A Holiday Poem

Well, it's once again that time of year. Here's a little something I wrote a few years ago in law school. For it to make sense, here's a quick primer: freshmen live in dorms on the Boston College law school campus, Joe Liu was my Property professor, and the Asahi case spelled out the rules for obtaining jurisdiction over someone. Don't worry about the law jokes, though, it's mostly about Santa's substance abuse problem.

'Twas the Night Before Finals

Twas the night before finals, and in the library
Law students were stirring and starting to worry.

Their laptops were plugged into outlets with care
In hopes that their outlines soon would be there.

While students in college were snug in their beds
and visions of beer funnels danced in their heads,

I sat with my casebook propped up in my lap,
And stared at the pages of State vs. Shack.

When out in the lot there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the chair to see what was the matter.

Away to the window I shuffled and slouched,
Expecting to see an old dormit’ry couch

That had fallen and crashed on the new fallen snow,
While freshmen tossed more things to the ground down below.

When what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh and eight tiny reindeer.

With a little old driver so lively and true,
I thought for a moment it might be Joe Liu.

My eyes did deceive me I soon came to see,
For the beard on his chin came down near his knee.

My eyes, how they twinkled, my dimples, how deep,
For under the sleigh, I could see my crushed Jeep.

“A lawsuit!” I cried, as I ran out the door
To catch up with Santa and give him what for.

As I got out to see him, he turned with a jerk –
It was clear he’d been drinking ‘fore coming to work.

He nearly fell over, right out of his sleigh,
But I looked right up at him and started to say,

“You fucked up my Jeep, you stupid drunk dick.”
“It wasn’t my fault,” said fat old Saint Nick,

“It was that stripper named Vixen from two stops ago,
She didn’t have cookies, but knew how to --“

“Hey!” I said, “Nobody wants to hear that,
But for the sake of the Mrs. I hope it was wrapped.

Now back to this problem of you on my Jeep.
I’m going to sue you, and it’ll be steep.”

“Sue me?” said the elf. “I’d like you to try.”
“The court in Asahi says your ass is mine,

Unless we can settle right here and right now.”
“I’d like to,” he said, “but I don’t see how.”

“I want a new Jeep with really big tires.”
“Is that all,” he asked, “is there more you require?”

“Darn tootin’,” I said, “I need the exams
For all 1L courses so I can finish this cram.”

“I’ll do you one better,” he said looking sly
“If you won’t go tell about this little toy.”

He held out a bong from floor to his shoulder
That was mounted right there in a candy cane holder.

“I’ll give you the answers,” the old stoner wheezed,
And you’ll ace your exams with A’s and no B’s.”

“Sounds good to me, are they there in your sack?”
I asked the old devil as he reached in his pack.

“They are here in my hand,” and he gave them to me,
And I made lots of copies for the whole class to see.

So if you’re real tired and starting to crack,
And you’d like all the answers, just e-mail me back.


Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays everyone.
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No Red States, No Blue States, Just Football

President-elect Obama told us there are no Red States, and there are no Blue States. There are only the United States. He was 100% right, but it had nothing to do with politics. As a nation we are still divided on any number of political issues: abortion, bailouts, tax policy, the Clintons, immigration, war, gay rights, women's rights, etc, etc, etc. We do have common ground, however. It's football.

Go to Massachusetts on a crisp fall Sunday when the leaves are in full color. There, in the land of John Kerry, gay marriage, and legalized marijuana, there is only one thing that matters come Sunday afternoon - the Pats game.

Compare that to an autumn Sunday in Texas, when the weather is still as warm as a pit barbecue. There, in the land of George W. Bush, evangelicism, and oil companies, there is only one thing that matters come Sunday afternoon - the Cowboys game (or, if one was unlucky enough to be from Houston, the Texans game. Go Sage Rosenfels!)

To paraphrase Lee Greenwood [FN 1], from the lakes of Minnesota to the hills of Tennessee, across the plains of Texas, from sea to shining sea, we're proud to be American football fans.

I have a story that proves this fact.


