What About Paris? ™

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July 30, 2009

Geoffrey Hazard: How U.S. civil litigation is viewed abroad.

If you have European clients, you already know that in-house lawyers across the Atlantic do not like to have their company's commercial disputes heard and decided by American courts (even by our most efficient and respected U.S. district courts). Their reasons, however, turn on more than the obvious and commonly-given ones: lengthy and expensive proceedings, juries hearing civil disputes, and the fear of large damages awards, including punitive damages.

One more reason is the perception abroad of the extraordinary "localism" (generally county-based) of judges and juries in the state systems. Still another is the effect that contingency fee arrangements can have on the litigation process.

There are several more reasons. And every one of them can be troubling to both non-U.S. and American in-house lawyers.

At the podcast series of the International Institute for Conflict Prevention & Resolution (CPR), do not miss the interview by Mike McIlwrath, an in-house lawyer with General Electric in Europe, of Geoffrey C. Hazard, Jr., now at Hastings College of Law in San Francisco, in "American Exceptionalism: U.S. Civil Justice v. the Rest of the World". The July 17 interview is No. 75 in CPR's International Dispute Negotiation series. Hearing the Hazard interview is a "non-billable must" for any American business lawyer (in-house or outside firm) acting for clients in more than one jurisdiction, within or outside of the U.S.

Geoffrey Hazard is a well-known American law professor and author in the areas of civil procedure, federal jurisdiction and ethics. He has also taught law at Boalt, the University of Chicago, Yale, and Penn Law. One of his former students--and his research assistant when Hazard taught at Yale--is U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito. Mike McIlwrath is Senior Counsel, Litigation for GE Infrastructure-Oil & Gas, and works out of Florence, Italy. Last year, the IDN series earned both McIlwrath and New York-based CPR an award for ADR excellence from CEDR, an ADR group in London.

Geoffrey Hazard

Posted by JD Hull at 12:30 AM | Comments (3)

July 29, 2009

In America, we call that a scoop: Charon QC interviews Lord Falconer.

Has the Blogosphere in the West finally arrived? Yesterday, London's silver tongued Charon QC--in his other life a well-regarded legal educator and journalist--interviewed Lord Falconer (Charles Leslie Falconer), the Lord Chancellor of Great Britain between 2003 and 2007. Jack Straw, in Gordon Brown's administration, now has the position. Among the other powers and duties assigned to him, the Lord Chancellor is a member of the Prime Minister's Cabinet and responsible for the operation and ensuring the independence of the British court system. Charon's podcast interview is here.

Lord Falconer

Posted by Rob Bodine at 03:23 PM | Comments (1)

July 20, 2009

Houston-based Defending People adopts "no-name, no-publish" policy .

Effective immediately, absent compelling reasons, this blog will join [another blog] in not publishing any comments of anonymous commenters. All comments must be accompanied by commenters’ names (first and last) and real and verifiable email addresses.

-- Mark Bennett, Trial Lawyer, Houston, Texas, July 14.

Texans are quirky Americans. Internet handles like Law Gringo, Smokestack Lightning and Young Cardozo Speaks won't cut it with them. They like real names. Despite the Texas fondness for outsize egos, there are rules. Not many rules, mind you--but some. Texans are arguably the most secure humans on earth. They know who they are. Most Texans we know speak up, hate wasting time, and carry themselves with natural elan.

And they will always ask: "Who the hell are you?". Then you respond by giving a name. However, as mentioned, it's a real oddball tribe--so just humor them. The name you give must be your name, and it must be a real one, and very similar to the one your mother gave you, or that you give to the DMV. Got that? E-mail us if you are not clear on this.

Texans know that there are winners and losers in life. Not everyone gets to be a star--even in Texas. Asking who you are is the way to begin to keep track. And if in response you don't even give your name--well, you know, Bubba, it sounds like you have made the decision for us.

At work here is a powerful instinct, folks. And we think it's a bit stronger in Texas than it is in other regions of the U.S. It's forged elegantly, and complexly, of several elements: human curiosity, friendliness, warrior spirit, playfulness.

Respect, too.

