Their Lies Have Consequences

This a bit old so perhaps you've seen it; if not, you should. The White House is literally trying to rewrite history. Watch the short video linked here of an Oct. 31 press briefing where spokesperson Scott MClellan says “that's accurate” in response to a question about the Scooter and Karl's involvement in outing Valerie Plame. The sound is pretty clear and the way his lips move, he can hardly be saying anything else. Yet the White House insists McClellan actually said “I don't think that's accurate.”

Every time I write about bullshit like this I wonder why I bother. Still, I can't help it because I still have some small capacity to be shocked by what American citizens are letting this administration get away with. Lies upon lies upon lies. The latest is the new offensive to claim that “everyone agreed we had to go to war.” Talk about rewriting history!

But just as I'm shocked, offended, and angered by these lies, I'm also nearly struck dumb with awe at the sheer audacity of these people. Bush attempts to rewrite history by accusing his critics of attempting to rewrite history! Orwell would be so very proud!

It's really not enough that this administration has lost popular support. The crimes of Bush and Cheney are so heinous that they need to be run out of town on a rail (so to speak), and the way to do that is to impeach the bums. And how can we do that? We can elect a Congress that will hold these liars accountable. One year from now, impeachment proceedings could begin. To paraphrase Captain Picard, let's make it so.

Posted 06:02 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack | general politics

Welcome (and Welcome To) Wex

Have you seen the new Wikipedia-like legal resource? It's called Wex and it's part of the awesome LII.

Wex is an ambitious effort to construct a collaboratively-created, public-access law dictionary and encyclopedia. It is sponsored and hosted by the Legal Information Institute at the Cornell Law School. Much of the material that appears in Wex was originally developed for the LII's “Law about...” pages, to which Wex is the successor.

Sounds terrific. They're seeking qualified contributors to help build the resource, so if you'd like to help and you're qualified, go to it!

Posted 12:39 PM | TrackBack | law general

Clinic: 1 & 0

One of my fellow clinic students just finished her first trial yesterday, and although she technically lost (her client was found guilty), the outcome (probation only) was much better than could be normally hoped for such a case, so I'm counting it as a win. Also, her judge is known as a lock-em-up judge, so giving the client probation only was about the same as the judge saying he'd had a reasonable doubt. Too bad the judge didn't do his job and acquit, but hey, police officers always testify truthfully and credibly, right? Even when they contradict each other, right? Uh huh. Yeah.

I watched the closing argument and learned a lot. I mean, I've seen a lot of closings in bench trials, but they start to get blurry so this was a good reminder of how judges can be. In this case, the judge listened to the prosecutor w/only one interruption that I can remember. But the defense attorney got only one sentence out before the judge was interrupting. After that, the judge talked more than the defense attorney; he seemed determined to tell her why he wasn't going to believe anything she said. Nevermind that she had evidence that raised a reasonable doubt as to the necessary facts of the government's case. No, that's not important. Despite the government's contradictory evidence, the judge appeared to have his mind made up and was basically telling the defense attorney she had to prove her client's innocence. Um, no, your honor, that's not the way it works. Oh, but yeah, it is. It's just good to be reminded of the realities of the system.

Speaking of those realities, I picked up another case yesterday and got my new client released on his own PR. That wasn't hard b/c the government wasn't seeking a hold, but that didn't matter to my client. As we walked out of C-10 he just couldn't stop telling me what a great lawyer I was. I was flattered, sure, but I hadn't really done anything and parts of what I had done had been whispered in my ear by my supervisor. Still, this suggests to me that this guy has had some really crap lawyers in the past. No surprise there.

So my trial is scheduled for Tuesday and there's no way I'm ready. I haven't been able to secure any witnesses to testify for us and I suspect this is going to come down to another situation where someone makes a claim, my client is homeless and says it's not true, but the complaining witness is an “upstanding citizen” and therefore must necessarily be telling the truth even though the complaining witness has no witnesses, either. So in a he said/she said, the defendant is going to lose. I hope I can come up with some way to change that outcome over the weekend, but it's going to be a busy couple of days.

Oh, and tomorrow I'm going to go help build a Habitat house for a few hours, so, you know, it's good to have plenty to do.

Posted 12:27 PM | TrackBack | 3L

Blogroll Dive #2: Let's burn this law school down.

Energy Spatula has a great rant against the stupidity that is law school, a story about the Dating Protection Program, and she's like this close to getting a job she wants if only the drycleaner doesn't ruin her chances. I am jealous. Maybe I should, like, at least apply for jobs. You think?

Scoplaw is working on a brief for the SCOTUS and celebrating Georgetown's success at raking in the public interest funds—their auction just pulled in a record $75k! Congrats to GULC's EJF. Why why why can't we do this at GW?

Mackenzie is getting published—his case note was accepted for publication next summer. Congrats, Mackenzie!

Dave! is getting excited about BlawgThink, apparently a legal blogging conference that's going to happen this week in Chicago. He can also tell you a lot about cheese.

Half-Cocked notes that in Dover, PA, the town that is currently the subject of a court case to determine whether school teachers should teach intelligent design, all the Intelligent Design proponents on the school board lost their bids for reelection. He's also recommends you add Chili-5-ways to your weekly menu. With the coming cold weather, I'm thinking that sounds like a fine idea.

Monica Is happy she doesn't have to apply for financial aid again next year. Me, too! Now if someone would just give us jobs.... (Ok, yeah, I have to apply first, I know. This seems to be a recurring theme.)

Posted 09:55 AM | TrackBack | blogrolldiving

NaNo2005: 10,000 Strong and Growing

NaNoWriMo has entered its second week. If you're keeping up, you should have 13,300 words or so by the end of today. And if you're like me, you're about a day or two behind at around 10,000 words. But that's ok, because that's what weekends are for, right?

November can be such a crazy time! For me, classes are quickly spiraling to an end; at GW we only have three more weeks of class, including this one. Due dates for assignments that are due at or near the end of the semester are looming, and anything else you've been putting off before the holidays is starting to look more and more urgent. What a perfect time to write a novel!

Oh, and in clinic news, my client was rearrested and I was unable to get him released this time (shock!) so he's in jail for at least a week and unless we can get some kind of worthwhile plea deal (which is pretty rare around here) it looks like I'll be having my first trial next week.

Man, I better get busy!

Technorati Tags: nanowrimo

Posted 01:11 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack | 3L NaNoWriMo