Into The Wilderness

As I write, it is in the very last minutes of the Bush Presidency. Barack Obama will take the reins very shortly and begin the unenviable job of leading the country through a difficult economic crisis, and a substantially more hostile world than the one his predecessor inherited. To him, all I can say is, "You asked for this job, Mr. President."

Thinking back to my own political camp, we enter the wilderness today. Republicans and/or conservatives control no arm of the national government. Part of the reason for that is voter fatigue, part of the reason for that is dissatisfaction with the events of the past several years. I'm not going to here pin any blame for that on the leadership of the GOP, but I do think it's useful to point a few things out for the future.

First of all, from a governmental perspective, blue-colored Kool-Aid drinkers are talking about war crimes proseuctions for Bush Administration officials. Rick Moran is right to say that such a proposition should be viewed with great caution. We don't and can't know everything that was known to the previous administration and can only offer conjectures based on what we've read in the media. And it will be impossible to properly examine the real evidence without it turning into a political circus that we really don't need. Let Congress confine itself to eliminating a statute of limitations for very severe kinds of war crimes (if any exist; I don't actually know) and leave the matter to rest for a while.

Secondly, the red-colored Kool-Aid drinkers need to lay off. Barack Obama is the President of the United States. That's it. It doesn't matter if he says the oath with "so help me God" at the end or not. It doesn't matter that Hawaii hasn't released his original birth certificate. It doesn't matter what his middle name is. He's an American, he's our President. "Supporting" the President does not mean agreeing with his policies; it means conceding the legitimacy of his administration and not setting up any cheap ploys to bring him down. Republicans will lose more than they gain if they do that.

Which means, as the previously-linked article describes in detail, we need to refocus on our core ideas, and leave the polarizing social issues and the partisan maneuvering aside. Those are short-term tricks; amphetamines for the body politic. Health and vitality for the Republican party will be found down a different path -- one that remembers the sorts of things that will not only win elections but turn in to the law of the land. As one retired Congressman puts it, we need fresh, good policy ideas, not political stunts:

eliminate checklists and litmus tests and focus on broad principles, not heavy-handed prescriptions. Free trade. Strong defense – at home and abroad. Government as small as is practicable in these times. Economic, education and energy policies that promote growth, energy independence and a competitive agenda that will allow businesses to grow and compete, not be protected by artificial barriers. That’s it. Believe anything else you want, but advocate for those things outside the structure of the party.

That may be as good as it's going to get in terms of abandoning the failed social polarization policy that eked out two very narrow victories in the past and was overshadowed by powerful economic events and war fatigue. Even then, I predict a lot of people will have a hard time letting go of an agenda that they found enjoyable to pursue despite the fact that it has produced such miserable results.

Now, the quote above is general in scope and deliberately so. Indeed, nothing on the list is objectionable to most Democrats; the difference between them and us is a matter of prioritizing competing goods and competing objectives for public policy rather than disagreement that these are good things for the government to pursue.

But as we go into the wilderness, we need to keep our priorities straight. It is not a matter of waiting for some politically charismatic savior to come along; there must be a foundation of new ideas upon which a charismatic leader can build. Right now, we have none of these things. What we have is a new President. He's not from our party and we can't expect that he's going to be a great friend to our ideas. But that should never stop us from explaining why our ideas are better.

We cannot hesitate to offer good ideas and try to make them real; the voters will see whose ideas they are and reward them if we are bold and positive in our contributions to making the country a better place. If we stop thinking of ways to make the country work better, and instead lay traps and wait for Obama to make a misstep (as he inevitably will) or for something to go terribly wrong so we can pounce like partisan vultures, we will be doing our party and our nation a grave disservice.

Wrong Spin

The Sun has got entirely the wrong spin on this story. It suggests that the events described in the story are somehow a fortuitous turn of events. In fact, what's going on is damned scary.

Al Qaeda is playing with the bubonic plague. They're trying to weaponize it.

