Heavy Environmental Impact

A study at the University of Illinois by Sheldon H. Jacobson found that 938,000,000 extra gallons of gasoline are burned each year because Americans are overweight. How about getting some of those overweight Americans off their rumps and onto bikes? It would help their health and help environment, right? Well, it might help their health; however the healthier they become and the longer they live, the more carbon emissions an individual puts out. In a study that came out last July, bike commuters actually produce more carbon over their lifetime because they live longer. Sometimes, you just can't win for loosing.

Half Way

Believe it or not, I am almost half way through law school. The almost consists of finishing my constitutional law take home final, but I do not have much more to go. I just handed in my 25-page paper surveying governmental programs dealing with homelessness, which you can download here if you are interested. It is definitely not my best work. The class was a lot of fluff. We went on three field trips, and when we were in class we either had guest speakers or watched PBS documentaries from the late 80s on dislocated populations. I have never done so much research on the Internet for a paper before. I went to college at a time when teachers still frowned upon using the Internet for research, but I think things have gotten a lot better since then. People were afraid they would not be able to verify information, but now that so many legitimate sources publish their information on the web, it seems archaic to go to the library and root through volumes of journals. Anyway, I will post again this weekend with a semester wrap up.

Getting to know your Justices, and yourself.

This semester has felt very different from all of last year. There was something so intense about the One-L year, as if all of life was wrapped up in law school. I am still studying a lot, but last year at this time I do not remember ever forgetting that I was at law school. I worked last Friday; I went out to dinner tonight; I watched a movie last night, and during all of those activities, I kind of felt like I was just living like a normal human being. Sure, I have not had a weekend where I did not study for at least 4-5 hours per day, but I am not behaving all that different than I would if I was simply working. I guess this means I am “thinking like a lawyer” – working on weekends – and that I have learned to find some balance in my life.

As to the law and my life, I learned recently that a former Supreme Court Justice came from my hometown and went to college at my alma mater, the University of Colorado: Justice Byron White. That is about where our similarities end. He was a professional football player with the nickname of “the whizzer,” and he tended to vote with the more conservative wing of the court–he joined Rehnquist in dissenting in Roe v. Wade. As a Kennedy appointee, he is further proof that you never quite know what you are going to get with a justice. O’Conner, who wrote the Casey opinion essentially upholding Roe was appointed by Reagan, so for people who are freaking out about the two new appointees to the court, history tells us to just wait and see; often justices do not act on the bench as we think they might. Still, in my inquiry into the personalities of the Supreme Court, I was excited to see that Fort Fun had produced a SCOTUS justice (Supreme Court of the United States). After learning that the rumor of Kip Winger growing up in Fort Collins was untrue, he grew up in Denver, I did not think there were any famous people from our little outpost on the boundary between the mid-west and the west. Around Seattle, everyone talks of their golden judicial child, Justice William O. Douglas– a decidedly more liberal justice.

Heeding my own words, supra, I do not want to simply reduce any justice to a single categorical description of liberal or conservative. One thing I have learned this year is that most Constitutional law questions are more complicated than a simple either/or category. By the time a conflict has moved its way through the lower courts, it has been stripped of much of the detritus of the individual facts, but unhinged from those facts, what remains is often a very difficult to answer question, such as trying to figure out what is meant my “liberty” in the 14^th Amendment’s “nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” With such a daunting task, it is good that the court has justices with different perspectives and a good sense of humor.

Getting to Know your Justices

Check out this video of a discussion with Justice Breyer and Justice Scalia. These two justices represent the two major opposing perspectives on constitutional interpretation. Who seems to make more sense? The discussion is particularly void of any specific factual scenarios, so you get constitutional interpretation without the baggage of an individual case. What is interesting is not only the places where they disagree but also the beliefs and perspectives they share. Also, thanks to my faithful reader J. for pointing out some legal humor in a recent Supreme Court Opinion, Lopes v. Gonzolaz, where Justice Souter quotes Alice in Wonderland:

Reading §924(c) the Government’s way, then, would often turn simple possession into trafficking, just what the English language tells us not to expect, and that result makes us very wary of the Government’s position. Cf. Leocal v. Ashcroft, 543 U. S. 1, 11 (2004) (“[W]e cannot forget that we ultimately are determining the meaning of the term ‘crime of violence’”). Which is not to deny that the Government might still be right; Humpty Dumpty used a word to mean “‘just what [he chose] it to mean— neither more nor less,’”5 and legislatures, too, are free to be unorthodox. Congress can define an aggravated felony of illicit trafficking in an unexpected way. But Congress would need to tell us so, and there are good reasons to think it was doing no such thing here.6

You can see here how Souter is employing his own method of interpretation to determine what the statute is talking about. I wonder if I can quote Alice in Wonderland in my finals? Probably not. Supreme Court Justices get a bit more leeway.

