So, I guess I'm back...kinda?

A long rambly multi-topic catchup post wherein I pretend all 3 of my remaining readers still care...

Last night I scrolled through my first two pages of posts and realized that was all I had so far for 2010, and it's nearly freakin August. This made me feel terrible about my chronic blog neglect. Luckily several massive projects completed either last week or Monday of this week, and so while I am certainly still swamped I no longer feel like I am swimming for the surface but just don't know if I will make it before I drown. Living in that feeling for the last 3 months, and in other spurts for most of the last 10 months, has really sucked. And I'm sure it will suck again soon.
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So, like I said in the infusions post, I had 2 parties in June and July. It wasn't really the greatest idea I've ever had, but it's done now and it was for the most part fun. Also, crazy expensive. Also, this post from my dear friend Susan is like the greatest thing ever. Read it, learn it, live it.

I made so many different dishes it is hard to pick just one or two to share recipes for, but one is something I sort of invented based upon a suggestion from a friend, and it was delicious, and easy:

Feta-Stuffed Mini Peppers

2 packages of miniature red, yellow and orange peppers, tops removed, cleaned, split down one side
1 package of good feta cheese
olive oil, ideally infused with some herbs, garlic or red pepper for extra flavor
balsamic vinegar
8 leaves fresh basil (if oil is not infused)
salt and pepper

If using basil, cut into a chiffonade and place a pinch of the basil into each pepper. Stuff each pepper with feta, packing tightly. Drizzle liberally with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and sprinkle with salt, pepper, and any remaining basil. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour to allow flavors to meld. Skewer each pepper and either place on top rack of a grill away from direct flame, with uncut sides of peppers down, or place on a rimmed baking sheet and broil in a hot oven until the cheese browns and the peppers have just started to soften. Be careful when removing the peppers from the grill or oven, as the filling will want to fall out. (If it does, just discreetly stuff it back in. Nobody will notice.) Serve warm.

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I've decided that when I get my bonus in December, I need to do something big with it. Option #1 is a major trip somewhere outside the U.S. where I can get away from it all for awhile. Suggestions on locale are welcome...right now, I am considering exotic places like Italy, France, New Zealand, Tahiti, Barbados, etc. Ideally it should be somewhere that the weather will be lovely in January or February when I can afford to go. Honestly, my biggest concern is that none of my friends will be willing to go with me because of either financial restraints, lack of interest in traveling to where I want to go, or fear of flying. I've been trying to explain to people recently that traveling alone as a single girl is just way dicier than as a guy. My friend who went to France last year by herself and got mugged 3 times in the span of a two week trip, including having her wallet stolen on the very first day she arrived in Paris, is a classic example. She hung in there, got money wired by her parents, and made the best of it, but I would probably be so dejected at that point that I'd just want to turn around and come home. I travel alone all the time for work, but that's different--I never GO anywhere or see anything, I just go from airport to hotel to deposition back to airport. But if I'm traveling abroad, I really don't want to be alone. There should be a place where you can find travel partners for things like this who aren't shady or annoying. (Feel free to also volunteer to be my travel partner in the comments, although I won't be fronting your costs if you do...)

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On the mini-vacation front, I need to go visit a friend in New Orleans for some weekend in August, and I am also probably going back to Biloxi for the poker tournament around Labor Day. This was a total bust last year, but a friend is also going that same week for other reasons and asked me to join her, plus they have lowered the buy-ins considerably from last year. I wonder if that's the effect of the economy? At any rate, I never have the time or desire to play poker in my Thursday night game anymore, so in order to get some practice with live play I am probably going to have to start playing bar tourneys a few times a week. Suggestions for good places in Atlanta with bar tourneys that start at 9pm (not 8, which I can never make it to) are welcome. I used to play at the Brewhouse but apparently new folks are running it so it may suck now.

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Local politics is depressing the hell out of me. I seriously don't like any of the candidates on either side of the aisle who ran for Governor of Georgia, and I will probably write in my friend Page in November. (It's a thing, we write in Page when we don't know who to vote for.) I waver between resolving not to give a shit because it's too upsetting to pay attention to, and resolving to make my own change by working to revamp the Democratic party in this state into something effective and inspiring again. Y'know, with all that free time I have.

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So it's late July, and I resolved in March to maybe run a half marathon this year, and yet I haven't even been able to string together 13 miles on the treadmill across one whole week since that promise, let alone actually starting to train for it. I keep waiting for things at work to get less hectic so I can get home at a normal hour and have the energy and time to recommit, but it just hasn't happened. I wish I didn't have to choose between getting in shape physically and getting my career in order. But doing both at the same time has proven nearly impossible.

...

I'm getting ridiculously excited about FSU football this year, even though Vegas has apparently only pegged us to win 8 games. Still, this is one of those years that has the potential to be really special--not national championship special (despite what Tim Brando apparently predicted), but a better year than we have seen in recent memory. I think we could conceivably run the table in the ACC, which would be great if we didn't also have the incredibly difficult non-conference schedule of Oklahoma, BYU and Florida to deal with. Still, the most frustrating thing about FSU's decline this decade has been our tendency to let mediocre ACC teams beat us, and the first step to returning to former glory is to stop letting that happen and start kicking conference asses again.

...

I think that's all I got for now. Whew, I was storing up a lot of random junk!

A Threat or a Promise? McBerry's Libel Claims

Recently the word "libel" has been thrown around a lot in the Georgia blogosophere in connection with one fringe gubernatorial candidate who allegedly had a past predilection for the young ladies. Very young ladies.

Ray McBerry was a teacher in the late 1990's when he got to know a student at his school fairly well. She moved on to a different high school, and to hear her and her parents tell it, she began a romantic relationship with McBerry that led to him leaving teaching and having a judge order him to stay away from the girl. To hear him tell it, he was just counseling the girl after her parents made her end an interracial relationship, and her parents got the wrong idea and now they are all defaming* him all over Georgia.

Meanwhile, a few weeks before the girl and her parents' story hit the pages of "respectable" media, the SWGA Politics blog threw its skirt over its head and called McBerry a child molester. When informed that the law in Georgia does not apply to victims over the age of 16, and that this girl was 16 when the alleged sexual contact began, the blogger in question basically said he didn't care because McBerry was a teacher and teacher-student sex is still some form of crime, even if not meeting the legal elements of child molestation. (Side note: it's unclear whether this is even accurate, since the girl claimed the sexual contact only occurred once McBerry was no longer her teacher, as she had moved to a different school.)

McBerry threw a hissy fit of his own the other day, and started making threats of litigation against online outlets and individuals. Some wondered if one target for a libel suit might be SWGA Politics itself. But despite all his bluster, I would bet a cool Benjamin that McBerry never files any sort of defamation lawsuit against anyone. Why?

