the review. It's long, but it seemed to be a nice summary of the general 1L introduction to property law. Plus, you'll learn the Bobby Brown rule of property, the Destiny's Child Doctrine, and the Greg and Marsha Brady rules of co-ownership and tenancy. And you thought property was boring, didn't you? (If you'd like the notes I took, just ask.)
Beyond property, those of you heading into another season of finals might get a little lift from Franzese's advice on grades:
That advice appears to be connected to something called "Humanizing Law School" from Florida State University College of Law. The program offers more advice for law students, if you've got the time to check it out.
Posted 11:17 AM | Comments (4) | law school
Marriage is so overrated
No time for more than just a quick pic from some of yesterday's big events at GW -- Dean endorsed Kerry. As Scott at L-Cubed notes, Dean still knows how to work a crowd better than Kerry ever will. I also agree with Scott that this was the best sign in the crowd yesterday.
Posted 08:28 AM | Comments (3) | election 2004
Elle's Back
Liable returns and she's doing well:.
I'll second at least parts of that. The good ones. Really. Yeah.
Welcome back, elle!
Posted 07:35 AM | Comments (1) | law school meta-blogging
Optimus Prime
Which Colossal Death Robot Are You?
Brought to you by Rum and Monkey
I am Optimus Prime!
Link via Screaming Bean.
Posted 07:29 AM | Comments (3) | life generally
Rockage
One thing that makes busy-ness (bisy backsons are us) better is great music, and in that area Elevator Ride will give you all you crave and more. For starters, you can't beat four free songs, especially when one of them is "Nervous Breakdown Prevention Day," which, as I mentioned before, is in heavy rotation on the iPod and iTunes. Rockage makes all the difference. If you are about to rock, check out Elevator Ride. And I salute you once more.
Posted 05:47 AM | life generally
Wait, I have to learn something?
The hustle currently consists of: preparing and practicing oral argument for moot court, attending Supreme Court oral arguments for a court-watching assignment, trying to pull the auction together (now accepting any and all donations — please!), planning that course schedule for the next two years, trying to start outlining for finals, keeping up with financial aid deadlines, oh, and maybe doing some studying and going to class where I can. Needless to say, most of this is being half-assed, at best. But this long task list explains why I can't do much more at this moment than point you to some great writing and thinking about law school, being a law student, and practicing law.
From Stay of Execution: Why Should I Stay In Law School. Great question. Possible answers: Power and because "feeling bad accomplishes as much as feeling nothing"; rockage; and because, as Musclehead puts it:
Related: A symposium from De Novo about Being and Becoming a Student, including followups here and here. Yes indeedy, I'd love to read all that. Maybe someday I will.
Posted 05:21 AM | law school
Get thee to the loo!
Speaking of scheduling, GW scans every written comment students make about their professors and then puts them online as PDF files so we can try to get an idea of who we want to take our classes from. 
As you can see, some of the comments can be quite humorous (click image for larger, more readable version). This was an actual comment about my very own ProfessorCrim last fall, and I really only agree with the last part—he kept us on our toes and was a terrific teacher. He was also rather stern most of the time, but scary? Not so much.
Posted 06:43 AM | Comments (1) | law school
Ambivalent Scheduling and Career Imbroglio
Hi. Now seeking any and all advice about "planning a balanced curriculum" for years two and three of law school. GW offers so many options that sound good, I really don't know how to choose.
That's right, no more will all my classes be chosen for me and handed to me on a silver platter schedule (or shoved down my throat, depending on how things go any given day); instead, I must figure out some plan that will get me from here to "public interest lawyer" in two years or less. Depending on many variables (whether I make journal, how many clinic hours I take, whether I do any outside placement at any time, whether I do mock trial for credit next fall, and probably other variables I'm not thinking of at the moment), I probably have 15-20 classes left to take over the next two years. So far, the classes that seem indispensable include:
- CrimPro
- ConLawII
- Evidence
- Labor Law
- Federal Income Tax
- Professional Responsibility (required)
- Admin Law
- Corporations
- Federal Courts
- Secured Transactions (I was told by a trusted advisor I should take at least one course focused on the UCC)
- Environmental Law
- Negotiations and/or Mediation and/or Alternative Dispute Resolution
- Consumer Mediation Clinic
- Employment Law and/or International Labor Standards and the Global Economy
- Antitrust
- International Law
- Public Justice Advocacy Clinic
- Federal Criminal and Appellate Clinic
- White Collar Crime
- Race, Racism and the Law
- Literature and the Law
- Higher Education Law, Communications Law, Legislative Analysis and Drafting, Campaign Finance Law, Lobbying and the Law, Products Liability and/or Toxic Torts, Consumer Protection, Public Interest Lawyering, Legal Activism, and Housing and Community Development Law
- Public interest/non-profit work, possibly to include lobbying, for a group like MoveOn or Public Citizen. This would likely require a longer stay in D.C., at the prospect of which I'm not exactly thrilled. Also, a variation on this would be to work for a federal agency, such as the FCC or FEC, helping draft and enforce legislation.
- Becoming a public defender or legal aid lawyer in a small town somewhere (preferably or probably MI, MN, CA, or any of the "mountain" states).
- Becoming a general practitioner, either with a small *gasp* plaintiff's firm, or on my own, again in a small town in one of the above locations.
- Something completely different where my J.D. is only incidental, such as working as a legal journalist somehow. This is a pretty vague and unformed option, obviously. Getting away from direct practice of law, I could also see myself enjoying/being fairly good at career counseling for law students.