Weird Al Yankovic-Bob

One thing about finals is that you actually have quite a bit of free time. Sure you have to study, but without class, that still leaves time to find funny videos on youtube, such as this Weird Al Bob Dylan parody made entirely from palindromes.

The Leaked Memo

Have you noticed how much of our information lately comes from leaked memos? This morning, a leaked memo from a senior vice president at Yahoo is getting a fair amount of air time. The so-called "Peanut Butter Memo" comes on the tails of the leaked Rumsfeld Memo, the leaked Hadley Memo, the Downy Street Memo, and the list goes on. Doesn't this all seem a bit suspicious? Is a regular press release not sufficient anymore? Or do we have a different reaction to a leaked memo? Is it possible that we think that a leaked memo is somehow more truthful, because it was meant to be kept secret? Have we all become so cynical that we believe the information the government and corporations holds from us is more true than the information they tell us straight out? There may be some truth to that, but I am not buying this leaked memo trend. What better way to get the media to jump all over your press release than to call it a leaked memo. For the last six years, many people have been talking about how secretive the Bush administration has been, so I do not believe that all of a sudden they are having a problem keeping all of their internal memorandum from reaching the public. In the modern information era, whoever controls information, controls the power, and the disseminators of information are very sophisticated in framing their information so that we not only receive the information but also the method to interpret it; that is the goal of any good propagandist. According to this new trend, the next time I hear "leaked memo," I am going to think, "now here is some information they really want me to know."

Finals

This is what finals feel like.

Psychodrama

I came across an interesting article about the use of a psychological technique called psychodrama during trial. Essentially the lawyer works to make himself more vulnerable in order to elicit an emotional connection with the jury. In my last post, I spoke about the use of humorous rhetoric to enhance the power of one's argument, but what about creating an emotional response? Are there limits to the use of humor or emotions? Is it OK to use personal stories of loss and tragedy during voir dire to elicit emotional reactions in the potential jury? To see who will cry? To see who remains stony cold? During my two days of jury duty, one of the criminal defense attorney's spent about 15 minutes leading us through a discussion about how different people make decisions. Do we use our minds? Did we think decisions should be logical or can we use our emotions to make decisions? Do we listen to others when making up our own minds? She was simultaneously trying to feel out the jury pool and trying to inform us of the way a jury should come to a decision. She wanted us to understand that a jury does not make a compromised decision (as is sometimes the case in other venues) but rather a unanimous decision.

The boundary between emotions and logic is an interesting question and I think I will give it some more thought in the coming months. The law requires logic so that we can have equal application. Emotions are too subjective to be used as legal standards, but emotions clearly have a place in the law. More to come. . .

Snow Day and Legal Humor

We had a snow day yesterday! It is true that school was cancelled, but for a Colorado kid, it hardly felt like a snow day. In my neighborhood, we had less than an inch of snow, but in the north-west, it is not the snow that shuts the city down but the sheet of ice that covers everything. The most dangerous part of my travel outside the apartment yesterday was getting down the stairs in front of my apartment which were also covered in ice. Unlike childhood snow days, I spent most of the days studying. I did take a break to sneak downtown for lunch. The city really was shut down; I have never had such an easy time finding a parking spot. I could have had my pick. So, even without the snowmen, having a snow day was pretty nice.

School is back in session today, and since we are heading toward finals, I will not have many breaks for the next three weeks. You may see more posts like my previous one which consists of video clips I have been viewing as distractions from studying. It is important to keep perspective on this whole process.