1) Defamation suits are expensive, time-consuming, and generally not taken on contingency by the attorneys who file them. This means McBerry would probably have to pay a lawyer by the hour to file the lawsuit, unless he intended to proceed pro se (in which case he might as well not even bother). McBerry hasn't exactly been lighting up the fundraising in his gubernatorial race, and I don't think he's rolling in the dough personally either. Even litigating on the cheap is likely to cost upwards of $25K to take such a case to trial, which brings us to the next problem...

2) The targets of such a suit, for the most part, are judgment-proof or close to it. What assets do either the girl and her family, or the proprietors of SWGA Politics, really have to satisfy any judgment rendered against them? Lawyers are especially wary of taking such cases on contingency when they strongly suspect at most their clients will obtain a moral victory, but no real cash. Why spend $25K to win an apology and a judgment that allows you to garnish someone's wages until the end of time? Now, any media outlets that report the allegedly defamatory statements could also be sued, and would not be judgment proof by any means, but the standards for a libel suit against a newspaper are higher and they have more defenses. They also have more and better lawyers who have defended cases like this before. Does McBerry want to take on the AJC and the big firms that represent it? I doubt it.

3) Truth is a defense in defamation cases. I make no allegations about McBerry's veracity or the propriety of his past behavior. (See, I know how to stay on the good side of the defamation line!) But if the girl and her family have evidence to support their allegations, which it sounds like they might based upon the apology letter they have already produced, then they could defeat any defamation action simply by showing that McBerry really did the things they claimed he did. Even if they don't have evidence, if a jury were to determine that the girl and her parents were telling the truth, McBerry would lose. And on the way to presenting evidence of truth or falsity to a jury, the parties would have to engage in embarassing discovery in the form of depositions of those McBerry or the girl talked to about their relationship, people who may have found them in compromising positions, etc. Not exactly the sort of character evidence an aspiring politician wants to see put down on the public record, even if he did eventually prevail at trial.

4) Potentially, McBerry would have to show "actual malice"--knowledge the story is false, or reckless disregard for its truth or falsity--in order to prevail. There is little law out there on the question of whether blogs enjoy the same first amendment protections as "traditional press" like newspapers in defamation cases, so this one is sort of a guess. The Supreme Court famously ruled in New York Times v. Sullivan that in order for a newspaper to have libeled a public figure, it must have shown actual malice--meaning either the newspaper knew a published statement was untrue or showed a reckless disregard for its truth or falsity. McBerry is arguably a public figure by virtue of qualifying as a candidate for Governor. The question is whether the blogs that published this story showed reckless disregard for the truth of the story or knew it was false. Now, as discussed briefly above, if the story is true then McBerry has no case. And if the bloggers who published the allegedly defamatory statements are protected by Sullivan to the same extent the AJC and other traditional media outlets are protected, then McBerry would need to prove that they showed a willful disregard for the truth of this story, which is a high burden and highly subjective because it relies upon the knowledge and intentions of the publisher of the libel.

I could write an entire series of posts on whether Sullivan applies to bloggers, and whether it should, but that is a post for another day when I have more free time. For now, if we assume it applies, then it makes a tough case to prove nearly impossible.

And that, my 3 readers, is why Ray McBerry's threats to sue will never be more than threats.

* I prefer to use the term "defamation" to cover both libel and slander, because people often erroneously use the two terms interchangeably and having one term that covers both is less confusing. Generally speaking, libel is written while slander is spoken, though the expanding definition of publication has led to libel also governing internet postings and TV/radio broadcasts. In the instant situation, the news stories containing the statements of the girl and parents about McBerry would be governed by libel laws, while the girl and her parents' actual spoken statements about McBerry would be governed by slander laws. However, because this gets confusing in a situation where slander is published in a potentially libelous news story, I'll just use defamation for both. The only real differences are that libel requires "publication" of the defamatory statement, slander requires actual damage to reputation through the spoken defamation, and there are some libel protections for press reports involving public figures as described above.

Name that Justice

As I wrote today over at Blog for Democracy's /law page, today the Supreme Court issued the Citizens United v. FEC ruling invalidating restrictions on political advertisements funded by corporations, on first amendment grounds. Many people have been shocked to learn for the first time that corporations have 1st amendment rights, but they shouldn't be. The Supreme Court ruled in 1978 in First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti that a corporation had a 1st amendment right to engage in political speech through campaign contributions. While some recent rulings had narrowed the precedential value of Bellotti, the Supreme Court had specifically asked the litigants in Citizens United to brief and argue whether those later precedents should be overruled. That is exactly what happened.

In re-reading Bellotti today for the first time since law school, I was struck by the fact that Justice Stevens was in the majority of the opinion, which was authored by the more liberal wing of the Court at the time. Stevens wrote a 90 page dissent to Citizens United, so you'd never know that he was one of the majority votes for the decision that essentially underpinned today's decision. But even more amusing was this dissent in Bellotti, written by a Justice to be named later (see if you can guess after you read the whole thing):

This Court decided at an early date, with neither argument nor discussion, that a business corporation is a "person" entitled to the protection of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific R. Co., 118 U.S. 394, 396 (1886). Likewise, it soon became accepted that the property of a corporation was protected under the Due Process Clause of that same Amendment. See, e. g., Smyth v. Ames, 169 U.S. 466, 522 (1898). Nevertheless, we concluded soon thereafter that the liberty protected by that Amendment "is the liberty of natural, not artificial persons." Northwestern Nat. Life Ins. Co. v. Riggs, 203 U.S. 243, 255 (1906). Before today, our only considered and explicit departures from that holding have been that a corporation engaged in the business of publishing or broadcasting enjoys the same liberty of the press as is enjoyed by natural persons, Grosjean v. American Press Co., 297 U.S. 233, 244 (1936), and that a nonprofit membership corporation organized for the purpose of "achieving . . . equality of treatment by all government, federal, state and local, for the members of the Negro community" enjoys certain liberties of political expression. NAACP v.
Button, 371 U.S. 415, 429 (1963).

The question presented today, whether business corporations have a constitutionally protected liberty to engage in political activities, has never been squarely addressed by any previous decision of this Court. 1 However, the General Court [435 U.S. 765, 823] of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the Congress of the United States, and the legislatures of 30 other States of this Republic have considered the matter, and have concluded that restrictions upon the political activity of business corporations are both politically desirable and constitutionally permissible. The judgment of such a broad consensus of governmental bodies expressed over a period of many decades is entitled to considerable deference from this Court. I think it quite probable that their judgment may properly be reconciled with our controlling precedents, but I am certain that under my views of the limited application of the First Amendment to the States, which I share with the two immediately preceding occupants of my seat on the Court, but not with my present colleagues, the judgment of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts should be affirmed.

