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

A new study of lawyer licensing in the USA concludes that regulation serves the profession’s financial interests rather than the public’s interest in protection from incompetent or unethical lawyers. In “What is the Objective of Professional Licensing? Evidence from the US Market for Lawyers” (Nov 2004), Turin Univ. Prof. Mario Pagliero finds that the objective of such regulation in the USA is explained by capture theory, and “licensing increases annual entry salaries by more than $20,000.”

Pagliero notes “This implies a total transfer from consumers to lawyers of 36% of lawyers’ wages and a total welfare loss of over $6 billion.” The abstract is available from SSRN, and the entire 36-page study can be obtained with a free registration.

• According to the study, of the 25 states covered, the “transfer” per lawyer from consumers was more than $40,000 per year in Mass., NY and NJ, and under $10,000 only in Iowa. (chart at p. 32)

the thief
is just as he is…
hazy moon

……………………………………. by ISSA, translated by D.G. Lanoue

one-breath pundit

On a not-unrelated topic: As he does so often, Matt Homann at the [non]billable hour, is once again dreaming up ways for lawyers to extract more money from clients without giving them a better product. (and LegalBlogWatch is encouraging him!)  Once again, I wonder how the fiduciary relationship jibes with manipulating client psyches and price elasticities in order to maximize profits. See our posts on value billing, lawyer marketing, and fees and the lawyer-fiduciary.

I can’t believe we let two days go by without stopping at The Heron’s Nest

to see its December edition.  I hope “chief judge” Christopher Herold won’t

hold me in contempt. 

 

  Among the dozens of fine haiku, two by f/k/a Honored Guests

were selected as this month’s Editor’s Choices:

 

crackling beach fire —

we hum in place of words

we can’t recall

                                 Michael Dylan Welch

 

Flooded plain —

fence tops show which water

belongs to whom

                                   George Swede

 

 

 

Editor’s Choices, The Heron’s Nest VI:11 (Dec. 2004) 

 

 

Click here to see this month’s winner of the Heron’s Nest Award, a fine haiku by

Joann Klontz, along with commentary by Paul David Mena, part of which has

a great tip for haiku poets (and worked for dagosan this morning):

“When a haiku poet is devoid of inspiration, he or she needs only to

look to the sky. Whether the moon waxes or wanes, shooting stars

silently arc above us, or clouds render the heavens a featureless

expanse of utter nothingness, it is often our only consistent Muse.

Winter stars are all the more poignant in their contrast with the dark

sky, a contrast that heightens with each sleepless hour.”

 

by dagosan:

snow falls

from a low gray sky –

she lifts the sauce pan lid

                                    [Dec. 3, 2004] 

 

• 
  
  If you haven’t seen the United Church of Christ 30-second ad that was refused
  
  
  by some major networks as too controversial, please go here. (via Jim Moore). 
  
  
  UCC describes the ad:
  
  

  
  

  The UCC’s first 30-second television advertisement – part of the

  
  

  denomination’s new, broad identity campaign – began airing nationwide

  
  

  on Dec. 1, stating that – like Jesus – the United Church of Christ seeks

  
  

  to welcome all people, regardless of ability, age, race, economic circumstances

  
  

  or sexual orientation.
  

David G. Lanoue is the word-wizard behind the hundreds of haiku   

you’ll find at this site by Japanese master Kobayashi Issa.  David’s

own haiku show the multi-dimensional poetic sensibilities that allow

him to breathe life into Issa’s words from two centuries ago.  E.g.,

 

       never more alive

     sparrow in the cat’s

           mouth

 

 

     the old fart

stacks the winter

      kindling

 

 

the cold front
reaches the Deep South
nipple by nipple

credits: “never more” and “old fart” from from: Haiku Guy (Red Moon, 2000)

             “cold front” from World Haiku Ass’n website.

• 
  
  If you’d like to introduce a friend to haiku, David’s
  
  
  novel Haiku Guy is the perfect gift — an adventture
  
  
  with action, romance, time travel, wisdom, and more. 
  

  You can read the first two chapters here. 

 

• 
  
  by dagosan:

a favorite tree

reflected in the river –

made me look again

                                            [Dec. 2, 2004]

one-breath pundit  

 

  B.J. Grenier has an interesting post on Common Law Marriage in PA at

BenefitsBlog.   That reminds me: Where CLM still exists, does calling

your paramour “my fiancee” (for a decade or two) defeat a marriage claim?

 

   Eugene Volokh’s piece on protecting sources — at established news media

and at weblogs — is worth your time.  He suggests a rule and opines that “the

rules should be the same for old media and new, professional and amateur.” Go there.

• 
  
  Less edifying is finding out that some of Prof. V’s readers couldn’t
  
  
  figure out all by themselves what he might have meant by “pronouncing
  
  
  the capital letter in a word.”  I hope the clueless ones are nobody’s
  
  
  lawyer or professor (click here for some examples of its use.

   John Palfrey notes that Merriam-Webster has deemed “blog” to be the

“word of the year.”  As we explained recently, the honor means that “blog”

was looked up online more than any other word this year.  That might just

be because those four letters give absolutely no hint as to what the word

means or its relationship to any prior-existing word or language.  More.

pruned by the antelope’s
jaws…
New Year’s pine

 

                          ISSA, translated by D.G. Lanoue  

 

 

ethicalEsq and skepticalEsq have been far too active around here lately — 

leading to a homepage with far too many words (far too many of which

are cantankerous).   haikuEsq and the Editor promise to keep their cranky

and egotistical alter egoes in check from now on, limiting f/k/a to haiku

and one-breath punditry.  Some recent posts will be deleted or moved

inside, as a demonstration of our commitment.