If you have been reading for a while, you will know that I have had several posts on the topic of legal humor. My general thoughts on this topic have evolved. I no longer think, as I did during my one-L year, that the law does not have a sense of humor. While it is not necessarily easy or appropriate to compare the law to literature or drama, this does not mean humor is absent. Sure, the law is clearly different. Where literature has a metaphorical affect on human behavior, the law has actual effect. If you are sued and you are found liable at court, you will have to pay. Nothing in literature has this kind of power. However, you will only be paying if you do not win, and because one of the most important aspects of handling a case is making good arguments, humor may very well have a place in your toolbox of argumentative tactics. The use of humorous rhetoric is not just the province of bold and creative trial attorneys; there are even examples in the writings of Supreme Court Justices. No matter how we feel about Justice Scalia's style of constitutional interpretation, he is without a doubt the most colorful justice on the court, and his opinions are often the most entertaining to read. I was reading his dissenting opinion in the law school affirmative action case of Grutter v. Bollinger, 539 U.S. 306 (2003) when I came across a fine example of his sarcastic humor. The Majority upheld the University of Michigan's use of race as a factor in creating a "critical mass" of diversity in their law school admission decisions. Scalia responded, including this passage:

. . .If it is appropriate for the University of Michigan Law School to use racial discrimination for the purpose of putting together a "critical mass" that will convey generic lessons in socialization and good citizenship, surely it is no less appropriate - indeed, particularly appropriate - for the civil service systems of the State of Michigan to do so. . . . And surely private employers cannot be criticized - indeed, should be praised - if they also "teach" good citizenship to their adult employees through a patriotic, all-American system of racial discrimination in hiring. The non-minority individuals who are deprived of a legal education, a civil service job, or any job at all by reason of their skin color will surely understand"

This use of humor is cutting and its purpose is not necessarily to make you laugh. He uses humor to make his argument, but by using this type of rhetorical tool, he manages to make his argument both more accessable and more enjoyable to read. If you ust ask about any law student, they will most likely tell you that reading an opinion from the Consevertive Scalia is considerably more entertaining and engaging that an opinion by, for example, the former liberal justice William Brennen. Unfortunatly for Brennen, even if you think you agree with him, you may not be entirely sure because you have no idea what he is talking about in his opinions. Humor clearly has a place in the law, and I wish more justices and lawyers infused their rhetoric with it.

Things you CAN'T do when you're NOT in a pool

This is why I have always liked swimming. I know this video has nothing to do with law or lawschool, but I find it hilarious and this blog could use a little break from teh serious posts.

Problem with comments?

It has come to my attention that there have been some difficulties leaving comments on my blog. This is an unintentional programing glitch. I welcome comments and hope that this glitch has not posed any problems (I am flattering myself here.) I am trying to sort it out, but I am running up against the limits of my own computer knowledge. If you wish to comment, you can always e-mail me at hiltops@gmail.com and I will add it to blog as a seperate post under a title "Comment on '_______'" I will not edit comments any more than I would if it was left as a normal comment. Hopefully this will be resolved shortly.

What's in a name?

There is a reason I blog under my real name. Certainly, there are some risks. What I say in this blog is out in public, which means that I have to take responsibility for what I say. If I blogged under an anonymous moniker, I might write about other thoughts or topics, but the purpose of this blog has always been to chronical my thoughts about law school that I would normally share in a non-Internet forum with friends and family. The blog is simply a different medium. Many people share much more personal information on myspace or facebook than I ever would think of posting to the public, but maybe they are more open in person too? On the other-side, there are also some bloggers who feel their personal safety and privacy would be jeopardized if they used their real name. I think this concern is real, unfortunately. There are some creepy people out there who are looking to abuse innocent disclosures of private information. Therefore, I think I try to strike a balance between putting myself out there under my real name and keeping back those thoughts that would jeopardize my privacy or my job marketability in the future. If I feel good about what I write and a future employer reads this blog and does not like what he reads, it is unlikely I would want to work for him anyway. This is one of the perks to blogging under my real name. By being honest with the world, I am inviting the world to be honest with me, and I believe this standard works out best in the long run. The legal profession requires a standard of honesty and a lawyer plays a dangerous game when he begins to act in less than honest ways. So, I think this blog is a good place to start.

