Collage 203               H u m o u r N e t                5 JAN 96

Ya know, you folks are all right.

I sent out my "politically-correct" opener yesterday, figuring that
*this* time I would surely score some flames. (I keep trying.... :-)

Well, I certainly received some messages -- every one saying, "Yeah,
I've about had it with all this PC [propaganda], too."

(Okay, so one of the senders was a little confused: he'd recently
"upgraded," such as it is, to Windows '95, and wasn't quite straight
on the subject matter at hand.)

The best message of all, however, came from Nigel in Canada, who
says he is offended by the term "Politically Correct," claiming --
among other things -- that it "harms [his] self image to think that
[he] could be incorrect."

Nigel suggests that we instead use the term "culturally sensitive" --
the politically-correct term for "politically correct."

(Days like this, I wonder why I didn't go public with HumourNet a lot
sooner. :-)

He goes on to say that, "in order to repair my harmed self worth, I
require a cash settlement.  Several thousand dollars ... should
suffice."

Sounds like Nigel has been taking "amateur lawyer" lessons. :-)
Which brings me to a *serious* amateur lawyer, this one from (where
else?) California ...

**
Before I forget again: *Many* thanks to Jim in L.A. for the news
story I'm about to abuse:
**

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Last month, Superior Court Judge David Garcia
added Patricia McColm to the list of about 225 Californians
classified as "vexatious litigants," whose frequent meritless
lawsuits are deemed to be an abuse of the court system.

(Only 255? They must have a *separate* list for the lawyers....)

State law allows a judge to classify as "vexatious" any litigant who
... repeatedly files meritless cases or motions, or uses delaying
tactics....

(Sounds to me like a *lot* of trial attorneys should be very
concerned about this. Hey, wait a sec -- don't attorneys write the
laws? You'd think they'd do a better job of covering their *own*
litigious butts....)

... It does not apply to clients represented by lawyers, since the
State Bar can discipline lawyers for similar tactics.

(Ah, there we go. And the State Bar is composed of ... lawyers? So,
professional courtesy being what it is, ....)

McColm has sued basketball-playing neighbors, critical judges, and a
gum-chewing State Bar examiner. She has also sued tenants in her
home, the federal and city governments, a doctor, a dentist, a
supermarket, department stores, two newspapers, judges quoted by
the newspapers. An investigator said McColm sprayed him with mace
as he was serving her with legal papers, and later sued him for
assault.

(Who *is* this chick, anyway?)

"She's your worst nightmare," said Richard Benjamin, a neighborhood
resident. He said McColm blocked his eight-foot garage extension
for 11 months, even though the city had repeatedly approved it.

(Sounds like that's not the *only* extension she has avoided.)

McColm has asked Garcia for reconsideration. A former actress,
dancer and law student, ...

(Oh, suddenly it all starts to become so clear.)

... [McColm] got a law degree from Golden Gate University in 1984
but failed the bar exam twice. She then sued the bar, claiming,
among other things, that one of the examiners chewed gum too loudly.

(I'm sure his breathing interfered with her concentration, too.)

Do law schools attract these people, or do they *create* them?

Well, over the years, a lot of very insightful observations have been
made about lawyers, and many of them have been cataloged here as the
piece entitled, "A Running Commentary on the Legal Profession."

Collage 203 also features "Outtakes," a collection of *real-life*
lawyer-related tidbits.

As noted in the text, all of the material is excerpted from the
book, _Lawyers_and_Other_Reptiles_, by Jess M. Brallier, and is
provided here with *many* thanks to Kim.

The legal profession--if it weren't so annoying, it'd almost be
entertaining. Well, actually, it's so annoying, it *is* entertaining.

- Vince Sabio
  HumourNet Moderator
  HumourNet@telephonet.com
____________________________________________________________________
          Opener (above) Copyright 1996 by Vincent Sabio
  Permission is hereby granted to forward or post this "Collage";
  please observe the guidelines stated at the end of the message.
____________________________________________________________________

SUBJ: Outtakes ...
(The following are excerpted from the book,
_Lawyers_and_Other_Reptiles_, by Jess M. Brallier)

When a Dublin attorney died in poverty, his legal colleagues set up
a fund to pay for his funeral. Upon being solicited, Lord Norbuy
(1745-1831), a judge, asked what sum would be appropriate to
contribute. When told that no one else had donated more than a
shilling, he exclaimed, "A shilling!" and reached into his pocket.
"A shilling to bury an attorney? Why, here's a guinea! Bury 120 of
the scoundrels!"

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

Upon his death in 1869, a French attorney bequeathed $10,000 to "a
local madhouse," declaring that "it was simply an act of restitution
to his clients."

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

Overheard in a courthouse corridor: "I told you you should've got
yourself some legal advice before running to a lawyer."

--The New Yorker

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

In 1990, Dr. James M. Dabbs, Jr., a psychologist with Georgia
State University, revealed that high levels of testosterone--which
causes overly aggressive or antisocial behavior--is commonly found
in juvenile delinquents, substance abusers, rapists, bullies,
dropouts, and *trial lawyers.*

========================[ H U M O U R N E T ]=======================

SUBJ: A Running Commentary on the Legal Profession
(The following are excerpted from the book,
_Lawyers_and_Other_Reptiles_, by Jess M. Brallier)

"Everyone ought to take every opportunity to blast lawyers."