Now, it's not surprising that they bungled the experiments. Under the best conditions, there are problems working with these bacteria; they have to be very tightly controlled in the laboratory to minimize, if not eliminate, the risk of infecting a person working with them. I somehow doubt that terrorist scientists are working under the best of conditions in modern, sanitary labs.

But then again, they don't need to be. What they need to do is figure out how to breed the nasty little bacteria and transmit them to civilian victims. While it seems that modern strains of the bacteria have evolved from their fourteenth-century antecedents to be less virulent, that means that it works slower, and may or may not be as deadly. It still has the potential to kill.

So here's the thing. If you get what feels like a bad case of the flu, and especially if it happens suddenly, you may need medical attention. If it is plague (and likely it isn't, so don't panic) then you will need to be on an intense course of antibiotics and be quarantined for a while. In the meantime, don't forget that it's a dangerous world out there populated in part by people who want to kill us simply because we're different from them.

Raw Video Of Hudson River Water Landing

A Promise Keeper?

Thanks to the miracle of the Internets, we will be able to follow the progress of our new President in fulfilling his campaign promises. Or not. From the same folks who brought you the Truth-O-Meter during the campaign, presenting... the Obameter! The St. Petersburg Times has identified 510 specific campaign pledges made by Barack Obama on his trail to the White House, and they're watching to see which ones he makes good on, which ones he ducks, which ones stall out, and so on.

Now, obviously he can't deliver on all of his campaign pledges right away. No one could reasonably expect that. The thing to do here is to watch the website from time to time and see how he's doing in reality as compared to what he promised us. And not all the promises are intended to be taken too seriously -- for instance, #502, listed as "In the works," is Obama's promise to "Get his daughters a puppy." While he did promise that (to the country, at least; whether he made the same promise to his daughters is a different matter) if that's a promise that winds up getting broken I don't think anyone's going to get terribly exercised about it.

And as you've read here before, Malia Obama is apparently allergic to dogs so that's another good reason for the Obamas not to get one -- there is no such thing as a hypoallergenic dog. Some less than others. I query their taste; according to the St. Pete Times, they're looking at a Portuguese Water Dog or a Labradoodle. Both are kinda goofy-looking if you ask me -- and more to the point, they both look like they're dogs that will shed quite a bit, which will release dust and dandruff, and likely make the allergic girl sneeze.

But the point here is, someone's keeping track of promises made, promises kept, and promises broken. Check the Obameter often over the next four years.

The Best Way To Protect Yourself From A Live Grenade

It's rare for me to make Big Brass Ones Awards in rapid succession. But after seeing this video, I've gotta hand it to these Israeli soldiers who found a very creative way to take a couple of the bad guys out with astonishing bravery.

The California Riviera

The Wife and I took yesterday off work and drove up to Santa Barbara. It's paradise here. Even back in the high desert, it's cool and windy -- sweater weather. In Santa Barbara, in the middle of January, it was in the high seventies and people were wearing shorts and tank tops. Palm trees, upscale shops and boutiques, and beautiful buildings were everywhere and it felt like early summer. There was no fog and all of the Channel Islands were in sharp relief, and seemed close enough to get to with a long swim. The ocean looked brilliant and calm; a hundred different shades of blue with the sun glittering off of its surface like gold filigree. The air smells of the offshore salt breeze, eucalyptus leaves, and Mexican food. We met up with friends and had a nice dinner and today we're going to have a wine exploration adventure.

A few minor complaints -- the water here seems not quite right, somehow a little more sour. They must purify it a little bit differently here as opposed to water from the state water project. The hotel has TV in the rooms, of course -- and judging by what's on this morning, The Wife and I aren't missing much by not having any at home. But, the king-sized bed is pretty awesome. And we've had some good food and are enjoying the good company of our friends.

Tomorrow, it's back to reality with stops to pick up the new flooring for our spare bedroom and exchange a holiday present that apparently can only be exchanged at one particular store in Camarillo. Since I doubt we're going to take a prolonged vacation this year, weekend getaways like this are really what it's all about for us. We're planning on being back up the central coast in March and having a long weekend to visit my parents' new home in Houston in May. But I see no whole weeks off for the foreseeable future.