Not all lawyers will understand this. There are bad lawyers. Some are crooks, but others are just stupid. That is the same with all people. On the Internet, for example, there are plenty of crooks, and there are even more people who are just acting stupid. One of the behaviors that is rampant on the Internet is dishonesty. The medium is simply conducive to such behavior. Not all of this behavior is necessarily bad or harmful. Some of it is quite intelligent, creative, or funny. The Anonymous Lawyer phenomenon, that fictitious chronicle of a big firm lawyer, is both intelligent and hugely entertaining. The author's anonymity was part of the charm, and none were harmed by the deception. Another example of creative deception from television is Stephen Colbert's Colbert Report. He plays a fictitious character and part of the humor is getting interviewees, who are not playing a role, to say ridiculous things that play into the Colbert character. I find this show both hilarious and brilliant, and I lay much of its success on the good naturedness of the humor: the guests who are made to look like fools are in on the joke! The "dishonesty" is necessary for the humor, but no one is really deceived and everyone gets to enjoy the laughter.

Compare that to the humor of Sacha Baron Cohen, the mind behind the character of Borat. His humor is inherently disingenuous and cheap. Not only does he rely on dishonestly to make anonymous individuals look foolish, but because this is really more mean-spirited than comical, he has to rely on scatological jokes to make it work. Who doesn't think poop jokes are funny? This means it does not take much talent to get people to laugh with a poop joke. What separates a true comedic genius like Stephen Colbert from Sacha Baran Cohen is that it would be very difficult to emulate what Colbert does. The humor of Cohen on the other-hand is regularly, although admittedly less successfully, recreated by thousands of thirteen year-old boys in prank phone calls. In a prank phone call, the joke is one-sided; If the caller is successful in pulling off the stunt, his actions are harassment and can actually be quite frightening. If the caller is unsuccessful in pulling off his character, then he just looks pathetic.

Before I get to far off on that tangent, I should pull the narrative of this post back on topic. The telephone, the Internet, television all provide new opportunities to deceive. Deception is a necessary ingredient to fiction or drama, but there is a distinction between deception used for entertainment and art and deception used to harass. The new mediums of communication allow greater opportunities for both, but I think most people understand the difference. Borat is certainly funny, but Cohen's humor is not legendary and will soon be forgotten. I do not really feel sorry for his "interviewees," because I am sure they all signed releases before letting their images be used for the film. Unlike art, the law does not, and should not, rely on deception. It relies on good arguments, and it is the lawyer's role to make sure that those arguments are grounded in fact. This requires the highest standards of honesty, and it is for this reason that lawyers are disbarred for acts of dishonesty, in both their professional and personal lives. That is why I blog with my real name -- to say what I mean honestly and to take responsibility for my words. If people wish to critique what I say, they are free to do so, but as I enter into this profession, I expect the same standards of honesty from other attorneys. I do my best to stay away from those incapable of living up to the standards and responsibility of the profession. I like my deception in the form of a novel or some good comedy.

more thoughts on politics

I wanted to add some thoughts to my previous post (see below) concerning voting malaise. That post was written in a more stream-of-conscious fashion than normal and I did not give the topic its full thoroughness. I think everyone who can vote, should vote, and any law student who does not vote has yet to realize just how much politics will affect his/her career. No matter what area of law one decides to practice, from criminal law to real estate transactions, your practice will be effected by politics. The court is an apolitical institution, but everyone knows that judges are humans, and even if they are just following the law, following the law might be different depending on how you interpret the law. In a recent article, our new chief justices, John Roberts talks about how the "high court does not have political preferences," but he has an uphill battle to convince most Americans. The decision in Bush v. Gore did not help, splitting the justices along the lines of what we know of their party affiliations. Even if one's practice nave takes a lawyer into court, it is unlikely you will never deal with some government agency (i.e. Land use regulations set up by the Department of Ecology or the E.P.A.) The heads of those agencies are appointed by the President (federal) or the governor (state.) Those political appointments affect the atmosphere of an agency and have real life ramifications (The new head of the EPA for our region is a former Dow Chemical executive. Whose interests do you think she will favor?) If that is not proof enough that the law is tied closely to politics, let me remind you of the branch of government that makes the laws: the legislature! We now live in an era where the law has become almost entirely a creature of statute. Those statutes are written by the legislature, and the legislature is put in office by our votes. Not only should we all be taking an interest in politics at the federal level, but also at the state--at least enough interest to read a bit on the issues and vote.

