Here’s an amusing old thread where people ask whether doing a surgical residency makes you dumb:
The expected and obvious answer is “no”. But there is a perception that a surgeon is more of a “technician” than a medical scholar, and being able to hold a scalpel with skill is more important than being an intellectual. (The thread seems to squash that perception.)
I remember watching the show Scrubs and seeing how the surgeons on that show were portrayed as high-fiving jocks with extremely high egos, compared to the other doctors who were trying to solve medical puzzles. I’m sure that stereotype is coming from somewhere (even if that place isn’t anywhere in reality).
Also, to get closer to returning to the subject, in the LegalEagle video just posted, Devin starts off by saying, “Not all lawyers are good. I cannot emphasize this enough.” Quite timely Mr. Stone!
Anecdote, but this is the Pit, so who cares. Several decades ago my step mother, a successful lawyer, was considering running for a Judge position.
After talking it over with her friends, partners, my father, and everyone else she decided it wasn’t worth it. Paraphrasing, as I don’t remember her exact words it went something like this.
“So I have to spend my time acting like a politician to appease the voters, dumb down my stance on issues for the papers, and get dismissed for my sex, only to have a successful result meaning I have to listen to horrible lawyers make arguments I could tear apart in seconds and have to give them an impartial judgement just because the other party was even worse? Hell no!”
Another anecdote. IANAL but have worked in law for 20+ years. I once knew an attorney that was a two time Jeopardy champion and failed the bar 6 times before he passed it. I’ve never been able to square those two facts.
I heard tell of one guy who spent 20 years trying to pass the Patent Agent’s exam in Canada. He was obviously good enough at his job as a junior in a patent agent firm to keep his job, but he just couldn’t get it together enough to ever pass the exam to qualify on his own as an independent agent.
Well, he’d probably have done okay if the bar exam had categories like Before & After, Science, Literature, American History, Potpourri, World History, Word Origins, Colleges & Universities, History, and Sports.
A court-appointed special master expressed frustration on Tuesday with the limited information he’s getting from the Justice Department and from defense lawyers for former President Donald Trumpabout disputes over documents seized from Mar-a-Lago.
Neither side has indicated which documents are disputed, apparently.
I don’t see where the Justice Dept. comes into this. The Trump team are the ones who are claiming that some documents are privileged. It’s up to THEM to tell the Special Master which ones. It’s not up to Justice to read the mind of the defence team.
I don’t, either. If trump is claiming everything is privileged, then it would seem to be on him to make a more specific argument. From the article it sounds like there’s some letter that trump has specifically claimed is privileged, but the DOJ has not acknowledged whether they received the letter or not. I don’t really understand it. An unsigned copy was found at MaL. The letter was addressed to the DOJ. Dearie wants both sides to decide amongst themselves whether or not the letter was mailed. I think.
So… I’m apparently confused here. Is Trump claiming that a letter he sent to the DOJ is “privileged material”, and so therefore the DOJ must not be allowed to see it?
" On Tuesday, Dearie pointed, for instance, to a letter that’s already in dispute as potentially private in the collection of documents taken from Trump’s Florida estate. The letter was apparently addressed to the Justice Department but the copy found in Mar-a-Lago was unsigned. The Justice Department hadn’t said if the agency had received it.
Dearie asked why the two sides can’t determine among themselves if the letter was sent, which would be a crucial fact to help the judge decide if it should be kept confidential.
“I don’t want to be dealing with nonsense objections, nonsense assertions, especially when I have one month to deal with who knows how many assertions,” said Dearie of the Eastern District of New York. "
My take: The Justice Department hadn’t said if the agency had received it.
The DOJ is telling Trump to go ahead and make his claims, before a judge. You asked for this, Trump, make a claim. We ain’t saying shit about shit, this is your shitshow.
That’s the way I’m taking it, but it makes zero sense. Maybe trump is saying he never sent it, and DOJ hasn’t said if they received a copy through the mail?
Trump’s counsel is asserting all docs are private/privileged.
One of the docs is an unsigned, unsent letter from Trump to DOJ.
DOJ has not said if they had received a copy of that letter.
Special Master is saying:
Trump counsel, tell me why this letter to the DOJ should be private/privileged.
DOJ, save us all the time and tell me if you have received this letter already so I can strike it from the list.
It makes sense that the DOJ wouldn’t comment; it is the Trump counsel’s job to make the argument. On the other hand if there isn’t a downside the DOJ could earn some good will by saving the SM some effort.
Having been in similar situations I suspect Trump’s team isn’t sure whether the letter was sent or not because Trump is so disorganised he couldn’t take a coffee order.
Trump’s team want to say “it wasn’t sent” so that it remains private, but they are scared that if they do, the DOJ will come up with clear evidence they received the letter, making Trump and his lawyers lose credibility. So Trump’s team are in a bind and the DOJ are more than happy to let them squirm.
What possibly gave it away? -chuckle-