But seriously, I could learn to deal with the water. It's paradise here.

Successful Water Landing

When I travel by plane, I do not pay all that much attention to the part of the safety briefing about a water landing. Frankly, I've always assumed that if a plane went down in the water, it would simply sink -- it's a big, heavy, metal object and it has never seemed to me that it could possibly displace enough water to keep afloat. So if the plane goes down in the water, I figured, your chances of surviving are effectively zero.

Well, it seems I'm wrong. A US Airways flight from New York to Charlotte went down in the Hudson River today after apparently taking two bird strikes on takeoff. (Um, no, the birds did not survive.) The pilots, displaying remarkable coolness in a tense situation, basically landed the plane on the river, bringing it slowly in contact with the water and keeping it up as long as possible so the plane wouldn't get caught and flip or submerge. It didn't. The picture on CNN shows the nose and the top half of the fuselage floating above the surface of the water.

All 148 passengers and the entire crew escaped with only minor injuries and a few cases of hypothermia (it was 20 degrees today in New York and the river water had to have been seriously cold.) And a Big Brass Ones Award to the pilots and crew for guiding their passengers to safety in an extraordinary and difficult situation.

Felony Vulgarity For Circulating The Bible

In South Carolina, a bill has just been proposed which would make it a felony -- yes, a felony -- to use vulgar language in a public forum, a public accomodation (as defined by the civil rights laws) or to disseminate such material to minors. Vulgar language is defined as "words, language, or actions of profane, vulgar, lewd, lascivious, or indecent nature."

I am endlessly amused by Eugene Volokh's noting that this bill would criminalize giving a copy of the King James Bible to a teenager. The KJV uses, among other things, the word "piss" to refer to an act of coprophagia,* something which if it weren't in the Bible, would clearly fall within any definition of "obscenity" that has ever been used. Also that an adult having sex with a sixteen-year-old would be committing no crime in South Carolina -- but if they talk dirty during their tryst, the adult becomes a felon for talking about what they are actually doing.

The author of this obviously unconstitutional piece of legislation is South Carolina State Senator Robert Ford, a Democrat, representing a portion of the city of Charleston. His home telephone number is listed on the website, which I think might turn out to be a bad idea. Note, though, that while this might be bad law, it's probably good politics -- I'm reasonably sure that Ford wouldn't have introduced so inane a bill if he didn't think doing so would please his constituents.


* 2 Kings 18:27 in the KJV reads: "But Rab-shakeh said unto them, Hath my master sent me to thy master, and to thee, to speak these words? hath he not sent me to the men which sit on the wall, that they may eat their own dung, and drink their own piss with you?" Coprophagia references -- as much proof, as if any were needed, that the Bible just plain ain't suitable for children.

Nothing Stings Quite Like The Truth

The Czech Republic began its six-month term as the rotating host nation for the EU Presidency in January. So that means that bureaucrats, lawyers, legislators, and other politicians from around Europe are all traveling to Prague to conduct business. And when they do, they're seeing art that the Czechs have placed on public display, including the piece by David Cerny which is the subject of this article.

Cerny's piece, "Entropa," provides a graphical description of various EU countries. Except for the UK, which is conspicuous by its absence (reflecting Britain's vacillation about joining its continental sister nations and adopting use of the Euro). Some of it is immature, like the depiction of Romania as a Disneyland-style Count Dracula-themed roller coaster ride. But my favorite piece has to be France: "Grève" is French for "On strike." Which it seems someone in France always is, causing all sorts of annoyances when you want to do things in or concerning France like, say, send mail or buy something. But what can you do? Thirty-four hour work weeks, free health care, and mandatory month-long vacations are simply not enough for the oppressed and hardworking French laborer. Vive le prolétariat.

Oh, sure, he could have depicted France as a hexagon or a fleur-de-lis or used Marianne. But that's been done. This is much more contemporary -- and, bitingly accurate, which makes it funny.

Ricardo Montalban Dies

What a cool cat this guy was. Mr. Roark from Fantasy Island, Khan from Star Trek, and the original salesman for the Chrysler Cordoba, with seats upholstered in "soft Corinthian leather." Although ill with a painful and chronic back problem, he continued to use his rich, distinguished voice of his right up to the end.