Clearly, when you represent a client and in following the laws, we are bound by the laws or a valid constitutional argument that the laws should be overturned. There will always be laws that we, according to our political beliefs, find repugnant. I do not think that everyone should have the same beliefs (although it would be nice if everyone agreed with me) but I think it is incumbent upon lawyers to have a basic understanding of the current political climate and to participate at the most basic level in that political system. It is important for your clients that you understand how and why laws are made and what forces may affect their change.

I think I can put this topic behind me for a while , at least until the '08 election season, which should be in full swing come January.

Voir Dire, Part I

My lack of posting is not the result of being impaneled on a jury; rather, after loosing two days down at the county courthouse, I have been playing catch-up. I did however get to sit through voir dire (the process through which attorneys and judges choose a jury from a pool of individuals) for two trials, one a murder trial and the other a drug possession trial. More than being a distraction from law school, my two days were very educational. I learned a lot by watching how the attorneys handle the pool of potential jurors, and in addition, I learned a lot about the cross section of my community that was randomly pulled for jury duty. I will try and sum up my observations in the next couple of posts:

First, more people than you would think have been victims of a violent crime. 65 people were called for the first trial, a murder/ robbery case. Around 20 people were released right off the bat because of hardship. Most of those individuals either had trips planned during the next three weeks (or so they said) or were small business people/ commissioned salespeople whose livelihood would be greatly affected by missing three weeks of work. From the 45 or so who remained, at lease five had had a gun pointed to their head at some point in there life. When one juror was asked, she replied "which time. . .I have had a rough life." The attorneys were asking these questions because there was a gun involved in the case. The former cop sitting in front of me described multiple occasion of looking down a barrel, and one tall bearded fellow had been an environmental activist who pissed off some loggers. Several others relayed their experiences in private, but this list only included those involved in gun crimes. There were others who had been kidnapped, beaten, robbed, held for ransom, etc. I must have led a sheltered life. I understand that this supposedly random section of society did not include those who had already found their way out of jury duty, but I think more people than we normally think have been victims of crime.

more to come. . .

Hurry up and wait!

I might actually get to see the inside of a courtroom today. No, the bar has not yet decided to allow me to practice based simply on my brilliance. I have jury duty. So far, I have been assigned to a jury pool, but before the action got started, I was released for three hours while the lawyers went over our paperwork and made preliminary decisions. Because I listed my occupation as law student, I find it unlikely I will be placed on any jury during my next two days of duty. I probably could have written and requested to be released, but seeing as this might be the last chance ever to sit on a jury and considering I have rarely ever been in a courtroom, I thought it might be a good educational experience--I am getting a lot of my homework done.

If perchance I am put on a jury, I will not be blogging about my experience until it is over. I read an article a few months ago about a criminal case in New Jersey--I believe--that went all the way up to the state supreme court on a jury related appeal because one of the jury members had been blogging about his experience during the course of the trial. The supreme court ruled that his actions had not been material to the decision and had not influenced any of the other members of the jury, so they let the verdict stand. Personally, I do not want to take the risk. I am probably pushing the envelop right now by blogging from a coffee shop, while officially still on jury duty. Of course the bar has not admitted me yet, but when I have my JD and have passed the bar exam, I would hate to not get admitted because I committed a previous indiscretion or was the subject to a supreme court appeal. I am not a lawyer yet, but considering what I already know, I will probably be held to a higher standard if I were to come up before a bar ethics committee--something I hope never to face. With that said, I will post after this experience is over and leave you all with any other impressions I have, unless they are no different from my experience this morning: hurry up and wait*

*I borrowed this expression. Thanks! I hope this gives you credit without disrupting your anonymity.

Urban Living

Some days I think I should go into advertising. I like coming up with funny short jingles, puns, and I am generally interested in what kind of images/ideas/trends appeal to people. Maybe that is an option if law school does not work out, or maybe just because this town needs some better marketers. Let me just share with you a couple of examples. For those of you who have not heard, Seattle has a new slogan. The Emerald City has been declared outdated, and the city has unveiled a slogan that will capture the spirit of the city--a place where people spend their days hiking and boating and their nights shopping at Nordstroms and eating organic food in chic upscale restaurants. I am sure some one was paid millions of dollars to come up with a word that would capture the feel and spirit of our city, and the best they could do was METRONATURAL, or METRO NATURAL. Are they serious???? First of all, it sounds like a city filled with a bunch of gay hippies. Did they really think it was a good idea to launch a marketing campaign with a phrase that sounds like the adjective for boys who wear Lactose shirts with their collars up, lots of hair gel and get pedicures: metro-sexual? I understand what they were trying to get at, but there are so many better choices: ecourbanism, urbanaturalism, techno-green, cosmonatural! Read the PI article that asks the same question here.

