« September 16, 2007 - September 22, 2007 | Main | September 30, 2007 - October 06, 2007 »
September 29, 2007
Functional Gen-X lawyer charms bosses, heads to Portugal.
That would be me. Next week, I'll be working in Portugal--but first stop is in the pleasant Algarve, mainland Portugal's rolling and floral southernmost region, originally settled by the Phoenicians and the Carthaginians, traders who established colonies on the coasts. The Algarve was once part of the Roman empire, later becoming part of the Visigoths' jurisdiction. The Arabs held the Algarve for more than 500
years. In 711, Moorish general Tarik ibn Ziyad defeated the king of the Visigoths. The region was reclaimed in the mid-12th century by Christians.
At 9:30 AM on November 1, 1755, an earthquake struck, causing damage throughout Portugal and destroying much of the Algarve. As a result of the Treaty of Fontainebleau in 1807, Napoleon and Carlos IV of Spain agreed to carve Portugal into areas to be governed by France and Spain, with the Spanish to assume control of the Algarve. The ensuing wars, backed by the English and French, defeated the plan to split up Portugal. The April 1974 "Carnation Revolution" ended 50 years of dictatorship and initiated a democratic constitution which led to victory for the Socialists with the government being led by Prime Minister Mário Soares.
Posted by Tom Welshonce at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Paris parfait by Bradford
Another American living la vie Parisienne, as she writes a book. Tara Bradford serves Paris Parfait: art, antiques, culture, poetry and politics.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Pittsburgh football by Brubach
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania native, author, part-time Parisian, and WAC? college classmate to boot, Holly Brubach has this feature in the op-eds of today's New York Times: "Where Everybody Knows Your Team".
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Morocco collages by Bantock
See Nick Bantock's "Collaged Morocco" at Maryam's My Marrakesh.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:54 PM | Comments (0)
September 28, 2007
Global corruption--and the winner is?
You'll never guess. China Law Blog: "China: Corrupt Me. Corrupt Me Not", with latest corruption rankings from Transparency International.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Lawyer resilience: Two tough Brits weigh in.
As a follow up to our recent post on lawyers' lack of stiff-upper-lipped-ness, see a January 2006 GeekLawyer piece called "The Personality Type of a Lawyer" and, from earlier this week at Ruthie's Law, "Are You Tough Enough?". And SRV, of course.
I would walk ten miles on my hands and knees--
Ain't no doubt about it, baby, it's you I aim to please.
I'd wrestle with a lion, and a grizzly bear
It's my life, baby, but I don't care.Ain't that tough enough?
--SRV/Fabulous Thunderbirds
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:48 PM | Comments (0)
An Asian water war?
NBC: Could climate change gradually deplete and eventually dry up the Mekong River--which runs from the Tibetan Mountains to the South China Sea--and other world freshwater sources?
Posted by JD Hull at 01:30 PM | Comments (0)
September 27, 2007
UK: Accounting Divas of Cardiff, Wales.
Attractive and ancient Cardiff, Wales, with its Roman and Norman past and hard-working people, is a favorite WAC? city. And one with conquering women, gathering from the way they take over the town on weekend nights. Our St. Louis, Missouri friend Michelle Golden directs us to an interesting interview in BusinessGears.com with two young Cardiff women--Sophie Hughes and Lucy Cohen are each 24--in her post "A Younger, Hipper Accounting Firm". These folks make money, too. If you hate the interview, the pictures are, well, fetching.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:27 PM | Comments (0)
Hanover hangover: Hillary by hair of the hound
Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire started out as a mission "to tame and civilize the wild and savage American Indians", or something like that. It's a great place, and one of the finest colleges in the world. In fact, WAC?, growing up in Cincinnati, applied to and was admitted to Dartmouth in the 1970s--but did not attend, citing as reasons his inferior drinking skills* and "are you crazy?...no girls". So he
headed for warmer Durham, North Carolina, where there were women, really interesting and smart ones, and no one started drinking until at least 10 AM. At last night's presidential Dem candidate debate in Hanover, WAC? and I, watching sporadically from San Luis Obispo, were impressed that now co-ed, always mega-smart but still hard-drinking Dartmouth student body apparently stayed passably sober for some of the evening program.