Sadly, he died today. The world is a little bit less colorful and interesting because of it.

Inevitable Information Imbalance

So many times when I have a disagreement with someone, I am struck by how my counterpart seems to be responding to a world that is simply different than the one in which I live. Discussion of the issue becomes strained when it seems we cannot agree on facts in common. An interesting insight on this point is offered from Tom Maguire at Justoneminute (riffing off of Ezra Klein at American Prospect and Matt Yglesias): We all have opinions on issues. Our opinions are based on facts and information that are known to us. But here's the rub -- we gather facts and information selectively, so as to support opinions that already existed.

The linked articles all apply to politics, which is perhaps the easiest way to identify this phenomenon. For instance, Freddie from L'Hôte looks at the same internet articles I do about the Israeli-Hamas war in Gaza. I conclude that Hamas are a bunch of thugs using human shields, human scum who deserve to be eradicated and the civilians who get killed in the conflict are their victims. Freddie sees the exact opposite -- he sees the Israelis as cruel oppressors who are as responsible for the death and suffering of the people in Gaza as the Hamas rocketeers are for the death and suffering of Israeli civilians. Same data, opposite conclusions. Is Freddie dumb? Is he a moral simpleton? No, far from it. Am I those things? No, I don't think so. But still -- same information in, different result out.

I see it in law, too -- eyewitnesses to the same incident describe seemingly very different things happening and reach very different conclusions about who was at fault and even what happened at all. Witness A: "The blue car was driving all crazy. That guy was a drunken fool. He swerved around this other car, sped up, ran through the red light, and hit the red car. It's totally the blue car's fault." Witness B: "The red car sped up to beat a yellow light and he should have stopped instead. So then he got himself trapped when the light changed and had to come to a screeching halt. He just made himself a target out there in that intersection, and he caused that accident. What's that about the red light? No, the blue car had the green light."

Creationists appear to me to be astonishingly blind -- selectively and seemingly willfully so -- to the evidence supporting evolution by way of natural selection. They also accuse "evolutionists" like myself of being willfully blind to the purportedly overwhelming evidence of God's hand in the creation of life. And there's apparently no using facts and evidence to change someone's mind on this; whatever evidence is offered by one side will be viewed through a lens so jaundiced by the other that it effectively does not exist. I'd like to say that I would be able to consider evidence that they would offer objectvely, but in all honesty, after learning what I have about the issue, I doubt that's true because the first thing that leaps out to me from every example is the fallacy underlying it -- typically it's the argument from incredulity or a straw man, but that's getting more specific than I need to be here because this is not a post about evolution.

And most prosaically but perhaps most clearly, consider the question of children in restaraunts. Kids get bored in restaraunts when they're not eating, and they demand a high amount of attention.* On that, a lot of people will agree. But the degree to which childrens' loud play or vocalizations will be tolerated in a particular instance varies highly. Some people are apparently completely indifferent to kids acting out in restaraunts; I'm much more sensitive to it and it takes an exercise of patience and focus to make myself ignore it. It would be one thing for the parent of a child acting out in a restaraunt to say, "My kid wasn't behaving inappropriately," because that might involve a difference of opinion about what is appropriate in the first place. But the parent would more typically say something like, "My kid wasn't doing anything at all." I gather information about the kid's behavior like, "She's been shrieking in apparent terror for ten solid minutes." The parent gathers information like, "Aww, she's happy." The result is that I am irritated and tense, while the parent is happy and relaxed -- I have gathered information about the child's vocalizations that the parent has no ability to perceive; the parent, similarly, has gathered information about the child that I cannot perceive.

How this state of affairs came to be may well be something of a chicken-and-egg question. Once the cycle starts, the phenomenon is clear. Once I have formed a bias, I will then view the world through the lens of that bias and gather information which supports my opinion, and eschew information which discounts it. But where did the bias come from? I had to have had information to react to in the first place, right? I think the answer may be "no."