If you think this is an isolated incident, you are mistaken. Seattle is changing very quickly and one of the biggest trends right now is the huge market for condos. This year alone, 4,000 new units are going on the market, and we are not talking about reasonable alternatives to owning in a city with an average home price near a half of a million; 400 square foot studios near downtown are selling for near $200,000. Along with new units sprouting up all over town, many of the older apartment buildings are becoming "condoized." For example, the building across the street from me is in the middle of the process right now, and unfortunately for me, the remodel is considered by almost all residents neighborhood and some local bloggers as one of the ugliest condo projects in all of Seattle. Check out this post on the blog urbnlivn about the project. I love how he describes the question he got,when he was taking pictures of the building if he was doing so because it was so ugly. Although the outside is decidedly ugly, my girlfriend and I went to their open house this weekend and the interiors are actually quite well done, but before one is lulled into the fantasy of chic metronatural living too quickly, it is important to notice that most of what you would be paying for is some new appliances. As a rental property, the building was notorious for having thin walls and outrageous heating bills. Beneath the veneer of new bamboo floors and stainless steel appliances, what you are mostly getting is an old building with single pane windows and old plumbing. One of the biggest outrages is that they are marketing as a two bedroom, a 600 square foot space, where the second bedroom is a murphy bed that folds out of the wall in the living room. They must be delusional if they think they can sell a "two-bedroom" without parking (on capitol hill, which if you know anything has the worst street parking situation on the whole west coast) for $350,000.

If you need further proof that they are delusional, or that there are a lot of suckers in this town, or that the condo market is out of control, you should check out their website. The marketing is right in line with the city's new metronatural theme. I especially like this description of some of the amenities you will enjoy as part of your life at the Vertigo condos: "up on the roof, you'll find a bit of green loveliness known to suburban dwellers as a garden. While the sun reflects off your patent leather boots, check out the city skyline and the Puget Sound." I can't tell if our mockery is intentionally induced as a way to engage our attention. Is is possible that if they were not so obnoxious with their language I would just ignore the building and would not be spending time writing about it. That might be the case, and if true, this would mean it is actually one of the most brilliant marketing schemes presently in operation. Just check out the tag line that is on all of the Vertigo condo posters and flyers: "The city is your game of tag. this is your base." Ha, ha, ha, are they serious? Who thought of that? Is it working? Maybe that "tag line" works in an era when the game of tag is being banned from school playgrounds across the country? One thing is sure, the investors who are marketing the condos are hoping there are enough suckers who place a larger value on image than on quality, because that is most of what they are getting.

Law of School is Funny

Law school is a funny place. Along with medical school, we are considered a trade school, but that classification always seems like an awkward fit. When I think of trade schools, I think of those schools that teach you professional skills like plumbing, auto mechanics, and pet grooming. Although we are training to practice the trade of law, a relatively small percentage of what we learn is actually the "practice" of law. I am not saying that a good founding in constitutional principles is not important to the practice of law-it is essential-but, rather, that most law school classes teach general legal knowledge. They are predominantly focused on intellectual concerns, not practical. On the other-hand, law school differs from other graduate school programs. In what feels like a past life now, I was once a graduate student in German literature. I used to joke with the other graduate students that we were in "trade school," and the joke was only funny because the only trade we were really learning was how to be a nutty professor of some obscure topic (mine would have been turn of the century German philosophical conceptions of transcendence through anti-transcendental expressions). Law school probably has broader application, but to give the "trade school" classification some credit-we are learning the intellectual basis for the practice of a particular trade.

