f/k/a archives . . . real opinions & real haiku

It’s time for some Alice in August:

 

summer’s end . . .
the staggered heights
of black umbrellas

 

 

 

 

 

 

late summer–
baring the tan line
on my wrist

 

 

 

 

 

late August –
pushing through cornstalks
midnight raccoons

 

 

  Alice Frampton

“summer’s end” – The Heron’s Nest (April 2002)

“late summer” – The Heron’s Nest (Sept. 2001)

“late August” – Honourable mention Betty Drevniok contest 2001

 

 

 

 

• 
  
  by dagosan:  

the old couple’s legs —

skinny and pale as

mine

[Aug. 12, 2005]

George Wallace is always trying to make insurance law interesting over

at Declarations & Exclusions, while also attempting to remain even-

handed.  He succeeds at both more often than you  might expect.  Earlier

this week he even buttered up the California Insurance Commissioner,

who had sniffed out fraud at a well-known L.A. waffle house.

 

Massachusetts Lawyers’ Weekly has a wrap-up of the new pay-raise law,

with quotes from many of the interested parties.  See “Bar advocates return

in droves, crisis averted: Legislature passes pay-raise bill”  (by Tony Wright,

Aug. 8, 2005).   Also, in a letter to the MLW editor, attorney Deborah Sirotkin-

Butler advises a “wait and see” approach to the new legislation.

                                                                                                        

The Endnotes column of the current Litigation Ethics Newsletter asks

three legal ethics experts, plus the guy formerly known as ethicalEsq,

“What books do you recommend to other litigators interested in legal ethics?”

(Summer 2005, compiled by Amy Gardner of Skadden Arps).  Because the

Newsletter is only available online to members of ABA’s Section of Litigation,

I thought I’d compile the selections here, with links: 

 

  John Steele of Legal Ethics Forum suggests “two great summer page-turners

that are chock full of ethics issues,” plus two with “more explicit discussion of ethics:”

The Prosecutors: A Year in the Life of a District Attorney’s Office (2003),

by Gary Delsohn

The Informant: A True Story (2001), by Kurt Eichenwald  

Lawyers Crossing Lines: Nine Stories of Greed, Disloyalty, and

Betrayal of Trust (2001), by James L. Kelley

Eat What You Kill : The Fall of a Wall Street Lawyer (2004), 

by Milton C Regan

 

Brad Wendel of Cornell Law School, another Legal Ethics Forum contributor, offers 

“some of the classics of legal ethics” — which establish “standards of right and wrong

action that do not depend on being enacted as positive law.”

The Good Lawyer, by David Luban (Editor)

Lawyers and Justice, by David Luban (1988)

Ethics for Adversaries, by Arthur Isak Applbaum (2000)

The Practice of Justice, by William H. Simon (2000)  

The Lost Lawyer : Failing Ideals of the Legal Profession, by Anthony

Kronman (1995)  

 

David E. Springer of Skadden Arps suggests Aristotle’s Rhetoric, “which makes a  

powerful case for adherence to ethical norms by linking personal character to persuasion,

the object of advocacy.”

 

David Giacalone of f/k/a (to no one’s surprise) recommends The Betrayed Profession:

Lawyering at the End of the Twentieth Century, by Sol M. Linowitz, with Martin Mayer

(1994).  The book is “Linowitz’s attempt to show what our profession should be, how it

has gone so profoundly astray, and what we (who betrayed it) can do about it — as individuals,

as bar associations, and through our courts and schools.” [You can read the first chapter here.] 

p.s.  Hmm. When asked to participate in this project, I understood that

Amy Gardner was asking each of us for the name of one book, with an

explanation of the choice.  Please note that the two non-professors complied,

while the academic types (Brad fulltime, John part-time) went for breadth rather

than depth.   Draw your own conclusions.