• 
  
  Nice segue to: The Healing Spirit of Haiku, a new book by physician-psychologist
  
  
  and professor David Rosen and Joel Weishaus, a poet and literary critic, with illustrations
  
  
  by Arthur Okamura.  The book “is a haibun of the psyche, a combination of prose
  
  
  and haiku about a soulful interactive journey that two old friends set out to accomplish
  
  
  together.”  (it’s got a great cover, and you can Look Inside at amazon.com)

p.s. Even the very busy RiskProf has noticed our recent lapse into prolixity.

            late at night

      the cold white edges

             of the bed

 

 

         the cold night

 comes out of the stones

          all morning   

 

     in the dark

the trap snaps shut

     silent dawn

from Presents of Mind, haiku & illustrations by Jim Kacian

(Katsura/Red Moon Press, 1996).

• 
  
  by dagosan:

the river mirrors

the busy bridge –

one duck races the cars

                                            [Dec. 1, 2004]

• 
  
  Crime & Federalism addresses Indigent Defense fees in Massachusetts, and
  
  
  posts a reply from assigned counsel Deborah Sirotkin Butler.  Our two cents gets
  
  
  tossed in, too, of course.  Legal Blog Watch encourages more input.  (prior post)
  
  
• 
  
  George Wallace is Foolin’ around with the double dactyl genre again.                                   

Other than pointing to my recent post on employed weblawggers who beg, I shall

offer no comment on today’s posting by the otherwise bon vivant Steve Bainbridge:

Pledge Break

 

The computer in my home office is dying a lingering death and I’m

going to have to order a replacement this week. So if you’ve been

thinking about hitting the tip jar in the left sidebar, now would be a

very opportune moment to do so. And I thank you.

  Well, okay, maybe three questions: (1) will we at least get some special

programming, like they do during PBS pledge week? (2) what the heck will Steve do when

a good old California earthquake or forest fire strikes his home? and (3) to restore my faith in

macho neo-cons and libertarians, could someone please convince me that Prof. B is doing this

tongue-in-cheek as a caricature of the early alms-seeking denizens of weblog world?

 

 

begging actors–
even the horse’s ass
gets a blessing

 

begging at my gate
the geese lose
weight

 

Kobayashi Issa, translated by D.G.Lanoue                                                                                                              

 

 

p.s. Really Inadvertent or Nice Coincidence?  I just learned from my Referer List that this

weblog had the #2 result, out of about 5 million, for the Google search why do women

like big ones>.  Our posting do ads subtract? big ones sure do! got the listing.  Click here

for more Inadvertent Searchee fun.

speaking truth
the rainy season’s crack
of thunder

                       Kobayashi ISSA,

                       translated by D. Lanoue

This Harvard Law School graduate (HLS ’76) would like to join Howard Bashman’s reminder to my

alma mater that free speech often comes at a cost — as does sticking to one’s principles.  Howard

responds to news that HLS plans to start barring military recruiters, in the wake of  the 3rd Circuit’s

decision yesterday overturning the Solomon Amendment. 

 

Rather than losing federal funding, Harvard Law School has been allowing military recruiters on campus,

despite the anti-gay policies of the military.  As Howard points out, in words worth quoting in full:

“Harvard Law School at all times (including now) has had the right to ban

military recruiters from campus notwithstanding the existence of the Solomon Amendment

— the university simply had to pay the price in loss of federal funding.   Dean Kagan’s statement

suggests that now that the price to be paid will soon be zero dollars, Harvard Law School can

afford to exercise its right of association in the manner it prefers. On this very point, to the extent

that the Solomon Amendment causes a law school to “speak” in any manner, it seems to me

that a law school is forced to reveal that it finds the continuation of federal funding to have

a greater value than the evenhanded application of the school’s anti-discrimination policy.

This ‘speech’ — which reveals that the exercise of rights sometimes comes at great cost; even

at a cost that may be too great to bear — would seem to teach law students a valuable lesson

about how the real world often operates.”  (emphasis added)

If Harvard Law School can’t afford to give up federal dollars in order to take a principled stand, who can?

Merriam-Webster’s Words of the Year 2004 have been announced.   

It’s a list of the ten words that have been looked up the most at the M-W

online dictionary and thesaurus in 2004.

 

Most webloggers will take special notice, I’m sure, that the word “blog” was came in at

#1.   In fact, as TalkLeft notes, “blog”  will be a new entry in the 2005 version of the

Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Edition.   Here’s the M-W definition:

Blog noun [short for Weblog] (1999) : a Web site that contains an online

personal journal with reflections, comments, and often hyperlinks provided

by the writer

I’m sure there will be plenty of quibbling over the definition, but I plan to stay out of

that loop (find other defintions of “blog” at OneLook Dictionary and Ask Jeeves).

Of course, I need to preserve my customary objection to the adoption of that ugly

 little word.  Click here for a brief history of the word “blog” (and my plea that we

do better from now on as we create our online and technological Language Legacy).

 

I have a different observation:  M-W‘s Top Ten List gives a remarkably good sketch

of the events of 2004 — an outline of words on the minds of many Americans. In addition

to “blog,” here’s the list:

 2. incumbent
 3. electoral
 4. insurgent
 5. hurricane
 6. cicada
 7. peloton : noun (1951) : the main body of riders in a bicycle race
 8. partisan
 9. sovereignty
10. defenestration

     There are still 31 days left in 2004.  I wonder what events in America or

around the world could change this list, as we go online to better understand the words

that are important to be well-informed citizens, students, parents, and human beings.

 

 

looking up, wrinkles
looking down, wrinkles…
a cold night

 

drawing words
in an old tray’s ashes…
winter cold

Kobayashi ISSA, translated by David G. Lanoue