The reason I say that is, in all of these cases, it's not just a case of interpreting the same facts differently. It's a case of gathering facts that support the conclusion and excluding facts that discount from it. The information never gets stored in your brain in the first place. It's simply not there to interpret one way or another. It's not viewing the world through a lens, it's viewing the world through blinders. That's why one person seems to be living in a different version of reality than someone else -- despite being exposed to the same things, different memories result.

This is a difficult thing to recognize in yourself and a more difficult thing to combat within yourself. I am not immune from this, and neither are you. Good science depends on being objective about evidence and not pre-determining a result. But it's almost impossible to divorce yourself from your own opinions and preferences, things that happen irrationally, subconsciously, and in all probability, nearly instantaneously.

Where do the different reactions come from? I don't know that we can say, ultimately. But that's worthy of more reflection. For now, my insight, offered for your contemplation, is this: we don't just interpret the same events differently. Instead, we learn about events differently in order to support our pre-judged conclusions, biases which may well have nothing whatsoever to do with the facts at hand.


* I have dinner periodically with friends who bring along their two-year old son. I'm not referring to him here, at least not in particular. My friends are good about appreciating when the kid has had enough and it's time to take him home or otherwise get his behavior toned down.

Italian Atheists!

Translated, it's a "good news-bad news" sort of message:

"The bad news is, God doesn't exist. The good news is, you don't need him to."

Right now, it's only on two busses in Genova. But it will expand from there. I'd predict Milano before Roma but it will get there. Don't look for this message on gondole in Venice, though -- the decorations that can go on a gondola are tightly regulated. (More people take the vaporetti to get around there; the gondole are just for tourists.)

Auguri, humaniste italiane!

Apply For The Best Job In The World

It pays AUS $150,000 a year -- that's just over $100K in U.S. money.

The job requires relocation -- to a paradisical tropical island off of the Great Barrier Reef in Queensland. Perqs inclue rent-free lodging in a three-bedroom vacation home with plunge pool, a golf buggy for going around the island, and snorkelling equipment.

Duties require touring the island and neighboring areas, exploring the Great Barrier Reef, and periodically blogging and answering press inquiries about what a great time you're having. Successful candidates will be able to speak and write English clearly and have good press skills. Other minor duties as required (i.e., picking up stray coconuts, light cooking when the PM drops by).

Apply at http://www.islandreefjob.com/en/ -- that is, if the site isn't down from too much traffic from other people who would like that job too.

Now I Don't Want To Buy The Dark Knight Anymore

I enjoyed The Dark Knight very much and I was tempted, the last time I was at Target, to buy one of the copies on the display rack. But now I know better. I won't be able to watch it. Warner Bros. has put copy-protection on the DVD such that I will not be able to play it on my computer at all. Asinine.

Unlike Max Barry, who was technologically savvy enough to figure out how to illegally rip the DVD he legally purchased so that he could watch it, I don't have or care to spend money on any of the technology necessary to bypass this sort of copy protection and instead I would rather just be able to use something that I buy in the legal manner which I choose.

So I guess I'll just watch more streaming TV on hulu instead.

IDF Briefing

This is an English-language briefing -- yes, intended for a European and American audience -- from the IDF. You won't be seeing this on the Daily Kos.

Epic Failure, or, The Wrong Response To Getting A Speeding Ticket

Police car cameras are very useful. And somehow I don't think this guy is going to beat this ticket:

I think the police officer is to be commended for his extraordinary professional and calm demeanor throughout the whole episode.

Hat tip to Orin Kerr at VC.

Sixth Year Blues

I'll say this for Congressman Jose Serrano (D-NY) -- he introduced a bill to repeal the Twenty-Second Amendment in 2005, just after George W. Bush was re-elected. So he is being evenhanded to introduce it again now that a member of his party is about to take the White House. He seems to genuinely think that the limitation of Presidents to two terms is a bad idea and that the people should be able to pick the President they want.

