No Buts, Meow -- It's the Law

Forgive me, perhaps I'm feeling a little bit drunk with power right now, but goddamn! I love the law sometimes. I mean, authority figures have always ingrained this "It's the Law" mentality into our heads. First, growing up, our parents told us we couldn't do something. We ask why; their response? "Those are the rules." Occasionally we'd get something nearer the truth: "Because." Because? Because why? "Because I said so!" That's not an answer, we thought vainly to ourselves, as there was nothing we could do about it.

Same with teachers. Why can't I walk around the hallway without a hall pass? "That's the rule." Then, as we get older, the major authority -- police officers. "Why can't I drive 35 mph through here when its four lanes and there are no houses or pedestrians?" "That's the law." And now (for some of us), the ultimate authority - courts. Why is segregation permissible? "We uphold the rule of stare decisis. This is the law as it stands, and we affirm that law."

The law my ass. The older we get, the wiser we get, the more we realize - "Because I said so" is actually the truth behind the matter, in pretty much every occasion. Someone decided this is the rule. Whether there is good reason for the rule or not, virtually every decision, whether rule, law, or nonbinding resolution, is pretty much just "Because I said so."

That's the great thing about finally being the authority figure. Or at least in a position to fuck with authority figures -- i.e., a lawyer.

Here I am at work, drafting this brief charging a statute as unconstitutional again. I just printed off a rough draft, read through it, and realized -- this is absolute hogwash. I mean, no court on earth should look at this and think, "Yeah, that's an accurate statement of the law." Don't get me wrong, its well-written and relatively persuasive. I present an argument that, if you completely lose sight of the statute and its purpose, you might actually buy, if only for a moment. It's a fairly complex issue, and the brief basically follows a logical progression along the lines of "This is a well-established policy. This is an important fact. Because of the presence of this important fact, this policy should be applied to this completely unrelated statute under these circumstances, and achieve this result." Now, the policy is correct, and the facts are correct, so it's not like I'm just making shit up. But at some point, the logic train pretty much goes straight the fuck off the rails. In other words, what I'm suggesting is a pretty absurd result.

But my god, if a judge were to read this and buy my argument? Stranger things have happened. And if that happened, heaven forbid, this would be the new state of the law.

Because I said so.

How cool is that?

What is Your Position?

Good question. I'm sitting in T&E right now. No, seriously. I'm at the class.

You want proof? Um...we're talking about elephant tusks right now, if that helps. I don't know why. He's asking us the value of elephant tusks, and something to do with probate. Would I want to probate my elephant tusks? Maybe, I don't know. I've never probated an elephant tusk before, I don't know if it's worth it. Could be.

High basis. Maybe we want a high basis. Unless we've got a different client, then our interests will conflict. What? But I like high basis. If I can sell the tusk, the capital gains tax is lower than the estate tax, so I'd rather have a low basis. Or something.

And, the future tax is less onerous than the present tax. John is not picking a basis. When you do that, you are also setting the basis. It is very important to keep those two things separate.

T&E is hard, apparently.

UPDATE: Still in T&E. Some guy just sneezed the loudest sneeze in history. People are laughing. It's awesome.

UPDATE: Holy shit, I actually got called on. The one day I go. Actually, I was going to leave halfway through, when I still hadn't been called on, and only one problem remained for my section. I stayed on the off chance I'd get called on (and laziness, not wanting to move my stuff) and there it happened. Sometimes, life just works as it should.

3Lism

Number of pages assigned for reading in Sentencing this week: 280

Number of pages I read for Sentencing this week: 0

Knowing that it won't make any difference whatsoever: Priceless


For most law students, there is diligence and effort;
for 3Ls, there is coasting.

Unmitigated Crap: The Musical

Every once in awhile a particular singer or band will come along and create a song that leaves me thinking "Man, that is the worst song ever made. Ever." For awhile, I thought it was Sean Paul, whose pathetically simplistic beats and incoherent babbling flooded the airwaves with craptastic song after song. However, Mr. Paul has since been upstaged (downstaged?). Now, don't get me wrong, Sean Paul still makes terrible music. But apparently he doesn't have the chops to compete for Worst Artist in the History of the Fucking World anymore.

No, that title came down to a dogfight between Gwen Stefani and Sarah "Fergie" Ferguson. While Gwen Stefani may have been respectable back in her No Doubt days, she has since blossomed into one of pop music's premier writers of atrocious music. Who can forget "Hollaback Girl" and its rousing chorus of "This shit is bananas, B-A-N-A-N-A-S!" That song alone should have earned her a banishment from, well, life.

Then Fergie came along. There's been some real shit on the airwaves the past few years, most of it really bad R&B/pop, but Fergie really takes the cake, then shoves it down her hideous throat and recycles it into the next worst song you've ever heard. Remember the Black Eyed Peas? Remember how they used to be kinda fun and new, with songs like "Let's Get it Started"? Well, then "My Humps" happened, destroying every bit of credibility they ever had. Riding the wave of this smashing success, what's a girl to do, besides piss her pants on stage?

Put out a solo album, of course. Got to hand it to her, she went all out in the effort to ruin popular music as we know it. First there was "London Bridge," one of the most asinine pieces of audio defecation ever made. Then there was "Fergalicious." Now, not only was it horrible, it was also unoriginal. Not that Destiny's Child's "Bootylicious" was some musical masterpiece, but it didn't deserve this. "Fergalicious" pretty much sums up Fergie's approach to music: it's just like bad pop music, only infinitely more wretched.

But then, what is this? Has Fergie been unseated? This song I'm hearing on the radio lately - some raspy-voiced woman spelling out the word "Glamorous" to the tune of some simplistic-poppy-horseshit beat may just edge out anything else on the air right now! For a moment, I was really impressed that someone could just come and bitchslap the Duchess of Crap like that and take her crown.

Then I found out that, in fact, "Glamorous" WAS performed by Fergie.

Ah yes, I should never have doubted her, or her unparalleled ability to churn out the most offensively bad 'music' in the history of space and time. Thank you, Ms. Ferguson. Now shut the fuck up already.

For Realz

That Guy on State Street: "Hey, do you have a minute to help fight global warming?"

My response: "Not really."

What I wanted to say: "Hellz yeah! Let's make this a real fight though, know what I'm saying? I'm talking sabotage, espionage, maybe a little genocide-age. You show me your arsenal, I'll show you mine. It's past time we break a foot off in global warming's ass! You say the word, and its on! Shit's about to get real for realz, homey. I'ma cop me a rocket launcher, climb up a tree, and bust a cap in the sun's greenhouse gas-spewing grill, muthafucka!"

Sad thing is, I used to be That Guy, for one week in June, 2005. For the money, not the cause. So when I held my tongue today, it was because of whatever enemies might be lurking, not because I relate. Fuck That Guy.

Snark

Quote from a rather rotund girl at LDP: "Every once in awhile I'm on top of things."

My thought: "Apparently not your boyfriend, otherwise he would have been crushed to death by now."

Some People Are Just Too Incompetent to Drink Coffee

I'm not a coffee drinker. I tried it when I was younger, and the taste put me off of it, much like beer. So I never got hooked on caffeine, and I pretty much avoided coffee. Then once I got handed a free sample of a Starbucks Mocha Frappucino, and it was damn tasty. So from then on, whenever I found myself having to be at a coffee shop, at least I had something I could order. I still never got coffee from gas stations or at restaurants, because I liked soda better. Then I started getting the Starbucks frappucino bottles every once in awhile when I wanted something different, and they were okay. Since then, I've had a cup of coffee on occasion, and I find that its not that bad. An acquired taste, much like beer. Still, not my drink of choice.

But today, for some reason, I felt like coffee, and decided to get it from a gas station. I've never gotten coffee from a gas station before; I've had it when other people brew it, or in a coffee shop, or in a restaurant, but never somewhere where I had to choose what I wanted, pour it myself, and mix it myself.

Not a big deal, right? It pretty much consists of pouring coffee into the cup. Simplest thing in the world. And who am I? I'm 24 years old. I'm a law student, about to graduate, about to become a professional. Beyond that, I'm a ninja. Stealthy, coordinated, and graceful. I can kill an antelope from 300 yards away with little more than my piercing gaze. Sure as hell I can pour myself a cup of coffee. Well, I'd just never done it, so it was new to me.

So I did it. I chose french vanilla. I poured the coffee, added the cream, and grabbed a lid, and proceeded to put the lid on.

And dumped it all over the counter, on the floor, and on myself.

Life can be humbling sometimes.

Mitigated and Unmitigated Crap: Double Feature

Is there any such thing as mitigated crap? This discussion came up over spring break; all philosophical implications aside, my answer is yes. My latest cinematic review should demonstrate the difference, employing the same double feature tactic of the movie that inspired this review. Ladies and gents, may I present cinematic review the eighth:

Grindhouse

and

2001: A Space Odyssey

An odd pair, no? After all, Kubrick's 2001 is often cited by critics as one of the best motion pictures ever made; Rober Ebert places it at #2 on his all time list. Possibly the most influential sci-fi movie ever, groundbreaking for its use of realism in space, showing everything happening in real time, moment by moment. By contrast, Grindhouse is an homage to 70's b movies, a compilation of feature flicks by Tarantino and Rodriguez, two directors known for sensationalist depictions of violence and depravity, and fake movie trailers which are equally over the top. 2001 is an epic tale of exploration and discovery, of the dangers of technology, and of mind-bending questions that have left viewers scratching their heads for decades. Grindhouse has alien zombies, Nazi werewolves, Mexican assassins, car chases, and oh yeah - a girl with a gun leg.

So what we've got is one classic movie and one terrible movie, right?

Exactly. Just not in the way you'd think.