So, law school is sort of a trade school and also a bit of a graduate school, but with assigned seats and lockers, it sometimes has an element of junior high. This mix of educational identities has a strange effect on the atmosphere of law school, which is what I really mean when I saw that law school is a funny place. It is not unusual to see students on any given day in suits; actually it is quite common place because many students also work while at school. Yet, it is also not unusual to see students in sweat pants as if they got lost leaving the dorms looking for freshman English class. There are a fair number of students here who did not stop at "go and collect two hundred dollars" after undergrad and for the most part see law school as an extension of their undergrad life. On the other-hand, there is a considerable number of students, especially at night, who have full time jobs, mortgages, two kids, and are already taking cholesterol medication. Add a $100,000+ price tag and a general atmosphere of competition, and more work than anyone could reasonably accomplish in a 16-week race for the finish line, and it is no wonder people are so grateful to get out of law school. As much as a do truly enjoy learning about the law I, like almost everyone I know, pretty much see this time as a necessary hazing ritual; and it is only necessary because they won't let you sit for the bar without it.

That does not mean I am not enjoying my classes. I am particularly enjoying IP and Constitutional law, but sometimes I look around and think, how did all of these people end up here together?

Government works?

As part of my work study job, I have occasion to call a local Social Security office. Often I have a very simple question, like yesterday when I simply wished to determine which worker was handling a file, so I could leave a message directly on his/her message machine. An attendant could have answered the question in thirty seconds, but if this particular office has its way, you will get so frustrated, you will never ever track down your claim. Let me explain.

If you wish to get in touch with your local office, the first thing you will have to do is get their phone number, which is neither in the phone book or on the Social Security website (only the address can be found in those places.) If you want the number, you need to call the national 1-800 number and you should expect to wait at least 7 minutes to speak with a representative and give lots of information. After you get the phone number, you can call the local office. I have learned from experience that if I simply act as if I have a rotary phone, I will most quickly be routed to "the attendant." If you follow their prompts for non-rotary phones, you will have to work your way through several levels of menus before you end up in the same place. Now, do not be fooled into thinking I have found a short-cut. I will still have to listen to a long recording telling me I can find all the information I need either on the website or the 1-800 number (which I have already discovered cannot help me.)

At this point I think it is only a matter of waiting in line for the next attendant, as the digital voice has told me. After several minutes, I hear a clicking sound and the line rings only to be interrupted by the message "mailbox 123 is full, your call will be forwarded to the attendant." I thought that is where my call was already going. When did I say I wanted to leave a message? Anyway, I am on my way now, and getting through that obstacle must mean I am close to speaking with a person now. But wait, after several more minutes of waiting, I receive another message: "thank you for calling Social Security. Have a nice day!" Disconnected. Hum. Try again. Same loop. Try a third time. Same loop. I guess if I want this question answered, I am either going to have to go down to the office or write a letter (and getting mail answered from Social Security is a whole other post).

I understand why our homeless disabled clients need us.

Classic Lines

It is time for some new classic lines from law school lectures. This time, some advise from one of our professors on dealing with judges:

• Have a healthy skepticism and contempt for judges, because you can never underestimate their stupidity.
  
• An odd judge may be ignorant, stupid, or lazy. You just never know if the judge in your case is going through a divorce or is just sick of doing his job and does not care any more.
  

• With growth of power, members of court interpret the government as having unlimited powers. At some point, people stopped reading the constitution. If we want the constitution to do the things we want it to do, we just amend the constitution. Why do judges keep doing things that aren't in the constitution just because we have been doing them.

And finally, the words of another Professor* of mine as he walked by me reading outside and catching some of the last sun rays of fall:

• Yo man! Wake up!

*The general consensus of our class is that he is totally nuts, but has been teaching and advocating for so many years he just says and does whatever he wants

Blogger Beta

Lots of blogging today. Guess I am trying to make up for my lack of blogging lately. Anyway, I just updated to the new blogger beta, so supposidly there are some new features. Fun, I will have to update some other aspects of this blog in the coming weeks. Some rainy weather would be helpful with that, but with beautiful days like today all I want to do is sit outside and soak up the sun.

Also, instead of writing more about detainee torture and the acts of congress (both are depressing) I wanted to say that I really like being a "lawyer in training." School is bearable, but as I continue with both of the jobs I was working last summer, one day a week in insurance negotiations for PI claims and one day a week advocating for disabled homeless in their Social Security claims, I realize how much fun this work is. I would much rather go to work than to school most days and when I am there, I really don't notice time going by. Maybe that is because everything is new, but maybe its because this stuff is fun. It makes me feel good about my choice to come to law school.