--Marlin Fitzwater, President George Bush's press secretary

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"The lawyer has learned how to flatter his master in word and
indulge him in deed; but his soul is small and unrighteous ...
from the first he has practiced deception and retaliation, and has
become stunted and warped. And so he has passed out of youth into
manhood, having no soundness in him ...."

--Plato (321 B.C.)

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"He was a lawyer, yet not a rascal, and the people were astonished."

--anonymous, said of Saint Ives, 13th-century lawyer and a saint

[Editor's Note: Well, which was he? </vs>]

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"One thing I supplicate, your majesty: that you will give orders,
under a great penalty, that no bachelors of Law should come here [to
the New World]; for not only are they bad themselves, but they also
make and contrive a thousand inequities."

--Vasco Nunez de Balboa, to King Ferdinand V of Spain, 1513

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers."

--Shakespeare (King Henry the Sixth, Part 2)

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"God works wonder now and then; Behold! a Lawyer, an honest Man."

--Benjamin Franklin, 1733

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"That meanness, that infernal knavery, which multiplies needless
litigations, which retards the operation of justice, which, from
court to court, upon the most trifling pretence, postpones trial to
glean the last emptyings of a client's pocket, for unjust fees of
everlasting attendance, which artfully twists the meaning of law to
the side we espouse, which seizes unwarrantable advantages from the
prepossessions, ignorance, interests, and prejudices of a jury, you
will shun rather than death or infamy."

--Timothy Dwight, president of Yale College, addressing the
graduating class of 1776

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"It is the trade of lawyers to question everything, yield nothing,
and to talk by the hour."

--Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"The mere title of lawyer is sufficient to deprive a man of the
public confidence.... The most innocent and irreproachable life
cannot guard a lawyer against the hatred of his fellow citizens."

--John Quincy Adams, 1787

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"Lawyers are plants that will grow in the any soil that is
cultivated by the hands of others, and when once they have taken
root they will extinguish every vegetable that grows around them.
The most ignorant, the most bungling member of that profession will,
if placed in the most obscure part of the country, promote
litigiousness and amass more wealth than the most opulent farmer
with all his toil.... What a pity that our forefathers, who happily
extinguished so many fatal customs and expunged from their new
government so many errors and abuses both religious and civil, did
not prevent the introduction of a set of men so dangerous."

--H. St. John Crevecoeur, 1787

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"They all laid their heads together like as many lawyers when they
are gettin' ready to prove that a man's heirs ain't got any right to
his property."

--Mark Twain

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"No one can have been for twenty years in active and varied legal
practice without becoming convinced that the profession to which he
belongs harbors within itself examples of as base, deliberate, and
ingenious depravity as any that, less favored by fortune or cunning,
have gravitated into the penitentiary."

--Theodore Bacon, 1882

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"A man who never graduated from school might steal from a freight
car. But a man who attends college and graduates as a lawyer might
steal the whole railroad."

--President Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919), attempting to persuade
his son to become a lawyer

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"There was a time when an apple a day kept the doctor away. Now
it's malpractice insurance."

--Dr. Lawrence J. Peter

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"As we watched Judge Clarence Thomas's Supreme Court confirmation
hearings, all of the commentators said the same thing: 'One of
these people in the room is lying.' Do you believe that? You've got
two lawyers and 14 senators in the room, and one *one* of them is
lying?"

--Jay Leno

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"The trouble with law is lawyers."

--Clarence Darrow

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"The trial lawyer does what Socrates was executed for: making the
worse argument appear the stronger."

--Judge Irving Kaufman

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"If you think that you can think about a thing, inextricably
attached to something else, without thinking of the thing it is
attached to, then you have a legal mind."

--Thomas Reed Powell

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"The ideal client is the very wealthy man in very great trouble."

--John Sterling

[Editor's Note: This guy would've *loved* OJ. </vs>]

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"Law reform is far too serious a matter to be left to the legal
profession."

--Leslie Scarman

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"You're an attorney! It's your duty to lie, conceal and distort
everything, and slander everybody!"

--Jean Giraudoux

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"The law is the only profession which records its mistakes
carefully, exactly as they occurred, and yet does not identify them
as mistakes."

--Eliot Dunlap Smith

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"It is a maxim among these lawyers that whatever hath been done
before may legally be done again, and therefore they take special
care to record all the decisions formerly made against common
justice and the general reason of mankind. These, under the name of
precedents, they produce as authorities, to justify the most
iniquitous opinions."

--Jonathan Swift

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

"Virtue down the middle," said the Devil, as he sat down between two
lawyers.

--Danish proverb

----------[ H U M O U R N E T ]----------

Two farmers each claimed to own a certain cow. While one pulled on
its head and the other pulled on its tail, the cow was milked by a
lawyer.

--Jewish parable

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