Grindhouse is certainly a crappy movie. Intentionally crappy, that is. The ideas are terrible, really. I'm talking absolute schlock. But the directors know this; in fact, that is the point. Entertainment is the bottom line here, and these directors know how to entertain. Take an idea beyond any hope of plausibility and just have fun with it. There's a sense of energy that pulses throughout the movies and trailers that draws you in, tells you to leave your inhibitions at the door, and just enjoy yourself. This, of course, leads to some terribly exciting moments, absolutely hilarious movements, and simply awful moments. Many people would be turned off by this, and rightly so -- it's not everyone's cup of tea. Not all of it was mine, either. But the spirit behind the movie was incredible, and it really was exactly what it said - an experience.

The best part of the show, for me, was Machete, the first movie parody featuring a bad-ass Mexican assassin who kills a whole lot of people with a machete. Cheech Marin made a guest appearance as a shotgun-toting priest, which was hilarious. And possibly the best tag line ever made: "They just fucked with the wrong Mexican." And the runner up: "If you hire Machete to kill the bad guy, you'd better make sure the bad guy isn't you." Best of all, this is apparently getting made into a real movie, direct to dvd. Hot damn.

Then Planet Terror, Robert Rodriguez's feature contribution. Overall, this was very strong. My main problem with it was that the dialogue in the first half hour was surprisingly weak. From what I remember, the entire theater was silent for those 30 minutes. Of course, that was just the setup for the craziness that was about to unfold, but still - rather than silly and foreboding, it was just kinda awkward. However, once the zombies began appearing and the plot threads started coming together, it got awesome in hurry. I won't give away too many details -- spoilers aren't a major concern for this movie because even if you know what happens, you have to see it to believe it. The gun leg certainly doesn't disappoint, though you will have to wait until the climax to see it, and from that point on - sheer awesomeness. (Suspended disbelief is a must, of course) The latter 2/3 of this movie are a combination of balls-out action and silly comedy, marked by a ridiculously hilarious moment when a particularly important scene got cut out, and suddenly shit gets crazy. And oh yeah, Fergie gets killed, horribly.

Then more fake previews. Of this bunch, Thanksgiving is probably the best, an 80's slasher that pushes every convention of the genre to its ridiculous extreme. Don't was pretty funny as well, lampooning the ominous voiceover for scary movies, though the joke got old pretty fast. I was really disappointed by the Werewolf Women of the S.S. trailer; from the premise, I figured this would be the craziest of the bunch, but it just didn't have many laughs. The only exception is an appearance from Nicholas Cage, which may have been the funniest moment of the entire double feature. Good to see his career is heading back up after Ghostrider.

Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof closed out the show. He brought his patented technique of excessive banter between the characters, all of which seems entirely extraneous, but actually provides an illuminating look into the psyche of each character. For instance, in Death Proof, we are presented with two extended scenes of dialogue - one with the first group of girls, one with the second. The first group reveals themselves to be insipid and kinda skanky; the second group appear to have much more strength of character. This dichotomy becomes important when Kurt Russell's character makes attempts to kill each group with varying success, and helps explain why the second group is ultimately able to expose him as merely a twisted coward, rather than this death proof badass he thought himself to be. Ultimately I thought this was a pretty good show. Not on par with Pulp Fiction or the Kill Bill series, but certainly entertaining.

My grade: Machete - A
Planet Terror - B+
Werewolf Women - C-
Don't - B-
Thanksgiving - A-
Death Proof - B

Recommendation: Not for the faint of heart, but those who just want to be entertained, this craptastic extravaganza is right up your alley.

2001 provides our example of unmitigated crap. Talk about a movie that takes itself seriously. I'll admit, there are some pretty cool ideas here, such as the "technology can turn on us" idea reused in countless stories since this was released. I really wanted to like the movie; I wanted to care. I wanted to appreciate it for its message, its aesthetics, its intelligence. Instead, I ended up hating it for its unfailing pretentiousness.

The first 25 minutes gave us monkeys; lots and lots of monkeys. The monkeys learned things, over time, including how to use tools (such as animal bones to bash in each others' skulls). That's all well and good, but I don't care. There's a reason we don't make movies about neanderthals and cromagnons - they were fucking stupid. And god-awful boring. It's the same reason we don't make movies about how we evolved from single celled organisms - it was BORING AS SHIT. I'm sure Kubrick was making a statement about how discovery is a constant, and how it is the same now for us as it was in millenia past. That's the deal with the Monolith that appears here, then later on a planet, then in the guy's room at the end. But for the life of me, I just don't care.

Then the space station. This section was at least watchable, and had some semblance of a point. The noteworthy thing here is how Kubrick didn't cut to the exciting or important moments -- he filmed every single excruciating second of what happens in space. Now, there's something worthwhile about that in itself, and if he were making a documentary about space exploration, I could forgive it. But this is a fictional story; it was based on Arthur C. Clarke's short story of the same name. None of that is necessary to tell the story. None of that belongs in this movie. Yet many critics still say this was groundbreaking. Of course it was - no one ever did it before. You know why? It was BORING AS SHIT. Are we sensing a running theme here?

After the space station, we take a trip through the Jupiter Infinity Wormhole of Inexplicable Crap. I dare you not to fall asleep during this sequence. This was comparable to sitting down and watching the colorful patterns that play on Windows Media Player during the songs; a lot of color and wonder, but no meaning whatsoever. If you manage to stay awake (or wake up) in time for the ending, you're treated to a few shots of the surviving astronaut from the space station arriving in some room, seeing himself older, eating at a table, then seeing himself older, dying in bed. And the monolith reappears in front of him. Again, discovery, exploration, blah blah holy shit my eyes are bleeding blah blah. Then, finally, a giant baby floating in space, staring at the earth. Then its all over.

Aint that a kick in the scrote.

My score: C-
Recommendation: Maybe you can get more out of it than I did, or maybe you should spare yourself the pain.

Thoughts From Florida

So, things have been hella awesome here in Floridizzle. I won't recap everything - Ismael's already on it. I will just note a few things:

- Today I burned my scalp so badly that the skin on my forehead seems to have liquified a bit. When I press on it, the skin squishes like tar. It's not the best feeling.

- Coolio will never die. "Fantastic Voyage" is an amazing song. Screw you, haters.

- Mr. Utah did not have a spider enter his ear canal and lay eggs last night, contrary to popular belief. That was an unsubstantiated rumor that started with an actual game of telephone that went horribly, horribly awesome. Not to say that it won't happen, but it hasn't happened yet.

Vice, signing off.

Touchee

This helpful bit of advice comes from the Dane County Emergency Procedure Manual:

Suspicious packages: Handle with caution.

This Just In

Battlestar Galactica rocks major ass. I've just finished the season 3 finale, and I'm happy to say that, just like the previous two, the finale is fucking mindblowing.

Watch this show. Seriously.

Huffing and Puffing

Elections are coming up soon, and with them the opportunity to vote for the next Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice. The major candidates are Annette Ziegler, former judge and prosecutor, and Linda Clifford, current werewolf.

Hold on, werewolf? Apparently, if you have seen the latest round of political ads on tv. Clifford's ad depicts Ziegler as having a severe conflicts of interest issue, having decided a slew of cases where she had a financial stake, and almost all of them decided in her own favor. Ziegler's response ad states that these allegations are completely false, and that Clifford is actually a lycanthrope who howls at the moon. Seriously, anytime the ad shows Clifford, the screen darkens, and a haggard looking Clifford appears standing in front of the moon. At the end we are treated to a howling noise, which is obviously meant to imply that Clifford is a werewolf.

This raises many questions. Do we want werewolves on the supreme court? Personally, I think we do. I think Clifford's ability to shapeshift shows that she is not some entrenched partisan unable to change her views to comport with the facts of the case. Although some may see a judge turning into a wolf and attacking attorneys or fellow justices as radical judicial activism, I think that type of fresh blood should be welcomed on an aging court. Plus, for those of us concerned with diversity, adding a member of a growing minority group would demonstrate that Wisconsinites respect our werewolf brethren, and would prefer that they not rise up and eat us all.

Remember, come election day, a vote for Clifford is a vote for justice and progress. And by "justice and progress," I mean "a bloodthirsty werewolf."

Come and Get Me

Someone is clearly trying to kill me. Assassination attempts are nothing new, of course, but nonetheless irritating. Imagine having to remove the head of a new assassin each week and placing it on a pike to ward off all comers, only to realize that the decapitated-head-on-a-pike routine just ain't striking terror like it used to.

This time, they started attacking through my dreams. Over the course of one particular dream this morning, my enemies bombed, in succession, three of my most frequented dwellings. The dream began with the knowledge that someone had blown up my apartment and destroyed all of my belongings. I drove my vehicle (a red minivan) to an overly elaborate Law Review meeting, then sat in the audience and chilled. (At least I think it was overly elaborate, unless the Senior Board regularly books full conference halls with auditorium seating for spectators to watch them discuss WLR-related business while seated at a long table on a raised platform.) After the meeting, I went to find my minivan, but it had disappeared. After an ill-fated attempt to chase down a similar looking vehicle, I called in a search party, which discovered my minivan's whereabouts - scattered in pieces all around the parking lot. Someone had bombed my frickin' minivan.

Now, normally I'm not too rattled by the occasional bombing, but two successful bombings in a row made me worry. I called my parents' house to see if they were alright. My older brother answered the phone. He laughed at my concern, but then noted that he was holding some "thing" that was beeping. Then the phone cut out. I literally started screaming. Someone had bombed my parents house and killed my family. Thankfully, the dream ended without any more attempts. I can only assume my adversaries chose not to attack KH's apartment for fear of her inevitable reprisal, referred to in police circles as "firebombing the shit out of everything that moves."

Once I had woken up, I thought the threat had passed. However, after about a half hour at work, I discovered someone had left a thumbtack lying on the floor of my office, with the sharp end sticking up, ready to attack. If not for my impeccable bat-like vision, I would be dead right now.

Normally at this point I would ask that if you see me, do not make any suspicious movements, 'cause I'm a bit on edge at this point. Rest assured, however, you won't see me. For the next five days, it's all ninjatude and stealth mode. Come and get me, haters.

Sentencing Sing-Along

Everybody now:

Oh I wish I could go outside today
And I didn't have this stupid brief to write
For this Sentencing class, which fucking sucks,
And my creepy looking teacher with his giant head.

