George Carlin on humans & agendas

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George Carlin was not only funny, but also keenly incisive about human nature:

"I love human beings one at a time. Individuals are fine, but then they get into groups. And then they have an agenda—which is usually to do something to other people."

Politicians are mildly bearable one at time. But when they get into groups (e.g. legislatures, or Congress) and the mischief starts. Dangle money, power and fame in front of them and it gets horrible. I recommend you get this book and read pages 61 and 62 if you want to eavesdrop on how it works.

Following Sarah Palin

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Tonight's debate should be entertaining even if it promises to be uninformative. The pundits are boiling over with all manner of speculation, such as: Will Joe Biden come across as too overbearing? Will Sarah Palin commit any gaffes? Will the looming financial collapse play a factor in the debate?

My big question is this: will Sarah Palin be doing live updates to her Twitter page during the actual debate? Given her spunk, I'd bet that she will.

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American (as opposed to Nigerian) email scam

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Dear American:

I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a transfer of funds of great magnitude.

I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most profitable to you.

I am working with Mr. Phil Gram, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the 1990s. This transactin is 100% safe.

This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.

Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to wallstreetbailout@treasury.gov so that we may transfer your commission for this transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds.

Yours Faithfully Minister of Treasury Paulson

(Thanks to Billy for sending this along)

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Gimme that Old Time Religion, procedurally speaking

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Picture_1As you know, I favor looking for new ways to do things in the legal profession. I don't like boilerplate language in pleadings because, first of all, no one reads it. One place where you see a lot of crusty legal prose is in the concluding section of pleadings. Many people refer to this area as the 'prayer for relief' section. That is no longer an accurate description of the section; a prayer is something solemn, or at least it's supposed to be.

Why, then, don't lawyers make the prayer section more solemn, more devotional?

I don't know. Maybe it has to do with that pesky fear of merging religion with government. Whatever. So, in keeping with my celebration of those who think outside the narrow legal box, I commend the plaintiff in this case (PDF FILE) for pushing the juridical envelope. Now we have a clear example of what a prayer for relief should look like.

Adjust your boilerplate accordingly.

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Learn to negotiate from a pro

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Negotiation is an art, but one that can definitely be learned. The best way to learn is by watching someone who's really good. CEOs like Donald Trump or Steve Jobs have to be great negotiators; it's a given.  I'm not much of  Trump fan, but I have often wondered how Steve Jobs negotiates.  Guess what?  Today he decided to share some of his best tips in his blog post entitled I love to F&%k with Car Salesmen.  Obviously, most of these techniques are not for beginners.

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Donnie says 'you suck at Photoshop...'

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Over the years I've bought a few books that were designed to teach me to use Photoshop, a wonderful image editing program that is also extremely complex.  Invariably, the manuals don't help me because they're boring.  But now it appears that I have finally found the Holy Grail of Photoshop instruction.  Some guy named Donnie has been creating video tutorials called "You Suck at Photoshop."  The tutorials are roaringly funny. 

In episode #5 Donnie plans to take a last minute beach vacation and shows you how he plans to create a hammock.  During the tutorial his boss keeps interrupting him and we discover that, while Donnie is great at Photoshop, he's a total slacker. Obviously, the whole thing is staged.  Which is what makes it so ingenious.

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New techniques in corporate management

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Picture_1 Michael Lewis' excellent book Moneyball was purportedly about the emerging "science of management" in baseball, and how the Oakland Athletics used this science to win an improbably high number of games.  The number of games won was 'improbably high' because their payroll was the second lowest in baseball.  Moneyball (which I wrote about here) was really a study of corporate management techniques in general.  Apparently baseball is shedding its traditionally stodgy approach, and adopting new ways of dealing with management problems.

Some of these new management approaches that baseball managers are developing can now be found online. This video is one great example of the new 'out of the box' thinking taking place in baseball.  I guess you can say there's still a lot of 'art' in the 'science of management.'

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NASA - not so good at screening, but great at training

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Shuttle Here's a crazy observation: NASA's screening process is not perfect, but you can't criticize them too harshly.  Lisa Nowak was exceptionally well-trained, which is why she was almost able to complete a very difficult (albeit illegal and completely rogue) "mission."  Wearing diapers while driving a thousand miles is not only a sign of ingenuity; it also shows real 'mission focus.'

I'm not so sure that NASA can be faulted for having hired someone who blew a mental fuse (if so, then let's shut down the postal service).  But maybe they did something wrong.  Now that the mainstream press is tuned in I guess we'll soon find out.  But, meanwhile, let's focus on what NASA did right.   On the Daily Show last night their "space correspondent" observed that the closest Russia's program ever got to putting an astronaut near a targeted murder victim was 400 miles.  Obviously, NASA's astronauts are formidable, both in space and on Earth.

So that's one thing that we've got going for us, which is nice.

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What ever happened to Jack Handey?

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Pug_puppy Many of you may remember Jack Handey from the old Saturday Night Live days.  He was the guy who did 'Deep Thoughts,' which were hyper-wierd observations that were offered with the innocent patois of a Hallmark Greeting Card.  You never got to see Jack Handey.  You only heard his soothing voice as he said something like:

"If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason."

Every once in awhile I would wonder what happend to Jack Handey.  Then just the other day I came across this article he wrote for the New Yorker about his First Day in Hell.  The opening paragraph immediately drew me in:

My first day in Hell is drawing to a close.  They don’t really have a sunset here, but the  fires seem to dim a bit, and the screaming gets more subdued. Most of the demons are asleep now, their pointy tails curled up around them.  They look so innocent, it’s hard to believe that just a few hours ago they were raping and torturing us.

Go on, read the whole thing.  Maybe it will motivate you to start looking for salvation.

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Why new drug ads tout side effects

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Pills I noticed the other day, while watching a TV advertisement, that drug companies are getting more comfortable talking about the side effects of the drugs they are promoting.  At first blush it seems counter-productive.  But, if you consider the inevitable litigation that will ensue, it's actually a very smart move. As we all know by now, people don't pay attention to warnings, so why not feature them prominently in TV ads?   

Here's why this is a good idea. If the drug sounds enticing the potential consumer will focus only on the benefits, and downplay the side-effects. Some people will experience side-effects and sue the drug company.  But when that happens the drug manufacturers can point to the TV ads and say 'geez, what else do you want us to do to inform you about side-effects?'  A powerful argument, to be sure.  Indeed, this new advertising strategy is so clever that even manufacturers of older drugs are using it.  For example, note how an advertisement for this social anxiety drug briefly touts some benefits, but then gives a laborious list of side-effects. 

Hey, I'm ready to try it myself.

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The New Living Will Form

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I don't practice much Estate law, but the other day someone sent me a new form for a Living Will and asked me to help them update it.  Obviously, no one wants to think about death, but it's one of those inevitable occurrences; so it behooves us to think about it at least to the point of making a few important plans.  After making changes to the Living Will form that my friend sent me, I thought I'd upload it here (pdf file) for commentary and suggestions for improvement.  Remember folks, this is serious stuff.

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