Our quick and dirty report: Hard to pin down Queen Hillary wins, as she runs out the clock. Strong showing by feisty John Edwards on Iraq war (he'll somehow just end it with no residual ops). Joe Biden--watch for him to end up as HRC's Secretary of State--is a traditional WAC? favorite but we can still see clearly enough to give him barely third place. Obama was really out to lunch--bad night for him--and WAC? still thinks he can kiss this all goodbye. He's not "ready"; he's never been ready. Maybe 2012. But, hey, this campaign is not over for anyone. We could be wrong. --HHO and JDH
*WAC? would have needed remedial drinking courses at Dartmouth. During a WAC? visit at age 17 to Dartmouth, an older ex-athlete from WAC?'s high school in Cincinnati, and WAC?'s former doubles tennis partner, got drunk in a dorm room where WAC? was hanging out one night and "blew lunch" on both WAC?'s new winter coat and on his Joni Mitchell "Blue" album.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 10:59 PM | Comments (0)
North Carolina: Players v. Duke?
The Chronicle: D.C. lawyer Charles Cooper has told ABC News that a majority of current and former lacrosse players and their families have hired him to investigate the possibility of a lawsuit against Duke.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 09:58 PM | Comments (0)
McGermany: Got Americanization?
See at Berlin-based Observing Hermann "Heuschrecken ohne Ende" (literally Endless Locusts). Note: Hermann's kidding, mainly.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 01:59 PM | Comments (0)
Who's really greener--Democrats or Republicans?
In olden times, just over 30 years ago in the mid-1970s, the environmental movement was still young, 'environmentalists' were a troublesome new class of malcontents and eccentrics, and men were still men.
Our law firm tried to answer the "who's greener" question in 2006 for Water & Wastewater Products magazine. The answer is interesting and still the same. Do see the timeline/chart in the article "Who's Greener--Democrats or Republicans?". WWP, as dull as it sounds, has great writing and useful, if sometimes technical, content. Some of its readers, though, have their wild side. Environmental engineers can
get pretty wiggy after throwing back martinis and swapping a few stormwater permit sampling event stories in the Boom-Boom Room at the Ramada after work. Anyway, a lot of them--especially the ones over 40--loved the WWP piece. They miss the old days--when an "environmental problem" just meant that the ground had finally caught fire.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:01 AM | Comments (0)
September 26, 2007
Duval & Stachenfeld, salaries, real life: Value Movement?
Markets pay lawyers what markets will bear--and you need great young people to help you serve high-end clients with complex problems. Just the same, will it take strong partners with great clients bolting from firms to get some law firms off their knees? Besides, and (gulp) sorry, brilliant 27-year-old ex-law clerks don't know anything. Even they know that. And some of them will never get it and catch on. How about merit-based pay based on actual experience? The new Actual Value Movement ("AVM")?
See at Legal Blog Watch Carolyn Elefant's "Law Firm Salaries: If You Can't Beat Them, Retreat From Them" her report and links there about Duval & Stachenfeld LLP (NYC, LA and Las Vegas), which
pays starting associates $60,000--or $100,000 below the going rate. Salaries don't stay flat, however, and by their third year, D&S associates [the 50% who "prove themselves", according to D&S] can expect to match salaries of their counterparts at top firms.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
US court news (AP)
Parts of Patriot Act ruled unconstitutional. Portland, Oregon judge strikes down two provisions which allow search warrants to be issued sans showing of probable cause. Ex-husband in Warren Jeffs polygamy case charged with rape. New case is based on trial testimony in Jeffs case in Washington County, Utah. Phil Spector mistrial in LA. "Da doo ron ron ron, da doo ron ron. Yes, my heart stood still..."
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Texas: Another reason not to popularly elect judges--ever, anywhere.
Re: courts and lawyer cluelessness. See at Overlawyered this one: "Furor over Mikal Watts 'judges owe us' letter".WAC?'s said before that popular election of state judges is an embarrassingly medieval institution that hurts us all. (See, e.g., Are federal judges "better" than state judges?)
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:24 PM | Comments (0)
September 25, 2007
London law merger market: so what's the problem, U.S. firms?
And will you know what to do once you get there? London-based Legal Week, armed with a survey, reports that "US firms target UK mergers as battle for London hots up". WAC? still sees London-U.S. law merger market "movement" as slow and reluctant because it takes cautionary lessons, for example, from some unprofitable and often ill-conceived attempts by U.S. firms to become players in Russia twenty years ago and China a decade later. Now, for once, lawyer risk-aversion is an asset. But The London legal market? Yes, London's off-the-chart expensive these days. But as stable as you'd want. Entering it poses cultural issues and barriers even sophisticated Yanks don't pick up on with any clarity for months
and usually years--Brits are different, folks--and most large American firms don't even know what those problems really are. But they sense them.