All his asinine readings are no help,
Bunch of pscyhobabble bullshit, it makes me hurl
Stupid criminalogical studies, and blah blah blah.
What a fucking disappointment this class has been --

Makes me wanna kick Gollum squah in the nuts.

Then he'll scream "My precious!" and fall to the floor,

"It burns us! It burns us!" His sad laments,

Then we throw him in the fire, and read no more!

The Day the Laughter Died

Law Revue is officially over. I've refrained from commenting thus far because, well, it's kinda made me sad. No more script writing, no more rehearsing, no more outrageous performances. No more live tigers. No more ninja fights. No more alleged vaginas. No more nonsensical Kaplan jokes. No more carrying a machete down State Street. No more Commandos. No more bringing down the Hamburglar.

I've been involved on and off in sketch comedy since freshman year of high school. Over the past decade, there have only been 2 years where I wasn't knee deep in putting together either a Saturday Night Live tape or a Law Revue production. It's something that I absolutely love, and am going to miss dearly. I need a good creative release to stay marginally hinged, especially while in law school, and this show provided it. I dont know that I'll ever have an opportunity like that again. There's always little comedy troupes and plays and things going on, but I don't know that I'd have time for them.

This year's show came and went a little bittersweet. I didn't start writing until late; for some reason, I just didn't have the writing bug. Of course, just like last year, by the final weeks of the show, I was kept up at night with new ideas, including one sketch written entirely between the hours of 4:30 and 6:30 a.m. I was happy that Ismael got to participate a lot more this year, not having Law Review elections on game day, which ensured that all members of MZRM were well-represented this year.

As for the show itself, I thought it was better than last year, if nothing else. Regardless of the audience reaction to some of it, I thought the quality of the individual sketches this year was definitely better. Some of it got lost in translation on stage (notably Kaplan's lines, the Gameboy music, and 1L Cop, which was flippin hilarious), but most turned out well. RPM and I toiled for weeks on Harry Potter, and although I still wish it had been performed as one unit rather than split into pieces, I thought that went over pretty well. The Hall of Fame movie was pretty sweet, and expertly edited. I was disappointed with how the Commandos sequel turned out, obviously, but I was still pretty proud of that sketch. Plus, seeing Chuck Norris decapitate the Douche Lord will forever live on as a high point of life.

Of course, one sketch was not at all well-received. I'm not going to say much about it, except this: I admit the sketch was in poor taste, but I stand by it. I did not mean to offend anyone, and I can see how some could be offended, but you really have to take it in context. Not just the context of the sketch, which is significant in itself, but the context of this being a comedy show. The day we can't even mention negative stereotypes (banning the "n word," anyone?) is the day I give up on comedy and freedom of expression completely.

Overall, it was an incredible experience, one that will be sorely missed. Maybe, if we ever get dvd copies, we can get together once a year for viewing parties once we enter the real world. I say bring on the dvds, and let us live on in infamy!

Amateur Hour

For all the talk about China as the next country rising to the level of international superpower, I have to balk a little after what I've seen recently. Despite the collapse of the Soviet empire in the late 1980's and early 90's, China has stood strong as the only real communist power in the world for the past two decades. (Cuba - if you're listening, nobody gives a shit!) Of course, China's economy has changed drastically over this period, giving them somewhat of a hybrid system that could not be accurately referred to as "communist." Then again, neither Soviet Russia nor Maoist China could ever really be characterized as "communist" judging by the manifesto, since neither money nor political elites ever went away like Marx envisioned. China's major claim was (and still is, I suppose) the Communist one-party rule. However, in the 1980's Beijing decided to allow peasants to vote directly for its village leaders, as one of many small but surprising steps by China toward democratic reform. While tangible progress has been rather sluggish, more changes may be inevitable due to the emerging grassroots movement. So you may start to wonder, with its economy already rolling toward future market dominance (their GDP grew by nearly 10% in a 9 month period in 2005), and now with its government moving gradually toward liberal reforms, will China be surpassing the US as the world's superpower?

Probably not, after seeing this story. It turns out, Chinese politicians are amateurs. For a while, they employed a crude yet undeniably effective method for getting out the vote: bribery. The logic is infallible; pay enough voters, they elect you to office, you repay them for their support, they reelect you to continue the cycle. That's democracy at its purest. Of course, in America, we've elevated the craft to a level where not only do we achieve the seamless give-and-take dynamic of money for votes, but we can also justify it on principle -- here we call it "pork," and its perfectly legitimate due to its indirect character. Naturally, the Chinese have emulated this practice, and had created a pretty solid system.

But then they went and made a pact not to bribe voters anymore. Are they crazy? Are they seriously just going to let the voters make up their minds without any sort of monetary incentive? Quite frankly, that's just un-American. No wonder the voters are pissed. And the consequences are frightening. Just think - voter turnout in the US is already pretty lethargic; just imagine what it would be if none of us were getting any sort of kickback, financially or otherwise. You send the president of Amoco to the voter booth with nothing but a bowl of rice, and see if he votes you back for another term. Fat chance.

A word to the wise: if you want democracy to thrive, make sure a small portion of your population benefits to an obscene degree. I'm talking Publisher's Clearing House-style checks, 700% milk subsidies, and land grants to study rock flatulence in your benefactors' home districts. Maybe then we'll get some parity in the political scene.

There Are Those That Call Me.... "Tim"

At the recent request of a fellow blogger, I have completely removed all references to the names behind the blogs I link to. From this point on, I will only use vaguely inappropriate nicknames, which I will change at my whim. If you have a problem with your label, or would like it changed, or wonder what the hell I'm referring to, speak now.

Sentence This

I thought about attempting a simul-blog about Sentencing class today; however, I think anyone who happened upon reading it would have gotten tired of seeing the phrase "I don't care" approximately twenty-seven thousand times. This is the most disappointing class I've ever taken. I heard great things about it, that Dickey and Smith would impart their wisdom about sentencing, and that it would be an incredible learning experience. Instead, Dickey is always off somewhere (crime-fighting, one presumes) and we get Smithy. That would be fine, if he taught us anything whatsoever about sentencing law. He teaches us a great deal about behavioral psychology instead. Granted, this stuff can come in handy when making a sentencing argument, but so would KNOWING THE ACTUAL LAW. I came into this class knowing very little about sentencing law, and I will leave knowing exactly the same. Plus, there are other issues regarding sentencing beyond just determining what the appropriate sentence should be, such as the applicability of sentencing guidelines, knowing what evidence is permissible at a sentencing hearing, whether judges have too much or too little power in sentencing, and probably hundreds more, except I'll never know anything about them, because we won't even blink at anything like that.

So at what point can I stop the class and ask why we’re not learning anything practical? At what point can I raise my hand and say “This is not what I signed up for.” If I get called on today, what do I do? I can’t drop; I need the credits. Maybe from now on I’ll just forget this reading, and read the case law and the statutes -- you know, the ones I'll have to apply if and when I get a job.

But no. Let’s talk about how best to study crime, or talk about how best to make an offender comply with the law. Wait, no, let’s not. That’s not my job. Whether lawyer or judge, that’s not my job. I’m not a social worker. I’m not a shrink. I can’t fix people’s behavioral problems. That's that job of the Good Chuck.

Low Tide

An avid movie and television viewer for many years, reviewing tv and movies on my blog seemed only natural. I've never been much of a book reader, however. I used to read books in high school; not constantly, one after another, but maybe one or two a month, in addition to class stuff. But then it just tapered off when I didn't have a library so readily at my disposal. It's not that I didn't like books, I just love seeing things on screen. Lately, however, one could say I've experienced a renaissance with books (if one was a tool), and have actively been looking for more and more books to read.

Which brings me to today's topic: Eragon, by Christopher Paolini. Cited by many as the next big thing in fantasy books, and written by a 15 year old (at least when he started), I decided to jump on this one early instead of waiting and reading it after the fact (like Harry Potter). And, I have to say, this one was.....

Decent.

There are definitely some things to like about the book. First, the dragon(s). I've read and seen very little where dragons were on the side of good, so this was a welcome change. Also, it presented a huge potential for adventure, which the first book exploited pretty well. This will only grow as Eragon's capability and expertise as a dragon rider grows, so the sequels should have plenty of excitement there. Also, the city of Troncheim (sp?) sounded spectacular. The plot was pretty good, overall. It possessed many of the elements I enjoy in fiction, issues of power and responsibility, good and evil, etc. It set up some potentially interesting interplay between the dwarves, men, and elves, and what will almost certainly be the need to unite in order to defeat Galbatorix. Also, the possibilities of dark riders - that is intriguing. And I also really enjoyed Murtagh, as he presents a nice contrast to Eragon - someone worried more about survival than honor, someone who kills without remorse. He is a friend to Eragon now, but may end up being an adversary.

Now the bad. First, some things that annoyed me, but may not be problems for others. Again, the fantasy naming thing I complained about in my Lord of the Rings post. Only, here it's worse. Not only does every place have a silly name, but every horse, and even his stupid sword. I don't care what each character calls their horses. I mean, if it's a special horse, like the greatest horse in the history of infinity, fine, give it a name. But random horse #3 can remain nameless, for all I care. But then, at least horses are living creatures, unlike the fucking sword. As far as I can remember, "Zar'roc" isn't even like a descriptive term in another language. Maybe it is, I don't know. At this point, I'd take "Sword of Elendil" or "Sword of the Flaming Donkey Balls" over just a name. That's like giving your penis a name, and only referring to it by that name. Might as well do that too. That way, after Eragon stabs Galbatorix with Zar'roc, he can whip out the Sword of the Flaming Donkey Balls and piss on his enemy's corpse. And while I'm on the subject of names, how about "Galbatorix," the vicious tyrant king? It's like a 15 year old tried to create this big evil character, then give him the evilest name he could fathom. ...Oh, wait, that's exactly what happened. Sorry, "Galbatorix" is uber-silly. Then, your main couple - "Eragon" and "Arya." Sounds a bit like "Aragorn" and "Arwen," no?

