JD Law Students Blog

To say we are having a blizzard is an understatement.  So far 2 -3 feet, yes FEET, have fallen!  Next the winds are coming according to the funky local weather guy on channel 5 that I am watching on my little 15 inch TV with rabbit ears, since I am too cheap and busy to justify purchasing satellite TV.  I haven’t seen snow like this in a few years now.  Last winter was a complete disappointment. 

Classes for the most part were cancelled (or should have been) since VLS closed at 12:30.  I think my Crim Law prof was crazy even trying to hold class this morning.  We were also suppose to host the Vermont Supreme Court but that didn’t happen – which is a bummer – I was really looking forward to that, so I hope they reschedule.  Anyway, my road wasn’t even plowed until late morning, and I just decided to stay put since I live on a winding 5 miles stretch of dirt road and hills with ditches everywhere.  My landlord who lives up the road attempted to go out today and wound up in the ditch up the road and can’t get out.   She drives a 4 wheel drive vehicle also, but it didn’t matter.  She is waiting for the plow guy to come pull her out. So, I think I made the right decision to stay put!

Anyway, I caught up on a lot of school work!  My paper on felony murder is coming along nicely.  I hate to say this but I am really enjoying criminal law.  I guess “enjoying” is not the right word to use, but it is so fascinating and I just find myself wanting to know more and more.

I also got outside to enjoy the snow for a bit today.  I strapped on my snowshoes and Orvis over the knee boots and other necessary gear, and packed down a path with my snowshoes from my front porch to the stairs leading to my car in my driveway – my unprotected no garage driveway.  Now mind you I have a big, tall SUV, and it is more than half covered in snow at this point.  I tried to stay ahead of it today.  I went out late morning, packed down a path, shoveled and cleared the car, started the car and backed up several times in the driveway so as to create a path to get out.  But, the snow kept falling and I got tired of repeating this task, so I said the heck with it. 

I just saw an enormous plow that looked like a steam shovel go by my window.  I guess that is what it takes to clear this road at this point, a giant construction like vehicle with huge tires.  My first class for tomorrow has already been cancelled, but my afternoon class is TBD.  With the winds, and all I have to ask myself is it worth risking life and limb for property law?  Hmmmm.  I’ll let my fellow classmates answer that and I’ll plead the 5th.

I love the snow at night, actually.  And it is Valentine’s day but I am without said Valentine tonight, but I can still enjoy the romantic connotations that stir from a white wonderland of snow.  The air is crisp and makes you feel alive.  I am a native Vermonter and I wouldn’t trade any of this to live anywhere else.  In fact, call me crazy, but I love it! 

To check out a fun website that show you how much snow my stomping ground up in the northeast kingdom is getting go to the Cole Pond Weathercam:  http://www.robertlyonsphotography.com/webcam/index.php

It updates about every minute and I think it is showing snowfall of almost 35 inches.

If you are a weather buff, this website is great!

Happy snow!

4 February 2007: Clear skies, ice cold.

It’s not my line, but it sure is eye-catching. Wasted effect, probably, as reproduced for my own brief commentary on an article you may have already read in today’s New York Times. David Bell asserts, in a piece entitled “The Peace Paradox,” that “the idea that warfare might actually end ha[s] a paradoxical effect, for it destroy[s] any rationale for waging war with restraint.”

He notes historical instances in which war has been prematurely declared obsolete; thus the ensuing disillusion. Although Bell may not fully endorse it, his critique strikes at the very heart of “progress” by suggesting that perpetration of horrors like Abu Ghraib and extraordinary rendition is a natural extension of utopian thinking. This descent into irrational and unrestrained warfare, at least on the part of Western society, is an indirect result of the Enlightenment itself.

As Bell writes, the “Enlightenment creed of secular human progress” anticipated an age of reason in which war would become patently unnecessary as a means to ensure national security. What it also gave birth to, as the author notes, were utopian dreams of a single civilization, unified by Reason. What the Enlightenment made possible, and what I think most destructive, is the perverted logic that endorses monocultural domination of the globe in the interests of utopian “peace,” potent irony in light of similarities to religious fanaticism.

