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You are here: Home / Politics / Activist Judges! / No One Expects the Spanish Inquisition Socratic Method!

No One Expects the Spanish Inquisition Socratic Method!

by John Cole|  May 12, 20106:11 pm| 108 Comments

This post is in: Activist Judges!, Clown Shoes

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I’m sure as soon as the wingnuts get done furiously googling the+Socratic+method and figure out it is not a lesbian sexual technique, they will in no time agree that this line of attack will surely sink the Kagan nomination.

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Reader Interactions

108Comments

  1. 1.

    Mike Kay

    May 12, 2010 at 6:16 pm

    MY GOD! Obama has nominated a MONSTER!

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wOUMd3bMRI

    Watch reich marshal kagan in action, as she beats teh shit out of a poor hippie.

  2. 2.

    Jim C.

    May 12, 2010 at 6:19 pm

    Oh no!

    She called on people in class and if you weren’t prepared you looked like an idiot!

    Now what is it that judges on the Supreme Court do when people are presenting arguments before them? It seems vaguely similar to asking questions and probing the law students (or in this case the lawyers) in front of them.

  3. 3.

    taylormattd

    May 12, 2010 at 6:20 pm

    I’m so glad you are poking fun at this. I read Paul Campos’ latest stupidity on Kagan in disbelief. I mean really. She shouldn’t be a Supreme Court Justice because she taught using the Socratic method?

    Wow.

    Believe me, I hated the assholes who still used this method when I was in law school, but my god. What a stupid fucking post. And it goes on forever.

    He doesn’t have to be this crazy. Some of the quasi-anti-kagan posts from Scott over at LGM have been very good, and pretty persuasive.

    But this crap.

    I swear, Campos regularly trolls the front page of that site. Lately, it’s been crazy Kagan posts, but he quite frequently causes an outrage by writing about how wonderfully healthy it is to be morbidly obese, and then somehow trying to work discrimination against gays into those posts.

  4. 4.

    Midnight Marauder

    May 12, 2010 at 6:20 pm

    Wow. That is some incredibly extraneous exaggeration.

    EDIT: And I like how that entire post is about some asshole student who says:

    I hated the Socratic method, and while many people in my section were so terrified of Kagan that they did their Civ Pro reading before anything else, I quickly fell into the habit of not doing my Civ Pro reading. Hell, we were just going to spend half of class rehashing what people already read the night before. In my 1L mind, I was being efficient.
    __
    So it came that one Friday morning I was cold-called. I wasn’t even in the ballpark of being prepared. But I didn’t want to waste everybody’s time. So I responded: “Professor Kagan, honestly I didn’t get to all of the reading for today’s class. Sadly, I think I need to pass on this one.”
    __
    Bzzt. Wrong answer:

    Yeah. If it was National Sympathy Day, you gets no sympathy.

  5. 5.

    The Moar You Know

    May 12, 2010 at 6:20 pm

    Oh my. Mr. Campos doesn’t like Ms. Kagan’s methods of teaching stupid, willfully unprepared students a valuable life lesson. The butthurt and whining from the source blog is unreal and must be read to be believed:

    Like Frodo on Weathertop, there are some wounds that never fully heal. Professor Kagan massacred me intellectually, and brutalized my pride. I got some form of a B in her class (I honestly don’t remember if there was a modifier — I’ve tried to suppress those memories). Kagan was a frightening professor for those who wanted to match wits with the brightest legal minds in the world. For people like me, people who just wanted to get through law school with minimal mental damage, Kagan was nothing short of terrifying.

    I like her now.

    That Elie Mystal, author of the source article, is a lawyer is a damn shame. Someone with an attitude like his shouldn’t have been allowed to graduate.

  6. 6.

    General Egali Tarian Stuck

    May 12, 2010 at 6:21 pm

    As Glenn Greenwald points out, skepticism about the Kagan appointment issuing from anyone left of Miguel Estrada (who by the way thinks Kagan is a terrific pick) has been met with the sort of response engendered by essentially tribal loyalties. “Our” team’s captain has made his decision, and now it’s time for everybody to get dutifully on message.

    All I cared to read from this post. And that was too much.

  7. 7.

    freelancer

    May 12, 2010 at 6:21 pm

    I read that, and while LGM has published some valid criticism of Kagan in the past week, this is ridiculous.

  8. 8.

    Short Bus Bully

    May 12, 2010 at 6:21 pm

    She was mean to students who didn’t come prepared to class? How is this different than anything anyone else has endured in any higher level university class?

    R. Lee Emery fits this occassion nicely: “I’m here to weed out all the non-hackers who do not pack the gear to serve in my beloved Corp! Do you maggots understand that?”

    What, do you think the judge is going to give you time to read up on a case if you walk into court with just your dick in your hand?

    Pussies.

  9. 9.

    From Both Sides

    May 12, 2010 at 6:23 pm

    Someone’s not been keeping up with trends in education – I’ve seen a lot _more_ use of the Socratic method by instructors, because the material sticks far more when the students carry out the line of reasoning rather than being spoon-fed the information. You not only learn the material, but the process of analysis that can be used on far more than any case or (in my situation) historical incident.

  10. 10.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    May 12, 2010 at 6:26 pm

    @General Egali Tarian Stuck: I haven’t had time to read anything in depth on Kagan, I’ve been mostly absorbing secondary critiques, but this seems to be about as deep as it gets: She hasn’t proved that she isn’t a crypto-fascist so she must be one, and conservatives don’t hate her, so she must be evil.