The naming issue is not a big deal, in the grand scheme of things, I guess. More of a problem for me was the structure. As far as I'm concerned, Paolini completely lacks the ability to build any dramatic tension. Which is a shame, because there are plenty of big, exciting events that happen. But they all happen suddenly, unexpectedly. There is no anticipation, no buildup, no sense of dread or anxiety over the conflict ahead. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying there shouldn't be plenty of surprises and unexpected twists. But moments which, in retrospect, should have been big and momentous, come and go with little fanfare. One moment, in particular, should have been huge and devastating, and was even prophesized well in advance. Then it happens, with little or no drama, and it's like "Oh...huh. That's too bad." Even the big, climactic battle seems to catch everyone by surprise. I got to about page 400, with roughly 100 to go, and expected some buildup to a climax. Instead, he started setting up the political intrigue that I assume unfolds in the next books. Then 425 came and went, then 450, then 475, and I'm thinking "Okay, there's not much left...when is this big ending supposed to happen?" Then it did, and it was over in about 10 pages. Huh.

That's kind of the feeling I was left with. The book had so much going for it, so much going on, and I was completely underwhelmed at the end. Maybe this will come as he matures as a writer, but Paolini has to learn how to make the big moments count. When I first started reading, I was struck by the staggering number of really short chapters. It all made sense once you read them, because each chapter has a seemingly important event or issue occurring in just a few pages.

Let me put it this way. You're a surfer (Bodie, from Point Break, if that helps). You take your board and head out to the ocean. The ocean's there - its just as vast and lively as you had hoped, with plenty of waves. But once you paddle out there, you realize the waves are all really small. But you're a good sport - you diligently spend your afternoon riding them, one after another, until the sun goes down. At the end of the day, you end up looking back out at the ocean and wondering, what happened to all the massive waves, the ones that give you a real rush? That's what surfing's about, right?

Well, to me, that's what an epic fantasy story is about, the big moments. Maybe the hype created this problem for me, maybe I shouldn't have expected so much. Except that Eragon was clearly intended to be one of those fantasy epics, and despite its best efforts and potential, it fell far short. Again, the story was pretty strong, and plenty of good things happened, but it could have been presented in a far more effective manner.

Surprisingly, the movie version was pretty much the diametric opposite - it gave a few big moments, with little in between. I'd say the movie covered only about 30% of the story contained in the book. Which is sad, because the movie had the opportunity to tell the story in a much more streamlined, exciting way, and the producers straight-up skimped on it. As soon as I saw the movie was only 1 hour and 40 minutes, I knew that was probably going to happen. A really strong action movie ought to fill up a full 2 hours, and the best (Spiderman 2, Batman Begins, Star Wars Episode III, the Matrix, Pirates of the Carribean, etc.) cover 2 hours and 20 minutes. If restructured effectively, this story could easily fill that much time.

So there you go. Both versions of Eragon had incredible potential; one to tell the next great fantasy epic, and one to streamline it into an exciting movie. Each succeeded in telling a good story, but each struggled to present it in an effective manner.

Still, I'd recommend each, particularly the book. I assume the story will only get better, and the writing with it.

Poo Flingers

I've been conducting a search of the average sentences for a certain crime handed out in Dane County recently, and have been looking through all of the felony cases charged for a certain year to do so. (Note: There may very well be a much easier way to do this, but this is how I roll - slowly, tediously, and inefficiently.) I've run across several strange charges, such as "Mayhem," "Theft From a Corpse," and "Go Armed With Firearm While Intoxicated," but my favorite by far would have to be:

Prisoner Throw/Expel Bodily Substances

Seriously, that crime was charged probably 6 times in 2005. Seeing it again this morning reminded me of a quote from last night. Kristin and I had squared off in a game of Sequence, and our cards had become increasingly useless during one game. Having become particularly frustrated, at one point Kristin looked up and said "If I were a monkey, I'd be flinging poo right now."

Indeed.

I Don't Think You're Taking This Seriously, Young Man

Effin' T&E. The last real law class I'll ever take. The last class with a subject I care nothing about, in a room of about 100 students, called on at random to answer hypothetical problems. I intended not to attend class a single time after the first day, but Howie's instituted the 20% participation rule. Judging by previous exam scores I've (ahem) achieved, I can't really rely on 80% of my exam score, even to clear the pass/fail hurdle.

So I've been (more or less) attending the days that my section has been on call. I've been reading a little for those days, and working the problems to an extent. But I've also got the outline with the answers to all of the class problems with me, so if I haven't done the work and I get called on, I can just consult the outline. With that in my pocket, I've also been able to score points through voluntary participation by giving that extra answer that no one else mentioned, which I knew because...it was on my outline. I figure doing this enough will cover me for when, inevitably, I'm not there when I get called on.

Today I was supposed to be there at 3:30, but a freak occurrence (actually having work to do at LDP) kept me occupied until I realized it was 3:45, and I was not, in fact, at T&E. So I packed up my shit, since my group was on call, and hurried down there, not having read anything. I open the door, and some woman's speaking about who cares really, and I made eye contact with Howie. Brushing it off, I slipped into my seat. However, at that point the speaker began splitting the rooms into sections to discuss the problems in our reading. These were in additions to the work problems, apparently, and my outline would not help me.

So when my rows start assembling, and I'm all deer in the headlights, I look at a couple people and say "Actually, I can't stay," then duck out, smooth criminal style, after all of 25 seconds.

You know what sucks about being a 3L?

Triumph, Or Not

I received two pieces of news today that, while good, both seem to be rather pyrrhic victories. First, in the defamation case I've discussed here, where I wrote a brief challenging the constitutionality of the criminal defamation statute, I learned that today the DA on the case decided to dismiss the defamation charge. We've been eagerly awaiting the AG's reply brief, which was due any day, but apparently they're not going to fight it. The DA said that after conferring with the Attorney General's office, the statute would be unconstitutional as applied to our client, and therefore he could not proceed with that charge. On one hand, that's pretty damn sweet. The client has one less charge to worry about. My challenge to the statute was both persuasive and, apparently, correct. One small step for nyah.

On the other hand, this means that the overbreadth challenge is done with. The client isn't going to pay for a challenge to a statute that has no effect on him. Effectively, it's over. Which sucks, because I really wanted to get a statute struck down as being unconstitutional, and I firmly believe that this one should be, based on every bit of law I've read on the subject. I suppose the AG could recommend that the legislature take a look at the statute, since it is extremely vulnerable to such challenges in the future, but I doubt that will happen. So the statute stands, and nobody's going to fight it, unless and until another case like this comes along. Plus, our client still faces a bunch of other charges, so he's not off the hook.

The other piece of news - the Winnebago County DA's office, where I worked this summer, has not filled its two intern positions for the summer, and have asked me if I would like to work there temporarily while I search for a permanent job. Again, on the one hand, that's very cool. It means, once and for all, that I won't be unemployed this summer if I don't want to be. I may find a full-time job before that, and I am certainly still going to be looking at all times. But, this gives me a little security. At least for a few months. Plus it's a prosecuting position, which is what I want. The more experience I get in prosecution, the more likely I can find a full-time position as one.

The downside - it's in Oshkosh. So same problems as last summer. I'd travel down here a lot more often this time, probably staying in Oshkosh only twice a week, but still - - major pain in the ass. Plus, it won't pay like a full-time position. Probably more than I made this summer, but still not that great. And I could already probably keep my position I'm in now, clerking for a local attorney, through the summer (and beyond) until I find a job. That position pays about twice as well, and would require me to work only half as many hours a week (which, for the summer, is a sweet-ass prospect). Of course, I'd have to get Lexis or Westlaw access somehow to continue that, and I won't have it free through my student account anymore. Grrr. Plus, I would rather be prosecuting, get the chance to be in court, be a real attorney, or at least act like one. Then there's the housing situation, because my lease runs out in mid-June.....

Maybe I could be a psycho and do both, work two days a week here, three up there, get paid a whole lot, but have to work and travel a whole lot, get the best and worst of both...

OR, maybe I will find a full-time job, right where I want to be, or near enough. Maybe I won't have to worry about either of those options. I'll keep looking.

Until then - Goddammit! Why don't two half jobs equal one full job?

And also, eat it, Attorney General Van Hollen! I schooled you, homey!!

Animal Cruelty

Note: I will review Eragon in due time, as promised. But first...

Anybody see the guy in the Library Mall today handing out flyers saying "Pamphlet against animal cruelty?" I kinda had the urge to pimp-slap that asswad as I walked past. First, he had the most effeminate voice I've ever heard on a man. As far as I'm concerned, whether man or woman, gay or straight, hippie or human being, you speak with that lilting high-pitch and ridiculous lisp, I have every right to ridicule you.

Beyond that, animal cruelty is not a major concern for me. I mean, sure, I cannot abide cruel animals. I hate it when animals attack people for no reason, like Utah and his raccoons. I don't like when the kitty attempts to take my goddamned pot pie. But you know what? I take it like a man, walk it off, and smack kitty in the face, saying "No kitty, that's a bad kitty!!"

So instead of going out onto library mall with your ponytail, girly voice, and "my other tank top is also a purple sequins tank top" sticker, complaining about your lack of control over the animal kingdom, break off a strip and take back your own pot pie.

Prologue

As I've probably said before, I discovered Tolkien's Lord of the Rings pretty late in the game. I saw the movies first; I just finished the extended versions, and now I'm just starting the books. I went to the movies knowing practically nothing of the story, and with little interest to learn it. As much as I've always enjoyed sci-fi, fantasy was another matter. I assumed that LotR was a story with a little person taking a journey through a magical land, encountering wizards and elves and whatnot, and all learn an important lesson, or somesuch. Stories about the days of yore and maidens and horses and men with flowing locks and forgotten languages and no electricity and magical creatures held no interest for me. LotR had all of those things in droves.