That's smart, sort of. We at WAC? have been involved personally and professionally with law firm mergers: all dressed up, and nothing to do, is certainly something to avoid.
Let's assume American firms know strategically how to enter London and all the more inviting UK/Europe legal marketplaces and have the resources to do it. So what's the problem? My answer: U.S. firms know they aren't culturally saavy and secure enough to go into the UK/Europe, and they are right to think that way. Note, via a hand-off from the vigilant Ed. at Blawg Review, a post which not only got us thinking about this but reflects the somewhat different sentiments of HMPC's overworked co-founder and international tax diva Julie McGuire two weeks ago at a meeting I attended in Pennsylvania. However, its author, Bruce MacEwen, said it first and, as usual, likely better than anyone else could have: "London Calling: But Who's Ready to Dance?".
Posted by JD Hull at 11:58 PM | Comments (0)
California: "My vibe guy is E.F. Hutton, and he says..."
WAC?, still north of Los Angeles, called last night to report that he may have to move back East sooner and not later. "Guess I'm not a California guy", he concluded. Apparently, his ears had perked up in a restaurant when a stunning and articulate professional woman spoke glowingly of her "energy advisor". He inquired, and it turns out she was not talking about: fossil-fuel consultants, brokers specializing in utility stocks, or promoters of deals to sell shares in peat farms.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:00 AM | Comments (0)
September 24, 2007
New York: Ahmadinejad, "mystical populist", holds forth at Columbia; Columbia blows it.
Updated 7:30 PM EST: Everyone loses. Columbia allows aggressive, long-winded, grandstanding and scripted opening "questions", preventing Ahmadinejad from looking as bad as he might have looked, and giving the Iran president a chance to hit them out of the park, which he in turn also screws up. Except for letting him speak, Columbia totally blew the details of this. Everyone involved, including Columbia President Bollinger, looks bad, pandering and/or lame. Shame on us. AP: here, including MSNBC video. -- JDH and HHO
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:00 PM | Comments (0)
The Blogs of War, Day 1: Viking Pundit
Man is by nature a political animal. --Aristotle, Politics
Beginning today, and as our time permits, we'll start showcasing a few of the stronger U.S. political blogs: left, middle, right, and even off-spectrum. We start with Eric Lindholm's Viking Pundit.
What do American politics and the 2008 U.S. presidential election have to do with law, this blog, clients, customers, business, international law, litigation, IP, corporate tax, natural resources and the global economy, anyway?
Well, to us, everything. While each of us here who write or suggest
posts can be opinionated, the What About Clients? blog is non-partisan, with writers of several persuasions and strains: GOP, Democrat, independent (and one Druid, but she could be kidding). We are about ideas and standards, but we seek to mix and match the best--and then use it in real work and real life. Politics, and who stays in power or comes to power, affects all of that.
But we have no traditional or cookie-cutter party agenda. No "moral" imperative. Among ourselves, knee-jerk anything or convention for its own sake are frowned upon, and even laughed at lovingly. But if you consistently and steadfastly buy into this party line, or that cultural agenda, or anyone else's "outline" (other than your own), we might secretly think you're a chump. But we're here to help.
Similarly, Hull McGuire employees over the years, on their own, have worked for, raised money for, thrown and attend fundraisers for, and contributed to both Republican and Democratic candidates for national office. We encourage it. Each of us look beyond party. We cross-vote. But we think that politics--the art of controlling one's environment--is important no matter what your views are. Participation rounds out and secures your status as a true world citizen. And this is America, folks: use it or lose it.