  11. 11.

    Mark S.

    May 12, 2010 at 6:27 pm

    What a mean old lesbian. Professors usually love it when you show up unprepared for class. I’m sure Scalia never did something like that. He’s so gentle to lawyers who present bad arguments to the Court.

  12. 12.

    General Egali Tarian Stuck

    May 12, 2010 at 6:29 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: It is politics just as intellectually empty and scorched earth as the wingnuts practice.

  13. 13.

    Fergus Wooster

    May 12, 2010 at 6:29 pm

    What the fuck? Have none of these people seen “The Paper Chase”?

    She was schooling future lawyers, for Chrissake, at Harvard. If you want easy case studies with no Socratic call-outs, go to fucking business school.

  14. 14.

    ulee

    May 12, 2010 at 6:30 pm

    I think Kagen is a Socratic lesbian. She should not be confirmed.

  15. 15.

    Brien Jackson

    May 12, 2010 at 6:31 pm

    My favorite thing about the source post is that, not only does the author admit they had no interest in doing the work (I wonder how many thousands of people who didn’t get into HLS would have loved the opportunity to suffer that class?), the class in question is civil procedure. I’m neither a lawyer nor a law school student, but if I’m not mistaken that’s roughly the class that instructs you on basic legal procedures you need to know in order to represent your clients. So while this entitled asshat couldn’t be bothered to care, I’m sure their client would care very much if they fucked up a case because they couldn’t be bothered to do the reading in a 1L class.

  16. 16.

    themann1086

    May 12, 2010 at 6:31 pm

    Campos really is a moron, isn’t he?

    His comments are even worse though, as he lashes out incoherently and doubles down on whatever stupid thing he’s defending.

  17. 17.

    K488

    May 12, 2010 at 6:31 pm

    A few years ago Jane Smiley wrote a book called Moo, which takes place at a large midwestern university (not unlike where I work). One of the gags in it involved the upper administration referring to the students as “customers,” and wanting the faculty to know that the customer was always right. No gag; that simply reproduced the language that had been introduced by our then University President and his Provost. Every time I hear about students whining about how they were treated in class, I think of that image and squirm. I’m squirming now.

  18. 18.

    Mark S.

    May 12, 2010 at 6:32 pm

    Next week:

    Prof. Kagan Failed Me When I Didn’t Show Up For The Final Exam! Stop Hitting Me!

  19. 19.

    Brien Jackson

    May 12, 2010 at 6:33 pm

    I think Campos has something personal against Kagan, I really do. The level of butthurt in his posts on her have completely lapped everyone else.

  20. 20.

    WereBear

    May 12, 2010 at 6:33 pm

    Get out! You mean that’s supposed to be a detriment? Terrifying 1L’s into doing their homework?

    The horror.

  21. 21.

    Wile E. Quixote

    May 12, 2010 at 6:35 pm

    @Cole, master of Lily, pawn of Tunch

    I’m sure as soon as the wingnuts get done furiously googling the+Socratic+method and figure out it is not a lesbian sexual technique, they will in no time agree that this line of attack will surely sink the Kagan nomination.

    What with recent events who can blame them? I remember when “Hiking the Appalachian Trail” meant going for a hike on the Appalachian trail and not taking a taxpayer funded sex junket to Buenos Aires and when doing a Google search for the phrase “carrying my luggage” didn’t turn up this story. Of course saying “I have a wide stance” has always sounded totally gay.

    As an upside to all of the time I spent over on Urban Dictionary trying (and failing) to find the dirty meaning of “Socratic Method” I did learn that “Stinky Hitler” is a synonym for “Dirty Sanchez”.

  22. 22.

    stevie314159

    May 12, 2010 at 6:36 pm

    When I was at business school, where they also use the Socratic method, one day the professor called on one of my (unprepared) classmates.

    He asked her something about a XYZ marketing plan and her opinion on it.

    After a brief pause, with a totally straight face, she replied “I’ll have to get back to you on that”.

    Highlight of my 2 years there.

  23. 23.

    Gordon S

    May 12, 2010 at 6:36 pm

    “Socratic Method”? I’m sorry, I thought you said “Sapphic Method,” which, if it isn’t a homoerotic move, should be coined right now.

  24. 24.

    taylormattd

    May 12, 2010 at 6:36 pm

    @WereBear: the fact that she assigned any kind of “homework” or “reading” is evidence she is tied to an old, washed-up method of teaching and is ill-suited for the Supreme Court.

  25. 25.

    Fergus Wooster

    May 12, 2010 at 6:37 pm

    @WereBear: Seriously. What the fuck? I couldn’t believe what I was reading.

    Blank slate, fine, executive power concerns, I get it. But between Sully and the Reichtards deciding she’s a crypto-lesbian and this Campos asshole raising the alarm that ZOMG as a professor she expected you to do your reading assignments, I have a distinct “We’re All Mayans Now” feeling.

  26. 26.

    Mark

    May 12, 2010 at 6:38 pm

    Irrespective of what Kagan actually did, I love the reflexive defense of the professor’s right to be a total asshole to her students.

    Just like in the real world, huh? If your boss is a jerk, none of her employees transfer or quit, and she never gets reprimanded or fired. Maybe in 1962.