My good friend Pipes and I went to Texas to visit our Army buddy, Bakes. Bakes was born and raised just outside Dallas, and was every inch the Great American Hero: strapping young lad, blond hair, blue eyes, high school football player, West Point graduate, Army officer, married to his high school sweetheart, and life-long Texas A&M fan. Pipes and I flew to Dallas, hopped into Bakes's ginormous pick-up truck, and drove to the heart of A&M football - Aggieland, aka College Station, Texas.

Now, I grew up in NJ, where football is certainly popular - what kind of a week people are having often depends on how well the Giants or Jets are doing. But football in Texas is something else entirely. Once you get within 60 miles of College Station, you are in Aggieland. The water towers and billboards proclaim the greatness of the Aggies. Everything from gas stations to restaurants to doctors offices is dedicated to Aggie fanaticism. Every radio and television station covers some aspect of Aggie football.

We drove into College Station, and Bakes nosed his monster truck through the throngs of maroon-clad fans that mobbed the streets. We had arrived hours before the game - in which the Aggies would face the Cornhuskers of Nebraska - and the pre-game celebrations were already in full swing. "Where to?" I asked Bakes. "We're goin' to the Dixie Chicken," Bakes said, spitting a stream of Copenhagen juice into a Coke can.

Ah, the Dixie Chicken: a cowboy football bar to beat all others. A single-story pine-board building housing hundreds of feet of bar, serving cold beer and hot wings to the hundreds of Aggie faithful that mob it each weekend.

Bakes found a nearby parking spot and our intrepid trio walked into the bar. Inside was a sea of Aggie fans in maroon and gray, interspersed with a few brave Nebraska fans. Raucous groups of fans circled around their pitchers of Bud and Shiner Bock, scarfing down nachos and wings. Solid Red-Staters all. Bakes, Pipes and I grabbed a few pitchers and found an unoccupied corner between some Aggie college kids and Nebraska alums.

We drank up, and Pipes pulled out his camera for some group shots. We passed the camera around, each of us taking pictures of the other two. We looked around to ask someone to take a picture of all three of us. Who to ask? Aggie kids? Cornhusker alums? "How about that guy?" asked Bakes.

He pointed at a tall feller standing 20th in line for the men's room. "Who, the guy in the blue rugby shirt?" I asked. "Yeah," he said.

Pipes put his beer down and said, "Hey, you know who that is?" I gave him a blank look and shrugged. "That's Mark Cuban, the owner of the Dallas Mavericks."

For those who don't know, Mark Cuban is a multi-billionaire. He lives in a 24,000 square foot mansion just outside Dallas. Recently, he was doing the Watusi with Wayne Brady on "Don't Forget the Lyrics." But there he was, elbow to elbow with the hoi polloi, waiting his turn for the pisser, enjoying some authentic football Americana.

"Let's get a picture with him," I said. "Nah," said Pipes, "People've probably been bothering him for that all day."

"Ok," said Bakes. "Let's just ask him to take a picture of us." He grabbed the camera and tapped Cuban on the shoulder.

"Yeah," Mark Cuban asked, looking at Bakes and eying the camera. "Excuse me, sir, but would you take a picture of me and my friends?" asked Bakes, smiling widely. Mark Cuban looked at him quizzically, clearly taken aback. I think he had a "Don't you know who I am?" moment. But Bakes didn't blink (good Republican that he is, he's incapable of blinking in the face of adversity). Mark Cuban recovered his composure, smiled and said, "Sure!"

He took the camera, and Bakes stepped back and put his arms around me and Pipes. Cuban held up the camera and focused it. "A little closer, guys." We got closer. "No, cheek to cheek," he said. We got cheek to cheek. "Good. On 3. 1, 2, 3." Flash, click. "One more, just in case," Cuban said. Flash, click. "Ok guys, that's great," he said.

Bakes stepped forward and took the camera back. "Thanks a lot, sir, I really appreciate it," Bakes said. "Oh, no problem guys," said Cuban, and he turned to resume his place in line. Bakes came back over to our corner, and we noticed the dropped jaws of the Aggie kids and Husker alums around us.

"Y'all know who that was?" asked one of the Nebraska guys. "Yeah," said Pipes, "that was Mark Cuban." "Well that's about the most awesome thing I've seen," said the Nebraska guy, laughing, and he high-fived us all around.

Indeed, it was pretty awesome. It's not every day you can get the billionaire owner of a championship-caliber sports franchise to take your picture in a bar.