Early in our history, Mr. Chief Justice Marshall described the status of a corporation in the eyes of federal law:

"A corporation is an artificial being, invisible, intangible, and existing only in contemplation of law. Being the mere creature of law, it possesses only those properties which the charter of creation confers upon it, either expressly, or as incidental to its very existence. These are such as are supposed best calculated to effect the object for which it was created." Dartmouth College v. Woodward, 4 Wheat. 518, 636 (1819).

The appellants herein either were created by the Commonwealth or were admitted into the Commonwealth only for the limited purposes described in their charters and regulated by [435 U.S. 765, 824] state law. 2 Since it cannot be disputed that the mere creation of a corporation does not invest it with all the liberties enjoyed by natural persons, United States v. White, 322 U.S. 694, 698 -701 (1944) (corporations do not enjoy the privilege against self-incrimination), our inquiry must seek to determine which constitutional protections are "incidental to its very existence." Dartmouth College, supra, at 636. There can be little doubt that when a State creates a corporation with the power to acquire and utilize property, it necessarily and implicitly guarantees that the corporation will not be deprived of that property absent due process of law. Likewise, when a State charters a corporation for the purpose of publishing a newspaper, it necessarily assumes that the corporation is entitled to the liberty of the press essential to the conduct of its business. 3 Grosjean so held, and our subsequent cases have so assumed. E. g., Time, Inc. v. Firestone, 424 U.S. 448 (1976); New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, [435 U.S. 765, 825] 376 U.S. 254 (1964). 4 Until recently, it was not thought that any persons, natural or artificial, had any protected right to engage in commercial speech. See Virginia State Board of Pharmacy v. Virginia Citizens Consumer Council, 425 U.S. 748, 761 -770 (1976). Although the Court has never explicitly recognized a corporation's right of commercial speech, such a right might be considered necessarily incidental to the business of a commercial corporation.

It cannot be so readily concluded that the right of political expression is equally necessary to carry out the functions of a corporation organized for commercial purposes. 5 A State grants to a business corporation the blessings of potentially perpetual life and limited liability to enhance its efficiency as [435 U.S. 765, 826] an economic entity. It might reasonably be concluded that those properties, so beneficial in the economic sphere, pose special dangers in the political sphere. Furthermore, it might be argued that liberties of political expression are not at all necessary to effectuate the purposes for which States permit commercial corporations to exist. So long as the Judicial Branches of the State and Federal Governments remain open to protect the corporation's interest in its property, it has no need, though it may have the desire, to petition the political branches for similar protection. Indeed, the States might reasonably fear that the corporation would use its economic power to obtain further benefits beyond those already bestowed. 6 I would think that any particular form of organization [435 U.S. 765, 827] upon which the State confers special privileges or immunities different from those of natural persons would be subject to like regulation, whether the organization is a labor union, a partnership, a trade association, or a corporation.

One need not adopt such a restrictive view of the political liberties of business corporations to affirm the judgment of the Supreme Judicial Court in this case. That court reasoned that this Court's decisions entitling the property of a corporation to constitutional protection should be construed as recognizing the liberty of a corporation to express itself on political matters concerning that property. Thus, the Court construed the statute in question not to forbid political expression [435 U.S. 765, 828] by a corporation "when a general political issue materially affects a corporation's business, property or assets." 371 Mass. 773, 785, 359 N. E. 2d 1262, 1270 (1977). I can see no basis for concluding that the liberty of a corporation to engage in political activity with regard to matters having no material effect on its business is necessarily incidental to the purposes for which the Commonwealth permitted these corporations to be organized or admitted within its boundaries. Nor can I disagree with the Supreme Judicial Court's factual finding that no such effect has been shown by these appellants. Because the statute as construed provides at least as much protection as the Fourteenth Amendment requires, I believe it is constitutionally valid.

It is true, as the Court points out, ante, at 781-783, that recent decisions of this Court have emphasized the interest of the public in receiving the information offered by the speaker seeking protection. The free flow of information is in no way diminished by the Commonwealth's decision to permit the operation of business corporations with limited rights of political expression. All natural persons, who owe their existence to a higher sovereign than the Commonwealth, remain as free as before to engage in political activity. Cf. Maher v. Roe, 432 U.S. 464, 474 (1977).

I would affirm the judgment of the Supreme Judicial Court.

That argument against finding that the first amendment could be applied with equal force to corporations crafted entirely out of the laws of states that recognized them, was the work of one Justice William Rehnquist. I'm quite certain Justice Rehnquist would have come down with the majority in today's ruling, so it begs the question: what changed?

Quote of the Day, doomed to repeat it edition

Giving up on the idea that’s been your primary preoccupation for the last year-- and, by the way, a primary focus of the last presidential campaign--is not exactly a way to challenge these conclusions.

You'll have less political capital, making it hard to deliver progress on the economy or anything else. As for reelection, well, ask the congressional Democrats running in 1994 how failing to deliver health care reform worked for them.

--TNR's Jonathan Cohn in an open letter to House Democrats.

Live Like You Were Dying

So Martha Coakley lost the Senate seat Ted Kennedy held for 40 years to an unknown Neanderthal, and suddenly the world's gone topsy-turvy for Democrats. Prominent House and Senate members who'd voted for Healthcare reform at the end of last year are suddenly sounding the alarm and wondering if we need to seriously re-evaluate everything just because one special election went the way of the candidate that ran the vastly superior campaign and capitalized on voter unease with Washington's not-at-all-clear plans.

Well, maybe we do need to seriously re-evaluate, but probably not for the reasons that they think. So what if Scott Brown's election signals that every Democrat is vulnerable in 2010 or 2012? They probably are, but this is not a signal that Democrats need to go into every-man-for-himself survival mode and try to figure out if killing HCR will get them more votes than helping to pass it. Who does that serve, other than the ones lucky enough to hold onto their jobs for another term? Nobody.

Instead, I ask every single Democrat in Congress right now to do one simple thing: think about what you would want your political legacy to be if your current term were your last. If you knew you were retiring at the end of this term, what unfinished business would you want to make sure made it through before you were done? Discard considerations about your colleagues' electability, too: imagine that EVERYONE in Congress were retiring at the end of this term. What's on your legislative Bucket List?

Ted Kennedy wanted more than anything in the world to see Healthcare reform come to pass in his lifetime. His legacy may forever be damaged if the current legislation is allowed to wither on the vine or be tinkered with to death. But there were a LOT of things that the folks in Congress told voters in 2006 and 2008 they wanted to get done and would do once we took back a majority, and presumably at least some of it really did matter to them and wasn't just a focus-grouped soundbite. So what would be on that list? What would you do if you could enact anything you wanted free of political considerations?