  27. 27.

    Germane Jackson

    May 12, 2010 at 6:39 pm

    It’s interesting how conservatives and libertarian types are all “bootstraps” and “survival of the fittest” and “personal responsibility” except in the case of having to read 30 pages of case law at Harvard Law School.

  28. 28.

    Gordon S

    May 12, 2010 at 6:39 pm

    Sapphic Method: technique of questioning whereby the inquisitor tries to determine if a female is a lesbian, but ultimately announces to the world that the inquisitor has indeed shagged goats. See also: Kaus, Mickey; Victory, Pyrric (but without the victory).

  29. 29.

    Donald G

    May 12, 2010 at 6:39 pm

    Heaven forbid a lawyer arguing before an appellate or supreme court should be prepared to know case law and be able to think on his feet and justify his reasoning when answering probing questions from a potentially hostile judge.

    Do these lawyers for whom the Socratic method is too traditional and authoritarian think Scalia’s going to go easy on them and give you a pass just because your degree is from Harvard Law?

  30. 30.

    Scott

    May 12, 2010 at 6:40 pm

    Oh no! She wasn’t a fun professor! That means she won’t be a fun Supreme Court Justice!

  31. 31.

    Brien Jackson

    May 12, 2010 at 6:40 pm

    @K488:

    FWIW, getting humiliated in section of my Political Theory class as a freshman was one of the best things that ever happened to me. It wasn’ta dressing down or anything, but I definitely underestimated how much involvement with the material the class was going to require, and the professor must have sniffed it out, because she disabused me of my misconception in the second week. For one thing, it was good to get smacked in the face with the differenece between college courses and high school (or even introductory level college classes). For another, it was certainly kind of the professor to deliver that lesson in a meaningless classroom discussion rather than, say, on the midterm or my first paper. As it was, I put more effort into the reading and wound up with an “A,” something I certainly wouldn’t have gotten if I’d bombed the first paper because I didn’t take the course seriously enough.

  32. 32.

    mistersnrub

    May 12, 2010 at 6:40 pm

    Everyone at my school was absolutely terrified of their Civ Pro prof – it’s basically a prerequisite to use the Socratic Method if you’re going to teach that subject.

    Oh, and Socratic = Greek = Boy fuckers = SHE’S GAY!!!

  33. 33.

    taylormattd

    May 12, 2010 at 6:41 pm

    @Mark: Um no. It’s called law school. Quite a few professors are still like that. Forgive me if I don’t QQ for the little shits lucky enough to get into Harvard Law.

  34. 34.

    Midnight Marauder

    May 12, 2010 at 6:41 pm

    @Gordon S:

    “Socratic Method”? I’m sorry, I thought you said “Sapphic Method,” which, if it isn’t a homoerotic move, should be coined right now.

    Uh, wouldn’t the “Sapphic Method” be more lesboerotic?

  35. 35.

    Brien Jackson

    May 12, 2010 at 6:43 pm

    @Mark:

    Huh? I’m taking the student’s story at face value and concluding the professor had a total right to give them the business.

  36. 36.

    Midnight Marauder

    May 12, 2010 at 6:44 pm

    @Mark:

    Irrespective of what Kagan actually did, I love the reflexive defense of the professor’s right to be a total asshole to her students.
    __
    Just like in the real world, huh? If your boss is a jerk, none of her employees transfer or quit, and she never gets reprimanded or fired. Maybe in 1962.

    I hated the Socratic method, and while many people in my section were so terrified of Kagan that they did their Civ Pro reading before anything else, I quickly fell into the habit of not doing my Civ Pro reading.

    In the real world, if you decide that you don’t want to prepare for your job, you get fired. End of story.

    And students who decide they don’t much care for lesson plans typically don’t do very well, either.

  37. 37.

    Chyron HR

    May 12, 2010 at 6:45 pm

    @Mark:

    Oh, no! That total asshole gave Whineypants “some form of a B in her class”. She was just like Galadriel’s evil sister Beruthiel! What a total asshole!

  38. 38.

    gwangung

    May 12, 2010 at 6:47 pm

    @Mark: This is one of the more witless comments I’ve ever read on this board.

    You deserve the full weight of whatever comments are coming your way.

  39. 39.

    Donald G

    May 12, 2010 at 6:49 pm

    @taylormattd:

    Um no. It’s called law school. Quite a few professors are still like that. Forgive me if I don’t QQ for the little shits lucky enough to get into Harvard Law.

    Look at is as a kind of legal SERE training, to prepare elite young lawyers to withstand harsh treatment from mean, cranky, sarcastic judges.

  40. 40.

    Citizen_X

    May 12, 2010 at 6:52 pm

    @Mark:

    I love the reflexive defense of the professor’s right to be a total asshole to her students.

    Oh, boo-fucking-hoo. When you’re practicing criminal law and you’re unprepared, your client spends two extra years in prison unnecessarily. When you’re a sloppy engineer, your bridge collapses and kills people. When you’re an inattentive medical researcher, the drug side effects you ignored kill hundreds. Etc, etc.

    Here’s to the asshole professors that protect us from those people.

  41. 41.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    May 12, 2010 at 6:52 pm

    A featured comment from LGM:

    Obama could have nominated a real liberal like Wood or Karlan and expected to pay a an equally small political price in 2012. The fact that he didn’t confirms, for me anyway, that he prefers David Ignatius’s “beloved center”, the place where Washington, Wall Street, and the Ivy League meet and congratulate themselves for being Serious.