And yet, I found The Fellowship of the Ring to be absolutely spectacular. Epic in every sense of the word, sweeping and beautiful and exciting. And not just because of the badass medieval weaponry, which is far cooler than what we've got now. Far more personal, far more skill required. Additionally, the personal stories were excellent. But what really struck me were the themes of power, greed, ambition, manipulation, sacrifice, responsibility, love, and embracing one's destiny. While the story was certainly had its share of little people and annoying fantasy elements (particularly the ubiquitous fantasy naming - the _____ of _____. ie "the sword of Elendil," "the Watchtower of Weathertop," etc.), it was much darker and more exciting than I expected, with extraordinary characters, massive battles, and all beautifully-written.

In fact, for my tastes, I would say the story falls just short of perfect. The only overall story I would say I enjoyed as much was the Matrix trilogy. LotR was better written, certainly, and even more sweeping and epic, but the Matrix was more contemporary and urban, with a few mind-blowing concepts, without the fantasy elements I find annoying. However, I still find something about Revolutions to be disappointing, and the first half of Reloaded is admittedly slow, while each LotR installment is phenomenal. The slower-moving parts of LotR were far more satisfying because the story makes you care more about the characters. That way, when the action relents, you're still more engaged with the story.

About the only thing I can really point to in LotR about the story itself that I found somewhat lacking was the absolute dichotomy of good and evil. True, I love me some epic good and evil battles like you wouldn't believe. That's not the problem. What I find lacking is the almost complete lack of ambiguity, the "kill all evil without question" mentality. (The Matrix had this too, admittedly.) From what I could see, the only ambiguous character in the story was Gollum/Smegol, and true, there was Gandalf's excellent cautionary warning to Frodo that we should not be quick to judge others, and that we should not so blithely decide who should live and who deserves death. But the rest of the story - tens of thousands of orcs killed with no remorse. In the real world, the lines of good and evil are not so clearly drawn. As someone who will probably take a career in criminal law, I've come to terms with the fact that crime is not synonymous with evil, and real-life criminals are not like the villains of myth that should be locked up or killed for their crimes. Of course, LotR is fantasy, and in a fantasy we would like the satisfaction of standing up to evil and eliminating it once and for all, because we can't do that in real life. In real life, there are no easy solutions, no black and white decisions. Corruption and depravity linger, and no matter what measures we take to suppress or eradicate them, we never fully can. So I can't fault LotR for that; personally, I think the question deserves greater attention, but not every story can address every issue. It would be particularly silly to hold LotR accountable for this, considering the vast array of issues it does address, and often expertly.

The point of all this? Next I will review Christopher Paolini's Eragon, the book and the movie. Since LotR is the standard-bearer for all fantasy literature, I thought I should provide the framework I use for reviewing such a story.

Meeting of the "Minds"

Holy buckets. Put three lawyers in a room, let them discuss a legal issue for ten minutes. An hour later, try to recall any of what just happened. Today my employer wanted to discuss a case with me, and we talked about it for awhile before determining we didn't know how to proceed. Plus, there were some unresolved issues, such as him wanting to file a completely nonsensical motion, and me balking at it. So he called up his Yoda-esque attorney friend (complete with green skin) to have him conference with us and offer his opinions. Then the fun began.

Now, I prefaced this by saying three lawyers, and included myself. Normally I wouldn't, but this was one case I've been working for so long (the overbreadth challenge to the defamation statute) that I knew what I was talking about, and felt comfortable interjecting amidst the blabbing. It went like this. My employer would frame a question, but not in a way that the other guy could answer it effectively. The other guy would start to answer, thinking it through for himself, and then stop. I would frown at both of them. Then my employer would spout off some other stuff, which didn't really come into play yet. Yoda would consider this, then give another hypothetical answer, even more off-topic. I would interject, trying to draw them back to what the real issue was. My employer would agree with me, then add some more stuff to muddle the issue. Yoda would have a clearer picture, and offer a better response. My employer would ask another circuitous question, Yoda would ponder it, then give another response that didn't address anything relevant. I would frown at both of them, check my watch, and wait for the correct moment to intervene. And so it went, this ridiculous meeting of the Ents.

I can't wait to do this professionally. I want to be the guy obscuring the issue as much as possible, and getting paid roughly a billion dollars an hour to do so.

Frauds

Incompetence doesn't just hurt you, it hurts those around you. Remember that when you get your degree, find a career, and call yourself a professional. Remember it when you've got a big office, a big salary, and a big ego. Or if you don't. Know matter where you end up, try not to be an incompetent, arrogant moron, because you'll just be making good people suffer.

For instance, the incompetence of the person who prepared my parents' taxes almost led them to commit tax fraud, and almost forced me into a position to have to commit tax fraud just to fill my taxes out correctly. You see, I was all up on getting my homestead credit and a cool $800 extra this year, until my dad told me he and mom were claiming me as a dependent. I was like "Nigga what?" Apparently since they paid the final portion of my tuition last year, their tax person told them they could claim me as a dependent and get a credit back on that money and more. All of which would disqualify me for receiving the homestead exemption.

It didn't sound right to me, but my tax grade was laughable, so I didn't question the wisdom of their tax lady. However, a hot tip from Kristin the Queen of Taxery said that bitch was trippin', and there was no way my parents could claim me as a dependent. So we hit up the Tax Code, and she was right - out of four conditions to be a "qualifying child," I missed on two. I called my dad, told him the tax lady was wrong, and she had better check herself before my parents get indicted for tax fraud.

Dad called her, she told him that as long as I was a full-time student, I could be claimed as a dependent. Hmm. Well, that's not what the statute says, but she's a professional, right? She's done this plenty of times before, right? She must know what she's doing. Maybe she knows an exception to the rule that we, lowly law students with our "statutes" don't know about.

So I got her number, and I called her. Naturally, she was a bit cranky, so I played as polite as I could. I explained my concerns, and pointed out the statute I was looking at. Turns out she was going off the same statute. Okay...so I read her the conditions I didn't meet. First, I didn't live in my parents' residence for at least half the year. She said as long as I'm a full time student, that doesn't matter. Okay...doesn't really say that anywhere, but oh well. Next, I must not have turned 24 by the end of the calendar year. I explained that I turned 24 in October. If I'm not mistaken, October is part of the calendar year. She never really gave me much explanation for that, just confirmed the fact that I was wrong. On the other hand, Kristin, who had heard the conversation, confirmed that this woman was full of shit. So there I was.

I told my dad, he said he'd probably just go with what they filed, and trust that she knew what she was doing. Which, according to the statute, is encouraging people to commit tax fraud. But then, I wanted my $800. Now, if my parents put that I was a dependent, on for my homestead thing, I checked that no one claimed me as a dependent, I would also be committing tax fraud because I knew otherwise. Even if I was the only one actually following the goddamn laws.

Luckily, my dad contacted a CPA friend, who told him that the tax lady was 100% wrong. So they have to amend, and I can do my thang.

Moral of the story: This is what happens when you "know what you're doing," and don't listen to reason.

And in case you were wondering, as applied to the tax lady, the Hand Formula for this would be "suck my balls, you incompetent biznatch."

Snack Court

Today, as part of my requirements at LDP, I went to observe Drug Court proceedings. For those of you not familiar, Drug Court is for (usually) first-time drug offenders that, rather than getting sentenced to jail time or a fine, go through a program to get clean. It's all very positive and encouraging, everyone's talking about the progress the offender has made, and what they have to do to stay clean, and the benefits of overcoming addition, etc.

My question is, do they have anything similar for snack addicts? I know snacking is bad for me; I know I snack when I'm nervous, or bored, or breathing. I snack constantly. I try to limit myself to less unhealthy snacks (hence my struggles with animal crackers instead of, say, deep fried, cream filled donuts), or non-chocolate candy, but it doesn't make much difference -- I end up eating such a large quantity that it negates any health differential.

So where the hell is my support group?

Fuck it. I'll be right back, I'ma get me some Skittles.

Infiltration

Is it weird that Lord of the Rings characters seem to be popping up in my everyday life? On my way home from work today, I spotted Saruman standing on the sidewalk on Gorham street. His hair was still shock white, and there was some graying in his beard; it looked like he had cut it a little in back, but it was definitely him. He was looking a little worse for the wear; gone were the stately white robes, replaced by the quasi-homeless army green jacket and brown pants. But I imagine that after getting kicked outta Dodge by the Ents and no longer being funded by Sarun & co., his financial prospects might not be looking so hot.

I guess it's not that strange to see him; after all, I've been learning sentencing from Gollum for the past 5 weeks. Good to see he didn't let the fires of Mt. Doom keep him down.

Guilty

Sorry about the lack of posts lately. I've been busy with a lot of things going on, but none of them seemed particularly post-worthy. There was one event that made me think.

So lately I've been working at LDP. Defense is obviously a change for me; I've never had to deal with clients, never had to deal with real people and their problems. Even working as a clerk for a guy who does a lot of defense work - he deals with the clients, I get the legal issues. A lot of the clients seem pretty shady, so its a relief to forget their role in the process and just deal with what the law is (and occasionally attempt to fabricate the law on their behalf).

LDP is different. Forget, for the moment, intake at the jails - not a pleasant experience, but there's nothing overly shattering going on. I speak to the inmates, ask them the most basic questions, and move on to the next. Though the scene isn't pretty, you never really have to engage with anything.

Client work is different. For instance, I had a client with final pre-trial on Wednesday. Obviously, I can't go much into details; suffice it to say, I thought it was a pretty clear cut case, and she would have to plead (the offer was pretty decent, all things considered). Then we found out she was currently homeless, either living with friends or in her car, and 5 mos. pregnant, and was about to lose her job based on a faulty drug test result. Plus she's got a heart condition, and had a pacemaker installed about a year ago. All at the tender age of 18. This makes me think about how lucky I've had it, and how as a DA, I'd be able to skip all of this unnecessary real life stuff. I get the file with its boilerplate information on a nameless defendant and a standard offense, and make an objective decision.

Just like life - I can go through every day in my cushy life without having to see the problems other people face. I've always had this public servant attitude in me, this vague notion of wanting to do great things so I could help people; actually helping real people has been something different. And I start to think maybe I'm not as good of a person as people generally assume. I don't know.