The story of Texas in earlier times is the story of America Writ Even Larger. When your stomping grounds are limitless and often uncontrollable spaces, and you live in a transient society, you learn to expect all manner of creatures--human and not human--to come up and down your path. You need to size them up quickly. You may not see them again for a while.

In much of America over the last 400 years, whenever there was a new animal in the woods, you needed to confront it, and get a sense of it. After all, you might have to kill it later on--for safety, for food or for fun. So the least you can do is get its proper name. Do some quick but accurate homework, study the critter a bit, and file it all away for the next meeting.

With humans, it's not much different. In or out of the state of Texas, a typical Texan--trust us, there clearly is such a person--will effortlessly overwhelm, charm or take as hostage any room of people on the planet for as long as he or she wants. But there is a time-honored prerequisite to engaging, and eventually declaring victory over, any of us mere mortals, in business, battle, love or a parlor game.

They will first ask: "Who are you?". Ask the question. Get an answer. Then he or she will proceed. A good Texan's savoring of the joy and brutality of victory comes, it all, much later.

Besides, it's not that rewarding to engage cartoon characters and phantoms. The Nameless are more likely to lie to us, and hustle us. Life's short, and the people in it move fast. We need an your ID, mate. Take off the mask for a spell. Then we can talk. WAC? sees no reason for any other rules of engagement to apply on the Internet and in the Blogopshere--both of which in our view have quickly evolved into a sea of trash. These days, we seek a better neighborhood.

Getting back Texas, we were not surprised last week when, at the forthright and increasingly well-regarded site called Defending People, Mark Bennett, a Houston-based criminal defense lawyer, announced that his site would also ban, subject to compelling exceptions, comments by anonymous commenters. Do see his article "No, You Are Not Publius".

WAC? of course was proud to be mentioned. But we were very happy that it was Bennett who did this. Our main writer, a decade older than me, has quite a work travelogue in the U.S. and Europe, and has met a few lawyers. For two decades, he has worked on both litigation and transactions (especially on energy related issues) all over the Midwest and South. He gives Bennett the ultimate compliment: a "stand-up guy", and someone we should meet, get to know and learn from.

It helps that the handful of other lawyer-writers we respect--like Scott Greenfield, the white collar defense lawyer in NYC who writes Simple Justice--have such a high regard for Bennett.

The blogosphere, though, is still a mess. And one problem is that there are too many nameless commenters--some of them apparently talented--who disrespect themselves and us. We are thrilled that Mark Bennett, the proponent here, is not only a fine lawyer, but also deeply cares about (1) the legal profession, and (2) the Internet which showcases far more productive (and for that matter far more shoddy and unproductive) discourse about the law, courts, policy, and regulation than anyone would have predicted 5 years ago.

In short, a wonderful development: A "no anonymity" policy as a default position instituted by one of the Net's few stand-up guys.

Next, please? Who else will step up? Who will help improve The Conversation?

Posted by Rob Bodine at 09:15 PM | Comments (0)

July 18, 2009

Walter Leland Cronkite, Jr. (1916-2009)

Yesterday's NYT: "Walter Cronkite, Voice of TV News, Dies". Cronkite was part-Midwesterner, part-Southerner, and started out in print journalism. He earned his reputation as a war correspondent in Europe, covering some of WWII's major campaigns. Recruited to CBS in 1950 by Ed Murrow, he was America's first "celebrity" anchor, and we saw him nightly from 1962 to 1981. He took what he did very seriously: broadcast journalism as religion, the fourth branch, and something to be done the right way.

A studious-looking Lefty, Cronkite likely thought of JFK as "his" president. The two men were born eight months apart. We and our parents saw him choke up on the air--even if barely--just that one time: November 22, 1963, reporting JFK's death in Dallas. Cronkite had just turned 47. But he always seemed older somehow. He had this reassuring voice: authoritative but never affected or self-important. You never got the impression when he reported one crisis after another--there was a new one every month from 1963 until 1975--that he was telling you that things would be "okay". Rather, he was telling you the truth--and that it was his mission to get it right.

He served you. He was the soundtrack of every American Boomer's youth: from Kennedy's somehow promising but wistful and aborted New Frontier, Viet Nam, more assassinations, GOP and Dem party conventions that were serious brawls or riots, the Johnson, Nixon, Ford and Jimmy Carter administrations, and up to the start of the overly-serious, and some think seriously-demented, Reagan Revolution that gave us the Newt Brigades. Nearly 20 years.