    Jesus fucking christ. Do people really not get that Democrats and Republicans do not play on a level field? That the mid-term electorate is not the presidential electorate? That Obama’s “super-majority” includes Blanche Lincoln, Jim Webb and Mark Pryor? I actually would have preferred Wood, and I think, barring anything about abortion or gay rights that could be demagogued to an extraordinary degree, she would have been confirmed. But it would have been an ugly couple of months filled with, yes, Very Serious Concern from Hiatt Central that Barack Obama had moved “too far left”. Maybe that would’ve provoked a backlash from women and social moderates, I would hope so. But it’s not as simple as people (desperately want to) think.

  42. 42.

    Pete

    May 12, 2010 at 6:52 pm

    Dear Leader Greenwald and Duchess Hamsher have chosen this to be their Firebagger line in the sand, and every fool who wants to prove they are as intellectually honest as they’d like to believe they are will join in to show they aren’t in-the-tank O-Bots.

  43. 43.

    celticdragonchick

    May 12, 2010 at 6:52 pm

    @themann1086:

    I noticed that. I couldn’t resist myself and I had to add to the fun.

  44. 44.

    burnspbesq

    May 12, 2010 at 6:54 pm

    I loved the Socratic method. Then again, I ran the 800 meters in high school, so my masochistic tendencies are undeniable.

  45. 45.

    HumboldtBlue

    May 12, 2010 at 6:54 pm

    @General Egali Tarian Stuck:

    This.

  46. 46.

    Cat Lady

    May 12, 2010 at 6:54 pm

    Shorter Campos: OH NOES MEAN KAGAN GAVE LAZY ME A SAD

  47. 47.

    celticdragonchick

    May 12, 2010 at 6:55 pm

    @Mark:

    So she is acting like an asshole when she expects her students to read the fucking assignment before they show up for class?

    Interesting.

    As another commenter at LGM noted, it is better that the lazy student get that particular lesson from her then from a trial judge when real issues are on the line.

  48. 48.

    Mike Kay

    May 12, 2010 at 6:57 pm

    @Pete: you give them enough rope, they’ll hang themselves.

    let them paint Kagan as a nazi, then when she turns out to be a regular liberal vote, only their pathetic toe sucking groupies will jump the next time they cry wolf.

  49. 49.

    Cacti

    May 12, 2010 at 6:58 pm

    Mr. 1L must have had a pretty big case of Special Snowflake Syndrome. It’s beyond pitiful that a future lawyer would go “semper butthurt” over getting called out for not being prepared at an elite law school.

    If poor widdle duder thought that was harsh, imagine if he got called out in Court, by a judge who cares even less about his feelings than that mean ol’ perfesser, and a Client who’s paying $300/hr for his services.

  50. 50.

    stuckinred

    May 12, 2010 at 6:58 pm

    @K488: That is a big movement in education just like measuring every fucking thing.

  51. 51.

    Wile E. Quixote

    May 12, 2010 at 6:58 pm

    @Mark:

    Irrespective of what Kagan actually did, I love the reflexive defense of the professor’s right to be a total asshole to her students.

    Did you follow the link and read not only the stupid article by Paul Campos but the stupid blog post he linked to? The blog post was by some fuckup named Elie Mystal, who’s a whiny little punk-ass bitch who admits to not only not doing his homework for the class but also to not even following along. He’s a lazy asshole whose massive sense of entitlement got punctured.

    I’d love to see what Campos and Mystal would do if they were ever drafted and sent to something really stressful, like basic training, instead of law school. If they ever had a drill sergeant get in their face they’d probably lose control of their sphincters and die of an aneurysm. I used to think that law school was hard, but if the hardest thing that you ever face at law school is a prof like Kagan then I have to say that law school sounds like a three year walk in the park, a park where attractive strangers come up to you and give you money and offer themselves up for sex.

  52. 52.

    DonkeyKong

    May 12, 2010 at 6:58 pm

    “Socratic Method”, isnt that like a “Hot Carl?”

  53. 53.

    geg6

    May 12, 2010 at 6:59 pm

    @K488:

    “Moo” may be my favorite book of all time. Gets the whole atmosphere of public university academia (especially at schools that began as agricultural colleges like mine in Happy Valley) totally right. I love Jane Smiley.

    That said, my favorite classes were with profs who taught using Socratic method. Really separated the wheat from the chaff, no pun intended. Reading shit about Kagan from lawyers who had her in class really makes me start to regret not going to law school. I would have been brilliant next to these idiots.

  54. 54.

    Citizen_X

    May 12, 2010 at 6:59 pm

    I also loved in Young Mr. Emopants’ Tale of Butthurt how she made him read the relevant passage aloud, and he couldn’t even answer the question “What does that mean?”

    If I had a lawyer defending me who was that unprepared in court, I would throw myself on the floor in front of the bench and howl, “Please, Your Honor, I need a new lawyer like yesterday!”

  55. 55.

    Cacti

    May 12, 2010 at 7:00 pm

    @celticdragonchick:

    So she is acting like an asshole when she expects her students to read the fucking assignment before they show up for class?

    Yep.

    In the same way the Judge is being an asshole when he expects an Attorney to be prepared for Court. Meanies, all of them.

