jail receptionist
how does she endure the days
in this drab lobby
with defeated families
and judge judy turned down low
Author: ジェイミー
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He watches Rilakkuma and Kaoru and it’s only a little bit because he has a crush on Kaoru.
It’s also because it makes him think of his friend in Japan, and he likes to do that.
It’s also because he’s learning Japanese and he thinks it’s good to copy Kaoru’s pronunciation.
It’s also because he likes the simplicity of Kaoru’s life. A job that doesn’t matter. Time to view the cherry blossoms and the fireworks. Friends that don’t talk too much, or at all. Tea.
If he entered Kaoru’s world, he think he would be quite happy holding her under the blankets and looking out the window with her.
But he also knows that, actually, he would get tired of her in time.
And he also knows that, actually, she is a doll.
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sensing
the possibility
of a new me
I read through partita 3
in a minor
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trying
to fix things
Dad calls
to say
it’s Verdi’s birthday
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lunching alone
in the county grandstand
pretending to be
asked about the poems
I wish I could write
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a favorite memory:
the cassette’s whirr
cycling that summer
through sun and leafy shadow
beside the Smith River
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in my office
packed with felony files
I wonder what to do
for these people
who are all doomed
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leaving
the courthouse at lunch
I feel like Lando
just making it out
of the exploding Death Star
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those dark nights
in astronomy lab
kissing you
between searches
for Io
The Weakest Branch
As many of you undoubtedly know, the federal government is made up of three branches: the executive (the chief executive being the president), the legislative (congress), and the judicial (led by the Supreme Court). When we speak of these branches, we often say that they are “co-equal,” meaning that none is supposed to be more powerful than the other, and that each is supposed to treat the others with respect.
The truth, however, is that the branches are not equal. By far, the executive branch is the most powerful, and this is for three reasons.
First, unlike the other two branches, its decision making ability is consolidated into one person, the president, making it able to take quick and decisive action – a necessary and useful trait in time of war.
Second, the president is the commander-in-chief of the military meaning that, in theory at least, he or she has the power to bend the other branches to his will by literally holding guns to their heads. Although this has never actually happened in American history (yet), don’t think that the other branches aren’t aware that it could.
Third, the fact that the executive holds all the guns also means that it doesn’t have to follow the orders of the other two branches, as when Andrew Jackson famously refused to acknowledge the Supreme Court’s ruling that he didn’t have the power to forcibly remove the Cherokee people from Georgia to Oklahoma (“the Trail of Tears”), and did it anyway. “[Chief Justice] John Marshall has made his decision,” he’s reported to have said. “Now let him enforce it.”
Congress is the second most powerful branch because it holds “the power of the purse.” Simply put, while the president commands the military, congress funds it. If the president attempted to use the military in a way that congress disapproved of, congress could simply undermine that action by revoking the military’s ability to get paid.
And what of the judiciary? Without the power to wield either guns or money, what power does it have? None, other than its credibility.
The Supreme Court’s power has always derived from the people’s respect for it. Its members are presumed to be learned, thoughtful and impartial, and so their decisions carry a certain esteem.
But that will remain true only for as long as the people believe that the court is impartial. And that is one of the reasons why we are living in such a dangerous time.
Public respect for the court has been plummeting since Bush v. Gore, and it is now to the point where nobody truly expects impartiality from the court anymore. Instead, we all expect the Justices to decide cases according to their political preferences. Time and again, the Justices have met that expectation.
This is very bad, because a court that does not command the respect of the people has no power at all to function as a check on the other branches. “Now let him enforce it,” President Jackson said. Justice Marshall couldn’t enforce it, and 4,000 people died. In the end, it is always the citizenry that the court ultimately relies upon for its validity. But trust in the court has been lost. How can it be regained?
It seems pretty clear to me that our current president is on a collision course with the judiciary. He will be indicted and the court will soon be asked to decide the extent to which those indictments can stand. In anticipation of this, President Trump is packing the court with loyalists. The damage to the court’s reputation would be incalculable if these loyalists were to absolve him of his crimes.
Thus, it seems obvious to me that any judge worthy of the title ought to recuse themselves from deciding the fate of the very person who nominated them to the bench in the first place. Judges often obsess over the mere appearance of impropriety, and rightly so. Are the people on the court today so lacking in character that they wouldn’t care to avoid what all would recognize as actual impropriety?
We do not have to accept such a court. Let us watch it closely. Let us demand impartiality from it. When the president’s case makes it to the court’s docket, let us demand that Justices Gorsuch and Kavanaugh remove themselves from it.
The Supreme Court has gotten a pass for too long. We have the right to demand that it do its job and stop all the politicking. Our government’s integrity is only as strong as that of the weakest branch.
The Tribe of Chopin and Slash
I went to law school knowing that I wanted to try cases. That’s all I wanted to do. I knew there was money, big money, to be had in transactional work – negotiating contracts, etc., but I didn’t care about that. I wanted to battle.
Luckily, I was in Chicago, and so I was able to observe many great trial lawyers. And here’s what I noticed: I wasn’t like most of them. I wasn’t loud or outgoing. I didn’t have what seemed to me to be an almost pathological need to impress people (one lawyer’s waiting room was wallpapered with news articles about his courtroom victories, another’s office was covered in drawings of himself arguing cases). Instead, I was quiet and reserved. Those lawyers mistook my introversion for shyness, and decided that they didn’t have any use for me.
I was angry and upset about their rejection for a while, but then I just got on with trying cases. It’s been fine. Despite what those guys might have thought, I haven’t collapsed in tears or passed out during a trial yet. Not even once. I’m an introvert. That doesn’t mean that I can’t perform. It just means that I’m not going to get all in your face about it.
I’ve been thinking about this because I was listening to an interview with Slash the other day and he mentioned not liking to sing or promote albums and it hit me: He’s an introvert, like me. And he’s awesome.
I imagine that when Slash gets on stage, he feels much like I do when I start a trial. I enter a kind of Avatar State. Some usually dormant part of me comes to life and fills me with energy and I can just do it. I get activated. And then I go home and don’t feel the need to prove anything to anybody until the next trial.
I mean, here’s how I see it: there are Chopin fans and there are Liszt fans. You can admire and respect them both, but if you listen to them long enough you’re going to be drawn to one or the other.
Those Chicago guys were Liszt lawyers, full of bombast and flash. That’s fine, but it’s not for me. I’m not impressed by spectacle.
I prefer Chopin. On first listen, maybe his music doesn’t grab you in quite the same way that a piece celebrating Mephistopheles might, but something about it keeps you coming back, and you start to hear more and more, and the profundity of what you missed in those early encounters – because Chopin didn’t come right out and tell you about it – starts to be revealed.
Don’t get me wrong: I don’t have anything against those extroverted Liszt lawyers. Many of them are great, and their Steve Vai brand of showmanship can get results. But if that’s not who you are, don’t worry about it. The courtroom is just another stage, and there’s a place for the Slashes and the Chopins too.
[More on the differences between Chopin and Liszt: Chopin v. Liszt: Teaching Style Showdown.]