(Photo: Washington Post)

Posted by JD Hull at 02:14 AM | Comments (0)

Creation.

There is no joy except in creation. There are no living beings but those who create. All the rest are shadows, hovering over the earth, strangers to life. All the joys of life are the joys of creation: love, genius, action...

--Romain Rolland (1866-1944), Nobel Prize winner, in "Lightning Strikes Christophe".

Posted by Rob Bodine at 12:40 AM | Comments (0)

July 17, 2009

Breaking news: I will name my next three children after Jack Welch.

Query: In the United States in the year 2009, must you be Jack Welch just to tell the truth any more? And please note, everyone: it's not a Mommy, Woman, Man, or Gen-Y thing. It's about customers, quality, and not alienating the productive workers at your shop so irretrievably that they vote with their feet.

Tons of coverage--and oddly much of it negative--on this story. WAC? is so outdated, irrelevant, and old fashioned. For now see "No Such Thing as Work-Life Balance for Women, says Jack Welch" by Alpha Mummy at The Times of London.

We are indebted to Redford for the heads up on the Welch story. We've been working too hard lately to notice coverage of the WLB swan song. But this is great. I was getting tried of going to my meetings, anyway:

Hello everyone. My name is Rob, and I'm a recovering workaholic. Feels really good to be able to say that today. My life was unmanageable. My co-workers did an intervention--and they saved my life. You see, one year ago today was the end of my last work bender....

"Work-Life Balance Is A Dumb-Ass Issue" and related posts dating from 2006 can be found in the Running Firms archive at this blog.

Life ain't easy for a little girl on the playground known as "Jackwelch". But we are too inspired to change it now.

Posted by Rob Bodine at 11:59 PM | Comments (3)

July 16, 2009

The Economist: Goldman Sachs's record profits.

In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is King.

--Erasmus of Rotterdam (1468–1536)

But a win is still a win. See yesterday's article in The Economist, "Keeping Up with the Goldmans". Excerpts:

This windfall will eventually dwindle. Goldman and other survivors will benefit from the coming wave of debt issuance by federal, state and local governments. But dealer spreads are sure to shrink as markets normalize and those that have retreated return to the fray.

This is likely to be offset only partially by a pick-up in businesses tied more closely to economic growth, such as advising on mergers and acquisitions.

Wall Street will also face tighter shackles. Regulators are on the warpath against commodities speculators. A clampdown is also coming in credit derivatives; this week America’s Justice Department joined those probing that market.

Erasmus, by Hans Holbein the Younger, 1523, Musée du Louvre

Posted by Rob Bodine at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)

The Divine Mr. Greenfield: Policing Your Kool-Aid for You.

Because let's face it: a lot of us drink the work-life balance Kool-Aid before we even read the instructions. See Scott Greenfield's from-the-heart "'Cause You Got To Have Friends". This is the most eloquent writing we've seen this year on (1) the meaning of lawyering, (2) why clients matter most, and (3) the hard but important reality that there are simply no short-cuts in this profession. Excerpts:

There are clients, real people who suffer real consequences, as a result of the delusions perpetrated on the internet.

They come to lawyers believing them to be competent, even expert, and willing and capable of helping them, saving their lives sometimes. And the lawyer's primary focus is to get paid and be home by dinner, with the client merely the conduit for the transfer of revenue and proof of the mastery of the secret to success.

So I leave my niche in criminal law from time to time to be a voice in the wilderness, that we are not selling laundry detergent, but are lawyers, professionals, in whom people repose their trust. I've seen their children cry when their lawyers fail to fulfill their duty. The need to enjoy a happy lawyer life will never wipe away their tears.

The Divine Mr. G, without eyeglasses. Scott Greenfield worries about the the profession because you and the WLB consultants won't.

The Divine Ms. M never mailed it in, either.

Posted by Rob Bodine at 09:57 PM | Comments (1)

July 12, 2009

London: The Good Ship Rioja.