• Make single payer health insurance available to every American who wants it?
• Ensure every child is insured until age 18 regardless of ability to pay?
• Pass a new Equal Rights Amendment and send it back to the states to be ratified?
• Renew and strengthen the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act, and add new benchmarks for sustainability and global warming prevention?
• Pass a new Civil Rights Act prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation?
• Repeal the Defense of Marriage Act?
• Make all healthcare expenses tax deductible?
• Make all tuition at public higher education institutions fully tax deductible and with federally-guaranteed loans for every student admitted?
  
• True immigration reform?
• The expansion of environmentally friendly mass transit outside the big cities through a new federal initiative?
  
• A new New Deal that puts the 10% of Americans in the workforce who are unemployed back to work on public works projects for the federal government?
• Expand Medicare and Medicaid to every uninsured American?

Think big, Democrats. Remember what you believed in when you first thought about running for office, and the sorts of things you wanted to accomplish. Think about what legislation you would forever want to be known as having your name attached to it. And then figure out your own personal agenda of what you're willing to fight for, even if it kills you in your next election. If the answer is "nothing is worth risking my seat for," then you deserve to lose anyway. We want leaders who care about making the lives of the citizens better and fixing our country's problems, not people who only care about extending their own job security. And as we've shown tonight, we are not afraid to tip the election to the other guy if you forget who sends you to Washington and who you should be working for. So make your list, and live like there's no tomorrow. Because there might not be.

Once again, Jon Stewart nails it

It would be pretty funny if it weren't so sad.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Mass Backwards
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

Secret sexism

As voters in Massachusetts head to the polls today to decide who will take over Ted Kennedy's Senate seat, pundits everywhere are casting blame in anticipation of the loss by AG Martha Coakley (D) to state Sen. Scott Brown (R). There is much talk of Coakley's lackluster campaigning skills, a dig she made at Republican former Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling as being a Yankee fan, a mailer she sent out accusing Brown of wanting to deny healthcare to rape victims, and comparisons of her meager time spent gladhanding the voters as compared to Brown's. There is also much discussion of how this is really a referendum on Obama, and Democratic control, and healthcare, and can't we see that voters are pissed off?!, etc. But one thing that nobody is talking about, and that may be playing just as much of a role as any of those factors, is the secret sexism of the Massachusetts voter.

Only five women have ever been elected to statewide office in Massachusetts, one of whom is current Attorney General Coakley, who was elected in 2006. 3 different women have been elected Lieutenant Governor, but MA elects a slate rather than individual Gov and Lt Gov votes, so there is not a separate campaign and election for Lt Gov like we have here in Georgia. The first woman independently elected to statewide office in MA was Shannon O'Brien, who was elected State Treasurer in 1999. O'Brien made a run for governor in 2002, but lost to Mitt Romney. Jane Swift was elected Lieutenant Governor along with Paul Cellucci in 1998, and became Governor in 2001 when Cellucci left to become an ambassador, but Swift served less than 2 years and was persuaded not to run for Governor because of her tremendous unpopularity. Mitt Romney's Lieutenant Governor was Kerry Healey, who lost to Deval Patrick in the 2006 gubernatorial election. Massachusetts has elected no female Senators, and only 4 Congresswomen. Prior to Niki Tsongas' election in 2008, it had been 25 years since a woman from Massachusetts had served in Congress. (For what it's worth, Tsongas is the widow of very popular Senator and former Presidential candidate Paul Tsongas. Her husband's legacy undoubtedly assisted her in her candidacy.)

For all of the discussion of how "liberal" Massachusetts is, in reality the electorate is politically quite moderate. Catholic voters make up a sizeable voting bloc, and those voters are socially more conservative (particularly on abortion) than the rest of the Democratic electorate. In fact, numerous Massachusetts House Speakers in recent years have been anti-abortion. In addition, union workers make up a sizeable chunk of the electorate, and even though union workers do tend to vote Democratic on the whole, they tend to be more politically moderate as well, particularly on social issues. They also don't tend to vote for female candidates.

Yet, despite the acknowledged difficulties female candidates have faced in past statewide elections in MA, virtually nobody is mentioning it as a potential factor in a Coakley defeat today. Why are the many political pundits, all of whom have been dissecting this race for weeks and loudly declaring why Coakely might lose even before a single vote has been counted, completely silent on the potential role that sexism might be playing in Coakley's lukewarm response in MA? You would think that after the landmark year that was 2008, when female candidates and the unique challenges they face were front and center in both the primary and the general Presidential election, that reporters wouldn't be afraid to mention the fact that one candidate is a girl running in a state that traditional doesn't like electing girls very much.

But if in the past 3 weeks you have watched any political news program, read political blogs, or read the newspapers with their Coakley pre-mortems, you'll find that virtually nobody is mentioning the gender of the candidate as a factor. Maybe they're assuming to the point of hoping that we are suddenly post-gender and that being a girl no longer matters, but that would be a foolish assumption to make. It obviously still matters, in some places more than others. So why the silence on this fairly obvious contributing factor to Coakley's struggles? I find it completely perplexing.

Truer words were never spoken

Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.

--Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Something for us all to remember on this day of reflection on the legacy of a great man taken from us too soon. We had made such tremendous progress a year ago, as I was in D.C. preparing to witness the inauguration of Barack Obama as the President of the United States. But the last year has been a difficult and painful one, and some of the underlying ugliness was revealed to have merely been covered over for awhile, rather than truly healed. Progress is always a struggle, and as Dr. King once said, "the solution to one problem brings us face to face with another problem." But still we have to keep fighting, pushing forward, working to leave the old bad ideas and their proponents behind us in the dust.

I will promise to keep working for change if you will.

Why I Support Martha Coakley

From 1997-2005, I lived in Boston and slowly learned the ways of the strange political world that is Massachusetts. It is unlike anything we have seen down here in Georgia or anything I had seen growing up in Florida. The state is known for being intensely Democratic, and yet they had 16 years of Republican governors. Granted, many of these "Republican" governors would be considered too liberal to be elected in the South, but they still managed to defeat some Democratic stalwarts to win their seats. Meanwhile, the entire state Congressional delegation was Democratic, and there was little movement into or out of that delegation. Congressional seats were almost never seriously contested, and when they were it was generally in the primary. But still, Massachusetts was not a terribly liberal place. The bulk of the Democrats in the state were old line labor-driven Democrats, many Catholic and staunchly anti-abortion, very resistant to change. Ted Kennedy held his Senate seat for 4 decades not because people loved his views or his votes, but because he was Teddy Kennedy and it would be strange not to vote for him.