But it seems to me that right about year six is when most two-term Presidents start to run in to trouble. Recall:

• George W. Bush was elected in 2000; his sixth year was 2006. In 2006, Bush's Republicans lost control of Congress because of poor progress in the Iraq war, oil prices began to spike, and the beginnings of the economic decline we are currently experiencing got started.
• Bill Clinton was elected in 1992; his sixth year was 1998. In 1998, Clinton got impeached. The formerly booming dot-com economy busted.
• Ronald Reagan was elected in 1980; his sixth year was 1986. In 1986, Reagan got mired in the Iran-Contra scandal and the economy turned sour on him. In the November elections, his party lost control of the Senate.
  
• Richard Nixon was elected in 1968; his sixth year was 1974. In 1974, Nixon got into the worst Presidential scandal in American history and had to resign under threat of impeachment and subsequent indictment.
• Lyndon Johnson took office in 1963, so his sixth year would have been 1969. But 1966 would have been Kennedy's sixth year, and that's when Vietnam started to get really ugly, both in the theater and at home with Soviet backing of the VC starting in earnest; France threatened to withdraw from NATO; civil rights struggles got nasty when James Meredith was shot and Martin Luther King spoke out against Vietnam and got pelted with rocks.
• Dwight Eisenhower was elected in 1952; his sixth year was 1958. In 1958, the economy slipped into recession and the Mideast melted down as Egypt and Syria united to form a single country, and there was a revolution in Iraq which overthrew.
• Harry S. Truman took office in 1945, when FDR died; his sixth year in office was 1951. In 1951, Truman nearly got himself impeached by a red-baiting Congress when Truman had to fire Douglas MacArthur or practically risk a coup held by the guy. That was also the year the Twenty-Second Amendment was enacted and Truman found himself not grandfathered out of its application and therefore unable to run for re-election in 1952. Democrats lost control of Congress in the 1952 elections.
  

Historically, things have gone poorly for Presidents in their sixth years. And they never seem to quite get their mojo back after these things, which often coincide with significant gains for the opposition party in Congress.

So while a President might retain a fair amount of charisma (Reagan, Clinton) or at least a strong appeal to a core constituency (Truman, Bush) the fact of the matter is, we get about six good years out of a President and then the last two are just kind of sputtering along to finish out the term.

Mexico may have it right. Mexico's constitution provides that the President is popularly elected for a single six year term. No candidate for President in Mexico has to run against an incumbent -- and on the other hand, no incumbent has ever had to run to defend his record. In the past, the President has also effectively hand-picked his successor, but that's changed in the last couple of election cycles there. But the big deal there is, the President gets one six year term and it seems that pretty much empties any head of state's reserve of political capital and goodwill.

Just something to think about. I credit Congressman Serrano for consistency in his convictions but maybe eight years is already too long.

There's Good Guys And There's Bad Guys

The guys who set up their rocket launching sites in the middle of civilian housing areas, surrounded by noncombatant women and children, and then fire their rockets indiscriminately across their borders into civilian-occupied areas of their neighbors, are the bad guys. Don't forget that.

And don't forget that when peace proposals are put on the table, ones that have a reasonable chance of ending the violence while preserving both sides' sovereignty, that we should look askance at a party who urges rejection of the proposal.

In no way do I suggest that there is a connection between Hamas and Iran -- there is little evidence of that. Iran is using the situation for its own political purposes but the last thing the Iranians really want is a viable Palestinian state. They need a whipping boy, a scapegoat, a common enemy around which to rally all Muslims so as to sublimate the racial and sectarian differences that separate Iran from its neighbors. Israel is a perfect foil for that. If they didn't have Israel, they'd have to invent one.

Meanwhile, innocent people are dying because Hamas won't lay down its arms after proving that it can't be trusted with them. Quoth Julius Caesar of his enemies, upon the launching of the Roman Civil War: "They would have it thus." From Caesar's perspective, he didn't start the war; he was left with no other option. That is what Hamas has done to Israel -- it finds open conflict with Israel politically more advantageous than attempting to actually govern its people. That way, there is an external third party to blame for whatever problems exist in Gaza and the West Bank.

Hat tip to Stephen Green at Vodkapundit and the Weblog of Tomorrow.