Posted 06:23 AM | Comments (5) | law school
Cardozoian Wisdom
From City of Philadelphia v. New Jersey, 437 U.S. 617:
Right. So gated communities, private schools, private health care, and all the trappings of the grossly wealthy minority in the U.S. are unconstitutional, right? ;-)
Posted 03:57 PM | Comments (5) | law school
Grrr..
One year ago today the U.S. launched a unilateral war of aggression. That action alone should be enough to hand this fall's Presidential election to the Democrats on a silver platter. But guess what? The Democrats are continuing to squander prime opportunities to make their case against Bush. Making that point, Salon's "War Room" writes:
That's right. A year ago today Bush started a war that has become a quagmire, at best, and instead of making sure voters understand why the war was such a mistake, Bush's opponent in the campaign for the White House is snowboarding. Sure, it's cool to think our next President can snowboard. Neat. But right now?!?
It's times like this I think Democrats deserve to be the minority rather than the majority party. Sheesh.
Posted 10:54 AM | election 2004
One Year Later
One year ago today we mourned a war that still had not "officially" begun. At that time, the U.S. and much of the rest of the world were deeply divided over whether a war on Iraq was necessary or wise. One year later, there's not much more consensus about that, but there have been lots of consequences — none of them very great. On the global balance sheet, the war has given us a massive loss of lives (American, Iraqi, and others), ongoing violence in Iraq, an influx of foreign terrorists into Iraq, a bitterly divided world, the U.N. marginalized, and perhaps worst of all, a precedent that massive military action is an appropriate response to vague and unsubstantiated "threats." All of those things affect U.S. citizens, as does the huge budget deficit we're now facing, which is being used as a pretext for cutting social services both at the federal and state/local levels.
So did the war produce anything positive? Are the Iraqi people better off living in a war zone where every day they could be killed by random violence? Is the world now a safer place? The Bush administration would like us to think so (Powell chimes in, as does Cheney) I just don't see it. And tell me again, why should we listen to one more thing these people say?
Is it cynical of me to think this big showdown with Al Queda leaders has been staged and orchestrated to reach some kind of spectacular climax around, oh, today, one year after Bush launched his pet war on Iraq? You bet it is.
What a sad, sad year.
Posted 06:10 AM | general politics
Democracy for America
Yesterday Howard Dean announced what he plans to do to continue moving his campaign agenda forward. It's A New Day, with some great pictures reminiscent of the good old days (not so long ago) when Dean was still actively running for the Democratic nomination. Oh yes, those were the days.
Also of interest for a sort of big-picture look at why it's important this new venture succeed: Onward Deaniacs. (FWIW: I never liked that "Deaniac" term too much myself — I prefer Dean Democrat, or just plain old "progressive.")
Posted 05:29 AM | Comments (1) | election 2004 general politics
Political Madness
Today the Dean campaign will announce what comes next, and it looks like it will be called Democracy for America. And not a moment too soon, either.
We need all the tools we can get to get the word out about why the world can't afford to have another term of Bush. Along with the new Dean effort, the Committee on Government Reform has created Iraq on the Record, a searchable database of infamy:
Oh, and MoveOn has a great clip of Rummy playing what has become the Bush administration's near-constant liar's game. So when do impeachment proceedings begin? Do we really have to wait for November?
Coming from somewhere deep in right field, Hot Ambercrombie Chick (HAC) has begun a write-in candidacy for President, complete with a serious defense of t-shirts saying "Voting is for Old People." The fact that so many people can reach age 19 and be so ready to throw their votes away is Exhibit A for why improving public education is so vital in a democracy. Someone should tell HAC that the store selling her beloved t-shirts -- Urban Outfitters -- is owned by a right-winger:
Oh, and someone should also tell HAC this: Not voting is just as much a statement as voting, and the negative act does nothing to reduce your responsibility for policies you don't like, but in fact may increase your responsibility.
In the land of people who are more likely to be taken seriously, DG points out that the Bush campaign is distributing desktop pics that feature a quote from Bush about creating jobs. The funny thing is, the quote appears beneath a photo of workers holding pink slips. Yet another great reason to Pink Slip Bush!
But here's where the serious craziness is: The House debate over whether to officially declare that removing Saddam Hussein from power made the U.S. and world a safer place. Oooh. I feel so much safer! (The resolution apparently passed.) But this is related to the right's apoplexy over the defeat of their conservative friend, Aznar, in Spain. As Scott Rosenberg notes, those darned Spaniards are just refusing to follow the Bush party line! It seems pretty clear that Spanish voters were declaring their dissatisfaction with Aznar's alignment with Bush and support of the Iraq war, so why do people get all uptight when Howard Dean says just that? Zapatero, Spain's new Socialist leader is calling it like he sees it, calling the Iraq occupation a "fiasco":
Yes! A breath of sanity in a world of political craziness! But U.S. Republicans aren't listening. Instead, U.S. Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, has to go and say that in voting for Zapatero, Spaniards voted to appease terrorists:
Hey Dennis? Have another plate of "freedom fries," will you? In fact, have a few dozen plates. And remember, it's not polite to talk with your mouth full.
Posted 06:42 AM | Comments (2) | election 2004 general politics
GW Email Bonks
As longtime readers know, I've been supremely unimpressed with GW's computing regime since the day I was admitted, but today tops everything. This is the message you get if you've tried to access your GW webmail any time since 4:45 p.m. today:
Nice. But what makes it better is that GW allows no alternative to webmail. You can't use a mail client with GW's system because they've got everything locked down so tightly. Ok, you might be able to set it up to work with IMAP, but I haven't played with that in so long I can't remember how it would work. Bottom line: Since 4:45 this afternoon, GW students were w/out email. I won't pretend I hate saying "I told you so." I love saying "I told you so!" That's what happens when you rely on Micro$oft!