But now, Teddy is gone. And running to replace him Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley, who is in the throes of a potentially disastrous campaign in which she might actually lose the seat to a Republican state senator. I have watched and admired Martha Coakley for years, and always found her to be intelligent, reasonable, not prone to grandstanding or the easy political play. She made her name as the Middlesex County DA, prosecuting several high profile cases and using that to vault into the AG position. She has been considered by many to be "biding her time" in that seat while waiting for a higher office to open up (MA having a very strange seniority system where the powerbrokers decide who has earned the right to run for an open seat when the rare situation arises), and I predicted last July that she was itching to run for Teddy's seat. Of course, I was hoping Teddy would be able to serve out his term and retire, but within a few months of my post he was gone, and the battle for his seat began. Coakley emerged from the scrum as the anointed one, and nobody really paid any attention until the whole healthcare reform movement came down to having 60 safe votes for passage, and then suddenly Massachusetts had itself a horserace.

Coakley has run a bad campaign, and I'm certainly not excusing her failings as a campaigner. But she is squeaky clean as a politician and public servant, and has taken some very progressive and intellectually risky positions in her time as AG. For starters, she filed the lawsuit against the federal government that sought to overturn the Defense of Marriage Act, which she asserts violates traditional separation of powers between the federal government and the states by prohibiting MA residents in legal gay marriages from receiving federal marital benefits. That lawsuit could be the strongest gay rights challenge of the various legal maneuvers the gay rights folks are working through the courts right now, but it has gotten little attention in this election. It is perfectly emblematic of the sort of outside-the-box thinking Coakley has exhibited in her position as AG, and why the people of Massachusetts should support her now. There are many such reasons, but that is mine.

I trust and wholeheartedly endorse Martha Coakley for Senate and hope the good people of Massachusetts return to their senses and send her there.

NY, NY a wonderful town

I'm leaving tonight for three days in New York for a conference, and it couldn't come at a better time. Just yesterday I was lamenting on the phone to someone that I really didn't want to go, because I hate the networkingfest that these conferences inevitably turn into. We spend all day in presentations that we don't pay attention to, and then all night drinking and eating with potential clients. I come home more exhausted than when I left, with fewer billable hours and a few extra pounds.

BUT, since others have chosen today as a good day to blow up the Georgia GOP, and since I have serious reservations about the methodology being utilized, I'm quite happy to have an excuse to be off the grid until this mess blows over. Why do I have reservations, you ask? Because I have always been bothered by the media utilizing the reporting of rumors on blogs or the internet as sufficient basis to run with a story they otherwise couldn't run with because they lack sufficient independent verification and sourcing. No sooner did Erick Erickson put up his post telling all the tales that everyone wanted to hear about various Georgia Republican lawmakers, and he was saying on Twitter that a reporter told him that was giving the media the cover to run with the stories they'd been holding back. I'm willing to bet a shiny nickle those stories won't be about the underlying allegations themselves but will instead be couched in terms of "there are rumors on the internets that..." This sort of backdooring of otherwise unpublishable rumors without independent verification makes me sick. It's not even the story itself that bothers me, it's the way in which it is being brought to light suddenly now, after months of people holding back because nobody could nail down first-hand verification.

But, I have already lost the battle on that one, so I might as well head out of town for a few days to let the brouhaha blow over. Since my friend Samantha has brought me back burritos from Anna's Taqueria that I will get from her when I see her tonight, I can't complain too much. That is already guaranteed to make for a wonderful week. Maybe it will even snow a little, just so I can really get into the Christmas spirit. A girl can hope.

Dear Georgia Democrats,

You have just been handed a massive hammer. Use it.

If you cannot and do not capitalize on the coming Georgia Republican ethicinfidelapocalypse, then there is no hope for the state party. Three of the five Republicans who are or were running for Governor have somehow been swirled up in this mess of ethical breaches and banging of women other than their spouses. (The lone girl in the field will now benefit from the prevailing myth that women don't cheat on their spouses and can therefore be presumed above the fray and untainted.) Other powerful Republican members of the Legislature are in serious danger of being pulled into the drain swirl any minute now.

So, Georgia Democrats, you have 3 tasks:

1. Make sure every single member of the Democratic caucus is clean as a whistle on professional ethics and keeping it in your pants. NO SLIP UPS, and if they do happen, punish swiftly from within. Set the example.

2. Bang the drum of the dirty cadre of Republicans running this state constantly, loudly, and brutally, for the next year. I want to hear it in every debate, I want to see it in TV commercials and in the paper. I want you to force every candidate to take a stand on whether what these guys have done is wrong, and if they waffle then I want you to use that to make them look weak in the face of clear wrongdoing. You have been handed a massive gift--USE IT.

3. Remember, it's not the boinking of a woman other than their wives that is the problem, it's when that woman is a lobbyist pushing legislation at the same time. It's not the cheating on his wife, it's making criminal threats against her after she leaves him. It's not the blowjobs from women he isn't married to, it's the fact that they work for him and could constitute sexual harassment. FOCUS ON THE DIRTY PART, NOT THE SEXY PART. That is what ties it all together and makes it politically relevant, even if the other stuff is what makes people watch the TV and read the news. And one of the huge benefits of being out of power is that you have no real power to abuse--so emphasize that dramatic difference between Rs and Ds to your advantage.

I'm warning you guys now, if you don't come away with more seats in 2010 and at least one new statewide office, then you're more inept than I thought and I will not be giving the party another red cent of my money to waste wandering in the wilderness. Opportunities like this don't come along very often.

Get off your ass and VOTE, Atlanta

Tomorrow the City of Atlanta will hold runoff elections for the Mayor's race, City Council President, City Council Post 2 At Large, and City Council District 6. I won't be making new endorsements this time around because everyone I said I was voting for in the November 3rd general election either won outright or made the runoff, so my reasoning then still holds now.

Instead, I want to emphasize the importance of every single voter in the City of Atlanta turning out tomorrow to cast a ballot. First, let's dispel a few myths about runoff elections:

1. "It will take too long." Not so, since sadly turnout is projected to be in the ridiculously low category. In the general election, only 24% of Atlanta voters cast a ballot, and turnout for a runoff is usually below half the turnout for the general. It took me less than 5 minutes to vote on November 3rd, so really you should be able to carve out the 15 minutes it will take to find your precinct, cast a ballot, and head on to work in the morning or home after work at night. Don't be lazy!

2. "I can't vote in a runoff if I didn't vote in the general." I am not sure where this myth comes from, but it's completely not true. Nobody checks your name against voters who cast ballots on November 3rd. If you are a registered voter in the Atlanta city limits, you can vote in the runoff even if you've never cast a ballot in your life. Do NOT let anyone convince you that you have somehow waived your right to be heard.