On the other hand, all apologies to Mr. Utah, but I do give money to homeless people on occasion. Not so much to the panhandlers, but I also get a lot that come up to me directly and ask for a dollar or two. They've always got some story why they need it, and I'm not sure I ever really believe them. But I think either way, they've got it worse off than me, and dropping a couple dollars won't hurt me. Maybe they can sense I'm a softie. Maybe they can just see it.

So when we spoke to the DA and got her to offer a much better deal, I felt pretty good. And when I called some shelters for this girl to stay at, I felt better. Speaking to people has never been my strong suit; when we spoke to this girl at the courthouse, my supervising attorney did most of the talking, so I just got to hear the sad story. But now, it was my turn to speak. So I called her, informed her of the places she could go to stay, places she could get hot meals. And when, in tears, she thanked me for all of my help, I felt.....

Guilty.

Restorative Justice

Never again. I'm reading an article for Sentencing with The Dick and Smithy about 'restorative justice,' and my eyes are starting to bleed from the stench of ganja wafting off the pages. The author describes restorative justice as "healing rather than hurting, moral learning, community participation and community caring, respectful dialogue, forgiveness, responsibility, apology, and making amends." Weird. I thought "restorative justice" referred to when criminals injure innocent people, and we "restore" that feeling of pain and victimization back to the offender through a series of vicious headbutts.

(And don't go thinking I'm some electric chair pimping reactionary jackass who just wants to lock people up. I recognize the difference between someone who commits a crime and a criminal, the type of offender who has suffered through hard circumstances and made poor choices, and the type that victimizes people without remorse. When I say "dangerous people," I mean actually dangerous people.)

I've gotta say, this class is majorly disappointing. I knew from the get-go there would be problems with the hippies in this class (including the soccer mom/social worker/huge pain in the ass lady, the "No person of color has ever done anything wrong, and police should not be able to stop a person of color unless that person subjectively wanted to be stopped" guy, and a chorus of "Punishing criminals is wrong" bleeding-heart nutjobs), but the reading material has been surprisingly bad. Dense psychology, naive philosophy, and now this schlock. Remington Almighty.

Apparently I'm going to have to make sure I'm at class from now on. I remember when Mr. Utah got laughed at in Prosser's Hippie Love Fest/Crim Pro class for recommending a sentence of 5 years in prison for a drug dealer who shot at a car because the passengers stole his drugs and took off without paying. Well, time to return the favor. From now on, they want to start talking about flower power and making amends to justify letting a dangerous person go free, they can expect to get laughed out of the room. Time to restore some real justice to the classroom.

Pan's Crapyrinth

Huh. Well, that sure sucked some balls. I’m referring, of course, to the subject of 2007's first movie review –

Pan’s Labyrinth.

Billed as a fairy tale/horror story, I can say with confidence that it was pretty damn horrific. Set in Spain after the rise of Generalissimo Francisco Franco and Facism, Pan’s Labrynth tells the story of a young girl (Ofelia) who goes with her pregnant mother to live with her adoptive father, the father of her baby brother, a powerful Captain in Franco’s army. The girl gets drawn into a labyrinth by a fairy and taken down into some otherworldly location, where she speaks to some grotesque-looking faun. He tells her she’s some reincarnated princess for this land below, and she can return if she completes three tasks. Meanwhile, the Spanish army people are fighting off resistance fighters, the Captain is a sadistic asshole, and having the baby may kill Ofelia’s mom.

Warning: Spoilers follow. Seriously, if you want to watch the movie, don’t read.

So what’s the problem? First, there appears to be gore for the sake of gore, which I really don’t care for. I complained about the second episode of Heroes for the same reason – it seemed like they were mutilating corpses willy nilly for the sake of shock value, like “Ooh, this villain is so scary/badass, he somehow nails people horizontally to a wall, or freezes them and rips the upper portion of their body off, for no apparent reason.” If there’s a purpose behind the gore, that’s one thing. If there’s symbolism, that’s another. But if it’s just gore, I’ll pass. Maybe the symbolism was that this girl is experiencing horrors, real horrors, absolutely terrible things, and the only way to portray them adequately was to make them as disgusting as possible. Fine. But then the Captain bashes some guy’s face in with a bottle. Okay. Then some chick sticks a knife into his mouth (?) and slashes out the side of his face. Ew. Not only ew, but stupid. If you’ve got that much leeway in slashing him, why not cut his throat and be done with him? No, she sticks the knife in his mouth and cuts his face, allowing him to survive, then come after her. Retard. Then, at the end, the resistance fighter shoots him through the cheek. What the fuck? Are we to assume his aim was bad, or just that he honestly thinks shooting people through the cheek is a good way to finish them off?

Then there’s the “fairy tale” portion. Absolute crap. The frog in the tree – I’m assuming that was symbolic for something. Maybe the Nazis/Facists getting fat and rich off the people, and stifling growth. Fine. But that’s not exactly a bold statement, since the Nazi’s don’t have much of a fanbase these days.

Then the feast and the monster with eyes in his hands. First of all, why, when the monster has eyes in his hands, does he have to hold his hands up by his head, where most creatures’ eyes are? Doesn’t that kill the advantage of having eyes on your hands – that you can look all sorts of different places, that you can look around corners, that you’ve got an expanded field of vision? No, let’s hold them up by our head to look ridiculous. I mean, come on. Is he intended to be scary? Bizarre, certainly. Mentally challenged, clearly. But scary? Eh. Then, the idiot girl who eats the grapes, after being warned repeatedly not to eat the food. The faun told her straight out, it was a matter of life and death. Eat the fruit, you’re likely to die. So she goes in there, gets what she needs, starts to leave. Looks at the feast, and thinks “Hey, let’s have a grape, even though everyone and they momma said not to.” The fairies fly in, warn her off, she swats them away, and starts eating grapes. Her excuse afterward? “I didn’t think anyone would notice.” Dumbass! What about the “life or death” concept? Forget the monster sitting dormant at the end of the table; didn’t it even cross your mind the food might be poisoned? And Kristin pointed this out - - it’s not like there was any real compulsion. She wasn’t starving. There was no enchantment on the food drawing her to it. She was just a retard. “I didn’t think anyone would notice.” Gah. I wish the monster would have killed you.

Then there’s the two-dimensional Captain, who is always either a) an imperious soldier, committed to his own supremacy, the idea of honor and duty, and dying like a soldier, or b) bat-shit crazy and sadistic, killing and torturing at will, generally an asshole to those around him. A villain should have some sort of depth, something that makes understand and sympathize with what they’re doing. The Captain, much like this movie, had no redeeming qualities.

And the fairy tale ending? The girl died, spilling her own blood, thus completing her final task. Then she was rewarded in her kingdom. But the fairy tale clearly didn’t exist in the real world, because the faun wasn’t there when the Captain found Ofelia in the Labyrinth, and then she died. Lovely.

Okay, so maybe there was more to the movie. It’s gotten rave reviews, and everyone who I know that’s seen it seemed to enjoy it. I can see how someone would appreciate the story, find it moving, find it heartbreaking, find it mystifying. To me, it was just depressing. That’s not the kind of movie I want to watch.

So from what I can tell, the moral of the story was life sucks, then you die, and if you endured enough pain and suffering in life while still doing good deeds, you will be rewarded in the afterlife. Which, for an alleged fairy tale, is pretty fucking dark.

At least the movie ended. So, I guess, in a way, the theme came true – we suffered through a disgusting, depressing, thoroughly disappointing movie, and the only reward we got came once it was over.

My grade: D
Recommendation: Only if you hate yourself, and either want to subject yourself to a terrible movie, or you want your life to seem better by comparison.

On Mediums

I might be alone on this one, but I think there's some value to watching a movie of a story before reading the book that the movie was based on. Now, I agree that most book versions are significantly better than the movie, for several reasons - the story is more developed, both plot and character-wise, books let you imagine what things look like for yourself, and they don't have to aim for sensationalism in order to sell, like movies do. Thus story isn't sacrficed for explosions. (Not that there's anything wrong with explosions, mind you. Personally, I found it awesome in XXX 2: State of the Union when random vehicles and buildings started exploding just because Ice Cube looked at them or walked past them. He's that badass.) And I can also see the distincting between sitting down for two hours and watching a movie that you already know what happens versus committing yourself to spending 10 or more hours reading a book when you already know what happens (for those of us who aren't speed readers, KH.)

But for my money, I like to be entertained both ways. This way, when I go to see movies like The Da Vinci Code, I can enjoy the movie for what it is, not complain about what it's lacking. I may have been the only person I know of who thought that movie was okay, primarily because I didn't have a superior version to compare it to. Now, if I wanted to, I could read the book, find out all the ways that the book is far superior, and be entertained by that too. Or Harry Potter, for example. I didn't catch on when the books first came out, but I did watch the movies. They weren't bad (except the second one), but the story didn't really excite me that much. Then Goblet of Fire came out, and that was awesome, even to people who'd read the books. So after much coaxing, I went back and read them. Sure enough, the books were generally better (except the second one, which was still craptastic), and provided a lot more depth and explanation to what I'd seen in the movies. And this should pretty much hold true to any series I try, because the books are almost always much better.

On the other hand, some movies could scare me off of the books completely. Take The Lost World for example. The first Jurassic Park movie was pretty cool, but the second one blew some serious goats. Thankfully I had already read the book, which I thought was excellent. But if I had seen the movie first, I never would have ventured into the words on paper version.

Other times, who knows. I saw Children of Men in the movies first, and I thought that was a stunning movie, pretty much incredible. I heard that the book was almost completely different. Like instead of becoming a desperate, violent society like in the movie, the world had become peaceful because humans realized that no one was being born to replace the dead, and humanity would soon reach the brink of extinction. Now maybe the movie picked a bleak, violent future because that would provide more action and tension. Or maybe the producers and director thought that would be more realistic. I'm not too sure I don't agree. The despair in the movie may have made it too dark of a picture for some, but I thought it was awesome. In fact, one moment in the movie actually reduced me to tears, which is not something that happens at the theater much anymore. (Not to give too much away for those who haven't seen it, but when everything stopped and the soldiers put down their weapons, if only for a second - - to me, that was moving.) So I don't know if I would have liked the book more, because it sounds like it would have been lacking some of what I found so compelling in the movie. Who knows.