South Coast of England. Speaking of people who can still drink safely, more or less, mainly, see Charon QC's "Postcard from The Good Ship DOOMED". Excerpt:

I sit here on the bridge, a glass of Rioja in my hand. It is 9.45 am, but even though there are no icebergs on the Medway, Horatio Charon is not terribly good at sailing and if we go down I would not wish to do so without a wine glass in my hand. This is my new mantra.

The pathologist will not find anaesthetics, painkillers or enough dope inside me to kill a herd of elephants, but I would like him to write on my death certificate, should my soul be lost this day at sea.... “He died with an acceptable level of red wine inside him for a gentlemen of letters”.

An earlier famous Charon trip on the River Styx.

Posted by JD Hull at 03:32 PM | Comments (0)

London: GeekLawyer does Glastonbury.

Woodstock for Brits. Organized WAC? is up to his summer red bow ties in work--and is even behind on some non-client duties. Saturdays usually help to catch up. [If you're Gen-Y, don't try to fathom that last six-word sentence--you'll get a rash, or pull a hamstring. Pretend it's not there. Keep reading.] However, brief homage to some international incidents--even in a work crunch--is still critical. We could perhaps ignore the annual, world-famous, always-Woodstock-trumping Glastonbury Music Festival in southwest England.

However, we could never pass on reporting the attendance of it by certain of Albion's luminaries. See GeekLawyer's "Glastonbury All Done For This Year" from earlier this week. In this July 7 post, GeekLawyer, a London barrister, and author of several pamphlets on Etiquette: Summering in Aldeburgh, did seem to threaten a fuller report later--with "graphics". Last summer's video interview he did with a famous, shapely and sultry Brit solicitor, is here.

GeekLawyer Chambers: West London branch, Servants' Entrance.

Posted by JD Hull at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)

No-Name, No-Publish. What About Clients? is now a proud Wuss-Free Zone.

Effective July 1, 2009, and absent compelling reasons, this blog will no longer print any comments of anonymous bloggers and commenters.*

Nameless blogosphere participants, in our view, are rarely worth anyone's time, thought, or respect. Anonymous writers have already "discounted" themselves. You can discount them, too, without worrying you're missing anything. They are second-class citizens, at best. See our past posts on the subject here and here.

Policy: On this blog, the ethos is Step Up: (1) Say Who You Are, and then (2) Say What You Think. We need both bona fides to publish. Exceptions are special needs cases: e.g., CIA undercover operatives, abused housewives, Cuban or Iranian dissidents, ex-hookers who work with severely retarded children, Gen-Ys, or unwed teenage moms, bona fide members of the dreaded Club Ned, and serious non-wimp trailblazers. Garden variety risk-averse lawyer/CPA dweeb life forms need not apply.**

Everyone else: get a spine. Above: The highly-respected French Resistance in action. Twenty-first century counterparts may qualify for a WAC? No-Anonymity Rule special needs exemption.

*We can't read it, either. We simply don't have the time. Please find other passive aggressive exercises--or maybe just a part-time job--to fill your spare time.

**Since 2005 we have received hundreds of comments/e-mails from the likes of Zorro, Publius, Sweet Lorraine, Wanker Emeritus, Little Sammy, The Humongous, and Alexander Madison in which the writer asserts that, in a previous life, he or she was a Federalist Papers author, Mahatma Gandhi, or member of the French Resistance. No more comments, you folks, especially. Just get some help.

Posted by Rob Bodine at 12:00 AM | Comments (1)

July 11, 2009

...and on Bastille Day.

And the moral of the story is never lean on the weird. Or they will chop your head off. Take my word for it, Bubba. I am an expert on these things. I have been there.

--HST, 1994

How the Marquis de Sade was finally forced into politics. Bastille Day is Tuesday, July 14, the French day of independence, which occurred 220 years ago. During the workweek, of course, we are not likely to write about Revolution. Or The Marquis. WAC? has big ones--but we have a decent respect for those who are straight-laced, clean-living and just trying to avoid the next nightmare. They are our people. We come from that; we lived among them for many years.

Besides, no matter what the mainstream press tells you, there's a "riot goin' on" (i.e., the late-2008 Recession). No use in further aggravating our well-educated readers, many with serious resources to conserve and protect. Yet it is Saturday. This is What About Paris? Bear with us.

