24 Hours with Barack Obama (and Joe Biden!), Part II

(All times local and approximate)

9:30 AM: Drive out to the "South Fairfax" (i.e. not-Old Town part of Alexandria) Obama HQs with Jill to do some morning canvassing prior to going to the Obama/Biden rally in Fredericksburg, about 45 miles from the Beltway.  We made it through our walk list in what must have been record time--hey, we had to beat the weather and the crowds! Good feedback from the contacts we had-- 6 1s (strong Obama), 2 2s (lean Obama), 8 3s (undecided), 1 4 (lean McCain), and 1 5 (strong McCain).  Those are very promising numbers, and with the economy on several of the undecideds' minds, hopefully there will be a +.500 break for Obama for the undecideds.  

1:50 PM Find the end of the line outside the walls of the University of Mary Washington.  After threatening clouds in the morning, the sun has become unseasonably hot.  Just the sun, mind you: when the clouds roll in, it's perfectly pleasant, but the sun is bearing down something fierce.  The entrepreneurial men selling "rally towels" are looking better and better.

2:45 PM: Obama/event volunteers start passing out the free "tickets" for admission.  In a few minutes, they'll reveal that they're only valid if you fill out the request for information on them.  Very, very smart on their part (even if I've given my email about 6 times by now).  Volunteers are also going up and down the line registering voters--also very, very smart.

3:30 PM: The line starts its halting procession inside the gates, then through the UMW campus to the event site.  Inexplicably, nobody is selling water until we get well inside the campus.  Predictably, that person is making money hand over fist.

4:15 PM: Jill and I settle into our spots, to the right of the stage looking out on the crowd, about 150 feet away.  We've got an hour until the program is scheduled to start, but the soundtrack is keeping us going: Natasha Beddingfield, Mary J. Blige, some Motown, and one country song (hey, this is Virginia, after all).

5:15 PM:  I kid you not, as soon as the "scheduled program" is supposed to start, the skies open up.  Despite the deluge that we're stuck in (and, naturally, I left my rain jacket in the car...), nobody is leaving.  Literally nobody.  We wouldn't mind someone coming over the loudspeaker to let us know what's going on, but mostly I'm too busy wringing out my shirt.

6:15 PM: Right when we're getting antsy, 4 people walk on stage.  No, not the Obamas and the Bidens (sadly).  A preacher led us in a spirited prayer that included a call for the rain to stop, then a local state senator led us in the Pledge.  Somehow, the rain let up, leading us to wonder what took the preacher so long to show up.

6:30 PM: An Obama staffer continued the full-court press on snagging information, having the crowd text 22262 (OBAMA) to sign up to volunteer.  Incredibly savvy move--most people will never give up their cell phone # if they don't have to, but between this move at 10,000+ rallies across the country and the VP announcement ramp-up, they've managed to get a direct line to God knows how many potential volunteers.

7:05 PM: The soundtrack's been looping for a while... crowd is getting antsy again... clouds are gathering again... when a voice comes over the speakers: "LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, THE NEXT PRESIDENT AND VICE-PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES, BARACK OBAMA AND JOE BIDEN!"

After coming on to the stage to Bruce Springsteen, Joe Biden led off, with Barack on a stool next to him.  We were talking on Friday (I think) about how Joe Biden would be, in any other context, almost too phony to take--from the blazers to the tall tales to the slicked-backed hair, he looks, and sounds, like some sort of politician from Central Casting.  But somehow, it works.  It's authentic, too, somehow.  And it works even better because, somehow, he has the endorsement and backing of the man that he called "clean" and "articulate," so he must be okay, right? 

So when he's saying "ladies and gentlemen" for the 10th time in 5 minutes or "literally" for the 4th time in 2 paragraphs or when he's fumbling a line, it's endearing, not annoying.  It's especially endearing in person, because, at this point, he's realized that he's made it, and he couldn't be happier.  He thrives on the crowd, and the crowd looks past his support of the bankruptcy bill and his pandering and his vote on the Iraq war and cheers him on.

7:30 PM: Barack Obama did too, when he got up to the podium, but not before the crowd goes absolutely crazy for him.  I mean nuts.  Joe Biden cut oddly from a line on the middle class to introducing Obama, and while I can't imagine it was planned that way, it jolted the crowd into wild cheers.

Anyway, back to the Obama/Biden interplay.  After thanking the crowd and the introductory speakers, he thanked Joe Biden, and people started cheering.  Barack then joined in, mic'ed up, with a "Joe, Joe, Joe," chant and fist pump.  It's almost as if Obama were enjoying the Biden effect in spite of himself, too.  And that was only the first time--but the second one would come after the rain.

Here's the video from the Fredericksburg event on 9/27/08.  About 10 minutes into Barack's speech, it started to come down, and a murmur rose up.  Not again, we thought! Barack made a bit of a joke about it, saying it was just "trickling down" (zing), but in a few minutes, the heavens were opening a bit more solidly.  Watch the video to see how he handles it--he managed to hold a crowd, already once-soaked, in an open field, and bring them through a gripping stump speech.

