LinkedIn IPO finds Curmudgeon left behind

I don't know whether the Rapture will take place tomorrow as promised by Harold Camping, but I was definitely Left Behind by yesterday's LinkedIn IPO.

The fellow on the left is Reid Hoffman, the founder of LinkedIn; the fellow on the right is Jeff Weiner, LinkedIn's CEO. Mr. Weiner will presumably now be able to afford a decent shave, because, as I read in today's Chicago Sun-Times (from which the image is also taken), LinkedIn stock debuted yesterday on the New York Stock Exchange at $45 a share, soaring to $122.70 on frantic trading before closing at $94.25.

What is LinkedIn, you ask? Me too.

The linked article says that LinkedIn is a "trailblazer in the online networking craze." I haven't the foggiest notion as to what that might mean.

I've received invitations from people, from time to time, some of whom I actually have met, asking me to join -- or, as the gender neutral, automated email puts it -- "to become part of his or her professional network at LinkedIn." I don't know any of these individuals well enough, however, to ask just exactly what the heck LinkedIn is or is supposed to do.

Welcome to 21st Century America. We make "networks" that "link" people or businesses or sandwiches or coupons. These entities have weird names that trample accepted rules of spelling or punctuation. But, beyond that, exactly how do they innovate? For anything tangible, we still have to buy from the Chinese.

Prom and the pursuit of "perfection"

One of my wife's colleagues at school has a daughter who is the same age as Youngest Son. She went to Youngest Son's prom this past weekend (and not with Youngest Son).

So my wife and her colleague had something to talk about over lunch yesterday.

"We saw your daughter and her boyfriend at Mass on Sunday," Long Suffering Spouse reported. "They looked pretty tired."

"Well, I'm not surprised. They were at a 'sleepover' at the Abbots' house." She made air quotes as she said "sleepover." (The Abbots are another family in the parish; they also have a son who is shortly to graduate from Youngest Son's high school.)

Long Suffering Spouse and her colleague compared notes: The "sleepovers" attended by the other teacher's daughter and by Youngest Son had about the same numbers of boys and girls. My wife's colleague was not thrilled about the arrangements, though she holds Mr. and Mrs. Abbot in high regard and was confident that they were properly vigilant. "I don't know why the kids were so insistent about turning this into such a big deal," my wife's colleague said. "After all --"

"It's just a dance!" Long Suffering Spouse chimed in simultaneously and they both laughed.

"And they're never satisfied," continued my wife's colleague. "The dress, the limo, the nails, the hair. Something. My daughter was complaining this morning that she hated her hair."

The discussion turned to the prom this Friday night. This one is for the girls' school that the daughter of Long Suffering Spouse's colleague attends. The other teacher reported that some of the her daughter's friends are taking two days off from school, one before and one after, one to prepare and one to accommodate a trip to the Wisconsin Dells after the event. "And they still won't be happy," my wife's colleague concluded.

"The problem," my wife said, "is expectations. No matter how nice things are, nothing can meet their unrealistic expectations. They want it all to be perfect."

"There will always be something to ruin everything!" said my wife's colleague, intentionally lapsing into teen-speak. They both laughed again.

The best times are usually had when least expected. Put another way, it's hard to plan to have a good time. Eventually, we learn that one can make plans for something pleasant, but we can't summon a good time any more than we can command that the skies clear and the sun shine. Meanwhile, until we learn that hard truth, human nature tends to freight all our plans with impossible hopes. The least important flaws -- the pimple that erupts on prom morning, the bangs that won't stay down -- are magnified wholly out of proportion.

Long Suffering Spouse wisely refrained from mentioning that the expectations problem gets even worse when planning a wedding. My wife's colleague's daughter is her oldest child; she'll find this out in her own good time.

Living in New Chicago... Day One

Richard J. Daley was Mayor of the City of Chicago when I was born. Dat's Da Mare, on the left, or, if you must, over by dere. Saying "Da Mare" or "Da Late Mare" can only refer to Chicago's Richard I.