And I Want The Police Albums Too

The law, once again, guides the way.

A doctor from New York found his marriage failing. So too was his wife's health. He donated his kidney and saved her life. She was grateful -- but not grateful enough to continue the marriage. Now, the guy wants his kidney back. Or, in its place, a million and a half.

I say, no way. The kidney was a gift. An interspousal gift, but a gift all the same and interspousal gifts become personal property once the marriage is dissolved. I remember at least that much from law school.

And morally, it's an easy call, too. Without the kidney, she'll die. The husband gave her the kidney to save her life -- without her alive, he'd have had zero chance of salvaging his marriage. Unfortunately, the marriage didn't work out anyway, but that's a chance we all take, all the time. Meanwhile, he's at least saved her life -- something which is and ought to be considered its own reward.

My only question is, why is the judge even allowing the argument to go forward? Sure, I understand the man feels betrayed -- his wife went and had an affair two years after she got her husband's kidney. But it's an interspousal gift and by law, the organ cannot be sold from donor to recipient so even if it weren't the market value of the kidney is zero. So this can't possibly be relevant to any issue relating to the determination or distribution of marital assets.

Homework Is Fun!

Getting ready to coach the kids for the mock trial team is tons of fun. My first real meeting with them is set for this afternoon. Last night, I stayed up going through lawyer movies from my archive to find good scenes so I can show them what to do, and what not to do.

Just a few insights to share with all of you. In A Few Good Men, the examinations are brief, direct, and forceful. That's good. The objections are sarcastic and indirect. This is good theater but bad courtroom demeanor. In the very best parts (Tom Cruise cross-examining Keifer Sutherland and Jack Nicholson), the lawyers ignore the court's rulings and orders on questioning and press on with questions to which objections have been sustained. That's contempt.

A Few Good Men is also a good movie for non-lawyers to see because you get an idea of just how hard lawyers work in a high-stakes trial. They're hitting the books, combing through the evidence, rehearsing their examinations, planning their strategy until the wee hours of every night. They're working on only a few hours' sleep. They're tense and not always pleasant to be around. Oh, and it's an outrageously good cast.

My Cousin Vinny is useful, too -- it starts with the very basic lesson of what a lawyer should wear in court. Joe Pesci's character is such a schmuck he doesn't understand why the straight-laced southern judge would be upset that he showed up wearing a leather jacket and a black silk shirt with no tie. But as the movie progresses, Pesci not only gets a good fashion sense, but a good grasp of criminal procedure and finally, finds the hole in the prosecution's case. Oh, and the movie is really funny.

There's actually not a lot of courtroom scenes in Legally Blonde, but I save it for the end for two reasons. First, the climactic courtroom scene features a girl -- and many of the girls who showed up for the orientation meeting seemed to lack some confidence, so I want them to see a woman in the courtroom kicking butt. It also helps that the judge and the prosecutor in that scene are both women, being assisted by men, and the defendant and the witness are also women -- women do all the important things in that scene. More importantly, in one scene, the young lawyer transforms herself from being awkward and insecure into a confident lawyer able to make her point and get exactly what she wants out of the witness.

There's lots of good lawyer movies out there. Some are more recent than this. Others are classics. My favorite "classic" lawyer movie is The Verdict, but that's more of a character study than a lawyer movie. Oh, and the scene where the hero hits Charlotte Rampling -- and we the audience are quite all right with that because she's a backstabbing wench. Yeah, that's appropriate for adults to see but I'm pushing the edge showing movie scenes that have some profanity. (Jack Nicholson's character in A Few Good Men delivers a rather vulgar threat to Tom Cruise.)

I might go back further to, say, Inherit The Wind, or To Kill A Mockingbird, but at that point we're in black and white and I'd lose contemporary high school kids for that reason alone. They simply don't know who Perry Mason even is. (Was. Raymond Burr's been dead for several years now.) No, I think I'm good here. Even as it is, they look at Tom Cruise and think "Wow, he was so young back then!" Hell, I think that. The movie was released in 1992, sixteen years ago, after all.