Posted 09:02 PM | Comments (3) | law school
Bloggies and Pics Galore
For those about to rock, I salute you.*
I mean, congratulations to all the winners of the 2004 Bloggies . The list of winners and nominees includes so many great links it would take a week to look through them all. (Maybe I should take another spring break.)
A few quick favorites:
1. Blogumentary: A Documentary about Blogs. Hmmm....
2. Weblog Wannabe: Check out the "Distractions" in the right column. I really can't believe the Firdamatic. Incredible. Very distracting.
3. Photoblogs.org: Just the other day I confessed my fascination with Ten Years of My Life. Little did I know (although I suspected) there were so many more variants on the theme. This amount of awesome imagery is truly humbling. But perhaps it's not so humbling that you won't want to make your own .
* Sorry. I had iTunes on random and it played one of the Dean Scream Remixes, so now I have AC/DC stuck in my head. But still, if you're about to rock, I do salute you, really.
Posted 06:21 AM | Comments (2) | life generally meta-blogging
Fireworks
Follow the action: Heidi of Letters of Marque is pissed off because of some of the comments people have made about this post in which Heidi pointed to Professor Brian Leiter's scathing review of a student note in the Harvard Law Review about so-called "intelligent design" theory.
As you can see from the links in the Heidi's comments the conversation on Letters of Marque is just a small taste of what Leiter's review has stirred up. Leiter has an update here, including a link to a National Review Online story in defense of the student (or his note, I'm not sure which), and many links to sources that support Leiter's view that intelligent design is a bunch of hooey. I don't have time to actually read all the back and forth, but it's certainly fascinating.
Oh, and another bit of potentially great reading comes in the form of De Novo, a new group blog by most of the former contributers to the now-defunct En Banc.
Posted 06:13 AM | law general law school
Snapshot
Oh no! It's back to school! Runaway!
Here's a cool photo for your Monday. Now it's back to the books for me...
Posted 06:18 AM | Comments (1) | life generally
Nose Down, Keep Going
Ugh. This is the last day of spring break and honestly, I just don't want to go back to school. Can I quit now?
Ok, so I'm not quitting, and I'm sure it won't be as bad as it seems. But I do need to get my mind focused on school again for this final two-month push to the end of 1L. Partly as a way of doing that I just re-read Shelley's law school advice, part 1 over at The Menagerie. (She's also posted a few more tips here.) I've been meaning to point to this advice for some time; 1Ls-to-be might find it especially helpful to bookmark and return to in August or something. Reading her tips again was helpful at the moment though because they reminded me that everyone has doubts, law school isn't fun for most people, and that's just the way it is. Her last tip is especially helpful at the moment:
This will be my mantra beginning tomorrow: It's a lot of work, but just put your nose down and keep going. Nose down, keep going. Nose down, keep going.
This plow through to the end will be capped, of course, by exams. Make joyful noises everyone. If you're starting to get just a little worried about those exams (even if you've done them before), Scheherazade says it's normal to be like this:
This is totally normal, or at least it was for me....
That's it, she nailed it! That's exactly what studying for exams is like for me, too; in fact, any studying is like that for me, recently. So I guess it feels good knowing I'm not alone.
Nose down, keep going.
Rounding out this little tour of topics that may be causing anxiety and some level of depression or dispiritedness in the hearts and minds of courageous 1Ls everywhere: How's that career plan looking? The one thing everyone asks when you tell them you're in law school is: What are you going to do with that? And as Transmogriflaw points out, a lot of us don't have a much more precise answer than, "I don't know." That's why it's so important to hear from the "pros" —so we can figure out what our options are before we make these decisions. In response to Transmogriflaw's post, Scheherazade at Stay of Execution talks about what transactional lawyers do and why she's not interested in litigation, with some good discussion in the comments. This kind of "insider" perspective is invaluable to 1Ls because it's so hard to figure out what different kinds of law practice might actually be like. I wonder how much this dearth of useful information contributes to the fact that more law school grads are leaving the law. Since we don't know what we're getting into when we start or even when we're part of the way through, we're sadly disappointed when we find out what practicing law is really like? Let's hope not.
(Tangent: See, here's another chapter for the blawg book—how blogs are helping law students network and filling in the gaps in their education through the mentoring that practitioner and professor bloggers provide. Oh wait, no time for such tangents now. Nose down, keep going...)
Posted 02:10 PM | Comments (2) | law school
Top Rides 2004
There must be something about spring that makes people think about getting new cars. Maybe it's increased advertising? But as a quick followup to the car-focused post of a couple of weeks ago, Consumer Reports has announced its best automobile picks for 2004. DG will be thrilled to hear that the Ford Focus is the best "small sedan." (Check out DG's "enemies" list in the lower right column.) Scheherazade should also be pleased to hear the VW Passat tied with the Honda Accord for "best family sedan." FWIW, except for two versions of the Focus (the "SVT" model won for "fun to drive"), and the Passat tie, the top 10 cars are all Japanese.
L's car continues to have an annoying little coolant problem; there's a tiny leak somewhere, it seems, even though it was supposedly pressure-tested about a month ago and no leaks were found. Cars drive me nuts, which is why it's so great to be in a situation where I almost never need to drive (not to mention the joy of not having a car payment!).
Posted 08:09 AM | Comments (4) | life generally
Run for President Yourself
Nearly two years ago I heard about an idea for a "reality" tv show called "American Candidate," where contestants would somehow compete to become "the people's candidate" for POTUS. For a while, it looked like the show was really going to happen, but then I didn't hear anything more and figured the producers or networks or whomever had changed their minds. I was wrong.