According to Dr. Thompson in "Better Than Sex" (a 1994 book about U.S. politics), and some other sources, the Marquis de Sade (1740-1814), the Parisian artist and French nobleman, played a role in this opening drama of the French Revolution. It is true that the Marquis, a serious artist, was out-front different, wild, and independent; he didn't care what people thought or said about him.

Ever.

Thompson writes that on occasion The Marquis would run amok on booze and laudanum in the streets of Paris, just to blow off steam. The mainstream French aristocracy, and clergy, were never happy with the Marquis. They "not only hated his art, they hated him".

The Bastille

By 1788, the Paris police routinely harassed him, and jailed him a few times. The Bastille itself, and later an insane asylum, were his homes in the days leading up to July 14.

In turn, Thompson continues, the Marquis began to hate cops--and the government. Well, by the summer of 1789, Paris, in its oppressive July heat, was about to explode, anyway, and according to Thompson:

The mood of the city was so ugly that even the Marquis de Sade became a hero of the people. On July 14, 1789, he led a mob of crazed rabble in overrunning a battalion of doomed military police defending the infamous Bastille Prison, and they swarmed in to "free all political prisoners"....

It was the beginning of the French Revolution, and de Sade himself was said to have stabbed five or six soldiers to death as his mob stormed the prison and seized the keys to the Arsenal. The mob found only eight "political prisoners" to free, and four of those were killed by nightfall in the savage melee over looting rights for the guns and ammunition.

Posted by Rob Bodine at 01:59 AM | Comments (0)

July 10, 2009

Jordan Furlong at Law21: Everything will change. Get used to it.

A slow-moving but relentless development that in time will have vast economic, social and political consequences.

--The Economist, June 26, 2009

No, you won't need to sell the condo in Marco Island. But yes, in the Americas or Europe, everything--especially if you are a corporate lawyer--is about to change. Inspired by a piece two weeks ago in The Economist on the demographics of aging in the West, Canada's Jordan Furlong at Law 21 just gave us "Time Bomb".

Law21--launched 18 months ago and subtitled "Dispatches From a Legal Profession on the Brink"--has already been right about many things. Furlong's article discusses the end of retirement. Unfunded pension rights. The waning of big incomes, and of many law schools. Sobering. And everyone will work longer in multi-generational places and modes of work? This blog? We would settle for just starting to work again--and without apology to fashionable consultants. We can get finally off our knees.

And finally one very bright spot. It's the passing reminder in Furlong's piece that Gen Y is done hatching--as if all those gooey little pods in the "Alien" movies were blown up and scattered into Deep Space. We will now meet "Gen Z". So pleased to meet y'all. Really mean that. But ah, Gen Y: The Millennials. We will perhaps miss that aggressive and cheerful Reverse-Moxie.

To their credit, since the early 1600s in the Americas, no generation--in the twenty that started out in Virginia and Massachusetts--has been able to do what they have done. Who else has had the gumption and foresight to grab Mediocrity and Work-Life Balance by the lapels, shove it all up against the wall, look it straight in the eye--and then call it "excellent" without laughing?

Jordan Furlong

Posted by JD Hull at 12:38 PM | Comments (1)

July 09, 2009

Stamford Connecticut girl makes good (again).

Our friend Ellen Bry, a nighttime drama television mainstay (St. Elsewhere, Dexter, Boston Legal, Monk, The Closer) for decades--and known in the LA-NYC underground as WAC?'s in-house photographer--has the lead role as Ester Hobbes, a Chicago socialite who suddenly loses everything, in The Lost & Found Family, a new Sony Pictures release.

In the film, we meet a strong and spiritual woman who is surprised to learn that she has inherited just one thing from her dead businessman husband: a run-down old house in Georgia, and the turbulent foster family living in it.

Taken from the story Mrs. Hobbes' House, The Lost & Found Family is a poignant, uplifting, instructive and remarkably powerful family film set in the American South. It was filmed in Jackson, Georgia, a town between Atlanta and Macon, with a population of about 4000, in Butts County.

It is a movie for rural people who go to church, sing, watch lots of TV, listen to Bocephus, have at least two cousins in the Meth trade, eat a lot, and are afraid of virtually everyone, and of everything, all of the time. It is bound for fame as a cult classic: a comfort to millions of rustics stuck in the vast grayness and troubled reverie that is American Fly-Over Country.

