Thanks for the much appreciated kudos. I would love to do one of these every week, but doing would entail me cutting off what little contact I have left with my family and shutting down my law practice. I would still be able to eat, but probably only one meal a day and I would have to get my sleep down to 2-3 hours a night. But it just might be worth it.

When I saw that you were going to be doing this, I hoped you would not get too far from your roots by getting too "deep" on us. Your starting your post with quotes from Dylan and Kung Fu immediately told me that my fears had been unwarranted. Great job!

I try to always write at a level even I can understand.

Was there really any doubt? Seriously, was there?

Young Caine [Platek]: You cannot see.
Master Po [Harris]: You think I cannot see?
Young Caine[Platek]: Of all things, to live in darkness must be worst.
Master Po [Harris]: Fear is the only darkness.

I will second that from my completely unbiased perspective.

As a huge Monty Python fan, can I take your comment as a compliment?

I can see the mental tug of war now: "Hmmm research case or research Troy McClure references?"

Personally I loved him in "The Verdict Was Mail Fraud"

You can certainly take my comment as a compliment at least in part. As I had said, I too like Monty Python ("in some ways it's great stuff")... though in other ways I often feel like it's a bit "too in" ...in a Monty Pythonish and almost "overly British-of-a- certain-kind" sort of a way. (so maybe it was a bit too "lawyery" in some ways, but not less good because of that) (had you been a philosopher or a psychologist instead (though I do understand that these other disciplines are inextricably related to law even though some philosophers and psychologists might disagree) then I would have expected a slightly (even more) philosophical angle. (than for instance, my own typically very outside angle)

But given that you now say that you too like Monty Python (a near fatal admission in a bloggy context such as this) the essential existential question of lesser degree (of lesser degree than whether or not Fear is the Only Darkness which as far as I can see (mainly in the dark) (or staring out of Plato's cave) you still have not answered) and one whose answer could also only be sought by your true and authentic private self embarked on a near perpetual and determined holy grail quest or epic odyssey in search of truth (and also justice) ....but that with lots of luck eventually indeed could be found or discovered by you anyway.... (simply by having a deep tripartite conversation between me, myself and I that also would intimately involve your full id, ego and superego) is in fact just this:

Why do you think a casual passerby and relatively (or even absolutely) un-informed observer such as myself would casually be able to discern or intuit a kind of half-palpable Monty Python-ness in both the process as well as the substance of the utterances which you for mysterious reasons tacitly or deliberately chose to express (and here I am now giving away much more) if it weren't for the probable and also plausible fact that you happened to tendentially like Monty Python ex-ante? (there must be some logical principle at work here even if maybe nothing to explain it could be found in law) (though somehow I am almost sure it ALSO could be found there)

In other words what might be the implications of this internal ex ante consonance between your tacit preferences and their external manifestations .... and could it also be revealing (either probably or plausibly) (and legally or illegally) (and justly or unjustly) also of some possible higher order dissonance of some other much more dangerous and insidious kind? (more dangerous inasmuch as revealing a mind set completely incompatible with the normal processes and workings and even casual meanderings of law, let alone of progress towards justice?)....

And although I DO realize that I haven't really answered your weary query...(with anything other than Timothy Leary theory)...I DO hope I have at least pointed you in the right (i.e. the wrong) directions!

But factoring out Monty Python-ness for just a moment....(if such a thing should even be attempted or could be "justified" ) (on legal or illegal principles) I can see that to produce what you have produced took quite a bit of painstaking research. (independently of how you then chose to cast it all) And so if in the process of producing it (or afterwards) you still had some humour left over in you...then you are probably indeed also making some very good progress towards not fearing either darkness or fear itself which as I said at the outset is in fact the "higher order" issue. ATBFN (i.e. all the best for now) from....

outside angle....

(who sometimes can be reasonably acute although most often is rather obtuse) (but who at least nearly never likes to add up to a simple 180 degrees usually preferring instead to just come full circle for the whole 360 ....which in some circles is called tautology but in other circles and circularities (in some of the lesser countries of the planet) is also understood as always trying to go "the full 9 yards")

But what is a touchdown other than an arbitrarily defined temporary state of relative positions that both Heisenberg and Schrodinger would define as intrinsically undefinable and that also could almost certainly never really be proven at all in any court of law worth its salt? (or its pepper) ..and with that I think I can now safely (or unsafely) finally say "bye for now"...

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/20797485/chinas_allseeing_eye/1

If you don't win the best blawg review of the year for this, you should sue. It would be a crime, I tell you, if you don't win.

I have only just found this blawg review, and it brought tears to my eyes (sometimes of laughter, sometimes even of sadness). This is a fantastic blawg review.

It (almost) made me want to be a lawyer: clearly, they have a lot of time to read blogs and then write their own ;)