 

 

atop the scripture
reader’s head…
a katydid

 

       Kobayashi ISSA,

           translated by David G. Lanoue

 

 

 

 

 

 

new paperback —
the sun sets
without me

     david giacalone 

            from The Heron’s Nest  (March 2005) 

 

 

                                                                                                                                        

 

 

This morning, while trying to find Michael Dylan Welch’s little publishing

company, Press Here, on the web, I made a great discovery — Michael’s 1997

website, Captain Haiku’s Secret Hangout.  It’s a good place to learn about haiku,

but it’s main attraction for me is the compilation of over 40 haiku and senryu written

by Michael and entitled Thornewood Poems.  Here are just a few:

 

 

a red berry on the trail
I look up
to the chickadee’s song

 

 

 

 

 

 

a white swan shakes her tail
at last the ripples
reach her mate

 

 

 

 

 

afternoon shade—
moss rubbed off
where the branches touch

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

jays squawk
from redwood tops—
the hush of distant traffic

 

 

Michael Dylan Welch from Thornewood Poems,

from Captain Haiku’s Secret Hangout.

 

 

• 
  
  by dagosan:  

from the shower,

a sad love song —

bathtub cricket

 

 

[Aug. 11, 2005]

potluck

David Brooks has an interesting new NYT column, All Cultures Are Not Equal,

in which he urges smart 18-year-olds to seek a career in “cultural geography,”

saying: Study why and how people cluster, why certain national traits endure

over centuries, why certain cultures embrace technology and economic growth

and others resist them.”  He also notes that people are using new technology

and freedoms to “create new groups and cultural zones.”   He correctly notes:

“People are moving into self-segregating communities with people

like themselves, and building invisible and sometimes visible barriers

to keep strangers out.  . . .

 

“The members of these and many other groups didn’t inherit their

identities. They took advantage of modernity, affluence and freedom

to become practitioners of a do-it-yourself tribalism. They are part of a

great reshuffling of identities, and the creation of new, often more rigid

groupings. They have the zeal of converts.” 

Brooks is right: we need to know much more about how and why people cluster and

what this segmentation means for our society and the world. 

 

 

 The last additions to our Inadvertent Searchee page suggest that

we are just going to have to try harder.  Sure, we were the first result in a

Google search for armenian appreciation day> and even for “new jersey”

+soup slurping>, but our postings came in only #2 for take one-third>  

[out of 207 million Yahoo! results!] and for ipod caste>.  The former

result means we’ve been negligent in our fight against the standard

contingency fee; the later result reminds us all that, with the internet,

a bad pun is forever.   

 

                                                                                                                           

matinee

the summer sun

under the exit door

 

 

 

fireflies . . .

could i still

catch one?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

dog days–

the slight coolness

of a cast-iron stove

 

 

John Stevenson from Quiet Enough   “stevensonQuiet”

(Red Moon Press, 2004) 

 

 

• 
  
  from dagosan:  

 

firefly season

ends —

the freshman packs her car

 

 

[Aug. 10, 2005, for ana & megan]

potluck

MBDSR: Must Be Doin’ Somethin’ Right:  Prof. Bainbridge has republished his

weblog piece Roberts’ Catholicism  (Aug. 2) virtually verbatim in a Tech Central

Station column titled Judging Faith (Aug. 9).  One noticeable (at least to me)

difference: all references to my post what if Roberts is a “Serious Catholic”?,

including a lengthy quote, have been deleted.  MBDSR.

 

                                                                                                                                                           

August shade–
a heron’s wings
low on the water

 

 

“thnLogoG”

 

high August–

in a grove of radiant leaves
two women talking

 

 

 

 

Distant tail lights
in the dark
nostalgia

 

 Barry George  from Haiku Spirit 

 

by dagosan: 

a golden sliver of moon —

her wedding ring

glints

 

 

[Aug. 9, 2005]

potluck

  The newest additions to our Inadvertent Searchee Page show this humble

little weblog ranking first in Google or Yahoo! searches involving the following

queries: 

 

                                                                                                                                                                             

In “Our Honor: Policing Ourselves in the Legal Profession, ” (NYSBA Gov., Law & Policy

Journal | Summer 2005) David L. Edmunds, Jr., Chief Counsel for the NYS Attorney Grievance

Committees, App. Div., 4th Jud. Dept., discusses at some length the ethical obligation to 

report non-privileged violations of the ethical rules by our fellow attorneys. See NY Rule

1-103(A); Model Rule 8.3; D.C. Bar Rule 8.3.  Edmunds says:

“The integrity of the legal profession can only be maintained when violations of

the disciplinary rules are brought to the attention of the proper officials. . . . The

profession is indeed privileged to have the responsibility of policing itself.”