  56. 56.

    Cacti

    May 12, 2010 at 7:02 pm

    @Citizen_X:

    That level of unpreparedness where a Client was involved would get you a Bar Complaint.

  57. 57.

    Kelly

    May 12, 2010 at 7:03 pm

    I can’t believe that (either Campos’ opus or the source post, take your pick) was written by someone who actually went to law school.

    The whole point of first year Civ Pro is to scare the shit out of the brand new law students who think they’re ready to be lawyers cuz they watched A Few Good Men and Law & Order. Any professor who doesn’t use Socratic in that class isn’t doing it right.

  58. 58.

    Brian J

    May 12, 2010 at 7:04 pm

    @taylormattd:

    I’m not particularly sure what the fact that those on the right who are qualified to assess legal arguments actually like Kagan is supposed to mean. They are, as best I can tell, stating the obvious, as they did with Sotomayor.

  59. 59.

    pablo

    May 12, 2010 at 7:04 pm

    Oh, nos! Not teh gay!

  60. 60.

    Violet

    May 12, 2010 at 7:05 pm

    Is that whiner going to show up just as unprepared for his clients who are paying him to know his shit? That kind of dedication to his profession has to be worth $400 an hour at least. He’ll make partner in no time with a work ethic like that.

  61. 61.

    Midnight Marauder

    May 12, 2010 at 7:07 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    Not to mention the fact that Diane Wood turns 60 this July 4 (oh snap, now it’s a real travesty he didn’t put this diehard American patriot on the bench).

    That point by itself was enough to disqualify her from final consideration, I’m guessing.

  62. 62.

    Brian J

    May 12, 2010 at 7:08 pm

    @Mark S.:

    This.

  63. 63.

    Josh

    May 12, 2010 at 7:09 pm

    I expect if you’re a woman at Harvard, there’s a certain amount of pressure to be a toughie.

  64. 64.

    Catsy

    May 12, 2010 at 7:09 pm

    I think everyone’s missing the point here.

    All this butthurt and whining about the Socratic method and how mean she is? This is just dog-whistling the word “bitch”. She’s a mean bitch. She’s an uppity woman. If Kagan were a male nominee, people would be writing approvingly about how “tough” he was.

  65. 65.

    4jkb4ia

    May 12, 2010 at 7:10 pm

    Stamps foot. Ovechkin’s goal being disallowed WILL NOT STAND, I SAY! THEY WILL NOT GET AWAY WITH IT!

    I was going to say that Kagan’s mom taught her fifth and sixth graders that way according to the New Yorker post but I was going to make Campos’s point for him.
    Even if it’s broadly political, that way of teaching doesn’t say anything about whether that person has an authoritarian view of the executive or just of themselves. In fact Sasha Volokh had a response to the original post where he has a note: Kagan is for the unitary executive as a matter of policy but the constitutional backing for it is weak.

  66. 66.

    handy

    May 12, 2010 at 7:10 pm

    The hapless HLS “victim” in this Kagan story, Elie Mystal, has gotten a lot of flack from commenters here and at LGM. And rightfully so.

    I actually found his own account fairly good-natured and self-depricating. Even the “Frodo at Weathertop” line struck me as tongue-in-cheek. He ends his post with the following story:

    Kagan? She smiled slowly and shook her head as I walked by. My mother noticed: “That lady doesn’t seem to like you very much.” I said: “Well, Kagan really likes people who like rules, and people who are as passionate about the law as she is. So that makes us natural enemies. But I like her a lot; she’s very smart.”

    My mom said: “So you’re saying you would have gotten along fine, if she never had to meet you?”

    Mothers tend to know their children. At least the good ones do.

  67. 67.

    mr. whipple

    May 12, 2010 at 7:12 pm

    @burnspbesq:

    Then again, I ran the 800 meters in high school, so my masochistic tendencies are undeniable.

    Confirmed, as far as I’m concerned. The most brutal race.

  68. 68.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    May 12, 2010 at 7:19 pm

    I am not a lawyer nor do I play one on TV. I am a paralegal. I can however tell you how important this shit is from my personal perspective. We had a case in Federal Court (Federal Judges for the most part are not issued with a sense of humor there are some exceptions however) at the end of the week long trial the Judge asked us for our proposed Jury instructions. By the time we got back to the office from Greenville it was late, I had been in court all day and I was tired. Nevertheless I had to type up our proposed Jury instructions. Next day in court the Judge was reading over our instructions and looked over his glasses “Mr. Smith” he said to my boss “I believe in Jury Instruction 15 it should read “did not” as opposed to “did”” The boss turned round and glared at me, then turned to the Judge and said “I shall have her flogged later if that would please the court your honor” “That will not be necessary Mr. Smith”

    I wonder if the POS student who didn’t do his homework ever came before a Federal Judge who realized that he had not Shepardized one of his cases?

  69. 69.

    JasonF

    May 12, 2010 at 7:21 pm

    My property professor was a champion of the Socratic method, to the point where I was convinced that he had served as the model for the John Houseman character in the Paper Chase. His nickname was “The Hammer.” We all squirmed in his class, but three years later when we graduated, who do you think we voted for as our favorite professor?

    As for Elie Mystal, keep in mind who he is — he’s the guy who currently runs Above The Law, which is like TMZ for lawyers.

  70. 70.