Humor helped.  He took off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves, and Biden (now on the stool) offered him a hat.  "I don't need a hat," he said, continuing on, but--and with great timing-- he goes "but you've got a great head of hair, Joe, you might want it."   Biden, the consummate ham, puts on the hat, and Obama just sort of chuckles, "Somebody gave Joe Biden a hat."  What with the rain, the huge crowd, and the lighting, the event was already surreal, but that understatement, plus Biden putting one foot on the stool, looking like some sort of sailboat captain, added a level of absurdity.

Again, watch the video to get a sense of the rally.  I have obviously read his speeches before, but to be there was something else.  I kept thinking of The West Wing, when Leo tells Bartlet, "You're going to open your mouth and lift houses off the ground.  Whole houses, right off the game."  Well, that's what Obama did on Saturday.

8:00 PM  Winding our way through the UMW campus, we make it up near the road across from the parking lot where the car is, when we hear the sirens of the motorcade.  We sprint up to the sidewalk and see the motorcycles, Suburbans, and press buses.  Just when we think that all of the windows are going to be too tinted to see anyone, along comes one window rolled down... and it's Joe Biden, with the hat still on!  Joe Biden waved at us!

Needless to say, I'll be cheering on Joe Biden extra loudly on Thursday.  Then again, he might not need to say anything to win, but either way, the ol' back-slapper just won over two voters.  Not that the ticket needed to swing us.

9 PM  Finally out of the crawl to get out of Fredericksburg--26,000 people trying to leave a town of roughly 20,000.  Quite a 24 hour period.

24 Hours with Barack Obama (and Joe Biden!), Part I

No, I don't get stuck in a cornfield, but there is torrential rain and a motorcade.

Friday Night, 9 pm:

After some fun car issues in DC, Jill, Ted, Caitlin and I gather in Baltimore to watch the debate on CNN.  My take on the debates, from an earlier description of them:

What was noticeable about CNN's coverage was the instant dials they had w/a focus group of Ds, Rs, and Is.  At the bottom of the screen the lines went up and down with the voters' interest in what they were saying.  I first I thought I was going to hate it, but then I felt like I was Josh from West Wing, so it was cool.  To generalize what we were watching (and we were all watching the graph as much as the responses, so Ted I think can back me up): McCain's remarks, on the whole, saw higher R popularity, but then a sizeable gap between Rs and Ds and Is--very divisive.  Obama's remarks were more popular across the board; rarely did he polarize the Rs as much, and he was much more popular with Is (and Ds, obviously).  McCain bounced up and down the spectrum, getting lower than Obama ever did, while Obama was both consistently higher and had some of the highest testing moments of the night.  Just watching that line, it would seem that Obama elicited more positive responses from the audience.

Interestingly, at least once or twice, Obama's numbers would drop off from peaks or high plateaus with Is when he would attack McCain's record rather than speak of what we need to do positively.  From what CNN's massively unscientific (I'm sure) focus group showed, the "I agree w/John" didn't hurt him that much in the instant dials, while drawing contrasts--the first step of getting angry--did not play as well. I think the "I agree with..." gambit also works in neutralizing McCain's spin.  Afterward, one of McCain's flacks was saying that Obama was "out of the mainstream," but also saying that he agreed 8 times with McCain.  Oh, kay.  So either they're both out of the mainstream, or you're just lying about that.  But I suppose normal rules of logic don't apply to the McCain campaign.

Thought

If the White Sox play the Cubs in the World Series, will John McCain's campaign claim that MLB is 150% in the tank for Barack Obama?

Playoff Baseball

As much as I love Opening Day and think it should be a national holiday (we need more national holidays), and as much as Opening Day is usually the best day of the year for a fan of a team like the Orioles, as a baseball--and sports--fan, the playoffs are my favorite time.  Game times that battle the fading sunlight and growing shadows of the late afternoon, fans that get no quieter than a steady buzz and roar with a haunting intensity, everyone--not just pitchers--wearing long sleeves: it's hard to beat.  

In basketball and hockey, I would say that the intensity of the game picks up, which then fires up the crowds.  Given the large percentages of teams who make the playoffs in the NBA and the NHL, it makes sense that there's an urgency gap between regular season play and post-season play. In baseball, however, with only 4 spots per league (and yes, I do faintly remember when it was just 2 spots per league) in the playoffs, there is less of a jump-up in intensity in the playoffs.  Rather, it's the fans, understanding the stakes, feeling the cold, cheering in the hopes of perhaps holding on to the last traces of summer, who up their intensity.

Back!

Sorry for the long weekend off, everyone.  A lot transpired (including 24 hours of Obama), and then the week started up again, so I've been reading away.

Posts will start up again shortly, after I get back from the gym.

Woo!

First Safeway, now Busboys and Poets is open around the corner, too.  Sweet.

I leave for 3 hours...

Seriously.  I spend the bulk of my day at my desk and/or in front of a computer or television, doing homework, reading, and keeping news pages in the background.   This afternoon, I went over to 14th and R to help with a voter registration drive from 3 to about 6.  I get back, and I find out there's only one major candidate actively campaigning for president.  Apparently, the fundamentals aren't quite as strong as he thought.