So what are you waiting for? Get yourself an application and apply to be the people's candidate! According to the FAQ, the candidates will not actually run for president (obviously), unless they choose to after the show:
Interesting, no? Theoretically, something like this could throw a huge curveball into what otherwise promises to be a mean and dispiriting general election. Of course, (and probably more likely) the "American Candidate" could also be a big flop and have no effect on anything whatsoever. Also, the show is allowing anyone 18-yrs-old or over to apply to compete. If anyone under 35 "wins," it won't matter if he/she gets "a substantial amount of public support" because he/she won't be eligible to actually be POTUS. (See U.S. Const. Art. 2, § 1, clause 5.) But then, maybe the kiddies will be eliminated in the early rounds...
Posted 07:14 AM | election 2004 life generally
The Law Blog Book
Thinking about the law student blogs I read regularly and all the other law blogs out there gives me an idea: The history of blogging does not stretch back too far, and specifically, blogs by law students seem to be a relatively new phenomenon. Wouldn't now be a good time for a book about law school blogs and maybe law blogs more generally? I mean, as a sort of document of their development, a snapshot of this phenomenon before it goes nuclear and everyone has a law blog?
Some content ideas:
History and General Scope: Who was the first law blogger? The first law student blogger? Is there any sort of evolution that can be traced from the first law school blogs to those of today? What are the most popular law school blogs and why? Are there any common denominators among law school bloggers (other than the fact they have blogs)?
Blogs in School: What role do law school blogs play at different schools? This could be a main focus: Some law school bloggers report that their profs read their blogs -- is this a good thing? Does blog content come up in class or office hours? Do any schools take an "official" position on blogging (as in, do they try to control who has blogs and what they say)? There was a mini-brouhaha at Michigan about the "White Lancer" who apparently crossed a line by "bashing" a professor and a fellow student. Are there more examples of this? More important, are there good examples of law student blogs actually having a positive effect on the classroom environment or the quality of legal education in general?
Faculty and Blogs: This may be a subset of the above, or its own "chapter," but there are lots of fascinating law professor blogs. What role are they playing? Do students commonly read their professors' blogs? Are professors finding this channel of communication to be helfpul? (Presumably yes, otherwise they wouldn't blog, but we could try to learn more about this.)
The Future of Blogs in School: Blogs could be a dynamic teaching tool. Are any profs using blogs specifically as requirements for class (i.e., requiring each student to post once or more in a semester)? In what ways could blogs be used to improve the impersonal (and deeply flawed) assembly-line/mass production nature of legal education? In what ways might blogs only make that "teaching" model worse (i.e., will blogs encourage moves toward online education rather than classroom-based education)?
And why stop there? Why not a chapter on Practitioners' Blogs? Judicial blogs? Paralegal blogs? The future and different legal questions raised by blogs in different legal contexts (ethics, conflicts of interest, privacy, etc.) It need never end! The general point would be a populist/academic look at blogging the law. The target audience would include (in something like this order): future and current law students, current law faculty, all legal practitioners, the blogging community in general, anyone else w/an interest in blogging and/or developments in the law.
This could either be a solo project or an edited collection of essays, or it could take some other collaborative form. Could a book like this be written online? On blogs? (I'd say yes.)
So who wants to do what? Come on, you've got nothing better to do this summer, do you?
______
Posted while listening to: The Amendment Song from the album "A Song For All Seasons" by The Viper and His Famous Orchestra
Posted 06:44 AM | Comments (6) | law general law school meta-blogging
Conference Madness
If you're in New York today, get yourself on down to the Cooper Union for the Socialist Scholars Conference. The program sounds terrific.
Next month, April 15-17, the National Legal Aid & Defender Association will hold its Equal Justice Conference at the Hilton Atlanta Hotel in Atlanta, Georgia. Lots of good workshops and networking, and it only costs $100 for law students.
More "mainstream" and much closer to me: The American Constitution Society's 2004 Convention at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel, right here in D.C., featuring a keynote from SCOTUS Justice Breyer. That's June 18-20th. I'm there.
Posted 06:02 AM | Comments (1) | law general
UnReality TV Minute
Thursday = Survivor Day. After last week's episode of Survivor: All-Stars, Just Playin asked: "Will Sue sue?" For those of you who didn't see it, Professor Yin has a detailed summary of the episode, but surprisingly he doesn't address the potential legal questions it raised.
But while Professor Yin was sympathetic to Sue, Salon's Heather Havrilesky weighed in with a scathing denunciation:
And if that doesn't make it clear enough where Havrilesky stands on this burning question, she goes on to say:
Context is pretty important here, I'd say. Yet, the question remains: Will Sue sue? If she were going to, wouldn't she have done so by now? These and more burning questions next time on: UnReality TV Minute!
______
Posted while listening to: The Dog-End of a Day Gone By from the album "Seventh Dream of Teenage Heaven" by Love And Rockets
Posted 07:22 AM | Comments (2) | life generally
Daily Photos
I don't know how I stumbled on this, but for some reason it's fascinating. And of course there are many variations on the theme, including the Arrow of Time (a family portrait taken on the same day every year since 1976), and the Daily Photo Project (one guy taking his own pic every day for, well, a lot of days), which includes links to several others.
Oh, am I supposed to be working on spring break instead of trying to get to the end of the internet? Oops.
Posted 07:20 AM | life generally
RefSearch and Refer
Ask and you shall recieve. Thanks to Rick Klau for showing me how he does that cool Google trick. The secret is MT-RefSearch, which automagically detects when someone is coming to your site through a search engine, then runs a search on your site based on the terms that person had originally searched for. Confused? If it works, you should be able to search for "imbroglio," click the "ambivalent imbroglio" link on the Google results page, and see what I'm talking about. It doesn't seem to work yet if the search result directs you to an individual archive page (e.g., this search), but maybe that's the way it's supposed to be?
