Taking the Black

That Game of Thrones show that is so popular has this big chunk of the story about a group of men who take a lifelong vow to go stand on a wall and protect the world from zombies.  They call it taking the black.

Hardly a new concept.  Monks take vows, nuns take vows, you take a vow when you get married.

Hell, they've even had Shoalin Warrior Monks.

Now, I knew this because.. well I thought it was obvious.. but apparently it's new to enough people to have gotten a study done:  http://www.abajournal.com/news/article/want_to_run_for_political_office_dont_work_as_a_public_defender_first/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=ABA+Journal+Top+Stories

Defending criminals is a life vow.

Not that you can't stop.  You can.  But you can't really ever do anything meaningful ever again.

First, because people now hate you because clearly your moral compass is off if you're willing to defend, zealously, someone who is accused of (and lets face it, did) something really horrible.  Hillary Clinton cross examining someone in a rape case is the given example.  How dare she!

So much like the guys in the Thrones show, if you choose to defend criminals in this country, you accept that you have taken a vow.  You choose to stand on the wall and defend an ungrateful (to put it mildly) population from an overreaching (to put it mildly) government.  And you don't get to go on to do anything else, because you have burned your reputation.

Now, the article says Public Defender.

Let me tell you something: if you were really a Public Defender, there's another really good reason you'll never go on to do anything else-

You will know, have been neck deep in the shit, that there is nothing good in public life.  That democracy has become governance by bickering between powerful interest groups.  That nothing you do out there will ever feel as good as walking someone out to freedom after a year of scorched earth litigation.

Also, you will have garnered a few bar complaints, meaning that not even criminal defense law firms will be willing to hire you thanks to bullshit like Avvo.

If you're a law student looking at being a PD because you need a job and it sounds better than pushing paper, don't despair.  You don't have to be a real PD.  We won't hire you to do felonies.  You'll putz around doing first appearances and misdemeanors for years before you touch anything that can burn you.  Not because we care about you, understand, but because you are no PD, and no PD office worth a damn would let you walk into a courtroom with a client's life in your hands.  You have to spend some time being formed before we put you in the furnace to harden.

Besides, Public Defenders aren't made, they're born.  No one takes the black that didn't want to deep in their soul.  So keep your studies ABA.  You can't scare off new recruits better than our job already does.

Creatures

Sartre has this interesting part in Being and Death about a waiter, being a waiter.  Lost in being in a waiter.  Same with a gambler, lost in being a gambler.

Philosophy doing what now psychology tries to claim it does on a "scientific level."

You are what you do.  For those moments, you are your task and responsibilities.

What happens when, lost in that, you forget the larger picture?  You are one of the trees now.  Forest is lost to you.

Laughing with the judge about a losing motion for your client, who clings to life.   You should always be on the side of the client, but you know some things you only argue for formality's sake- the rules require it- so you do it.

The joke is on the formality.  But for those not in the know, including the client, it seems like its on the client.

Then some no-nothing stumbles into the whole affair, finds your conduct offensive.  The judge and you agree.

All of this is offensive.

Temper temper

So this judge in Florida has gone viral for beating up a PD.  I'm not going to give it another link.  It's bad enough as it is.

Comments have essentially varied between: "That man is no judge" and "That PD is an anklebiter."

(Nods sagely) Ah.  I, too, have bitten at the ankles of power.  And they were frail and overly sensitive.

Today (and I do this a lot, as do all PDs, so no, you can't figure out who I am) I lost my temper.

Judicial temperament is important because judges have to deal with a lot of people behaving badly.  Attorneys are supposed to be easier to deal with.  Calm, composed, making logical arguments with little or no ad hominem attacks.

Yeah but man, when you're in the hallway before court and captain assmcface is trying to force a felony on some mentally disabled kid or dying old person you can't always "keep composure."

Sometimes, you tell that fucker off.  You tell him he's a fucker.  He makes a quip about, "accountability" and you say, "yeah, you'll be held accountable, fucktard, when you see your God and have to explain all this fucked up shit."

Am I proud that such things occurred?  No.  Should a judge do such a thing?  Psh.  I don't care as long as it isn't on the record.

Do I punch the prosecutor in his stupid face?  I haven't yet!

No, you go in the courtroom and you do your job with an unnatural vigor driven by a cold rage.  And the judge and prosecutor (who is already unnerved by your display in the hall) try to duck your blows and keep things under control.

They fail, you win.

C'est la vie.

Or you explode and lose.  Like the judge in Florida.

He has to lose.

Rage is like a superpower in the courtroom if properly harnessed, but otherwise it bucks and kills the rider.

For the love of god, Florida, fire that judge.