Down is the New Up

Headline on Washington Post right now:  "Markets Up at Midday."

Dow Jones Industrial Average right now: down 102.90 for the day.

Chris Rock!

Missed this on Letterman last night.  Chris Rock, following Bill Clinton's lackluster endorsement of Obama, puts #42 on blast.  Clean, too, although Mike Vick does come up.

H/T Andrew Sullivan

Shoe Leather

(Adapted from an email I sent out to some friends earlier today.  It's a little long, but if it can get anyone reading out there to give just an hour a week or an extra $5 to the campaign, it's worth it.)

I have been trying to carve out time to give what I can to the Obama campaign.  The past two Saturdays, I have gone across the Potomac to Northern Virginia to canvass, with the occasional phone bank during the week.  With any luck, I'll be able to make it out most Saturdays before the election, and opt out of class on Election Day to help out however is necessary.  

It's not glamorous. Two Saturdays ago, it was pushing 90 degrees, and from the looks of it, you would've thought that I had just finished a 10K, not a walk list. There's no promise that, if I knock on 500 doors before the election, that I'll be the deputy communications director in the Obama White House (and that would be an ill-conceived promise for many reasons). But that's not the goal--the goal is that there will be an Obama White House.  And it is very rewarding to talk to other people about the election, to help register new voters, and to get people who have never volunteered before to give of their time. While I'm sure that the campaign organizers that I know have had their fill, for me, it's also a very welcome and enjoyable break from staring at a textbook or computer screen.  

It's always a tricky line for me on when, and how, to approach someone to talk about the campaign.  When I'm knocking on strangers' doors, as soon as they say, "Nope," I say "thank you" and leave.  Obviously, that gets more complex when it's someone I know, and with whom I feel that I have a strong enough relationship to have an extended conversation about politics/the election.  From what I have been told and from what I have seen myself, the most effective way to communicate who/what I support in conversation isn't to tell him or her that he/she must vote Democratic (even though he or she must, ultimately), or shouldn't vote for McCain (even though he or she shouldn't), etc.  Rather, I think what's best is explaining why I, personally, support Obama, or support/oppose a specific policy.  If he/she asks me follow-up questions based on that, I answer as best I can.  If asked, my answers blend the facts (say, Barack Obama supports expanding health care) with my own values (I want more people to have health insurance, health care is important to me).  

I imagine most people approach their own decisions in a similar manner.  The next step, as it relates to this or any other campaign, is to share those reasons with friends, acquaintances, and neighbors alike in the upcoming weeks before Nov. 4.  Especially with the internet, this can be done from anywhere, with minimal effort.  Talk to your friends, and bring them along.  Jill and I were talking as we were out in Alexandria last Saturday, and it really is a great way to build a team, and more broadly, to build a community: the common experience, the physical activity, the socially-oriented goals.  Community organizing and activism may be the new punching bag of the Republican Party, but, to paraphrase Margaret Mead, a group of committed individuals, working on a common goal, is the only thing that has brought about change.

Steagles

Writing about the Steelers and the Eagles, I was reminded of this great bit of trivia:

The "Steagles" is the popular nickname for the team created by the temporary merger of two National Football League (NFL) teams, the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Philadelphia Eagles, during the 1943 season. The teams were forced to merge because both had lost many players to military service due to World War II.

D-Fence

Where has the defense gone in the NFL?* Using no statistics and only my limited observations, I feel like every other game is some sort of 41-35 shootout.  This could be the byproduct of rooting for the Broncos, whose defense appears to be holding out for better contracts this season.

*Yesterday's 15-6 war of attrition between the Eagles and the Steelers notwithstanding.

Field of Dreams Live

So far during the "Yankee Stadium finale" broadcast that ESPN is pulling together for the Orioles-Yankees game, there has been a discussion between Joe Morgan and Joe Girardi on the difficulty of retiring from baseball and leaving the game you have played since age 5, an excellent Peter Gammons interview with an ex-Negro League player who hit a home run off of Satchel Paige in Yankee Stadium in the year 1940, a broadcast booth discussion with Whitey Ford and Yogi Berra, and the requisite Frank Sinatra tunes taking us in and out of commercial breaks.  The only thing that's missing is a James Earl Jones voiceover about the centrality of baseball to American life and fathers and sons playing catch in the outfield as they turn off the lights.  If Lifetime is "television for women," then this game is "television for men."  

As for "The Stadium" itself closing, well, it didn't have to close, but it sure as heck needed to clean up its insides.  Like most old ballparks, the bowels of the stadium were pretty run down, and not in a charming way.  The concession offerings (at least in the outfield) were mediocre, and--according to those who knew it back then--it lost a lot of its charm following the renovations in the 1970s.  Still, it's a nostalgic night for baseball fans of any rooting persuasion.  There's a lot of history (baseball and non-baseball) that went down in Yankee Stadium, and now that the Boston Red Sox have displaced the Yankees as the Evil Empire of Annoying Fans, I don't have the same visceral disgust for the pinstripes. Until they win their next World Series, that is.   