(If you'd like to install MT-RefSearch yourself and find the links to the files broken on the page above, try downloading them from here.)
Kill Refer Spam
Dean Allen's Refer is a cool little script to track who has visited your site, but it's been recording all kinds of crazy and unwanted spam traffic. Luckily, other people who know a lot more than I do are as annoyed by this as I am, so they've written a fix. I installed it a few days ago and it's cut all that junk to nearly zero. Thank you.
BTW, Dean Allen has just released the "gamma" version of Text Pattern, a new content management system. Looks pretty cool. Thanks to The Menagerie, I also learned recently of another content management option called Geeklog, which offers a very cool threaded comments feature. Is there a way to make MT do that? Also see this cool stats page that generates all kinds of useful info about a blog, like how many links it contains (and which are most popular) and the most popular posts (both by views and comments). Very very cool. The Calendar and "Poll Booth" functionality also looks very cool. And it doesn't look like any of this requires a plugin or tweaking -- it's built in to Geeklog. Definitely worth a serious look...
And speaking of alternatives to MT (not that I'm really looking), does anyone use WordPress?
Future Tweaks
Rick Klau has also implemented or discussed several other cool blog features I may implement someday when I don't have so much to do, including: A sidebar reviews blog (perhaps to replace the largely useless "ai booklist" sidebar), a MT-managed blogroll (this is also a good tutorial for how to include a blog w/in a blog on MT), and SmartyPants (which gives you "smart" punctuation; I thought I had this installed, but it looks like not). Of course, the MT Plugin Directory lists a huge number of other fun things you can do with MT, but MT 3.0 should be here soon and it might come with some of these tweaks built in.
I also keep forgetting to reformat the archives/individual entry pages so that trackbacks and comments will show up on the same page as the post. So much to play with, so little time. Which reminds me, even though there really aren't that many bloggers in the bigger scheme of things blogs might still ruin your social life. Perhaps we should all be careful, apparently they're infectious.
Posted 08:27 AM | meta-blogging
Ego for President
Over the weekend, CNN ran an edition of "CNN Presents" called True Believers: Life Inside the Dean Campaign. The title says a lot about what the program was trying to convey, suggesting perhaps that the Dean campaign was some kind of cult or something. In other words, the goal was not to spin the campaign in a positive way. It wasn't overtly negative, either, though.
So what was it? This reaction from Mike Walsh boils it down pretty well, although instead of calling it "The Rise and Fall of Howard Dean as Seen Through the Eyes of Joe Trippi," I think I would have called it "If Not for Trippi's Ego." That's what I was thinking as I watched it—if not for Trippi's ego, maybe the campaign would have been better prepared to react quickly and positively to adversity in Iowa. But it wasn't just ego, it was also management style (of which ego can be a big part)—Trippi comes off as such a force and a personality and so temperamental and moody that people seemed reluctant to tell him when they had bad news or to have serious and frank conversations with him about doubts they may have had. If people waited to discuss or deal with bad news or doubts until they became too large to ignore, by then it was far too late.
That's at least one potential version of what happened in Iowa and New Hampshire—the campaign refused to see/admit/discuss its loss of support, and once the problem became too big to ignore, it was so bad that there wasn't anything anyone could do. But then, looking back at how the campaign handled "the scream," I'm not sure what more anyone could have done.
At any rate, I certainly don't blame Trippi for the fact that Dean didn't get the nomination. In fact, there's no doubt Trippi was a (if not the) decisive factor in taking Dean "from asterisk to frontrunner." In the end, the Dean campaign was not about Dean, but it wasn't about Trippi either. As Trippi said: It's the people, stupid. But while Trippi has the vision, it does seem likely that that vision needs to be coupled with some disciplined management in order to be most effective. Was it Dean's responsibility to provide that discipline (either personally or in the form of a strong assistant for Trippi)? Perhaps. As I've said before, I look forward to the book(s) about the campaign in the hope that some insider(s) can offer some better perspective on what happened.
Best line from "True Believers": In the meltdown between Iowa and New Hampshire, Trippi retreated from the campaign trail and "hunkered down" in Burlington. As things got worse, he just wanted to "not think about anything Dean for a while" (that's a paraphrase) so he went to see "LOTR: The Return of the King." When he got back, he seemed in slightly better spirits and joked that the Dean campaign was like the final battle in the movie: "Certain death? Small chance of success? What are we waiting for!?"
Of course, in "The Return of the King" (which I just saw last night for the first time—yay spring break!), the good guys won. Now why can't real life be more like the movies?
FWIW: Change for America, Trippi's new blog, talks about the show here and here, while Blog for America talks about it here and here.
Posted 07:18 AM | election 2004
Journal Competition Notes
It is done! Spring Break has begun! In fact, it began yesterday afternoon around 6 p.m. In all, I spent a fairly concentrated three days reading eight cases, one snippet of congressional debate, two articles from law journals, a collection of four essays, a newspaper article, and an article from Reason magazine. It was about 200 pages in all, from which I produced a table of authorities and a 6-page "note." You might think I'm crazy, but all I want is you. Er, I mean... You might think I'm crazy, but I actually kind of had fun writing that note. I enjoyed it. In fact, it may have been the most enjoyable part of law school so far. Maybe. But it was definitely the best writing assignment so far. I'm still trying to figure out exactly why that is, but I know it has a lot to do with the fact that this assignment called for a type of creative critical thinking I haven't found a way to employ in my briefs and memos.