Point is, I think it's time to start reading the Lord of the Rings.

Jailhouse Musings

My first day of intake and arraignment with the Legal Defense Program has come and gone, and it all went relatively smoothly. I wasn't looking forward to intake at the jail, considering a) it's a jail, b) I generally don't think highly of people in jail, and c) I don't like speaking to people. Plus, I had been warned the locals might start flinging feces at me. Not me personally, I suppose, but at people who come to speak with them. The locals are known for occasionally reeking of alcohol, vomit, urine, or feces, and usually at least from bad breath. Some LDP students have had unfortunate run-ins with people (including one girl whose interviewee decided jail was as good a place as any to masturbate, and did so right in front of her), but mine were all relatively decent. No feces flung at me, I can tell you that. My theory is, they start flinging shit, I start flinging shit.

Arraignments were also pretty solid. This marked my first day appearing in front of Dane County courts, and I looked appropriately fly. Nothing worth mentioning really happened, just standard appearances. The DA was extremely reasonable with all of his arguments and conditions, so I really didn't have to argue anything.

What really struck me about the proceedings was how much I would probably be better off in another field of work. As the court commissioner went through giving his orders and stating the conditions, I found myself thinking about how absurd I could make things. He orders the defendant not possess or consume any illegal substances as a bond condition. As defense counsel, I find myself wanting to argue "Your honor, I would ask that we limit that condition to any illegal substances other than cocaine. My client is an avid cocaine user; let's say we keep it to under a kilo. Deal?" I mean really, it's kind of a formality, since no one is allowed to use or possess those anyway. This just provides another opportunity for a bail jumping count, I suppose. But then the next condition - - no possession of any dangerous weapons. "Your honor, that's outrageous. My client has an extensive shoulder-mounted grenade launcher collection, and I really think it unnecessary to restrict his access to these items. How about we limit that to 'no ground-to-air weaponry' and call it a day?" One of the victims in a case was named "Triumph." I hear "I will order that you have no contact with Triumph..." and I'm finishing that sentence as "the Insult Comic Dog from Conan O'Brian." You don't want those two getting together, cahooting about all sorts of criminality. No siree.

Then I think about the other conditions one could throw down. No playing of the game Monopoly unless you are the thimble, and even then, you may not own more than two hotels on any green property. No possession of any fire-breathing squirrels. Refrain from humming any jaunty tunes. You are not to loiter in any area of the city where the mercury level is less than eight cubits. You are not to consume any McFlurrys, unless they are Oreo McFlurrys, and then you must have written authorization from Margaret Thatcher. No bats, vampire or otherwise.

Even still, I can do this job. So does the fact that I'm competent and approach it with a sense of humor mean I'm in the right field or the wrong one?

Mad Props

Okay, so I’ve got to give Erlanger some credit. Yeah, it’s corny, but rocking out on his “paper guitar” to “I’m My Own Grandpa” was hilarious. Someone even snapped a picture. He really tries to make this stuff interesting. Now, I’ve grown a bit jaded and cynical in my old age, especially over all things law school-related. And with how much time I’ve spent working on creating comedy sketches between SNL and Law Revue, it takes something pretty funny to make me laugh. Goddammit Howie, I've gotta give you props on that one.

Go Away, Moosei

It appears that an increased snowfall in Anchorage, Alaska has led many moosei to start wandering around the streets like common transients, bitching because they don't like walking in the snow and that the snow keeps soaking through their brown paper bags, causing their bottles of wine to fall to the ground. As a result, more and more will be getting hit by cars, and starving to death because they can't find food. Meanwhile, others will be pouring in from the mountains, trying to get away from the extreme temperatures, and to take jobs away from hard-working urban moosei.

It's just sickening. Don't get me wrong, I can't stand the snow most of the time either. But I'm going to school, I'm working part-time, and so I spend most of my time indoors. Now, if these lazy-ass vagabond moosei would quit their bitchin' and get themselves some work, they could avoid the harsh weather conditions. Instead, they're probably going to start hanging around laundromats and public parks, assaulting good citizens, and dropping dead in our yards. Apparently, once they die in someone's yard, the body belongs to the citizen, and its their job to dispose of the moose carcass. Just like a transient, imposing themselves on everyone else. I'm already fed up with sweeping out the dead homelii from the lobby of my apartment; no way in hell I'd put up with moose carcass added to the piles.

So to the moose population of Anchorage and surrounding areas, I suggest you shape up and start being productive members of society. For instance, hold gladiator-style fights against one another, and charge a nominal admission. Or at the very least, if you're going to drop dead, do it out in the wilderness, so we don't have to deal with your fat, stinking corpses.

Friends Don't Let Friends...

...Use legalese as a substitute for actual humor. I've been guarding against this since I first came to law school, and the effects still worry me. Sure, it's nice to laugh and be silly, and I'm not one to be all haughty and supercillious about what I'll stoop to laughing at. So the first time I went to A8 China and a fellow law student asked if the wontons were "Wanton and willful," yeah, I laughed. And I'll admit, a well-placed bit of legal jargon can be undeniably funny. But use of legalese and legal puns on a regular basis is unacceptable.

So today when I sent out my response to an assignment for Sentencing class, I really had to check myself. I was describing a cognitive error known as the "Anchoring Effect" in the process of sentencing by way of a personal example -- using my first doctor's diagnosis of my stomach condition as acid reflux and prescribing medications to treat that condition as an "anchor" that prevented him from considering other possible conditions and medications, even when all the acid reflux medications failed miserably to treat my problem. The assignment asked us to suggest a solution, and I indicated that I no longer thought my problem was acid reflux, and instead concluded that, despite all indications to the contrary, it was a tapeworm, and needed to be eliminated by way of a flamethrower.

After suggesting this, I realized that this alternative would qualify as a different cognitive error we read about -- an "Illusory Correlation." So when I finished my assignment, I originally included a sentence indicating that my alternative would effectively take me away from the Anchoring Effect and into the realm of an Illusory Correlation. I thought this was clever. No, scratch that, the law student in me thought that was clever. The human being in me knew that this was blatantly retarded and corny, and was far beneath my actual humor capacity. So I deleted the line and sent it off.

Apparently I'm not as immune to this problem as I thought, but at least I had the good sense to curb the impulse. But I bet someone reading my response will come up with the same stupid joke I did, and if we end up discussing our responses at class, I half expect someone to utter it. Then, with the appropriate air of self-righteousness, I can look down upon the idiot in question with a mix of derision and pity, and backhand them in the mouth.

Please, friends - - don't be that guy.

Audit This

So not having prepared my own taxes before, I figure that it's cool if you don't report to the IRS when you make very little money. Say, under $1000 a year or so. By extension, once you start making over that amount, you probably still shouldn't claim any income, because the IRS hates inconsistency. Then, once your drug deals and mercenary contracts push you well over the $100,000 a year barrier, you should probably continue to not report it, because...

Goddammit, just let me keep my money.

(Points to genitals)

One Small Step For Mediocrity

You know, I've been rocking the same mediocre GPA for four straight semesters now (seriously - all four were within like 0.5 points), but apparently I can break that. I got my last grade for this fall today, and after averaging these grades against my other semesters, my average grade for this semester was a full 3 points higher than all my other semesters.

Now, if it only made any difference whatsoever...

Tragic

Death has left my life mercifully unscathed up to this point; I've never had to deal with any real sort of tragedy. I still have three of my four grandparents, and the fourth died when I was about eight or nine, and I wasn't nearly as close to him. As a result, the magnitude of what happened didn't really strike me at the time. I still remember my cousin and I playing in the basement of the funeral home while some sort of service was going on. Good friends of mine recently lost their father. I knew him pretty well, and he was a great man. But he had been in pain for so long, his death, while tragic, was somewhat of a blessing. A friend of mine from high school died in Iraq two years ago; I had lost touch with him for years before that. I went to the funeral, and it was quite sad, especially because of how young he was. But still, it wasn't close enough to really hit me.

Yesterday I received news that my ex-girlfriend's younger sister, Candice, was killed in a car accident recently. Now, we were never all that close. A fair portion of the time, I couldn't stand her. Much like my ex, and even moreso, her sister was everything that I was not. She smoked, she drank, she'd done drugs, she was a bit promiscuous, she cared little for school, she was loud and reckless and self-destructive. I thought she was a terrible influence on my ex, who at the time I was dating her, was in the process of turning her life around. Yet, Candice was a nice person. She could be pleasant and caring and fun to be around. As a result, I asked her to participate in the second Saturday Night Live show my friends and I put together. She jumped at the chance, and (unlike my ex) was actually pretty funny. Even after I broke up with my ex, Candice still participated in the taping. I mean, we were never really friends. But...you know how it is. You've got people in your life who piss you off most of the time, but for some reason, you still like knowing them. That was Candice.

News of her death saddened me, not only because of the fact that she died, but also for her family. That situation is beyond tragic. Two parents, five children - all step siblings, all between the ages of 15-20 (when I knew them). Not poor, but not remotely well-off. The oldest child, a boy, was autistic. The girls, all teenagers within two years of each other, were always fighting with each other or their parents, always getting into trouble. It was a depressing environment; as a result, the parents were incredibly pessimistic people. They had already had hard, crappy lives, and now their children were doing the same. Before I met her, my ex got expelled from school for drug use. One of the girls got pregnant when she was 18, and is now raising her child as a single mother; her younger sister got pregnant when she was 16, and I don't know what happened there. Every week there was a new catastrophe; every week the floor fell out from one cataclysm or another.