    Mike Lamb

    May 12, 2010 at 7:31 pm

    Hmmm…my recollection of sitting through Professor Campos’ Property I and II classes at CU was that he used the Socratic method exclusively. He was a pretty mellow guy and didn’t embarass people, but still…

  71. 71.

    Joseph Nobles

    May 12, 2010 at 7:34 pm

    I can’t even believe that LGM post. I’m stupified.

    “How I Didn’t Do My Homework and Tanked My Teacher’s Supreme Court Nomination”

    Unbelievable.

  72. 72.

    jeffreyw

    May 12, 2010 at 7:53 pm

    Lasagna!

  73. 73.

    mai naem

    May 12, 2010 at 7:53 pm

    Maybe Kagan turned Campos down for a date or something. Or she turned him down for a position at Harvard? Greenwalds just being his normal self. With Campos though, there’s something real personal. She’s dissed him in some major way.

  74. 74.

    Origuy

    May 12, 2010 at 7:55 pm

    Like Frodo on Weathertop, there are some wounds that never fully heal.

    Oh, now she’s a Nazgul!

  75. 75.

    Tazistan Jen

    May 12, 2010 at 7:57 pm

    @Fergus Wooster:

    What the fuck? Have none of these people seen “The Paper Chase”?

    Even Legally Blond shows this – and not sympathetically to the unprepared student.

  76. 76.

    Bill Section 147

    May 12, 2010 at 7:58 pm

    @Mark: I missed the part where she was an asshole or that anyone defended her for being an asshole.

    Irrespective of what Kagan actually did, I love the reflexive defense of the professor’s right to be a total asshole to her students.
    Just like in the real world, huh? If your boss is a jerk, none of her employees transfer or quit, and she never gets reprimanded or fired. Maybe in 1962.

    In the “real world” the underlings always get respect or the manager gets reprimanded. HR is always supporting the workers…that is the reason they have an HR Dept. Right. Oh…and it’s just a few bad apples too.

    I think the more idiocy I hear about Kagan the more I start channeling the right wing concept of, “if it is pissing you off… she should be confirmed.”

  77. 77.

    Bill Section 147

    May 12, 2010 at 8:01 pm

    @mai naem: I cannot believe he has the guts to ask her for the time let alone a date.

    And on the job…I didn’t know her position controlled the hiring of the janitorial staff.

  78. 78.

    Tazistan Jen

    May 12, 2010 at 8:02 pm

    @Mark:

    Irrespective of what Kagan actually did, I love the reflexive defense of the professor’s right to be a total asshole to her students.

    Honestly, this really is part of law school, and for good reason. Lawyers *should* have an instinctive repugnance to being unprepared. Med students should be reamed out for failing to wash their hands before operating too.

  79. 79.

    Brian J

    May 12, 2010 at 8:07 pm

    @Tazistan Jen:

    I was just thinking this. I wonder if the author of that post at Above the Law showed up to Kagan’s class with a heart-shaped pink notebook as well.

  80. 80.

    And Another Thing...

    May 12, 2010 at 8:15 pm

    I don’t have an opinion yet on Kagan, just don’t know enough yet. But, it’s just fascinating watching the left respond to the nomination. Kagan may indeed be a weak choice, but it’s instructive watching some people oppose her in a manner where they’re being real a-holes. This is kind of fun, in a sick way I admit.

    With the Sotomayor nomination is was a lot of righties/Reps making fools of themselves.

    This time it’s lefties/Dems.

  81. 81.

    Davis X. Machina

    May 12, 2010 at 8:29 pm

    This time it’s lefties/Dems.

    Watch the show.

    It’d be better than the circus, if it weren’t family.

  82. 82.

    Paris

    May 12, 2010 at 8:34 pm

    “What’s more notable is the number of conservative legal academics, including Stephen Bainbridge, Eugene Volokh, Charles Fried, and Glenn Reynolds, who are either enthusiastically supportive or at least not opposed to Obama’s pick.

    Update: Ken Starr thinks she’s a great pick as well.”

    That’s enough to make me suspicious of Kagan.

    Lawyers have thin skins. My physics instructors would just throw an eraser at you when you weren’t prepared.

  83. 83.

    WereBear

    May 12, 2010 at 8:37 pm

    I think perhaps some pundit qualities got masked during the Bush administration. My apprehension grew to disbelief, and then loathing, and I was not alone.

    Thus, people who simply cannot be pleased did not stand out the way they do now.

    I never expected our first African American President to be able to get all crazy liberal, because even the white guys have trouble. We don’t elect extremes; Bush was a stealth candidate.

    Strange as it may seem, a lot of people genuinely fell for it.

  84. 84.

    Brien Jackson

    May 12, 2010 at 8:45 pm

    @Paris:

    I don’t really get this. A lot of conservative lawyers attacked Liz Cheney when she attacked the lawyers who defended detainees accused of terrorism, because they recognized it as an attack on the fundamentals of their profession. Does that mean we should have been immediately suspicious and reconsidered Cheney’s argument?

  85. 85.

    debg

    May 12, 2010 at 8:52 pm

    @Brien Jackson: Thanks for saying that. I try to tell my college students that discussion is a like a lab, so they should expect to fall on their faces sometimes. It’s better to bomb in discussion than to do so on a test or paper.

    They never rarely listen. It’s been programmed into them that they have to be right, all the time, or they’ll fail everything.