Over/under on the next Orioles World Series appearance: 7 years.

Prof. Obama

Maybe he can moonlight when he's President and teach at the Law Center.  This is one of many stories on Obama the Law Professor, but it's a great read.  

Footnote of the Moment

"Mandatory training seminars are conducted at Burger King University in Miami and at Whopper College Regional Training Centers around the country."

Burger King Corp. v. Rudzewicz, 471 U.S. 462, 105 S. Ct. 2174, 85 L. Ed. 2d 528 (1985)

Foodstuff of the week: Applewood-smoked bacon

Over the summer, Dad and I got really into applewood-smoked bacon from the butcher's counter at Hannaford (I'd say that Mom got into it, too, but I don't think she's into any kind of bacon).  It's got a great natural flavor and scent from the smoking process, and it tends to cook more evenly with slightly lower fat than the vacuum-packed stuff in the deli cooler-- for those of us who prefer our bacon to be neither charred nor greasy, this is a find.  

Naturally, when the new Safeway opened up on 5th and L NW last Friday and they sent me a coupon for $2 off a purchase of $10 at the butcher's counter, I had to check to see if they had applewood-smoked bacon.  They did.  Needless to say, I'm liking this new Safeway. I felt slightly self-conscious buying roughly 2 lbs. of bacon, but I figured, what the heck--I'll freeze half of it for next week, and use the rest this week.  

Of course, due to some sort of weighing error, after they took the bacon off the scale, the total cost went from $10.03 to $9.88, nullifying the discount I was trying to use.   But it was worth paying full price: there definitely is a difference in taste and texture that makes it a lot more versatile.  

Bacon was featured in the following menu items this past fortnight (some instructions provided, but there's not a lot to some of these dishes):

• Breakfast tacos w/scrambled eggs, cheddar cheese, and corn tortillas (I suggest using flour, but I picked up corn--oh well).
• "Chicken à la king" (or something like it, at least).  First, dice bacon into small pieces (I believe the French call them "lardons," but I call them freedom slices) and sauté over medium-high heat to desired doneness.  Remove from pan and drain the bacon, and drain most of the grease from the pan, reserving some (or a lot, depending on how much fat you want in the dish).  Then, sauté diced chicken thighs (chicken breast or tenderloin is fine, really whatever you have), seasoned with salt and pepper, in the same pan at medium-high heat.  As soon as the chicken is cooked, add one can of cream of mushroom soup to the pan and 4 0z. (half a can) of milk.  Stir to incorporate chicken and heat until bubbling (a good time to add drained peas or carrots, if desired/available).  Right before serving, add the bacon back to the pan and incorporate.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.  Serve over toasted English muffin, waffle, toast, or starch of your choice (this would be great over mashed potatoes, rice, etc.).  
• Potato and bacon hash was also attempted, but this item needs some perfecting before I encourage anyone to make it.  It was still tasty, albeit a bit too greasy.
• French toast, topped with Nutella and strawberry preserves.

Time Magazine!

Wow.  Time Magazine (or, in this case, Time's political blog, Swampland) keeps the heat on the racist undertones that John McCain continues to bring into the presidential campaign.  Given that Obama will be accused of playing "the race card" ("playing the race card" is the new "racist") if his campaign even suggests that this ad is doing the work that it doing, it's good to see that the media, at least in one small corner of the internet, is doing its job proactively.

 

Freedom's Plow

"Freedom's Plow"

-Langston Hughes

Great poem.  I stumbled across it about a week ago in my (highly) edited Hughes collection, and if it didn't violate fair use standards, I'd post it all here--it's really speaking to me.  Here's a particularly apt quote for contemporary times:  

Thus the dream became not one man's dream alone,

But a community dream.

Not my dream alone, but our dream.

Not my world alone,

But your world and my world,

Belong to all the hands who build.

47 days to go.  

Muhammad Ali: A Holmesian Bad Man

We're in the midst of discussing legal realism in Section 3, so Oliver Wendell Holmes has been coming up a lot.  Here's a slightly edited version of a post that I wrote for a discussion board of my Legal Justice Seminar linking Ali with Holmes's ideas, among other things.

***

Every time I read the term “bad man,” my thoughts turn to Muhammad Ali (then Cassius Clay) declaring himself a “bad man” after defeating Sonny Liston in their 1964 fight.  In the past, I have agreed with Ali’s self-characterization when considering his career and history: “bad” as a slang term for “incredibly talented,” “bad” as a moral descriptor for the intensely personal and hurtful trash talk he directed at his opponents, “bad” in the context in which he used the term in 1964.  However, it took until today, after having read Holmes’s “The Path of the Law” and having reflected further, that I can now view Ali as a “bad man” in the Holmesian sense.