I was at a prayer breakfast with Da Mare in December 1976, shortly before he died. (He died, you may recall, in his doctor's office. He dropped dead, the story goes, moments after being pronounced perfectly fit. Who would tell Himself different?)

But, anyway, as I was sayin', I was at this prayer breakfast with Da Mare -- me and about 2,500 other people -- and, the next thing you knew, he was gone.

But many people also knew, then, that there would be another Daley on the throne soon enough. "Little Richie," as he was then known, was safely installed in the State Senate at the time. While some people thought that Little Richie would be neutralized by the loss of his famous father, others saw the appointment of another Bridgeport native, Michael Bilandic, as more or less a regency.

And then it snowed.

When the Blizzard of 1979 melted, Jane Byrne was mayor and Michael Bilandic had to go over to the Appellate Court (and later the Supreme Court) to support his family. (He'd married late in life.)

Meanwhile, Little Richie settled for becoming State's Attorney.

Jane Byrne let The Blues Brothers be filmed in Chicago and gave us Chicagofest at Navy Pier... which has led to Taste of Chicago, all sorts of other various fests, and the renovation of Navy Pier. Our tourist industry owes a lot to Janie.

But she was... erratic... and she lasted only one term. Little Richie thought it was time for him to take the reins in 1983; that probably would have been the plan had Bilandic been reelected. But Janie didn't go quietly and she and Richie were both defeated in the primary by a Congressman from Chicago's South Side.

I refer to Harold Washington. Harold (he seemed to prefer being called by his first name) did a stretch in jail once for failing to file federal tax returns. His birthday was April 15.

Harold presided over a contentious City Council. The media called it "Council Wars." Chicago was called "Beirut on the Lake" in those days. But Harold did something Michael Bilandic and Jane Byrne couldn't do: He got reelected.

Then he, too, dropped dead.

David Orr -- now Cook County Clerk, but then the Alderman of the 49th Ward -- became acting mayor for six days before giving way to Alderman Eugene Sawyer. In 1989, Sawyer faced the voters -- and Richie Daley -- in the primary. You know the rest. Richard II would rule Chicago for the next 22 years.

Rahm Emanuel was sworn in yesterday as Mayor of the City of Chicago. There's talk, of course, that he's just a creature of the same Machine that spawned the Daleys; that he is indeed the Daleys' instrument; that he will serve only so long as it takes for Nora Daley Conroy, a daughter of Richard II, to be ready to take over the family business. On the other hand, there's also talk that Rahm's a real reformer and people who figured he was kidding will be pleasantly... or quite unpleasantly... surprised. Some believe Rahm knows the ways of power so well that he can root out entrenched, systemic corruption and install an efficient, cost-effective municipal government.

I am no prophet. I know that there's been a Daley on the fifth floor at City Hall for over three quarters of my life. If there really is another Daley waiting in the wings, he or she has not been publicly groomed for the office. So I think the day of the Daleys may be done here.

I know the City is in a bad way financially. All local governments have been hurting in this interminable recession, but Chicago is hurting more than most. I don't know why any honest person would want to be mayor at this time. Still, if Rahm's really on the level, I wish him only the best.

But, even though I'm from Chicago, not from Missouri, he's still going to have to show me.

Promming around in the Curmudgeon family

There are things I will miss when Youngest Son (our youngest of all) graduates from high school in a couple of weeks. I'm going to miss those glorious Fall Friday nights, under the lights, when football was the most important thing in the universe. Of course, this being Chicago, we were only good for one such night a season, on average. The rest would be too hot, too cold, raining or snowing.

I'll miss the occasional instance where I can be helpful with homework, suggesting an essay topic, remembering some historical event. I remember I was even the first resource for computer questions, once upon a time. Even Oldest Son used to ask me computer questions -- until about his sophomore year in college, when he picked computer engineering as a major. Now I ask him questions.