Hey, just joshing you. Early in 2008, I saw a rough cut of The Lost and Found Family--then still entitled Mrs. Hobbes' House--before Sony Pictures acquired it. Do see the new Sony clip below, which includes what I saw. Like me, you may recognize the people portrayed:

Many Americans, including my own family, have roots that reach deeply into, say, southwestern Virginia, east Tennessee, and southern Missouri (where I've visited family my entire life), going back well over two centuries. Later generations are still there: always hard-working and proud, sometimes devout, seldom well-to-do, and worlds away from the country club life Ester Hobbes led when her husband was alive. They often struggle to make the best life they can.

So you need not be Southern, rural or devoted to any form of organized religion to be moved by Ester Hobbes' story. This film will touch every viewer with simple but forgotten verities that bind us to one another.

There are artful, and moving, performances by Ellen and her younger cast members, who include teen heartthrob Lucas Till (Walk The Line, Hannah Montana: The Movie), and Jessica Luza, a film and television actress (The Sullivan Sisters, Boston Legal) and MTV fashion host.

Ellen Bry's movie credits include Mission Impossible 3, Deep Impact, and Bye, Bye Love. Stage work has included The Sixties, The Cafe Plays, Tribute and Seduced. A graduate of Tufts and Columbia universities, she is former stunt woman, a Mom, and a well-known national advocate for autism issues. She is also reputed to make a mean Peppered Shrimp Alfredo.

--from JDH 6/24/09 post

Posted by Rob Bodine at 11:44 PM | Comments (0)

July 08, 2009

Tea, sympathy, and a grooming tip for "Club Ned" members.

Honey, just wear a black turtleneck. Even Ned Beatty looks good in a black turtleneck.

--Overheard last year in Brentwood

Ned in repose, planning Georgia fishing trip with buddies.

Just like a hog, eh? We are receiving many strong if not terribly classy "anonymous comments"--not to be published until we receive court records, affidavits and confidential photos--in nameless response to our strong but classy anti-anonymity piece earlier this week: "Play Time" on the Internet is Over. Wanted: A Few Good Rules". Apparently, there are way more people, presumably male lawyers, and many fire-breathing Above The Law regulars, than we had thought who unfortunately once received Ned's brutal and unsavory treatment in the woods that is the key prerequisite for Club Ned status. We think only about .05% of the population qualify. But that could still be a lot of victims.

The legacy of a bad weekend in Aintry. Our sympathies. Having to think about that kind of personal violation--or something similar--must make for a very damn tough train or car commute every day from New Canaan or Chevy Chase to work. The partners can't know. Your staff can't know. Your friends can't know. It's lonely, we are sure, even though we don't feel your pain. So we will be offering survival tips for you guys, as anonymity on The Net becomes a narrow and pitied exception to fair participation--and you painfully gather all those unspeakable files and send them to us so we can certify your CN membership.

Here's one. Club Ned of course is based on "Bobby" played by the great character actor Ned Beatty in Deliverance. If you are in Club Ned, you are by definition a victim of something horrible. And frankly you also may be a little hard on the eyes, anyway, at least by this point, if you catch our meaning, and get our drift. Sure, CN members are often physically unattractive. So here's a grooming tip, and two words: black turtleneck. It hides more of the bruises, too.

Posted by Rob Bodine at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)

July 07, 2009

Indiana Ivy-Leaguer goes national, makes good: Above The Law Editor on "The Law School Indicator".

One well-done, smart and useful interview by one tough guy. Bravo, ATL Editor Elie Mystal. Publisher Lat: Give this man a raise already.

Posted by Rob Bodine at 11:59 PM | Comments (1)

London law students: scholars, critics, lovers.

We send you the complete text of this circa-1595 comedy by Shakespeare, here, and on one page. The play was first performed before Queen Elizabeth, at her Court in 1597.

"Loues Labors Loſt"--note the obsolete spelling of 'love', showing the strong hangover of the French language in England--was also likely written for early performances before culturally-literate law students and barristers-in-training at the Inns of Court in Legal London. The idea was that the students would appreciate its sophistication and wit. Law students apparently were once like that in the West.