 

“What does (legal duty) mean to a bad man?” Holmes asks.  “Mainly, and in the first place, a prophecy that if he does certain things he will be subjected to disagreeable consequences by way of imprisonment or compulsory payment of money” (62). To borrow from Legal Practice, the elements of Holmes’ primary definition of the bad man are present in Ali’s refusal to enter the military during the war in Vietnam.  By refusing to report after being drafted (doing a certain thing), Ali was subjected to disagreeable consequences by way of a five-year prison sentence, the revocation of his boxing licenses, and the deprivation of his primary source of income (a tax, of sorts).  Yet from Ali’s point of view, theses were merely the legal consequences of fulfilling his moral duty to resist joining the Army; through his story emerges a clear example of the challenges of separating legal and moral duties (62).

 

 

Now, I do not wish to credit Holmes with the prophetic powers required to create a generic foil for his lecture around the emergence, in 60 years time, of a boxer from Louisville, KY who resisted military service, but like Prof. Luban, I noted with interest Holmes’s prediction regarding the future importance of statistics and economics to the study and application of the law (67).  Indeed, reading this intimation about the importance of statistics brings his fact-oriented dissent in Lochner into greater context; he seems to have a proclivity for a statistical approach to deciding cases. 

 

Focusing on the “statistical” element of this claim, the intellectual context in which Holmes is writing—the era of pragmatism—makes this line of thought even clearer.  As described in Louis Menand’s The Metaphysical Club, the late 19^th and early 20^th century gave rise not only to the Progressive Era of politics, whose ends the Realists aim to further through their critique of classical legal thought, but also philosophical pragmatists such as Holmes and William James.  I’d have to re-read the chapters on Holmes to check to see what direct connection there was between Legal Realists and pragmatists, but it stands to reason that there would be a theoretical kinship of sorts between the two groups.

 

This pragmatic influence finds its way, as best as I can tell, into “The Path of the Law”—in particular in a line that seems to at once critique the hegemony of classical legal thought and to safeguard against future adoptions of overarching legal theories.  “We do not realize how large a part of our law is open to reconsideration upon a slight change in the habit of the public mind,” writes Holmes.  Quite true—after all, as Holmesian Bad Man Ali can attest to, his conviction was overturned years later, after public opinion on the war in Vietnam had turned.

 

 

Background on Ali:

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070129/southpaw

http://www.time.com/time/time100/heroes/profile/ali01.html

http://www.ali.com/legend_boxer_controversy.aspx (the official website of Muhammad Ali Enterprises®)

Banal Articles about Lunch and Oliver Wendell Holmes

Example: this article about lunch in the Washington Post.

Bemoaning his lunchtime doldrums, the author writes: 

Far too often, the most uninspired meal of the day is the one I eat sitting at my desk, juggling a Cosi sandwich, napkin and computer mouse as I try to eat while writing or editing.

 I'll tell you what's uninspiring: the quality of this article.  I'm pretty sure he wrote it while juggling a Cosi sandwich, napkin, and computer mouse.I sincerely doubt that this has been edited, what with its four rhetorical questions, disjointed topics, and lack of description regarding the taste of the recipes.   

I understand that different sections of the newspaper employ different voices to tell their stories. Yes, the article speaks to a daily question that many of us face: "What's for lunch?"Who knows, maybe the author is tyring to be a New Journalist, putting himself at the center of the story, helping us understand our own quiet culinary desperation through his own stream-of-consciousness search to answer that existential noontime question.

But clear communication skills don't become less important when talking about lunchtime or when they're on page F01.  In class today, my property professor read a passage from Oliver Wendell Holmes's concurring opinion in International New Service v. Associated Press, where Holmes's language is impenetrable.  After letting the fog of the passage envelop us, my prof yelled, "Holmes! A verb!"  

After reading this, I wanted to yell, "Post! Some structure!"  In that sense, the author here is keeping good company; I doubt he intended this article to draw him a comparison to Oliver Wendell Holmes, but here it is, out there on the intertubes, ready for someone to do a "Google" and repeat it.  

But the point is this: it doesn't matter if you're writing a Supreme Court decision or a food column: the ways in which, and the ability with which, we communicate with one another dictates how we fare, both individually, and as a society.  Write a mediocre, mid-week column on homemade lunches, you'll get by well enough, but don't expect to become the next Anton Ego.  Write poorly in a judicial opinion, and expect attorneys, state agencies, law students and faculty for the next century to be debating your meaning.  Tell the nation that "the fundamentals of our economy are strong" the day that two Wall Street giants bite the dust, and you'll lose your campaign for the presidency.*

* I hope.

Community Organizing in the Washington Post

"Can I get an amen?"

Moving profile written by Courtland Milloy of a longtime community organizer from Holy Comforter St. Cyprian on East Capitol, Hal Gordon.  Let the Republicans tell his community and his group to its face that its organizers don't have "real" responsibilities.

Note the mention of Fr. Ray Kemp, professor/mensch/guru extraordinaire of Georgetown University and Washington, DC.  (Hence the name of the link, for the 8 pm-ers out there.)

Alumni Event at Indebleu

Anybody going to this shindig?

Indebleu
707 G Street NW
Washington, DC 20001

6:30 p.m.

