If you are a lawyer and reading this, I hope you can agree with what this brave one has to say. He is right on the money. I know not who the author is, but he nailed it. Read it carefully and absorb the full impact of what he is saying. Sure, as many Americans, I am sometimes scornful of lawyers. However, I never looked at them like he does and how they are impacting the sorry state of affairs in our once great nation., I believe the worst thing that ever happened concerning them was when they were finally authorized to advertise vice hanging out a shingle. Here in SW Florida, where the population is somewhat aged, every commercial TV break will have at least one, sometimes as many as three ads touting such ludicrous statements as, “If you’ve been injured in an automobile accident , it does not matter who was a fault, you deserve compensation. Do not jump to settle with the insurance companies.” I consider it absolutely criminal to make statements like that.
Anyway, this is a great article and well written and explains why we are at such odds with one another in today’s society. Surely the names he mentions will ring bells in your head. I wish I knew who wrote it. Enjoy.
As an attorney, I hesitated to forward this as it can be an indictment against my profession. But I believe there is much truth to the article below. Very thought-provoking. Lawyers are adversarial and are trained to try to win at all costs. It may work in litigation but does not work well when governing our nation. Trying to win at any costs creates the polarization and hatred that now fills our country and leaves no room for common sense or legitimate debate
Every Democrat presidential nominee since 1984 went to law school, although Gore did not graduate. Joe Biden (no surprise) was at the bottom of his class. Every Democrat vice presidential nominee since 1976, except for Lloyd Bentsen, went to law school. Barack Obama was a lawyer. Michelle Obama was a lawyer. Hillary Clinton was a lawyer. Bill Clinton was a lawyer. John Edwards is a lawyer. Elizabeth Edwards was a lawyer. Look at leaders of the Democrat Party in Congress: Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer is a lawyer. Former Senator Harry Reid was a lawyer.
The Republican Party is different. President Trump was a businessman. Presidents Bush 1 and 2 were businessmen. Vice President Cheney was a businessman. President Eisenhower was a 5 star General. The leaders of the Republican Revolution: Newt Gingrich was a history professor. Tom Delay was an exterminator. Dick Armey was an economist. Ex-House Minority Leader John Boehner was a plastics manufacturer. The former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist is a heart surgeon. Who was the last Republican president who was a lawyer? Gerald Ford, who left office 31 years ago and who barely won the Republican nomination as a sitting president, ran against actor Ronald Reagan in 1976. The Republican Party is made up of real people doing real work, who are often the targets of lawyers. This is very interesting. I had never thought about it this way before.
The Democrat Party is made up of lawyers. Democrats mock and scorn men who create wealth, like Trump, Bush, and Cheney, or who heal the sick like Frist, or who immerse themselves in history like Gingrich. The Lawyers Party sees these sorts of people, who provide goods and services that people want, as the enemies of America. And so, in the eyes of the Lawyers Party, we have seen the procession of official enemies grow. Against whom do Hillary and Obama rail? Pharmaceutical companies, oil companies, hospitals, manufacturers, fast food restaurant chains, large retail businesses, bankers, and anyone producing anything of value in our nation.
This is the natural consequence of viewing everything through the eyes of lawyers. Lawyers solve problems by successfully representing their clients, which, in this case should be the American people. Lawyers seek to have new laws passed, they seek to win lawsuits, they press appellate courts to overturn precedent, and lawyers always parse language to favor their side. Confined to the narrow practice of law, that is fine. But it is an awful way to govern a great nation.
When politicians, as lawyers, begin to view some Americans as clients and other Americans as opposing parties, then the role of the legal system in our life becomes all-consuming. Some Americans become adverse parties of our very government. We are not all litigants in some vast social class-action suit. We are citizens of a republic that promises us a great deal of freedom from laws, from courts, and from lawyers.
Today, we are drowning in laws. We are contorted by judicial decisions. We are driven to distraction by omnipresent lawyers in all parts of our once-private lives. America has a place for laws and lawyers, but that place is modest and reasonable, not vast, and unchecked. When the most important decision for our next president is whom, he will appoint to the Supreme Court, the role of lawyers and the law in America is too big. When House Democrats sue America to hamstring our efforts to learn what our enemies are planning to do to us, then the role of litigation in America has become crushing.
Perhaps Americans will understand that change cannot be brought to our nation by those lawyers who already largely dictate American society and business. Perhaps Americans will see that hope does not come from the mouths of lawyers but from personal dreams nourished by hard work. Perhaps Americans will embrace the truth that more lawyers with more power will only make our problems worse.
The United States has 5% of the world’s population and 66% of the world’s lawyers! Tort or legal reform legislation has been introduced in Congress several times in the last several years to limit punitive damages in ridiculous lawsuits such as spilling hot coffee on yourself and suing the establishment that sold it to you and to limit punitive damages in huge medical malpractice lawsuits. This legislation has been blocked from even being voted on by the Democrat Party. When you see that 97% of the political contributions from the American Trial Lawyers Association go to the Democrat Party, then you realize who is responsible for our medical and product costs being so high!
You might consider reading Kurt Schlichter, a retired Lt. Colonel, Army who went to law school and writes for Town Hall. I usually agree with him.
So do I.
Great article and comments; I think we are doomed and will never see tort reform. There are some good lawyers. I know one that said his firm will never practice “family law” and another who does nothing but real estate and boundary law. But that is only two!
While I disagree lawyers by nature lie, cheat and steal, it is no accident our worst Presidents started out as lawyers and our best came to success by another route. Lawyers learn to argue both sides of any issue and too many forget along the way duties of honesty and integrity. The win at all costs mentality enables the rotten to rise to the top.
I practiced law for 45 years, starting out as a Marine Corps Judge Advocate, and I’ve seen it all. From a Convening Authority who stacked the members to ensure a conviction, to those who understood justice will be served by taking a matter back down from Special Court to NJP.
Private practice brought its share of miscreants, but also many honorable men and women, lawyers and judges, who knew the value of good reputation.
“Reading” can be very educational.But “what” has been learned, can be very “scary”.
OK Jim, I’m a lawyer, but you know that. The important thing to understand is that there are two types of lawyers: litigators and transactional. Litigators, I discovered as a new young lawyer, are in most cases, without morals or ethics. That’s what it takes to win in court, and many (not all) judges are not much different. That’s why I stopped all court work and turned my practice into real estate and oil and gas title work (transactional). There is seldom justice in the courtroom, as we are finally seeing publically as the DOJ, state attorney generals, and local DA’s try to put Trump in jail for no legal reason. As a transactional lawyer, I do not like litigators. So when you go to your local lawyer to have a will drafted, a deed prepared, or title checked on your land, remember that they are not the bad guys. Lawyers that litigate are not the same as the rest of us…nor have they experienced, for the most part, the ethics that come from serving in the greatest organization in the world, the United States Marine Corps. Semper fi my good friend, and keep giving the unethical and immoral politicians hell!
VERY WELL put and explained to those of us who are dumb shits when it comes to this sort of discussion. I was always amazed at the number of yellow pages there used to be in phone books. There were twice as many pages for lawyers as there were for doctors. Through life you may never need a lawyer, but you will certainly need a doctor. I used to count them just for the hell of it. LOL Thank you Richard for the comment and explanation. I never knew there was a difference. Semper Fi my brother!!