And even more awesome was the disparate group brought together by this little scene: Bakes, the red-blooded Texan; Pipes, the hockey kid from Minnesota, don'cha know; me, from Joisey; the Husker and Aggie fans that would be clamoring for each other's heads in the upcoming game; and one of the richest men in America who really just had to pee. But backgrounds didn't matter, because we were all united in our desire for cold beer and good football.

See, there are no Red States, and there are no Blue States. Just the United States of Football. The end.

[FN 1] Lee Greenwood pretty much has one hit, "Proud to be an American." Because this song only gets air time when America goes to war, I wonder if it bothers Lee that the amount of his royalties directly corresponds to the severity of our armed conflicts.
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Hi, Mom? I'm in federal custody.

I just finished a conversation with my housemate, RB. In the parlance of our times, she's totally in the tank for Obama. Yesterday, she spent 12 hours en route to and from Obama's final campaign stop in Manassas, VA. Tonight she has a slate of 3 election parties to attend. Our conversation covered a lot of electiony topics, one of which was whether the Republicans would attempt to rig the outcome by challenging provisional ballots. She was generally opposed to provisional ballots, while I said they helped both sides. For example, I argued, wouldn't the Democrats want to challenge provisional ballots if a judge kept polls open to support a Republican candidate?

Maybe, she conceded. Nevertheless, she didn't trust the Republicans, and wouldn't lower her guard until McCain conceded. Then she went to bed, so as to be peppy during her full evening of Obamamania.

After she left, the question of federal judges and their politics sent my mind to wondering. However, the question of federal judicial politics is boring, so I ended up recalling my own experience working for a federal judge. Which brings me to the story I really want to tell you:

Politics play a very small role in a federal judge's job. Mostly, they handle apolitical cases, or are handcuffed into imposing statutorily required sentences that prevent "liberal" judges from "letting criminals off easy." However, nestled in a judge's humdrum day of initial appearances, warrant-granting, discovery hearings, and pre-trial conferences, there sometimes appears a real gem of a case. For example:



I once worked for Judge B, a federal district court judge. Every day after lunch, we'd go down to the courtroom for an afternoon of work - some civil, some criminal. The criminal cases were almost always drug-related and featured a young man wearing the latest in gangland haute couture or federal-issue orange. Except once.

One afternoon, as the other clerks and I entered the courtroom with the Judge, I looked at the defendant's table. There sat a young white male in his late teens or early 20's. He was decked out in preppie fall classics: wire-rim glasses, green sweater over white button down, jeans, and birkenstocks. Oh, and handcuffs and leg irons.

'Hm,' I thought to myself, 'this is out of the ordinary.' I looked questioningly at my fellow clerk, but he just shrugged. We took our usual seats next to the bench, and the courtroom clerk announced Judge B and opened the proceedings.

"Your Honor, first we have the initial appearance of Topher McWhitey," the courtroom clerk, Mark, announced.

"Very well," Judge B. said. She looked at the U.S. Attorney at the prosecutor's table. "Mr. U.S. Attorney?" she prompted.

The U.S. Attorney stood and cleared his throat. "Your Honor, Topher McWhitey is here on his initial appearance," he began. "Federal agents apprehended him in class at Boston University this morning, and he is being charged with 28 counts of international drug trafficking." My eyes widened, my co-clerk and I looked at each other, and we both sat up in our seats.

"Go on," said Judge B.

'Yes, do go on,' I thought, pen poised above my yellow legal pad.

"Your Honor, Topher McWhitey was arrested this morning after his co-conspirators were arrested while attempting to bring 2000 pounds of marijuana from Canada into Idaho. Upon their arrest, they identified Mr. McWhitey as the central figure in the drug trafficking scheme. I have prepared for the court a list of the 28 charges Mr. McWhitey faces, and have also provided the list to Mr. McWhitey's counsel."

Mark handed the list of charges to Judge B. She pursed her lips as she looked over it. "Mr. U.S. Attorney, what punishment does Mr. McWhitey face?" "Well," said U.S. Attorney, "he faces a mandatory minimum of 25 years, and statutory maximum of 40 years."

Geez! They yanked him out of class?! 25 years minimum?! A freaking ton of marijuana! And his buddies already rolled on him, so no plea bargain! This dude was way, way up Shit's Creek, and nary a paddle was in sight.