Perhaps the biggest came when my ex drove her car into the ditch and crashed into a telephone pole. She suffered serious head trauma, and the doctors had to induce a coma so she wouldn't injure her spine. She was in the hospital for forty days; when she got out, nothing was the same. She had been working two jobs, but both were gone. She couldn't concentrate in school, and ended up unable to go back the year she should have graduated. When she did go back, she dropped out after a month. She had been enlisted in the army reserves, and was going to use that to pay for college. After her brain injury, she could no longer serve. She never went to college. She became completely dependent upon me, she started smoking again, and she got depressed. She had been the only one in the family with direction; by about a year after the accident, she had none.

Now this. Candice had been drinking at a local bar, until she had too much to drink and was cut off. She drove home drunk, around the same road as my ex, and lost control on the same curve, flipped into the ditch, struck a tree, and died. The kicker? The bartender that cut her off was her father. He told her to go home. So she did. But she never made it.

The point of all this? Well, in one sense, I'm glad I turned out to be who I am. I'm glad that, as a teenager, I devoted my free time to creative enterprises like SNL rather than getting wasted all the time and messing up my life. But I didn't write this to extol my own choices. And I'm not seeking sympathy. I don't want anyone telling me they're sorry; this isn't my loss. This is just another tragedy for a terminally tragic family that I'm not a part of. I almost have the urge to call her father and express my sympathy, but I doubt it would mean much of anything. Not when his life and the lives of everyone in his family is in constant freefall.

I know death will strike closer someday. That's inevitable. I love my grandparents dearly, and their health is deteriorating more and more each year. Of course, tragedy could strike anywhere, anytime. I have no idea who I may lose, and I don't know how I'll handle it.

But for now, every day I thank God for everyone in my life, and for everything I've been given.

I Still Don't Care

Thanks, Professor Smith, for that stunning display in redundancy. First, he sent us an email Friday for the Sentencing Seminary with him and the Dick, detailing what we'll be doing for our first class. Blah.

Then, another email? Well, the exact same one. Okay.

Then, another email. Almost the exact same one, except he didn't leave his signature. Ooh, sneaky, Mike. We know it's you.

Then today, another email, saying that apparently the email about the first class didn't make it around, so here is what that email said, word for word. Huh, yeah I must have missed that one. Perhaps the email would get around more if he stopped sending it to me so often and decided to spread the wealth.

The internets are a confusing and dangerous place, Mikey. Find yourself an Idiot's Guide, and leave me the hell alone.

Robot Rights? My Ass!

The British government is apparently worried that robots might one day become so advanced through artificial intelligence that they will demand rights. They may demand to be treated as citizens, and may one day sue to be provided with full social benefits including housing, income support, and robo-health care. The state-sponsored study indicated, although this is probably at least 20 years away, that a "monumental shift" could occur if robots advanced to the point where they could reproduce or think for themselves.

Like hell, says I.

Listen up, you goddamn hippie-ass crackpots. The moment a man-made piece of metal demands to be treated like a citizen, those of us who are not bird-shit crazy will take a sledgehammer and fuck it up, Office Space-style. And don't even get me started on robo-humping.

Apparently the U.K. Office of Science and Innovation's Horizon Scanning Center thinks it's cool to just completely make shit up, then speculate about it like this is actual scientific discussion. Here's a thought - - let's not make robots advanced enough that we have to sit and debate whether robots have souls or feelings. I've seen Galactica, I've seen the Matrix, I've seen I, Robot. It never ends well. Take a few too many steps into the "playing God" zone, and you've got a full-on robo-revolution on your hands.

Nah. Robots wanna give me sass, I'll kick them squah in the nuts.

No News is Gay News

Sorry the news of my return to the DA's office has been so few and far between, but truth be told, not a goddamn thing has happening worth mentioning. They've been down two attornies lately, and reports of their backlog reached 1200 uncharged cases at one point. Which means, no court for me. I've gotten the pleasure of sitting and dictating domestic complaints non-stop, as well as charging out the occasional stack of traffic. Whoopee.

I did get one venture into court for a preliminary hearing for a child abuse case, which was a barely-mitigated disaster. It seems the investigating police officers decided to entirely skip the "investigation" phase and stick with mere allegations, which made getting any details out of the two witnesses (both 13 year old girls, one of whom recanted and said nothing happened at all) like pulling teeth. From a pissed off alligator. Who has no teeth. The only mitigating factor is we got in the bare minimum of facts for a bind-over on both counts, barely avoiding dismissal. I just want to give a shout out to police incompetence, since they made me look like an idiot when it really wasn't my fault. Thanks, assholes. At least I looked fly in my new suit.

It's not all bad though. I'm a lot more comfortable with domestics now. They gave me an office this time - the old office of the guy who just got elected DA. I still enjoy all the people here, and the only two who I didn't really care that much for are the ones that left. No real permanent job prospects here, though, since they've got to fill their openings pretty much ASAP. Still, good experience, and hopefully good money for me. Kinda shot my winter break as far as rest and relaxation, but honestly, I catch up enough on those during the semester. This should be a busier semester for me, between work, class, and LDP, but as far as I'm concerned, break starts when school starts.

Back home for the weekend. Hopefully I'll have more to report by then.

Vigilance and Travesty

I woke up this morning, looked outside, and saw that all was still right with the world, at least for the moment. Democracy still stands, GW still holds the office, and the Taliban have not set up camps in my front lawn. Yet. Despite these comforting signs, I know that vigilance is required to continue my happy American way of life.

Which is why the decision of Democratic representative from Minnesota, Keith Ellison, to be sworn into office using Thomas Jefferson's copy of the Koran is troubling to no end. The man calls himself a public servant, an American leader, and yet he takes his oath with one hand on terrorism's handbook? This goes beyond unethical, beyond unacceptable. This is downright dangerous.

First, it shows that our rock of American democracy, the US House of Representatives, has been infiltrated by muslims ("terrorists.") This is how it starts; first Minnesota elects a muslim in the House, then Iowa elects an Iraqi to the Senate, and pretty soon Kentucky's sending Mr. Kim-Jong II to the US Supreme Court. Not on my watch, Mr. Ellison. Not on my watch.

Second, as Roy Moore so succinctly stated, our country was founded on the freedom of religion without the interference of government. This means that the government may not interfere with its citizens' practice of Christianity. By swearing an oath on the Koran, Ellison is attempting to impose muslimocity on a nation of freedom-loving Christians. The US Constitution compels Congress to step in and prevent Ellison from taking office, unless he's willing to re-swear his oath on the US Bible. Otherwise, Congress will have been complicit in the greatest trampling of the civil rights of American Christians since Woodstock.

Third, Ellison's use of the Koran to take his oath undermines American civilization. This point is self-evident, and requires no further explanation or support.

Fourth, this incident exposes Thomas Jefferson for what he really was: a terrorist-lovin' terrorist. Sure, he wrote the Declaration of Independence; but few know the truth - - that Mr. Mohammed al-Jefferson originally intended to be a declaration of independece from liberty and the American way. Only after extensive editing by Paul Bunyan and one Mr. Charles Norris did this document come to be known as what it is today. But now that the truth is out, Congress must take several steps:

(1) Destroy all nickels. Nobody likes nickels. Nobody uses nickels. Nickels are small, puny, and frankly un-American. Nickels should all be tossed in a giant vat and melted down, and the molten metal should be shaped into a gigantic machete, with one purpose in mind:
(2) Removing Jefferson's face from Mount Rushmore. Surely the face of a more worthy patriot belongs on one of our nation's greatest treasures. Maybe not W yet, (YET), but certainly Ronald Reagan, or Jerry Falwell.
(3) Torch the Jefferson Memorial. That place is ass anyway. Rather than a massive, lithosphere-touching phallus like the Washington Monument, the Jefferson Memorial is vaguely dome-shaped, like some sort of...jihad...or something. Burn it down, and salt the earth. And -
(4) Replace all references to "Jefferson" across the country (street names, building names, people's names) with the word "Libertarydom." I know, it's not an actual word, but it sounds damn American.

Only after taking these steps can we ensure that this latest sideswipe by the terrorists will fail utterly and completely.

My parting words for Mr. Ellison and those (traitors) who support him: Freedom isn't free. Think about that when you're inevitably picked up in your cave and left to rot in Guantanamo.

Hey JB, this Statute is Facially Unconstitutional, and Coincidentally, So is Your Face

Word on the street is that Vice is taking on the Attorney General. That's right, working as a clerk on a case involving criminal defamation, Vice has laid down the gauntlet, challening the criminal defamation statute as both facially unconstitutional, and unconstitutional as applied to his client. Take that, AG-elect Van Hollen!

(In my best Outkast falsetto) "I - am - for - reeeeeal!" Any time you challenge a state statute as unconstitutional, as a courtesy, you have to send a copy of the motion to the AG's office, and they can decide whether or not they want to step in on the litigation. My boss got a call from the DA on the case yesterday, saying the AG's office wants in. Apparently, this is the first time in 20 years they've intervened in a misdemeanor case. Someone there read my brief, and told the DA that there were considerable issues raised worth addressing.

In all honesty, the statute as written is probably unconstitutional. It fails to provide some necessary exceptions to statements made about public figures and public affairs, which is an area that can't be subject to much limitation without infringing on free speech, since the ability of all citizens to criticize public officials and their affairs is fundamental to a liberal democracy. So unless the courts decide to (a) judicially narrow the statute to comport with the first amendment, which they really shouldn't do, or (b) read in the required components into some vague statutory language which would directly contradict what the statute says, then the statute should fall. And it's pretty damn exciting to me. My boss even offered to let me do the oral arguments. Which, legally I can't, and that would be downright frightening. Still, the thought of standing up there, going Walter Dickey-style on the court....goddamn!

Of course, the DA could decide to dismiss the defamation charge, and put our guy away on all the other charges they've got him nailed on. But for now, the charges stand, and the AG's office requested an oral arguments schedule and 45 days to respond to my motion. It's probably going to take months for anything to happen on this, so hopefully I'll still be working here when the dust settles. 'Til then.....put 'em up, JB. I've got your unconstitutional motion right here.