Do read Love's Labour's Lost when it's quiet. Maybe next weekend after the weenie roast, or when Uncle Seamus from Albany sleeps it off in the room with the happy bunny rabbits-motif wallpaper and curtains you never took down. Interestingly, and not to embarrass you about Uncle Seamus again, the play itself begins with a vow by several men to forswear pleasures of the flesh and the company of fast women during a three-year period of study and reflection.

And to "train our intellects to vain delight".

(From a 9/1/08 Dan Hull post written at Bayswater, West London)

Posted by Rob Bodine at 12:58 AM | Comments (0)

July 05, 2009

Real lawyers practice law. (Blogging comes second.)

We got a profession for you right here. See Scott Greenfield's April 22 piece "Waiting For The Checks To Roll In", commenting on a WSJ Mark Penn column declaring that "blogging is the newest profession". Greenfield excerpt:

They [pro bloggers] work long hours? Again, I'm not quite impressed. Working 50 to 60 hours might seem like a great burden to some, but most lawyers consider that half time. We work as long as we need to work, and then we work a little more to make sure our work is done right.

Note: Greenfield is a trial lawyer who simply hasn't yet heard that hard and careful work has gone out of style.

(From a WAC? 4/22/09 post.)

Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)

"Play Time" on the Internet is Over. WANTED: A Few Good Rules.

Are you really in Club Ned? Certainly, if he were real, Ned Beatty's character Bobby in the movie adaptation of the James Dickey novel Deliverance would be permitted to write in the blogosphere using a pseudonym. "Chattooga River Cutie", maybe. Those not in Club Ned? Real name, please. (Photo: Warner Bros.)

Life and Work are both supposed to be Fun and Meaningful. We can still get both. And if everyone wants to be a "junior journalist" on the World Wide Web, that's fine, too. But you need a few rules.

You need a few good, and intuitive, Internet rules for lawyers, non-lawyers, business people, academics, middle managers, CEOs, bloggers, commenters, students, sales people, Pulitzer winners, Fulbright scholars, store clerks, your Mom, Gen-this/Gen-that, your demented Uncle Seamus, and the 70-year-old guy across the street with strong views about Sarah Palin, Wall Street and the Cubs.

You can't, of course, legislate rules, and enforce them, for the Internet.

You can, however, demand of yourself and others--in your own spheres and "virtual communities"--a bit of fair play, credibility and stepping-up:

1. Tell people who you are. Your real identity. Demand that others do the same. Virtual sandboxes are fun for everyone. Make them a separate zone(s), maybe. But anonymity should not be the norm. Exceptions, e.g.: CIA undercover operatives; Cuban, Iranian, Chinese dissidents; abused housewives; serious risk-takers, productive radicals and genuinely-deserving victims.*

2. Be accurate. You just gave us your name. Try to get it right. Work at your content. Don't waste our time.

3. Be willing to take a hit. Again, you just gave us your name. You're without armor--we are proud of you. Now step up and take the pain, if you are challenged, criticized or even called a worthless cretin. That's the freight you pay. Respond if you want. But you have nothing to be ashamed of.

And, finally, our suggestion on anonymous "challengers". Ignore them. They are rarely worth your time or respect.

That's about all the rules you need.

*E.g., Not okay: Law students, associates or practicing senior lawyers with delusions that they were Federalist Papers authors in a previous life. Okay: Foul-mouthed but respected and mega-talented members of Lincoln's Inn with radical free-speech agendas; the people in Utah who just started up a hopelessly outrageous and funny Anti-PC site called "Dwarf-Tossing 101"; and certain men from Georgia or Tennessee writing about fishing, hunting or camping trips with their buds on the ill-fated weekends that have gone awry.

Anonymity: Reserve it for special cases. For people who need it. Keep The Club small.

Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (5)

Palin: Still a Robo-Babe.

Way cute when she's mad.

And still a great political property. Don't write her off. Now you've all done it. She's really mad. And outside the cabin. See Joan Walsh's "Sarah Palin Resigning as Alaska Governor" at Salon.com. This is a fine-looking, energetic and feisty American woman. And in the Yank outlaw mold. We need a Sarah. Especially since--as Holden Oliver noted back in February--the French started getting all the good Anchorettes. Palin still married to that former First Dude guy?