"Mr. McWhitey, please stand," said Judge B. He stood, as did his attorney. "I need some information for your packet, Mr. McWhitey. What is your address?"

He gave an address off Commonwealth Avenue. "You go to Boston University," said Judge B. "Is that your permanent address or your school address."

Topher looked green around the gills, althought it might have been his sweater. "That's my school address, ma'am," he said, looking at the table in front of him.

"Please address the court as 'Your Honor', not ma'am," said Judge B. "Sorry," mumbled Topher. "Now," said Judge B., "do you have roommates in Boston?"

"I live in a house with 5 other guys." said Topher. His lawyer nudged him. "Oh, uh, Your Honor," he said.

Hm, a house with 5 other dudes? I could only imagine things in that house that evening:
First Dude: "Hey guys, anyone seen Topher?"
Second Dude, playing XBox: "No, haven't seen him all day."
Third Dude, watching Second Dude play XBox: "You didn't hear? The fuzz dragged him out of Econ this morning. Heard it was the Feds."
First and Second Dudes: "Shit, man, no way."
Third Dude: "I know, right. Think Topher's a terrorist?"
First Dude: "Nah, it's probably drugs."
Uncomfortable pause in conversation while XBox bleeps and blorps.
Second dude drops XBox controller, exeunt rapidly.
Moments later follows the sound of marijuana being flushed down toilets.

"Ok, Mr. McWhitey," said Judge B. "And what is your home address?" Topher gave an address in Idaho. "Is that your parents' house?" asked Judge B. "It is," said Topher. "Have you been in contact with them?" asked Judge B. "I called my Mom this morning, after, well, this whole thing," said Topher. "She wasn't home, though, so I had to leave a message."

Awesome! Beep. "Hi Mom, this is Topher. I just wanted to let you know I got those socks you sent me. They're really great, thanks. Have I said I love you recently? Because it's really important you know how much I love you. And Dad too. And also Uncle Chuck. He's a lawyer, right? Could you call him for me? I kind of got a little bit arrested this morning. It's not like a big deal or anything, but I think you should really call Uncle Chuck. And, if you could, see if he knows anything about international drug trafficking charges. Ok? That'd be really great. Thanks. I love you guys."

"That's ok, Mr. McWhitey," said the Judge. "You'll be able to call home later. Now, you recognize you're facing some very serious charges, don't you?" "Yes, Your Honor" said Topher, looking up at the Judge, and then sighing as he looked up at the ceiling. Maybe he was hoping for a bolt of lightning to strike him dead before his first night in federal lockup. I know I would have been.

Judge B. looked at the sheet of charges. "Mr. McWhitey, I have no idea how you got your hands on so much marijuana. Nor do I have any idea what you planned to do with it once you got it into this country. However, I counsel you to cooperate with the U.S. Government and give them as much information as you can. If you do not cooperate, you could be in prison for the next quarter century, or longer."

By this point, I was riveted and bursting with questions: How'd you get into this, Topher? Paying gambling debts? Adventure? Medical bills? What? And who's your connection? Are you just a dopey kid that grew a bunch of weed in the woods and tried to sneak it over the border? Or does this go higher? Unfortunately, no answers were forthcoming.

Also unfortunate, for Topher anyway, was his list of options. Either he was the mastermind of this operation, which meant he was going to jail for 25-40. Or, he could flip on his boss to get a reduced sentence, but spend the rest of his life in witness protection. Either way, it wasn't likely the outcome he planned with his buddies back in Idaho.

Judge B. wrapped up some formalities, and the U.S. Marshalls collected up Topher. He did the leg-iron shuffle as he followed them out the door and back to the holding cell where he'd wait for a prisoner transport van. From there, if he was lucky, he'd get a con-air flight to Idaho that night. If he was unlucky, Judge B. said, he'd trade his J. Crew threads for a jumpsuit, spend the night in holding, and get a prison bus to Idaho.

Gah, a prison bus to Idaho? I suppose if there's anything worse than a regular bus to Idaho, it would have to be a prison bus to Idaho, but still. Poor Topher was F-U-K fucked.

And that's why I voted to decriminalize possession of 1 oz. or less of marijuana in Massachusetts. The end.

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