3. "The candidate who got the most votes on election day always wins anyhow, so why bother." Oh how some candidates wish this were true! All you need to do is look at the 2008 Senate primary to see how false that is. Vernon Jones had a huge lead on the other candidates in the primary, but lost handily to Jim Martin in the runoff. In fact, runoff elections usually feature SUCH low turnout that it really is unpredictable as to who will win the race. One thing is for certain--your vote can absolutely make a difference. My City Council District, #6, was won in a runoff by just FIVE VOTES in 2005.

4. "My candidate lost the first time around, so why should I care." Most losing candidates in these crowded races have gone on to endorse someone who made it into the runoff, so why not see who they endorsed and decide if maybe they have a good reason to urge their supporters in that direction?

5. "It won't matter; this city will still be screwed up no matter who is elected." This may be true, but at least if you vote you won't feel like you squandered the opportunity to help stop it because you had a bunch of excuses and couldn't get your butt off the sofa. Besides, there are some important potential landmarks to be gained by tomorrow's races, depending on where you live--we could see the first gay man and Asian-American elected to city council, we could see the first black lesbian elected to Georgia state house. We could see Atlanta's mayorship held by a white woman for the first time in eons. It could be the first election where a major southern city's gay vote decided numerous elections. Tomorrow could be historic in so many ways--don't you want to be a part of it?

Now the details: polls are open from 7:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m tomorrow. Find your polling place here. Review a sample ballot here.

As I said above, just 24% of registered voters in City of Atlanta voted in the November 3rd general election. If we are lucky, just half of that will vote in this runoff. That means about one in eight of us will be deciding who will run this city at a crucial juncture in our governance. That, frankly, is just sad. I really hope everyone who reads this site who lives in the City of Atlanta will decide to be part of the electorate, rather than part of the problem.

OK, stepping off my soapbox now. Good luck to the candidates and the many people I know who are busting their asses to get good people elected. (You can sleep starting Wednesday!)

Serious Question of the Day

Remind me again why we continue to pretend Joe Lieberman is a Democrat?

Reminder: Virtual Candidate Forum Today

As I posted about on Friday, the Committee for a Better Atlanta's Virtual Candidate Forum is today from 4:30 to 7:00pm. Already, some great questions have been posted on CfaBA's website, and I am sure even better questions will be asked during the live forum itself.

Here is the schedule of candidate question sessions, if you want to ask questions or just see what each has to say:

4:30 pm Kasim Reed (Mayor)
4:45 pm Amir Faroki (City Council Post 2 At-Large)
5:00 pm Clair Muller(City Council President)
5:15 pm Ceasar Mitchell (City Council President)
5:30 pm Mary Norwood (Mayor)
5:45 pm Liz Coyle (City Council District 6)
6:00 pm Alex Wan (City Council District 6)
6:15 pm Aaron Watson (City Council Post 2 At-Large)

Depending on how much I get to participate and whether it ends up as interesting as I'm hoping for, I may have a summary up later tonight for those of you who can't make it.

Serious Question of the Day

Would Sarah Palin be such a political or cultural hot commodity today if she wasn't hot (i.e., more physically attractive than average)?

I consider her to be the Anna Kournikova of politics, and I find that to be a sad and potentially dangerous thing. But I want to know if my 12 readers agree, and if so what you think it says about our culture that a hefty chunk of our population has elevated a nincompoop to politically iconic status simply because she's hot.

Questions for the Candidates?

In what I can only assume was a complete and total mistake (calling me a "prominent blogger" makes me question your judgment!), the Committee for a Better Atlanta has invited me to participate in a Virtual Mayoral Forum next Tuesday from 4:30 to 7pm. The event will be hosted live on CBA’s online community at http://www.betteratlanta.org/. I have been asked to pass this information on to you, my 12 readers, so that you can submit questions for Norwood and Reed during the forum. If you aren't comfortable submitting your own questions and you want me to ask the candidates something, put it in the comments, or email me at sarawara@gmail.com if you are not comfortable posting your question for all to see.

In addition, you should tune in on Tuesday, since this really is a fairly cool concept and probably will be a little more interesting than the standard televised debates.

The Committee for a Better Atlanta will also be allowing us to pose questions to the City Council candidates in the various races that have gone to runoff--Clair Muller vs. Ceasar Mitchell for the Council President slot, Amir Farokhi vs. Aaron Watson for At Large Post 2, and Alex Wan vs. Liz Coyle for District 6. So please pass along questions for them, if you have them, as well.

If nothing else, it is nice that even local politics are embracing the power and opportunities of social media. I still am surprised I was included in this because I feel like a blogging peon, but want to give everyone the opportunity to participate. So have at it!

On Advocacy

It is very easy for people to make fun of, look down upon, and pass judgment upon lawyers. As I have often said to friends, lawyers have the reputational issue they do because generally people only need one of us at the worst points in life: you have been injured, you have been accused of a crime, you have been sued, you are getting a divorce, you need to declare bankruptcy, or someone has died. As a result, it often feels to people who suddenly need to interact with lawyers that we are profiting from your misfortune, because we get paid for the work we do on some of the worst days of your life.

But on the worst days of your life, when your property, your liberty, or your rights are at risk, I assure you that you will want the most vigorous advocate you can find. You will want the person who will leave no stone unturned in trying to find the evidence of your innocence or the police misconduct that will keep you out of jail. You will want the person who persuades the judge not to give your ex sole custody of your children. You will want the person who makes sure your company is not run out of business by a massive punitive damages award simply because you made a great product that was involved in an isolated and unforeseeable injury. You will want the strongest advocate you can find and afford, and you will want that person to agree to represent you even if you are not 100% pure. Because frankly, nobody is.

When we sign up to go to law school, we know we will someday take an oath to vigorously advocate on behalf of our clients. We will agree to keep their secrets in virtually all circumstances (except when telling them can prevent death or serious injury to someone else). We will agree to take on representation we may later be ethically prohibited from withdrawing from even if we never get paid. We will agree to take positions that we may not personally agree with, because they are the best position for our client. And we will agree to put our own self-interest behind the interests of our clients virtually all the time. This is part and parcel of becoming a lawyer.

We agree to all of these things because we believe that vigorous advocacy is a necessary part of our criminal and civil justice system, which for all of its faults is the best one in the world. We recognize that we hold tremendous responsibility within that system as "officers of the court" to bring injustice to light, to prevent the entry of falsehood into the record whenever we can, and to ensure that every litigant's rights are protected whenever possible. Thought it is fashionable to assume we walk into court and lie every day, throw out the bad documents if we don't feel like turning them over to the other side, and train our witnesses how to wriggle out of responsibility for their actions, the truth down in the trenches is not even remotely close to this. In 9 years of practice, I can count on one hand, not using all of the fingers even, the number of lawyers I have worked with or battled against who I truly felt pushed the bounds of legal ethics. These people are usually treated as pariahs by the rest of us who are, by and large, passionate about upholding what we have sworn to do.