As the title of the blog alludes to oh-so-cleverly, all things Georgetown also capture my interest. Kudos to the alumni powers-that-be for putting together a multi-city event for alums, but between the time (dinnertime), the day of the week (Thursday may be the new Friday, but they're not Friday) , and the swanky location, I'm a little intimidated and not too likely to go.

Also, for an event that was heavily marketed toward young alums, why isn't it at a more young-alum-friendly location (Rocket Bar, etc.)? Indebleu's website promotes bottle service for late nights Thurs-Sat.  Even if the event is pre-$200/$500 minimum time, something tells me it's still going to be $9 beer night.  

Idiosyncrasy, Continued

Perhaps "idiosyncratic" is such a popular word here at law school because it rhymes with law profs' favorite Method, the "Socratic."

In other news, Houston doesn't have electricity and is operating on a curfew.

I understand that we're nearing the second coming of the Great Depression on Wall Street, but it would be nice if we could return electricity to the nation's fourth-largest city and bail out AIG at the same time.

Oh, and clearing Galveston of sewage would be nice, too:

"We have a blossoming health and medical concern," said Galveston Mayor Lyda Ann Thomas... (A) medical officer warned of emerging cases of diarrhea, dehydration and food poisoning.

Thoughts and prayers with the people of the Gulf Coast.

Idiosyncrasy is the new plethora

For the first 2+ weeks, idiosyncrasy seems to be in the lead for most popular word at law school (putting aside technical terms such as "memo," "fact pattern," and "issue spotting").   Professors seem fond of the term, which makes sense when considering the peculiarities  of decisions, theories, etc., but is somewhat ironic on an individual level, given the relative uniformity of the 1L experience.

John McCain Introduced Crackberry to America

At least that's what his campaign would have you believe.

Great response from the Obama campaign: 

In a statement, Democratic candidate Barack Obama's campaign spokesman Bill Burton said: "If John McCain hadn't said that 'the fundamentals of our economy are strong' on the day of one of our nation's worst financial crises, the claim that he invented the BlackBerry would have been the most preposterous thing said all week."

"Racism's still alive, they just be concealing it"

-Kanye West

This article by Michael Grunwald at Time hits the nail on the head.  The next time you hear a friend or acquaintance ranting and raving about how "Obama needs to get angrier" or "Obama needs to show some fire," point them in the direction of this article (if only because my thesis is a bit long for a quick read...) so they understand the perils of "getting angry."  I'll expand upon this at some point, but for now, circulate this article.

Then, encourage them to channel their frustration into positive action.  Barack is going to win this election yet, but it's going to require all of us to get involved.  Phonebank.  Donate.  Canvass. Send an email to your friends working on the campaign.  Write a letter to the editor.  Register friends and family to vote.  Nothing that I just described is difficult to do, but yet each of them is essential to getting the Obamas to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW.  

The First "Memo"

Just submitted My First Memo (sounds like a children's toy or something) for Legal Practice (Research and Writing, in the non-§ 3 world).  It was actually a re-write of a sample, bad memo, so it's technically not completely mine, but given how much needed to be re-written, it feels a lot more like mine than the sample.

What is a memo, in law school/law world terms? Keeping in mind that I've never had a job that required me to write them (funding proposals, yes, but not true memos), an office memo, as far as I can tell from the first two weeks, is basically a document that tries to predict what the probable legal outcome of a given set of facts is.  The memo is divided into two main sections: restatement of the facts, and discussion of the likely outcomes.  Office memos are supposed to be predictive, so the tone of them is not argumentative, but neutral.  That said, you are supposed to predict something, so implicit in that requirement is a certain amount of persuasiveness, right?  I'll probably get dinged on the tone part, but that's just part of the transition to Lawyerland from undergrad, I imagine.  

The writing that we've learned to do is also incredibly formulaic--sort of a "write-by-numbers" approach.  Each memo's discussion of the likely outcomes has a conclusion at the beginning, then an explanation of the rules in question, then an application of those rules to the facts of the case, then (if needed) a restatement of the conclusion.  CREAC, as we learned it (not to be confused with IRAC, which is apparently how exam responses are structured).  In many ways, it's a step back to 5-paragraph-essays of yore, at least in the spirit of the rigid structure of the writing.  

Again, I imagine that there will be copious suggestions and comments for how to improve this effort, but I'm setting my expectations very low.  After all, the only way to learn how to do this is to make some mistakes when the stakes are practically non-existent.

Also, this isn't for a grade, which I guess is only fair, seeing how we've only been in class for just over 2 weeks.

New Course Restaurant

Highly Recommended. At 3rd and E Streets, NW, this place serves breakfast and lunch for bare-bones prices M-F. I had a great club sandwich there on Wednesday--any place that carves turkey, ham, and roast beef per order is doing things well.  Looking to try it out for breakfast later this week.

Beyond that, it has a great mission: "Our goal is to provide the highest quality food and service to our customers while operating a successful catering business. Our mission is to train homeless and chronically unemployed men and women for a future in the food service industry by providing hands-on culinary arts training." 

More on their website here: http://www.newcoursecatering.com/

The Daisy Ad

"These are the stakes...We must either love each other, or we must die."