  86. 86.

    And Another Thing...

    May 12, 2010 at 8:57 pm

    @Paris: I basically agree with @Brien Jackson:

    This support could mean that she is a stealth conservative, or it could mean that she has a good reputation for intellect, scholarship, and collegiality, and they’re relieved that Obama didn’t nominate a Noam Chomsky. Apparently she made an effort to “integrate” Harvard Law School by hiring conservatives. Maybe they appreciate this.

    Basically, it’s too soon to tell, IMO.

  87. 87.

    Davis X. Machina

    May 12, 2010 at 8:58 pm

    @debg: The customer-satisfaction model doesn’t work in education.

    No amount of wishing it so can make mōns, montis, mountain, be a feminine noun, make Wallenstein a Swedish general, or change the valence of iron to +1.

    The present generation of students has been persuaded that the intensity with which one holds a position is a substitute for evidence or argument supporting it, and in some cases is actually identical to its truth value.

  88. 88.

    Uloborus

    May 12, 2010 at 9:03 pm

    @WereBear:
    He was. He absolutely was. He won the first time because he ran as a moderate, a ‘compassionate conservative’. You can see how tacking to the extremes helped McCain coast to an easy victory.

    EDIT: Bush’s whole presidency was such an… aberration. It’s no wonder he’s left the political system in chaos, and turned assholes into schizophrenics.

  89. 89.

    mey

    May 12, 2010 at 9:06 pm

    I read Elie Mystal’s post and thought he was actually making fun of himself and pointing out his own flaws. That basically he tried to pull juvenile, lazy shit that he might have gotten away with in earlier schooling, but Kagan called him on it — and WITH a sense of humor. Re-read the article, he’s not attacking her, it’s a self-deprecating article. Then again, I know nothing about Elie Mystal, maybe he’s a big firebagging wing-douche, and he actually wrote an article about his super butthurt. Just didn’t come across that way to me on first reading, more like respect for a tough professor.

    ETA: Just read handy’s post, and I agree. https://balloon-juice.com/2010/05/12/no-one-expects-the-spanish-inquisition-socratic-method/#comment-1758297

  90. 90.

    chopper

    May 12, 2010 at 9:08 pm

    reading that blog post (and all the comments, most all of which called the writer an idiot and a choad) i have a lot more respect for kagan.

    i heard back in the day that sotomayor could be brutal if an attorney was unprepared. i really liked that – i want the people on the scotus to be sharp – and i think kagan would fit right in in that regard. helluva lot better than thomas the deaf mute.

  91. 91.

    General Egali Tarian Stuck

    May 12, 2010 at 9:11 pm

    I was one of the first Environment Studies majors in a new program that was only one of two in the country at the time.

    No one knew what to make of us, and I don’t know if it was the Socratic Method or not, but our department head, who was a pretty far left hippy type added a couple of Economics classes and the first was an Environmental Economics one and our DH picked a right wing Adam Smith Acolyte rooster for an instructor. The guy actually had pics of Smith around the classroom and dressed like and looked like Smith to a spooky degree, even down to the bow tie.

    No one knew what to expect, but the very first day, he addressed us as “his little Snail Darters” which at the time, was the little fish that stopped construction of a major TVA project on the Tennessee River. It fell under the new Endangered Species Act and was only found in the waters to be dammed, and would have been made extinct. They were later transferred to a nearby river and did well and still survive. But at the time, they were the little fish that could and did stop a billion plus beacon of economic progress.

    Well, to make a long story short, that class could peak my adrenaline faster than anything has, with a combo of rage and curiosity that often turned into shouting matches with this prof, who despite being a wingnut ass, also knew his shit, and when it was over, I think I learned more in that class than any other.

  92. 92.

    Brien Jackson

    May 12, 2010 at 9:14 pm

    @And Another Thing…:

    I haven’t read all of them, but I did read Volock’s, and he claims to not agree with much of Kagan’s conclusions. He’s defending her against the accusations that she didn’t produce much, that the quality was weak, that it was unremarkable, etc. It sounded more like a professional pushback than a substantive endorsement.

  93. 93.

    bluehill

    May 12, 2010 at 9:33 pm

    Interestingly, Campos also wrote a piece in the Daily Beast (“Fat Judges Need Not Apply”) in which he suggests that Obama would not nominate Sotomayor or Kagan to replace then retiring Judge Souter, because of they were overweight. Maybe he’s just po’d at making such bad predictions.

    http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-05-04/fat-judges-need-not-apply/

    “Three of these assumptions—that a woman’s appearance is far more important than a man’s, that extreme thinness in women is especially desirable, and that weighing slightly more than average is a major health risk—have become interrelated in subtle and invidious ways.

    In the cases of Kagan and Sotomayor, the absurd idea that their weight represents the sort of health risk that ought to be taken into account when considering whether to appoint them to the Supreme Court illustrates both how hysteria about being “overweight” has gotten out of control, and how such concerns often camouflage less-respectable impulses.”

  94. 94.

    T.R. Donoghue

    May 12, 2010 at 9:38 pm

    I won’t be satisfied until he nominates Anita Hill.

  95. 95.

    Mark S.

    May 12, 2010 at 9:49 pm

    @bluehill:

    Jesus, I get dumber every time I read Campos. His evidence for this jihad against fat justices? Anonymous comments at various web sites.