Anyway, the subject was generally violence in the media and the First Amendment. The subject case was Sanders v. Acclaim Entertainment, Inc. (PDF), a suit brought by the widow and stepchildren of Dave Sanders, the teacher killed by Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris at Columbine High School in 1999. The plaintiffs argued that the makers and distributors of the movie "The Basketball Diaries" and several violent video games were negligent in making and distributing these materials, and were therefore liable for Sanders' death. A Colorado judge dismissed the claims on the defendants' 12(b)(6) motion, and argued that, like so many similar claims, these were barred by the First Amendment.
Doesn't that just sound fascinating? It was and it wasn't, but it was fun to argue that all these cases are silly because the media don't kill people, people kill people. Ok, that's not exactly what I argued, but sort of. It's hard to be very nuanced or original when you're limited to six pages and a set group of authorities. The point is, it's done, it was fun, and spring break has begun. I'm off to Tahiti. Have a nice week, everyone!
Note: ai is not going to Tahiti unless Tahiti is somewhere in Washington D.C. around 20th and J street. However, where ai goes in ai's mind is entirely up to him. So there.
Posted 07:06 AM | Comments (1) | law school
Disturbing photo essays
Just two:
- What happens when you become unable to stop collecting "stuff."
- Racing through Chernobyl, 18 years later. (You may need to start here, but it looks like suddenly the pages are "under construction" or something.
Posted 10:17 PM | Comments (1) | life generally
Word-Fu
And then it was brief-writing time, which is over for me, but not apparently not for others. So, for anyone who would like to format a Table of Contents (TOC) in Word where the page numbers are all aligned nicely on the right-hand side with dot leaders between the TOC sections and their corresponding page numbers, the easiest thing is to make Word generate the TOC for you. Go to: Insert -->Index and Tables.... --> TOC.
But then, if tabs elude you, then I'm guessing Styles are not your friend, and you must apply styles for Word to do its TOC automagically. So instead of a primer on Styles (which maybe I'll do another day if anyone's interested, though I'm sure primers on these things abound elsewhere), here's a "brief" bit o' tab magic (pun intended):
- Before beginning, "Save As" a copy so that if you mess things up, you can revert to what you've got. ;-)
- Select (highlight/drag mouse over) the text you'd like to align. Go to Format --> Tabs.
- In the "Tab Stop Position" box, set a tab at 6.5 or 7", click the box/button for a a RIGHT tab, and click the box/button for a "dot" leader.
- Click "Set." Then click "ok."
- Go back to your TOC, and delete all the periods you put in between your section headings and the page numbers.
- Once all periods are gone, click at the end of your section headings and hit the tab key. Your page numbers should now jump to the right side of the page with a dot leader in between. They will now all line up perfectly.
I hope that helps. For a time in my past I was a professional Word jockey, so I have a little Word-fu if you have more questions or if my instructions are unclear.
Now it's back to that journal competition thingy for me...
Posted 10:05 AM | Comments (7) | law school
Let the fun begin!
As of today, Spring Break has begun!
Except that it hasn't.
In a brilliant bit of scheduling, the beginning of spring break at GW just happens to coincide perfectly with the beginning of the journals write-on competition. So, instead of flying off to warm and sunny locales to forget about the law for a whole week, GW 1Ls are hunkering down with their computers, highlighters, and bluebooks to dig into over 200 pages of the most fascinating reading they've ever encountered. Doesn't that sound like fun?
Thus far this competition is distinguished by the seriousness with which it takes itself. For weeks I've heard a steady drumbeat of cautions against violating any of the competition's rules, followed always by ominous threats of the consequences for such violations. My favorite threat: You may be disqualified from even taking the bar exam. Horror of horrors! Say it isn't so! The rules are much like those of "Fight Club," so of course the first rule is: You don't talk about the journals competition. Yeah, that's the second rule, too.
Oops. Did I just mention the journal competition? I may have just violated the whole honor code and rules of the thing. Ssssh! Don't tell anyone!
So, ok. I have until 8 p.m. next Monday to get through this packet, Bluebook a list of about 17 sources, and write a 6-page note. And since I can't say more than that, I won't.
But I will say that I can't wait to be finished with this so spring break can begin for real. In the past month I've prepared for and competed in a Client Counseling Competition and a Mock Trial Competition, and I've written and turned in a brief for the Moot Court Competition, which will actually take place at the end of March. Sheesh. And I'm doing all these competitions why?
Oh well, no time to think about that now -- it's Bluebook time!
Posted 04:12 PM | Comments (9) | law school
They're Alive And Well
The other day I was wondering what happened to Lawless Gal and Liable. It turns out, they're both alive and well and living in Finland. Er, I mean, they're alive and well and attending their respective law schools with much success, if not without challenge. Lawless has picked up the blogging stick again (and she got a summer job -- congratulations!), and Liable provided a brief update of her own progress:
Thanks, AI, for letting me update here. Maybe once LW is over I can blog a little...
Glad to be of service! And I'm more glad to hear that Lawless and Liable are doing so well. I don't even know what schools they attend, but I still feel like we're all part of the same "class" -- the same cohort, if you will, the "blawg class of 2006." I'm sure they'd each populate the class a little differently according to which blogs they've followed most closely throughout the last year or so, but for me the class is a rather small one, including Lawless, Liable, and DG. Theirs were the blogs I read last summer as we all planned and prepared to start this law school thing, and theirs are the blogs I continue to check daily, just to see how everything's going. The class has grown since school started to include other 1L blogs I read daily (or close to it), such as Glorfindel of Gondolin, Letters of Marque, Transmogriflaw, and Musclehead. Of course, I read a lot of other blogs regularly, but my fellow 1Ls have a special place above the others. I guess you could call it a sort of class pride.