Posted by Rob Bodine at 06:41 AM | Comments (2)

July 03, 2009

More Crossroads: Boomers ask "Who is John Mayer?"

Would prefer a good video/audio of 1968 live version but this--with lame but short introduction--will have to do for this former U.S. national anthem:

Posted by JD Hull at 11:43 PM | Comments (0)

Distinguish your firm. And yourself. Surprise clients.

It's not about the lawyers anymore. No one cares you're a lawyer. No longer impressive. In America, they made it easy to become a lawyer.

Some day, everyone, including your waitress in Richmond, Kentucky, will be a lawyer. And hey she's gaining on you, Jack. So get a head start. Distinguish yourself by serving clients. And get higher standards. Surprise them.

Rule 4: Deliver Legal Work That Change the Way Clients Think About Lawyers. From our Mr. Rogers-esque and annoying-but-accurate 12 Rules. A note about our waitress: Blaise. She attended Oberlin, had to quit twice to make money, graduated, was Coif in law school (night division), made Law Review, and has a Marshall Scholarship.

And a kid. She's a CPA, too. Blaise knows the difference between Whitman, Wordsworth and Whittier. She never feels sorry for herself. She thinks it's a privilege just to work. Blaise the waitress is going to kick your wazoo in the workplace when she gets a job at your firm.

What about your waitress?

Posted by JD Hull at 04:59 AM | Comments (0)

The late-2008 Recession: A Crossroads for Corporate Law?

I'm staying at the crossroads, believe I'm sinking down.

If you can navigate through all the painstaking diplomacy without pulling a hamstring, do visit ALM's Legal Blog Watch and read "Are the BigLaw Layoffs a Good Thing?", and the related links. It was inspired by a provocative and courageous Dan Slater column July 1 at NYT's Deal Book. Note: In writing the op-ed piece, Slater, of course, used his real name. Most of the twenty-five commenters--presumably Cuban dissidents, battered housewives and former Tony Soprano crew in the Witness Protection Program--did not.

"I went down to the crossroads, fell down on my knees. Asked the Lord above, have mercy now, save poor Bob if you please." Robert Leroy Johnson (1911-1938) used his real name when writing and performing.

Posted by JD Hull at 12:58 AM | Comments (0)

July 01, 2009

Performance Reviews based on CS standards.

At your shop, talk about real client service every single day--as if it were a substantive area of law practice. Make it a running conversation. And if you are serious about building and keeping a "client service culture", you need to underscore it at every performance review.

It's an idea that is here to stay--in this, or any other economy. See "Performance Reviews Based On Client Service Criteria?" Are you serious about all that "client service" stuff on your website?

Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)

Senator Franken: Good enough, smart enough, tough enough.

The Minnesota Supreme Court unanimously gives Franken the nod over Norm Coleman. Al Franken got out there and worked his wazoo off for that Senate seat. Congrats, Renaissance man--and welcome to arguably the world's most elite club. Los Angeles Times: "Goshdarnit Al Franken's a Senator". But is putting him on the Senate Judiciary Committee a good thing?

Posted by JD Hull at 06:41 AM | Comments (1)

P.L. 111-22: A Hurdle for Purchasers of Foreclosed Homes.

A bona fide tenant renting a home will be entitled to a 90-day notice before being evicted by the new owner upon foreclosure of the home. On May 19, Congress passed a Senate version of the Protecting Tenants at Foreclosure Act of 2009 (also known as the Helping Families Save Their Homes Act of 2009). It was signed by President Obama and took effect the following day, May 20.

The 90-day notice is a minimum requirement; a tenant with additional protections already in place (e.g., "Section 8" tenants) won't lose those existing protections. The Act defines bona fide in such a way as to prevent the prior owner from abusing the requirement by mischaracterizing himself as a tenant.

The notice is relatively simple to execute. And as the Washington Post suggested last week, it may not be slowing down the resale process. Still, it is a hard and fast required step. The Obama administration's summary of the legislation as passed is here. It includes a sunset provision that terminates its requirements on December 31, 2012.

Posted by Rob Bodine at 12:35 AM | Comments (0)