Some people can't fathom the commitments our profession requires, and for those people it is easy to announce moral absolutes about how they would rather get fired than represent this type of criminal defendant or that corporate behemoth with sketchy accusations against them. Perhaps they are incapable of compartmentalizing, and cannot understand that preventing police and prosecutorial excess is important even when doing so in defense of someone who committed armed robbery or rape. Perhaps they are incapable of anything but strict adherence to a particular ideology, and prefer not to examine it too closely to see if it should be revised from time to time. Whatever the reason, for people who recognize their own unsuitability for this profession to criticize the way in which others have performed it is ludicrous.

Kasim Reed defended large corporations accused of discrimination and other violations of employees' statutory rights. Not every case in which discrimination is alleged is meritorious, and not every corporate defendant accused of discrimination is branded an evildoer for all time.

Some plaintiffs' employment cases are bogus, and those should be weeded out and dismissed so that the meritorious cases can be resolved faster and more amicably. If a county has 20 rape allegations in one month and half of them are proven to be false accusations, then it makes it harder for the other 10 to obtain justice. The same is true with frivolous plaintiffs' litigation--it makes it harder for the meritorious cases to obtain justice more quickly.

In addition, corporations are not immutable objects incapable of change. A person may be a rapist for all time if convicted of (and actually guilty of rape.) But corporations are different--boards fire CEOs and hire new ones, company policies change, and the corporation that paid women less than men in 1979 shouldn't have that hanging over their heads thirty years later if it's no longer the case. To take Reed to task for representing Cracker Barrel in 1999 based upon cases that occurred years earlier completely ignores the potential for change within an organization. Perhaps this is by design--all large corporations are inherently evil, to some. But once we get to that point, we're demanding the sort of ideological purity that will disqualify virtually every candidate.

But even if I were retained to represent Cracker Barrel in a race discrimination case today--why shouldn't I? I am not going to lie, cheat or steal to win the case, I am only going to use the facts and evidence, legal defenses and procedural maneuvers legitimately available to me. If the company has really engaged in systemic discrimination, then that should usually result in either a verdict at trial or a settlement in the event the company's lawyers decide a trial win is unlikely. This is exactly how the free market is supposed to work--if someone is indefensibly injured or damaged by a corporation, the corporation pays. And if I am able to obtain dismissal of the case or keep the verdict/settlement low, then the case probably wasn't as meritorious is plaintiffs first believed.

What bothers me most about Cardinale's position is that he presumes all of the defendants Reed represented had violated the rights of employees, and that Reed was therefore working against workers' rights by advocating on behalf of those companies. Again, should we presume that simply because corporations are always evil and hurting people however they can? Do we really believe that? I have worked on hundreds of cases at this point in my career, and I have seen very few true slam dunks of liability. I have seen many, many cases that fall in the grey areas, and many cases that are obviously frivolous. To completely ignore the possibility that some of these companies were not liable for discrimination or statutory violations, and simply assume Reed was defending bad companies, is simplistic and unsupported by the evidence.

I've glossed over many of the points I wanted to make but struggled with, because they are difficult to wrestle with in one post. For example, the notion that a junior or midlevel associate in a large law firm gets to pick and choose what clients he wants to do work for is, frankly, ludicrous. Even now with 9 years of experience and some decent seniority, if I said "no, I can't represent Cracker Barrel because I disagree with things they've done in the past," I would expect it to potentially get me fired, and certainly lead to negative comments in performance reviews, etc. Earlier this year an associate at the law firm of Quinn Emmanuel was fired just a few days after sending an email in which he questioned whether the firm should be defending the Washington Redskins against constitutional claims brought by Native Americans. Law firms do not provide the freedom to pick and choose your clients as an associate, and I would never presume to demand that anyone to turn down an assignment when it could get them fired (and potentially blackballed within their industry to boot.)

Every single candidate for political office who is an attorney has probably represented an individual or entity who was guilty or liable of something bad. If we are going to start holding candidates to the standard that they can't have represented any client who ever committed a bad act, then we might as well just disqualify all lawyers from political office. Considering that our President, Vice President, Secretary of State, and more than half of Congress are lawyers...have fun picking from what's leftover after the disqualifications are complete.

I am not the slightest bit ashamed of my profession, or of having represented corporations accused of injuring people. They deserved a strong defense, and I provided it. I will not apologize for that simply because some people are incapable of understanding that I am fulfilling a necessary role in our justice system. Kasim Reed should not have to apologize for it either.

Let a Lawyer Show You How It's Done

(This post will be a refutation of the factual assertions made by Atlanta Progressive News in two articles about Kasim Reed's representation of corporate interests in employment litigation. The background stories are here and here. I have pulled up the very same PACER dockets from which these stories were allegedly researched, except I bothered to actually read them all the way through and understand what they mean. In a separate post, I will share my strong feelings as to why it is complete garbage to make a political issue out of who a lawyer has represented.)

Dear Atlanta Progressive "News," if you weren't such lazy, biased f*cking douchebags, this is what you would have reported about Kasim Reed's representation of various corporations in employment litigation:

Kasim Reed's background

Reed was admitted to the bar in 1995. He initially joined the Atlanta law firm of Paul Hastings Janofsky & Walker, where he was an associate in their employment litigation department. In that role, he represented a variety of corporations in cases brought against them alleging various types of employment discrimination, unfair employment practices, and the usual sorts of claims that employment litigators are called upon to defend. After a few years at Paul Hastings, Reed left for Holland & Knight, where he continued to practice employment litigation. It is not clear if he is still a current H&K employee, or if he is either on leave of absence or has left the firm to concentrate on his mayoral race. My guess is that he will have left H&K for good if he is elected.

First, APN tried to make an issue out of Reed's biography no longer appearing on the H&K website:

According to a 2006 article from the Black Commentator, the job description for Mr. Reed published on Holland & Knight's website read: "M. Kasim Reed represents employers in employment law matters, including sex, age and disability discrimination, civil rights litigation, and contract-related disputes… He has extensive experience representing employers before various state and federal courts, as well as before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and other federal and state administrative agencies."

Incidentally, since that time all references for Reed have been apparently removed from Holland & Knight's website, which is unusual, especially when a firm should be proud to have a former employee running for Mayor of Atlanta.

It is not rare at all for law firms to remove the biographies of attorneys from their websites. It happens whenever an attorney leaves a firm. It happens if an attorney goes on leave. In fact, contrary to APN's assumption that H&K would want the good press of a former attorney made good on their site, I have never heard of a big firm keeping a biography of an attorney who has left the firm on their website. This argument by APN is just stupid.