Posted 02:29 PM | Comments (5) | law school meta-blogging
Cool Google Blog Trick
Try this Google search. On the results page, click the link to "tins : : Rick Klau's weblog."
See that page you go to? It knows you came from Google! How does it do that?
And look, it works with Yahoo search, too.
This is awesome. Why? How often do you do a search, find a blog that posted something that sounds like what you're looking for, then follow the link only to find that the post has rolled off the page and into the archives somewhere? With this neat trick, that problem disappears.
If you know how to work this magic, please let me know...
BTW: In addition to being a cool tech geek with a J.D., Rick was involved with the Dean campaign and has lots of great posts about his experience.
Posted 05:05 PM | Comments (2) | meta-blogging
A bit more on Haiti
A fair number of people have visited this page recently searching for information about Haiti, probably due to a couple of posts from the last few days. Obviously, I don't have any answers. I still haven't seen any real investigation of Aristide's charges that U.S. forces kidnapped him, nor does there seem to be much serious analysis of how, or to what extent, the U.S. supported the so-called "rebels" who now appear to be in power. At least now that U.S. Marines are on the ground, it should be less likely that "Baby Doc" Duvalier will be able to return to Haiti.
This article from The Jamaica Observer [link via Scripting News] offers more perspective on recent events, and argues that Aristide's good intentions were no match for the obstacles to positive change in Haiti:
Aristide was always a symbol -- with big ideas, it is true -- but without the praxis, without the experience and network of contacts to put his ideas into place. He was surrounded by people who depended on patronage, whether rich or poor, and since old habits tend to linger, they proceeded to behave exactly as they had before. It was Aristide who appointed Cedras who deposed him. And it was because he knew he couldn't trust the army that he dissolved it when he returned to power.
Without an army and with a laughably small and half-trained police force, it was always in the cards that gangs would develop in Haiti, as they have in Jamaica, Brazil and other countries, to fill the hiatus left by the state's armed forces. To describe such a situation as an example of Aristide's corruption is not only self-serving, it is dishonourable.
That's a fairly different story from the one being told in the U.S. by AP reporters:
Amnesty International offers lots of information about the "rebels" who have taken over (led by convicted human rights criminals), but doesn't say much about Aristide. For still more context, WeHaitians.com, which bills itself as a "journal of democracy and human rights of record," says:
Oh my! A dictatorship of the proletariat! Much better to have a military coup, don't you think?
Finally, for a lot more information on the U.S. perspective of Haiti, check out the U.S. Dept. of State's 2003 Country Report on Human Rights Practices for Haiti.
Posted 04:55 PM | general politics
Boing Spring Boing
The weather in DC recently has been perfect. I want it to be like this all the time. The daily temps have been ideal for shorts and a light shirt and jacket while it cools off just enough at night to remind you this isn't summer yet. Plus, it's been raining at night (very early morning), then clearing through the day, allowing us to wake up mornings to a crisp, clean, shiny new city. The trees are budding and the moisture on the grass gives it a healthy, organic scent, as if to say: "Hello, the process of turning green has now begun." Or something like that. It's just wonderful.
It reminds me of living in the Berkeley hills in, oh, about March or April of 1997. I'd wake up to the sound of water dripping on the roof from the night's rain, and my little apartment would be surrounded by fog. The bike ride to work was brisk and refreshing, and by the time noon rolled around the sun was out and the temperature would be somewhere around the mid-60s. It was like living in paradise, in a way.
Why can't D.C. be like this year-round?
Posted 10:44 AM | Comments (4) | life generally
Kerryyyaaaaaawwwwwwn wins
Subject line of today's email from the MoveOn PAC :
Taste in my mouth: Bitter. Disappointed. Moving toward resigned, I guess. I see what MoveOn is doing, and it's great. I just wish all that money and effort was going to go toward more significant changes than Kerry will ever be able to represent.
But, and so, Super Tuesday is over, the votes are counted, Edwards is calling it quits, and Kerry's now all set to start choosing a running mate. Can you say "politics as usual"? I just can't understand how anyone could get excited by this.
In better news, Dean crushed all opposition ... in Vermont, where he won a fat 58% of the vote. Yeah, so it doesn't mean much, but it's great to see Dean get at least one win, anyway.
Kucinich also won a primary yesterday -- the primary for his congressional seat. He claims he's going to stay in the race, and Sharpton says the same. Note how coverage of these campaigns is only showing up at small, local news outlets. It's a shame, but now that Kerry has locked things up, it's probably going to be nearly impossible for any other Democrat to get any attention for the next year or so. Perhaps Ralphie's got something, after all...
The current situation gives me an idea: Voters in the rest of the primaries should vote for Howard Dean. Crazy? Sure, but listen, lots of people (at one time, huge majorities) claimed they supported Dean, but then they changed their minds for a lot of reasons. One of those was that people decided that they liked Dean's message, but they didn't want him to be President. Fine. Now they can vote for his message and not have to worry that he'll actually win. So voters can now start giving Dean delegates, not so that he can get the nomination, but so he can go to the convention in July with enough support to make Kerry accountable.
But how would that work, exactly? I mean, now that Kerry's locked up the nomination, if Dean or Edwards or anyone else continues to pick up delegates, is there any way those delegates could make a difference? IOW: How the heck does the convention work?
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Posted while listening to: 3rd Planet from the album "The Moon & Antarctica" by Modest Mouse
Posted 02:30 PM | Comments (4) | election 2004
Still Wondering
The other day I asked what was happening in Haiti. Despite the headlines that have followed, I'm still wondering: What is really going on?