  96. 96.

    Polar Bear Squares

    May 12, 2010 at 10:00 pm

    You mean see used the Socratic Method?

    In law school?

    Isn’t that like a football coach yelling at his players?

    Shocking!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  97. 97.

    de stijl

    May 12, 2010 at 10:06 pm

    @Mark S.:

    And a “legal gossip site”.

    I don’t know why I was initially shocked to learn there are legal gossip sites; it makes sense in this day and age. Now, I’m tempted to do a Google search for ratemyjudge.com but I am terrified to find out that such a site actually exists.

  98. 98.

    baldheadeddork

    May 12, 2010 at 10:10 pm

    For everyone trashing the guy who wrote the original piece, my read on the whole thing is that he’s looking back at it openly admitting he was young and a little unmotivated. LGM paints it as a whiney bitchfest, but the author tells it a lot differently.

  99. 99.

    de stijl

    May 12, 2010 at 10:11 pm

    @T.R. Donoghue:

    That’s actually a decent premise for a sitcom. Hill, Thomas, and their coworkers could could get into all sorts of wacky hijinks, inappropriate workplace romances and hilarity will certainly ensue.

  100. 100.

    Darkrose

    May 12, 2010 at 10:13 pm

    @Mark:

    Irrespective of what Kagan actually did, I love the reflexive defense of the professor’s right to be a total asshole to her students.

    I believe if more people would be assholes to some of the entitled morons at most academic institutions, the world would be better off.

    I work at the help desk, where we routinely get calls like:

    — the 26-year-old law school applicant who doesn’t know her password because her mother set up her account;

    — the incoming freshman whose mother called to try to get me to give her the kid’s password because he was busy watching a hockey game;

    — the junior whose mother called to see if we could search the mail server logs to prove that her daughter submitted a paper so that she wouldn’t fail the class;

    — the MBA student who didn’t know her password and waited until five minutes before her final to see if we could give it to her, and who was livid when I told her she’d have to go to the computer lab.

    It’s not mean and cruel to expect a student to be responsible for their own shit, or to deal with the consequences without Mommy and Daddy bailing them out. If being publically humiliated in front of your peers is the only way to get that lesson across, then my only regret is that there’s no way to do that with the victims of Faculty Entitlement Syndrome as well.

  101. 101.

    Gordon S

    May 12, 2010 at 11:08 pm

    @Midnight Marauder:

    You are correct — I didn’t know there was was a distinction… had I Sapphicly interrogated someone, I may have found that out, but they would have found out about me and some ovine love in my closet…

  102. 102.

    Scott de B.

    May 12, 2010 at 11:16 pm

    The guy actually had pics of Smith around the classroom and dressed like and looked like Smith to a spooky degree, even down to the bow tie.

    Huh? Adam Smith lived in the 18th century. He might have worn a cravat, but not a bow tie. Do you mean your professor adopted the period look? Down to the powdered wig?

  103. 103.

    Phoebe

    May 12, 2010 at 11:48 pm

    @JasonF: Seconded, and also thirded and fourthed, by a fellow alum. That property class was a wonder and a marvel, and its mere existence stands as a full refutation of Campos’s nonsense about the socratic method as a form of ritual humiliation or hazing.

  104. 104.

    General Egali Tarian Stuck

    May 13, 2010 at 12:05 am

    @Scott de B.: Ha, you are right. It’s been 35 years. He talked about Adam Smith all the time, and had pics of somebody that wasn’t him wearing a bow tie, and so did he. But obviously, not Smith. I am corrected. thanks.

  105. 105.

    Batocchio

    May 13, 2010 at 5:16 am

    Ouch. I read the post Campos commented on earlier today, and thought it was interesting to see Kagan through the eyes of a willfully horrible student (judging by his own description). He credits Kagan with a sense of humor, which suggests it wasn’t personal animosity on her part, and I’d take some of his complaints with a grain of salt. Yeah, it sucked to be in her class when he repeatedly, deliberately blew off the homework. It should be – she was upholding a standard, which is part of the job.

    While Campos has a point that the Socratic method can be poorly used or abused in a classroom, he ignores that it can be extremely well employed. It depends on the teacher. (Socrates himself was hardly an authoritarian bully.) Reading that LGM thread was painful, because several commenters point this out to Campos – and make many other good points as well – and he becomes indignant. If a generally good student didn’t do all the reading one day, and Kagan raked him or her over the coals for that for most of the class, that probably would be bullying and bad teaching. But that’s not remotely Mystal’s situation. What’s most disappointing about Campos is he charges those defending Kagan in the anecdote and those who point out how good the Socratic method can be as authoritarians. That’s ridiculous bullshit. I hope Campos regains his form, because his post and comments were pretty bad this time.

  106. 106.

    Anderson

    May 13, 2010 at 7:44 am

    LOL at Origuy’s comment. JUST LIKE Obama to nominate a Ringwraith rather than an elf!

  107. 107.

    Albatrossity

    May 13, 2010 at 8:10 am

    “The whole point is to produce lawyers, which is to say people, who never question the fundamental power relations encoded by the legal, economic, and cultural status quo.”

    If that is the case, the right wing should be scrambling over themselves to get this nomination approved…

  108. 108.

    Nancy Irving

    May 15, 2010 at 10:40 pm

    Well, Socrates WAS gay, LOL…

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