-Lyndon Johnson, 1964

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyVn9k6d1og

Everyone always talks about the imagery of the Daisy Ad, and rightfully so. It's not a stretch to say that it helped change the course of political advertising.  I got to thinking about it this week after the bizarre conversations about McCain's latent, pro-sexual assault stances (or, Obama supporting a bill that taught stranger danger to kindergardeners...) and the McCain campaign's lack of grasp of common idioms (or, Obama saying "lipstick on a pig,"): how great would it be if Obama could drop an ad like this that (pardon the expression) vaporized his opponent? 

Obviously, the media environment today is completely different, not to mention 10,000 other factors, but when I went back to watch the ad, what struck me was the amazing juxtaposition between the apocalyptic visuals and the utopian spoken text from LBJ.  "These are the stakes: to make a world in which all of God's children can live, or to go into the dark. We must either love each other, or we must die."  The alternative LBJ proposed was horrifying, yes, but the course of action he proposed--"we must love each other"--seems radical by today's standards.  

Then again, maybe you can only get away with that when everyone's too busy hiding under the table out of fear of nuclear winter.

You Know You're in Law School When...

...you start comparing the instant replay/review controversy of the Broncos-Chargers game to civil procedure.  

Nerd alert.

Wild game, though-- Denver definitely had its lucky stars aligned to, um, sidestep the instant replay issues, but when it comes down to it, San Diego had two chances to stop Denver from scoring from the 10 yard line and another from converting the 2-point conversion.  Oh yeah, and they gave up 39 points in the game.  Norv Turner's indignation would be a lot more meaningful if their defense hadn't resembled a flag football team's.

It would have also been more meaningful if he had actively screamed at the referees during the game, rather than afterward.  However, given that yesterday's ref was Ed Hochuli, I can't blame him too much for waiting until after the game.

2-0! Go Broncos!

The Culture

Q: What are the people like?

A: I can't tell.  Everyone's got their hand in the air and their head in a book.

I kid.  There are plenty of Talkers, Gunners, Questioners, and Rodins (you know, the people who have a very pensive look, but are operating on a whole different level), but people are generally friendly towards each other, even 2 weeks in.  I think the big key here is that in college, everyone is more or less a blank slate (unless you come from the same high school, but even then, things change), and socialization and community building are essential parts of the experience, perhaps even the most important parts.  As I mentioned above, my approach to my own interactions with the community here are more measured and more tailored to my own interests and existing support system, and my guess is that's true for most people.  But people are friendly--they smile on the elevator, they chat pleasantly about profs and class, etc.  

That's not to say that I haven't stepped out to get a feel for what's going on: I signed up for some different listservs at the SAC Fair (not what they call it, but it's what it was), went to a discussion about attending a Jesuit law school, and went to a great Obama rally on Thursday for the law school's Obama group held at the bar across the street, the Billy Goat.  Rep. Patrick Murphy from (coincidentally) Ted's congressional district in PA spoke, then Prof. James Forman spoke to fire up the charges.  Both were fantastic, and I'm really looking forward to having Prof. Forman in the spring.  There were a ton of people there from my section (which, along with having it advertised before my Civ Pro class, tends to skew to the left), and generally lifted the fog of the cable news bubble of the week from our heads and got energized.  

The Adjustment

The adjustment to 1L life is a two-pronged adjustment: adapting from a do-nothing summer, and adjusting from Georgetown (this is only somewhat Georgetown--more later).  First, from 3 months of relaxation and very few, if any responsibilities:  obviously, there's a bit a system shock.  While over the summer, I was able to kick the collegiate habits of staying up until 3 am, eating complete garbage, and Guitar Hero, I developed new ones.  A renewed appreciation for television? Check.  Google Reader? Probably the best, worst thing to happen to me.  An obsessive focus on the 2008 campaign? Inevitable.  Now, spending hours on end reading, with easy access to both television and internet, has been a bit of a challenge, but my desire to be learning about something a bit more important than how the team looks at Kenner League has been able to subordinate those other things.  

The adjustment from Georgetown life has been helped by a number of factors:

-The amount of work I have.  It's just... more.  Or, more accurately, it's more work, more consistently.   Think of it as having a 5 pager due each day in terms of how much time you put into it.  Then repeat each day, Sunday-Thursday/Friday.  You simply don't have as much time to screw around as much.  Doesn't mean I don't get out to socialize, it just means that I have to really sock away the work a bit more.

-The summer off in between school and college.  Huge benefit.  People often ask, "what did you do before you came here?" I tell them that I came straight from undergrad, which is true, but I really want to tell them that I took 3 months sabbatical, because that's what has been just as helpful.  In that time off, I was able to recharge my batteries spiritually, economically (somewhat), and infrastructure-wise.  It also helped give me distance between My Georgetown Experience™, filled with extracurriculars, late nights, and tons of people, and 1L.  Instead of trying to relive Georgetown on a new campus, I've made my peace with my time on the Hilltop, drew lessons from it, and then focused my goals for the next 3 years.  As a result, I've resisted the temptation to join every club, I don't go out for the sake of going out, and I've prioritized getting the most out of my classes and trying (the next 2 years) to position myself for a job/field that I'm interested in, through class and through clubs/activities/internships.  Obviously, I was massively lucky to have had the opportunity to take 3 months for myself, but it was also essential.