Did the U.S. kidnap Aristide to get him out of Haiti? Of course the U.S. denies this, but do we have any reason to believe these denials? The history of U.S. involvement there and in other devloping nations doesn't make the U.S. denials seem very credible. See, e.g., a short history of Haiti by former U.S. Attorney General Ramsy Clark.
The UPI reported last week on accusations that the U.S. has been covertly supporting the "armed rebels" in Haiti:
Note the rhetoric of the news coverage. The people with the guns in Haiti are "armed rebels." Aristide is "Haiti's firs freely elected leader." Last I checked, where a small group of people resorted to force of arms to disrupt a legitimate government, they were being called "terrorists," not "armed rebels." Where's the line between "terrorism" and "armed rebellion"? Does it simply depend on whether the U.S. agrees with the goals of those using force of arms?
Another question: Has Haiti just become another Venezuela? The Revolution Will Not Be Televised.
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Posted while listening to: Catch Me Now I'm Falling from the album "Low Budget" by The Kinks
Posted 07:18 AM | Comments (3) | general politics
Warning: Sarcasm
In light of recent conversations, I want to make clear that I don't mean to offend anyone here, but I do appreciate sarcasm and so I can't resist: 12 Reasons Gay Marriage Will Ruin Society.
Note: This link is provided as an informational resource only and as a convenience to ai readers and their affiliates. The views expressed in this link do not necessarily express the views of ai or its affiliates. Reasonable efforts have been taken to provide accurate and current information, however readers take the responsibility for verifying all information. This link is provided "AS IS" without warranty of any kind, either express or implied, including, but not limited to, the implied warranties of fitness for a partiuclar use or non-infringement. YMMV.
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Posted while listening to: Get A Life from the album "Ultimate Alternative Wavers" by Built To Spill
Posted 07:15 AM | Comments (1) | general politics
Duper Tuesday
Today is "Super Tuesday," but somehow it doesn't seem so super. The last debate among the Democratic candidates was mostly annoying squabbling over trifles, as notable for the poor performance of the journalists as for anything the candidates said. Not so long ago it seemed like there was a lot at stake in this Democratic nomination race, but now the headlines say this could be "Edwards' last hurrah" and "Kerry hopes for knockout blow."
*yawn*
Howard Dean's candidacy is what made the nomination race interesting for the last year, and it's still making headlines. Political Wire has a roundup of the different takes on whether the campaign disintegrated because of infighting. Dean says no, Howard Kurtz says yes, and Matthew Gross, Dean's former chief blogger who is now working for Joe Trippi, says yes, too, but sort of moderates that position here. The worst accusation is that Dean never wanted to actually get elected, but I find that very hard to believe. He certainly didn't look or sound like someone who didn't sincerely want to win; in fact, until now, everyone seemed to think his desire to win was too intense, and that's one of the things that brought him down. But whatever the case, I hope Trippi's "people" and Dean's "people" can come together or at least cooperate on their mutual goals. A lot of good could come from what they started, and it would be a shame to waste all that potential on battling egos and hurt feelings.
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Posted while listening to: Pulk/Pull Revolving Doors from the album "Amnesiac" by Radiohead
Posted 06:59 AM | election 2004 general politics
My Ignorance, My Bliss
While I was wrestling with a moot cour/LRW brief arguing that receipt of a gun as payment for drugs constitutes "use" of a firearm during and in relation to a drug trafficking crime, it appears Three Years of Hell and the Curmudgeonly Clerk found much to dislike about Congressman McDermott's speech that I posted yesterday, as well as the fact that I posted it at all. There are several comments on their pages, as well as more in dialogue with Letters of Marque. Anthony (of Three Years) and the Clerk argue that McDermott is making a dumb argument, and that it was dumb of me to post it. To review, McDermott made a short speech using citations to the Old Testament to mock those who would like to make U.S. social policy conform to "Biblical principles."
I admit my ignorance of Biblical specifics is gross (meaning broad or general), in part because I determined long ago that any reference to the Bible (Old Testament or New) to support or refute any position was asking for trouble. Obviously, reference to the Bible to point out this fact is also asking for trouble. But seriously, people can toss "scripture" at each other endlessly and there's never going to be a winner in those fights. In that spirit, I didn't intend the McDermott speech as a serious argument about gay marriage or anything else; it simply mocked the ridiculous "prayer request" it responded to, and I still think it did that quite well. When the Presidential Prayer Group asked that U.S. policy conform to "Biblical principles," it didn't specify any content to those principles, so McDermott chose to respond with Old Testament citations. Anthony and the Clerk claim it was ridiculous or dumb or disrespectful or something along those lines to refer to the Old rather than New Testament, and perhaps they're right. But if McDermott's point was that the Presidential Prayer Group's request was ridiculous or dumb (and I think that was at least part of the point), then choosing those Old Testament passages made that point quite well.
But as I said, in posting McDermott's speech I wasn't trying to make a serious argument about gay marriage or civil unions or the Bible, and therefore I admittedly didn't do a lot of (or any) homework on these subjects. I figured my intent would be clear from the glib sarcasm of my remarks following the quotation. For future reference, if I want to make a serious argument about gay marriage or civil unions, I probably won't base that argument on the Bible.
All of this is tangential to the main and more important point on which Anthony and I agree: The government simply shouldn't be in the "marriage" business. We should grant equal rights to everyone, regardless of sexual orientation, and leave "marriage" to religion.
Now back to that brief...
Posted 06:00 AM | Comments (9) | general politics
