« February 10, 2008 - February 16, 2008 | Main | February 24, 2008 - March 01, 2008 »
February 23, 2008
Maintenance: The Blue Book
See "Cite-checking, dudes". This is your document. This is your document on drugs.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
February 22, 2008
How to "market" at moments you don't "need" to market.
When "the cotton is high", you make a phone call today anyway. You do it even if you're uncomfortably busy with billable work. Yeah, it's hard to switch that gear and call when you are up to your ears in work. Hard to move into marketing mode even if you know the call will take only minutes. But make time four (4) times a week to make a call to a (a) sought-after client, (b) existing client or (c) "influential" person. Keep adding to the pipeline even though it seems like the work you have today will never end--because it will.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 10:22 AM | Comments (3)
February 21, 2008
U.S. economy: Stocks swing up on hope of new stats and rate cut; JC Penney circles the wagons.
AP: Investors bet. Reuters: But JC Penney reports that profits are down; optimism for 2008 retail is even lower.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (1)
The Wages of Consumerism
The crude commercialism of America, its materializing spirit, its indifference to the poetical side of things, and its lack of imagination and of high unattainable ideals....
--Oscar Wilde, who liked Americans, in "The Decay of Lying" (1889), featuring George Washington.
WAC? takes back what it said some time ago about Western lawyers having no capacity for original thought. Well, not really, but we do take note of the beloved 1% exception. See at his Simple Justice a thoughtful piece by NYC trial lawyer-pundit Scott Greenfield entitled "The Measure of Prosperity, And Why People Steal", inspired in part by a recent NYT op-ed piece by Michael Cox and Richard Alm called "You Are What You Spend". They ask: does measuring prosperity by spending--rather than by earnings--make more sense? Scott responds.
Posted by JD Hull at 09:15 PM | Comments (0)
Article VI Fever: Got my judicial mojo workin'.
Four SCOTUS opinions with preemption threads yesterday. See at Legal Blog Watch "Preemption-Mania at the Supreme Court".
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:58 AM | Comments (0)
February 20, 2008
A truly American election: 2,025 or 1,191 "to win".
NBC: Delegate Count. Dems: HRC down by 50; Obama's got the 'mo. GOP: McCain has 884. It's all historic no matter who you bet on. Who the hell are we Yanks, anyway? And re: our egalitarian ideals, can we walk the walk?
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Eversheds: Your world in 2018.
From the alert Australia site Law Fuel: Magic Circle firm Eversheds heads up and completes study on what to expect in 2018. Dominance of the Magic Circle firms "set to erode" and partners believe work-life balance and excellent client service is a "contradiction in terms". More.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:17 PM | Comments (1)
Colorado River System in trouble?
From Water & Wastewater News. There's a 50% chance that Lake Mead, a water source for millions in the Southwestern U.S., will be dry by 2021 at present usage levels, say researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC-San Diego.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:16 AM | Comments (0)
February 19, 2008
The Praise
Samuel Johnson had quite a compliment for John Dryden (1631-1700), the English poet, critic and dramatist known for his energy, range, heart and nearly musical style. Dryden's compositions, Johnson said, "are the effects of a vigorous genius operating upon large materials". From a book my grandfather, Dr. J. Dan Hull, gave me after retiring from Washington, D.C. life and moving back to Springfield, Missouri. The Best of Dryden, L. Bredvold, editor, xiii (Ronald Press 1933).
Posted by JD Hull at 10:00 AM | Comments (0)
China Law 101 Plus.
Checking in with Dan Harris at China Law Blog, we find "How To Learn Chinese Law. Do Try This At Home". If you practice corporate law in this new world of ours, are busy, and have limited time to read legal weblogs/blawgs, please make CLB one of the four or five you religiously visit along with, say, SCOTUS, the WSJ's Law Blog and Blawg Review. Read CLB first--and WAC? way later. We can wait.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:50 AM | Comments (0)
February 18, 2008
And Huck stays the course--so we can keep posting this.
Have a Magnificent Quarter. Talk to you in April.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:59 PM | Comments (0)
Just Say It: The War Against Legal-Speak.
Lawyer-Speak and Legalese. Of all lawyer-centric institutions, only "Professionalism" and "Work-Life Balance" are more embarrassing or more likely to undermine clients--and at least those two originally had a point. Catching up on Sunday morning, I noticed a clause from the unused draft of a 3-page IP agreement used during talks for an acquisition a few years ago and forwarded by one party's lawyer: "Effective on even date herewith, the parties hereto hereby agree to...". Whoa. How about just one date at the top or bottom of the Agreement and then say "The parties agree..."? And if the whole thing is an Agreement, hey, maybe you don't even need that? Either would save trees, ink and space, be more to the point--and would help diminish the image of the self-important "I'm-special" lawyer rocking back and forth in his chair and talking to himself like a mental patient.
Update: Thanks, as always, to our good twin and ally Ray Ward at his the (new) legal writer. WAC? feels less alone.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:45 AM | Comments (0)
Euphoric: Blawg Review #147
What a Rush. Sorry, at least one of WAC?'s writers is an aging hippie, and we couldn't resist. Rush Nigut hosts this week's Blawg Review #147 at Rush on Business. Creative, upbeat, informative, even euphoric.
Posted by Brooke Powell at 10:59 AM | Comments (0)
U.S. economy: well, things could be worse.
AP: In Houston last week Alan Greenspan tells oil execs that we're not in a recession yet--but getting there. Pulitzer-winning fossil fuel guru Dan Yergin moderates Q&A and asks a wonky question or two. And Americans feel frustrated and shaky as gas and milk prices stay high and they worry about their jobs.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 07:17 AM | Comments (0)
Kosovo declares independence from Serbia.
U.S. supports it, Russia loudly condemns it. Gobs of coverage, e.g., Bloomberg, Los Angeles Times, Reuters, International Herald Tribune.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 12:22 AM | Comments (0)
February 17, 2008
New French "American-esque" president sinking in polls.
From the February 7 edition of The Economist, here's one we missed: "The Unpopular President". Excerpt: "Mr Sarkozy ran for election last May on a promise to restore faith in politics, to rebuild French confidence and to get France back on track. Instead, nearly nine months into his presidency, a majority (55%) of the French have “a negative opinion” of him, according to LH2, a polling agency". Some of the complaints are policy-related; some are the "jet-set" thing.
Posted by Holden Oliver (Kitzbühel Desk) at 05:23 PM | Comments (0)