E. O. Wilson, listing seven distinguished categories of innate human aggression, describes aggression “in defense and conquest of territory” and as a “defensive counterattack against predators.” Neither seems to adequately explain the current state of affairs. Another, the “moralistic and disciplinary aggression used to enforce the rules of society,” is what best characterizes “war on terror” rhetoric and perhaps the underlying motivations as well.

Within a given society, the rules enforced through disciplinary aggression go unspoken; they are understood. But extensive aggressive actions abroad and regular violations of the international code of war cannot be justified by reference to internal value systems unless the aggressor believes itself supported by Reason. A universal extension/imposition of normative values precedes unrestrained warfare. Right makes Might right.

What is needed is a new, post-Enlightenment concept of “peace.” To seriously consider the absence of all international hostilities a possibility is unreasonable. Wilson might suggest interlinking political and cultural ties as closely as possible as a disincentive to aggression. I would agree with him that a tendency to aggression has biological roots, yet can be culturally tempered. It is the belief that human aggression can be bred out through determined application of Reason that must go.

“It’s a war on war. . . . You have to lose. You have to learn how to die.” – Wilco

I’m still here! Still kicking! Just in case you were all sick with worry about me.

I survived exams, ok I did more than survive, I did very well as far as I am concerned. Hard work really does pay off. I also have learned immensely from this experience and will not make some of the same mistakes again on my next exams. It is really amazing how it all came together!

Anyway, it’s Thursday night, and I’m sure some of my classmates are goofing off at that bar down the street from school. (I am sure I would be doing the same thing in my younger days – I feel so old at the ripe age of well 30 something)

Many of us only have classes that start after 11am on Fridays. For me, Thursday night is a chance to catch up on re-writing (or typing up) my notes from classes and attempting to start an outline. I know boring stuff. Although I must admit, I don’t like the traditional outline. I do what I call a grid. I separate topics into categories and then list applicable terms and case law and any other examples in a nice nifty spreadsheet with columns. It worked pretty well for me during exams. My one regret is that I started it a little too late last semester. This semester, I won’t make that mistake. Then again, hindsight is 20/20. I am such an expert now, as John put it in his post, as a second semester 1L – yeah right! I spent more than half of the first semester just trying to figure which end was up. At least the initiation phase is over. Anyway, welcome back to the blog, John! I was one of those who called you a blog slacker, so glad to have you back! John is a great guy btw. We spent a lot of time during orientation together and then wound up having no classes together. Oh well, I’m sure our paths will cross someday.

If I can finish enough work tonight, I can maybe do some snowshoeing on Saturday, if we have enough snow, and then watch the Superbowl on Sunday. I am a bit sad this season – I was rooting of course for my beloved New England Patriots (although I am still a closet Giant fan – just don’t tell anyone). Then I was hoping for the Saints to win since that would have made quite a comeback story for the city. Now, I am probably hoping for Payton Manning and the Colts. So, that probably means the Bears will win. No matter, I just love football. Unlike baseball (sorry baseball fans) it is raw and rugged. There’s nothing like it. Then there are the ads and the cheesy half time show what is it Prince this year? Is he calling himself Prince again? I can’t keep up. I do remember when we all thought that the 1999 song was all that. Now it just seems well, silly.

So, back to work! Ironically, I am blasting my cheesy 80s hard rock ballads tonight. Some of which I must admit are on cassette as oppose to CD or digital media. Sad but true. There is nothing like listening to these “hits” on cassette tape – it really takes me back – Big hair and all. Back then I had tricked out bangs and they easily added a couple inches to my overall height – which was good since I’m only 5’ 2.” With bangs and my suede heeled boots that I wore all through high school I was easily 5’ 6.”

Sorry nothing too profound tonight. Maybe next time.