On the Right, see Viking Pundit, by Eric Lindholm, "the only conservative in Western Massachusetts". His site is of particular interest to us as research indicates that WAC?'s mom, and therefore WAC? himself, has some serious Norse blood: reddish hair, love of life, attitude, and an overt marauding instinct (i.e., desire to rove and raid in search of plunder). On the Iran president's controversial visit to Columbia University--Columbia has this way cool First Amendment thing going some lawyers have heard of--Lindholm of course gets it right: "Ahmadinejad's a nutter. Let's be the adults in the room and send the message that we're made of stronger stuff." Lindholm writes like he probably talks, gets to the point, respects others, and he's funny. Visit him on line. NOTE: I know Massachusetts, and Lindholm's gotta be lonely as a conservative in pretty much any part of the state--the reverse of our JDH, an alleged "D", living for some reason in San Diego, with all those Orange County-esque Rs.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 10:15 AM | Comments (0)
Blawg Review #127 - The Runaway Jury Review
Do yourself a favor and take a few minutes today to read Blawg Review #127, which is hosted at Anne Reed's Deliberations. This week's edition of Blawg Review presents the "17 Best Tips For Voir Dire".
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 07:49 AM | Comments (1)
September 23, 2007
Got Resilience?
Please see a piece by Texas lawyer Mark Bennett I've been brooding about ever since I saw it: "Resiliency". But don't obsess about it too much. Ironically, resilience--the ability to recover and spring back from adversity, a shock or a set-back in short order--is not a lawyer trait. Indeed, these days there's lots of commentary out there which in the aggregate goes something like this: lawyers don't market, work, argue, negotiate, or even do trial work as well as they could because they are "relational", nice, academic at heart, a bit passive aggressive, naturally not "war-like" and--even when we are competitive and direct--we suffer, brood and worry too long about setbacks and defeats. And we are beginning to hate what we do all day long because, oddly, (1) neither fighting (2) nor "going with the flow" are in our natures. It's true. We lawyers are, in the main, natural-born
weenies and squirrels. We are great people. But we sweat small stuff--part of our job, of course--and we over-react. We have amazingly poor defenses to each day's hard knocks and battles.
Well, why? My take: the profession attracts type-A eldest-child perfectionists who can become disoriented and even ashamed by not winning on every point. We get hurt easily. Too many of us suffer guilt or shame in the smallest defeat. We even kick ourselves about being that way. We feel like impostors. And that--trying to be something we can't always easily be--makes things worse. We start to hate our jobs and our lives. If our clients knew how thin-skinned and tortured some of us really are, they'd just take pity and fire us.
Solution? Somehow--and I don't care how--get over yourself, free yourself from all that bondage of self, and accept that some defeat is inherent in everything you do, and may be even helpful to achieve good results. I am NOT talking here about being a good loser or lowering standards. It's about Sweating Just Big Stuff. Stepping back. Getting perspective. Nothing brilliant here. However, without even doing an empirical study, it's obvious to me that lawyer "over-sensitivity" is a huge problem in our lawyer worlds and workplaces. Our reactions to the sum of small bad stuff prevents us from doing the big stuff or from doing it well. This hurts us as people. But way more importantly, it hurts your client: the main event. Remember that as a lawyer you are not royalty--sorry, but you never were that special. Clients are not "the equipment" for a patrician game. You are there to serve.
If you can't get a plan for this and change yourself--or can only do it the cost of violating who you really are--think about another career path. And for godssake if you're a trial lawyer, part of your damn job is to be resilient. So get some of it really, really fast, and buck up there, mate--or just teach, sell women's shoes or get that masters in taxation at NYU you sometimes dream about.
Posted by JD Hull at 08:20 PM | Comments (0)
And Ronald Reagan doesn't even make the main list.
By Alonso Duralde, MSNBC film critic: Big Fame, Little Talent: These folks are all famous, but do they have the chops to back it up?
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 07:04 PM | Comments (0)
Charon QC: The Emperor has great new clothes.
The site of the always erudite, Rioja-drinking and just plain fun lawyer-professor-blogger-pundit, Charon QC, has a new look, feel and format. Still, as always, good writing. Even the Times of London likes him. He still loves quoting Churchill, as do we war-like yet irreverent Yanks:
I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 03:44 PM | Comments (0)
Tomorrow is Blawg Review #127: "Hey, Anne, we know David Lat, we went to the track with him once, and you're right, you are no David Lat, okay?"
With apologies to the late Lloyd Bentsen. Lat-envy. Some of us--not WAC?--have it. Even uber-Milwaukee trial lawyer and jury guru Anne Reed, at her fine Deliberations, has it: "I can't rhyme, my dog can't write, and I'm not David Lat -- so please, be kind". But, tomorrow, at BR #127, we think she'll do just fine. No need to be that kind.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:30 AM | Comments (0)