We part company when he says “The legal community, both bench and bar, has met the challenge

and exceeded the responsibility placed upon it to regulate the profession.”   (see our prior post)  It

is ironic that Edmunds should be making this claim, since it was his 4th Dept. Grievance Committee

staffer who told me a few years ago — as described in blame bar counsel for the Capoccia Scandal 

— that they pay very little attention to complaints by lawyers about other lawyers, because (he

asserted) they almost always come from competitors trying to stifle the competition (e.g., complaints

about ads).

 

YAW: Yabut Analogy Watch:  Quoting Cain from the Bible, Edmunds uses a strange   

analogy in his article, pointing to the story of Cain and Abel, and stating that “We are

indeed the keeper of our brother and sister attorneys.”  As Answers.com has noted,

“Cain’s words have come to symbolize people’s unwillingness to accept responsibility

for the welfare of their fellows — their “brothers” in the extended sense of the term.

The tradition of Judaism and Christianity is that people do have this responsibility.”   

 

 

  The Body of Abel, Found by Adam, by William Blake; larger

 

 

Observers such as I would say that our profession has indeed acted too much

like the keeper of other lawyers — covering their colleagues’ behinds and winking at

their bad conduct — rather than vigilant police who are looking out for the welfare of

clients and the public. 

 

roly-poly pigeons
growing fatter…
a long day

 

      Kobayashi ISSA

 

hailstones falling–
the pigeons hear
their fate

 

     Kobayashi ISSA

      translated by David G. Lanoue

 

 

   How about ending our workweek with Peggy Lyles?

Sounds very good to me:

 

 

 

a sea breeze

through the oleanders–

long afterglow

 

 

 

 

shrimp glisten

in the cast net

summer moon

 

 

 

 

 

history lesson

slowly the caged eagle

turns our way

 

 

Peggy Lyles from Snapshots Haiku Magazine #10 (2001)

 

 

                                                                                        larger

 

• 
  
  by dagosan                                               

the grocery bag

spills —  blueberries . . . r  o  l  l

bananas don’t

 

[Aug. 6, 2005]

 

 

 

 

 

Pointing to yesterday’s post on Role Differentiation, Prof. Bainbridge tells his readers today

that I am “still worried John Roberts might be a serious Catholic.”  Steve has misunderstood my

reasons for discussing what it means for a judge to be a Serious Catholic.  I added this update

on Aug. 3rd, to my first reply to Prof. B, and it is also relevant here:  

update:  Paul at Power Line is concerned that people such as your Editor 

are suggesting a Loyalty-to-the Constitution Test.   I can’t speak for others,

but that was not my intent.   What I’m looking for is an honest discussion. I

broached this topic yesterday because so many supporters of John Roberts

have so strongly stated that there is nothing about Roberts’ Catholicism that

would require him to take stands based on his faith, as opposed to his legal

philosophy and analysis.  I think they’re wrong (and most know it).  

Prof. B. should not assume he knows whether I would be pleased to have a Justice Roberts

acting like a Serious Catholic on the Supreme Court.  Frankly, it depends on the issue.  I’ve

brought the topic to this weblog to fill a void in the debate.  I hope it will keep all sides honest. 

 

p.s.  By the way, Prof. Bainbridge is the only weblogger I’ve  “BainbridgePix”

discovered who agrees with me, as he said, that there will  

likely be cases where serious Catholic judges like John Roberts

“would be religiously obligated to put one’s faith-based beliefs

ahead of, say, one’s views of precedent or socially accepted

moral norms.”  He’s also noted that “[I]t’s worth remembering

that Catholic judges are bound by both [judical ethics] rules

and the dictates of their faith. The latter bars formal cooperation

with evil . .” 

 

p.p.s   Prof. B. has posted an interesting assessment of Judge

Roberts and Catholicism by Texas lawyer Ron Anderson.  I

may not agree with it, but it is worth checking out.

 

 

since I’m old
the fleas aren’t worried
about escaping

 

 

Kobayashi ISSA,

translated by David G. Lanoue

 

 

boundary dispute

the dead tree

still standing

 

 

 

 

a break in the weather

leaf bags

line the pavement

 

 

“tree B&w Small”

 

 

cloudless sky

a hairline crack

on the windshield

 

 

Yu Chang – Upstate Dim Sum (2003/II)

 

 

 

• 
  
  by dagosan:   

her thirty-year-old

photo — my nag finishes

out of the money

 

[Aug.4, 2005]