Reed's Representation of Cracker Barrel

APN then attempts to stir up a storm of controversy over Reed's representation of the Cracker Barrel restaurant chain in employment litigation. As many people know, Cracker Barrel was sued for discrimination in a variety of contexts and venues over the last few decades, and did not have the greatest run of PR during that time period. APN dedicated almost an entire article to community activists and well known (and paid) Norwood supporters acting shocked that Reed would dare represent Cracker Barrel when everyone knows they're racist bad guys. And APN is correct that Reed is listed as an attorney for Cracker Barrel in the Serena McDermott case, filed in 1999. But here's the rest of the story, as deduced from the very same PACER federal court docket information that APN claims to have reviewed:

Reed was counsel of record from 1999-2001 for Cracker Barrel, in Fair Labor Standards Act case brought by a class of employees. Though the case was brought by the NAACP, and though Cracker Barrel has been sued before for discrimination, the Fair Labor Standards Act is not a race discrimination statute. The lawsuit in question sought payment of unpaid and overtime wages, based upon allegations that the employees were made to work "off the clock," putting in more hours than they actually were compensated for and accruing time that was not compensated as overtime.

In other words, Reed did not defend Cracker Barrel in any sort of race discrimination case, or ANY type of discrimination case for that matter. Shame on APN for suggesting otherwise by quoting various individuals in their article to talk about past allegations against Cracker Barrel, without making the distinction between those cases and the one case Reed worked on.

In addition, Reed worked on the McDermott case from 1999-2001. The case continued until 2005, but PACER shows he was terminated from the case on 10/16/01. He was also one of twelve different attorneys who appeared on behalf of Cracker Barrel in the litigation, according to PACER. He was a 5th-7th year associate at the time of his involvement in this case, so it is not fair to suggest that he was lead counsel or necessarily even had a significant role in crafting the defense of Cracker Barrel to this major class action litigation. Attorneys can be added to the docket of a case whenever they appear for purposes of signing a few pleadings, appearing at a deposition or hearing, or to take over temporary responsibility for another attorney. Chances are good in a case of this magnitude that many firm associates were called upon to work on the case at various times, and Reed's role may have been very small. Neither of the two articles contain any followup research by APN to review the actual pleadings in the case to attempt to deduce if Reed was signing pleadings, if he was appearing at hearings or conferences, or if he had any significant involvement in the litigation. (I have not done that yet myself, but may do so if people continue to try and insist that he was lead counsel on this case and that it somehow should matter to his mayoral chances.)

APN also apparently did not contact the Reed campaign and give them a chance to respond to the allegations that Reed defended Cracker Barrel in cases brought by aggrieved workers. (There is no reference in either of the two articles about the Cracker Barrel case that APN sought comment from Reed or his campaign.) Presumably, Reed's campaign would have provided this sort of clarification of the actual scope of his role, however vast or limited, and it would have provided the article with proper context. But proper context does not appear to be what APN was after.

Kasim Reed's Other Employment Litigation Matters

Apart from the Cracker Barrel case, APN also reported about four other employment litigation cases in which Reed was counsel of record. I've checked those dockets as well. In the case in which he represented ATC Healthcare, Reed was counsel for the defendant from 2/13/97 until the case was terimnated in 9/16/98. In the case against The Hayman Company, Reed was counsel for the defendant from 12/11/96 until the case was terminated on 5/27/97. In the case against Parsons Brinckerhoff, Reed was counsel for the defendant from 2/14/96 until the case was terminated on 3/31/98. In each of these cases, the defendants were represented by additional counsel beyond Reed, and he was only a junior or midlevel associate at the time. He was almost certainly assigned to these cases and working under the direction of a partner who actually made the strategic decisions for the direction of the case.

To act like Reed was calling the shots and standing up to defend these companies in these cases when he was probably just a BigLaw minion is either disingenous, or demonstrates complete lack of understanding for life as a BigLaw employee. Since I am a BigLaw employee, in my next post I will explain exactly why it is ridiculous for APN to expect Reed or any other law firm attorney to refuse representation of companies that have been accused of race discrimination or other bad things, and why it is even more ridiculous to hold those past representations while a BigLaw associate against Reed the mayoral candidate today.

Absolutely

Stefan at Blog for Democracy gets it exactly right in his open letter to Kasim Reed, who I support in the Atlanta mayor's race. While I want Reed to win, Stefan is 100% correct that HOW you win elections is very nearly as important as WHETHER you win elections, at least for those of us who have to live in this city after a mayor is chosen. I want Reed to win (or rather, unfortunately, I don't want Mary Norwood to be my next mayor), but I don't want him to do it in a way that further polarizes city residents or reinforces the rest of the state's views of what's wrong with Atlanta.

I'm glad someone finally articulated the importance of how the next few weeks go down, because it definitely does matter and the stakes are huge.

Election Day

I've agonized over whether to do an endorsements post for the city elections that are happening today, because I'm concerned I will not be able to provide good strong reasons for my votes. So instead, I will just tell you who I am voting for and let you sort out whether it makes any sense or not.

Atlanta Mayor: Kasim Reed
Oh how I have struggled over this vote. I do not particularly like any of the candidates, but Reed made me cringe the least. Then Shirley Franklin gave him her quasi-endorsement yesterday, which I had feared for months. In the end, I'm going to hold my nose and vote for Reed anyhow.

City Council President: Clair Muller
When I don't really know anything about the candidates, I vote for the girl.

City Council At Large Post 1: Michael Julian Bond
Because some of my politically astute friends said so.

City Council At Large Post 2: Amir Farokhi
Because we need to build a bench of young charismatic progressives in this state.

City Council At Large Post 3: Lamar Willis
This is a hold my nose vote, since Willis has had some ethical issues but from all accounts his opponent is not a better option.

City Council District 6: Alex Wan
I've met him, and he was impressive while the other candidates are all either really unpalatable or completely unprepared for real political office, judging by their increasingly bizarre mailers and astroturf wars in the Creative Loafing blog comments. This race is guaranteed to head to runoff, so I just hope this is one of the two lucky campaigns that get to fight it out for another month so we can watch the antics continue. (In the interest of full disclosure, I also know his campaign manager.)

For all of the Board of Education races,I'll be voting for the incumbent since I have no children in school and therefore no reason to believe that Fulton county schools are being run poorly. I have met Charlie Stadtlander, who is running for one of those seats, but I recently heard he's a Republican so that pretty much nixed any desire I had to deviate from my incumbency votes.

So there you have it. I'll be heading to Inman Middle School this morning, where I expect turnout will be ridiculously light. That's sad, because this is an important election for the City of Atlanta and will impact all of us more than we may realize.