I'm also much cleaner and more organized than I used to be, as an added plus.

Wall Street: What is happening?

How concerned should I be?

The Fried Oyster Stew at Old Ebbitt Grill

Wow.  Try it, even if you don't like seafood.  I'm trying to get a recipe for this, it's that good.

Levi's Port Cafe

1102 8th St. SE, Washington, DC

Highly recommended.  Jill and I went there for lunch on my birthday, and aside from incredibly friendly service (and a free slice of birthday cake, complete with candle and singing), the food is fantastic.  On Barracks Row (between Eastern Market and Nationals Park), it has fantastic soul food and North Carolina-style BBQ.  Great fried chicken and chopped pork, in particular, as well as macaroni and cheese.  Affordable, too--2 large lunches, plus sodas, plus tax, came out to around $22.  

There's also sweet tea, which as a New Yorker, I don't see as a selling point, but Jill gave it her Texas seal of approval, so who am I to judge?

The Lifestyle

It's a strange blend of a monastic existence of focusing on texts for a good period of time, living in an "apartment-style dorm" (got my own bedroom, share the common space/kitchen/bathroom) on the law center campus near my classes/the gym. Mix that with a young adult life in DC (new restaurants, meeting with friends, sporting events, etc.), and you have a fair approximation. On Saturdays, I'm hoping to get out to Northern Virginia to do some canvassing for Barack (more on the first outing later).  Living in "downtown" as opposed to Georgetown definitely has its benefits, too: I'm 4 minutes from the Judiciary Sq. metro, 8 minutes from Chinatown, 5 minutes from Union Station, and 15 minutes from Eastern Market (all times walking), plus, my arteries have cleared up due to the distance between me and Philly Pizza (although it did just get a few blocks closer: http://www.thehoya.com/node/16225) .  

Q: What Do You Do in Law School?

People have asked me, "What's law school like?" "What do you do?" "Is it a lot of reading?" To answer those questions, the following is a brief checklist that gets some of the fundamentals down on paper: 

-Do you enjoy reading?

-Are you interested in the "American system" of law and government?

-Do you enjoy reading?

-Do you like seeing where theories of behavior, morality, governance, and policy find their ways into concrete, practical writings?

-Do you like asking "What?" to find out specific answers, and "Why?" to find out how to get those answers?

-Do you like learning from professors who are actually interested in teaching, and respect your time enough to give you clear guidelines?

-Do you enjoy reading?

If you answered yes to these questions, then I think that you'll enjoy law school.  There's more than enough reading, to be sure, but as I've been saying, it is thankfully in English.  From the first two weeks, this is the basic template for law school, at least in Section 3: reading cases (and, sometimes, background information), understanding the rules that come from those cases, and seeing why those rules were applied as they were, when they were.  At least for me, it seems to be a very fitting (and interesting) confluence of my academic interests, which, conveniently, will hopefully prepare me for my professional interests.  In short: so far, so good.  

Now, I'm sure when I'm making outlines and preparing for finals, or when I'm trying to memorize some byzantine part of the Federal Code of Civil Procedure, I'll be grousing about the work, but law school ain't beanbag, and I knew that coming in.  Then again, it's not medical school either, so things could be much worse.

The Classes: Translating Section 3

I'm in the alternative curriculum here, known as Curriculum B or Section 3, so my classes don't line up exactly with the standard first-year curriculum.  I've got Legal Justice Seminar (an overview of American legal thought, particularly since Reconstruction, which is definitely unique to Section 3), Property and Time (basically, a property class, taught by a legal historian who has uncanny knowledge of arcane legal details), Legal Process and Society (Civil Procedure), Legal Practice (Research and Writing), and Bargain, Exchange, and Liability (Torts and Contracts).   

Often, Section 3/Curriculum B gets called "Hippie Law," due to the non-traditional format of the curriculum, the leftward tilt of the faculty, and the leftward tilt of the students.  As far as I can tell, only the first element--non-traditional classes--seems to distinguish the Section from the other sections, as most professors here appear to lean to the left, regardless of section, as well as the students (although there does seem to be a sizable bent toward public interest careers in Section 3--not sure how that compares across other sections).  But if learning about the philosophical/historical context for legal thinking makes me a hippie, then pass the tie-dye and the granola (especially the granola).  Maybe it's my interdisciplinary background in American Studies that attracts me to this sort of approach, but for upwards of $60,000 a year, I don't mind doing a little extra reading to have more in my intellectual "backpack" and to get more than just a "recitation of spells."

Welcome

Hi everyone,

I figured I would toss my hat into the ring and set up my own blog to catalogue life as a law student in DC, which, contrary to rumors, also includes contact with the outside world: sports, food, restaurants, music, and above all, politics.  Please leave your comments or email me and let me know what you enjoy reading, what you read as you fall asleep, and what you'd like to read about more often.  

Hope you enjoy.