But I won't miss proms. This is not a new opinion. I quote from my essay of March 7, 2008:

My kids have all attended Catholic high schools. Single gender Catholic high schools. Even so, they have not been entirely sheltered from the excesses of modern culture. (I have, on occasion, listened to the CD's Younger Daughter has made for the car that she forgets to remove on those rare days when I actually get to drive the vehicle.) My consolation is that my children may have been more sheltered from the common culture than would have been true had they attended a co-ed public high school.

Bad as the "dance" may be, it is the before and after prom activities that really turn prom into a festival of wretched excess. Somewhere, in a more innocent time, someone suggested that the gang all get together the day after the dance for a picnic.

Now, many parents book hotel rooms for their little darlings to do whatever they please after the prom. (No, we won't.) Limos -- or even buses -- are hired so the kids can drink without fear of a DUI arrest. The kids don't go home and then rendezvous the next day for the picnic -- they crash at the hotel and go out for breakfast. Maybe they make it home for dinner the following night.

Fortunately, my two older sons had baseball games on the day after their senior proms. I'm not even certain that Oldest Son went at all. Younger Daughter insists that we let Middle Son stay out all night after another prom that he attended -- and under the inflexible principles of stare decisis we must now agree, supposedly, to let Younger Daughter stay out all night also.

Older Daughter went to her prom. On a blind date. With some peculiar-looking boy whose first name was that of a cartoon character. I never learned his last name, or whether he in fact had one. Long Suffering Spouse thinks I was dispatched to pick them up from a post-prom restaurant after the promised limo failed to arrive. If this is true, I have suppressed the event entirely.

Somehow we got through Younger Daughter's many proms. In the peculiar etiquette of Chicago Catholic high schools, a boy will ask a girl to his prom; she will then invite him to hers. Middle Son and Younger Daughter had too many admirers to adhere to that rule. Older Daughter and Oldest Son had no one special to ask. Only Youngest Son is playing this hand according to Hoyle.

His prom was Saturday; hers is this coming Friday.

The hotel room idea was floated again this year -- hey, the argument goes, the dance is at the hotel anyway; we'll just get a room there. The notion was just as quickly vetoed this year as in prior years. I am ready to be a grandparent; I just want my grandchild to be born to one of my married children.

"It's a big group!" Youngest Son protested. "What can happen?"

"An orgy," I thought to myself. I used to have HBO. But all I said aloud was, "No."

This year I didn't even have a baseball practice early in the morning to rescue me from hard decisions. (If Middle Son did stay out all night for one of his proms, it was with baseball teammates because he had practice early the next morning. If anyone else was involved, I didn't know about it.)

Youngest Son was busy for a couple of weeks before his prom with plans and counter-plans and trial balloons. We shot every trial balloon down. "Are you just going to say 'no' to everything?" he asked at one point. "If you are, tell me."

Long Suffering Spouse and I insisted we would approve reasonable plans.

In the event, I'm not sure that we did.

Not knowing for certain that baseball practice would be cancelled on Sunday until Saturday afternoon, but knowing that three of the five boys in Youngest Son's group are on the baseball team, and after having Middle Son's precedent cited for the 1000th time, we somewhere along the way agreed in theory to the boys staying at someone's house overnight after the dance.

Our house was proposed as the venue, and we were prepared to agree, until we started asking questions about how the girls would get home.

I'm not certain that Youngest Son was in the vanguard of the stay out all night brigade. The real mover and shaker behind the let's-rent-a-hotel-suite movement was the girlfriend of one of Youngest Son's teammates. We'll call her Tess (because, of course, that is not her name). Tess and her boyfriend (let's call him Tim) have been going out for four years. In high school years, this is the equivalent of reaching one's Golden Anniversary, although without the arthritis.

Youngest Son explained, at one point, that even Tim was not that committed to Tess's hotel idea, but he more or less had to go along. "Why?" I asked. "Well, she is pretty good-looking," said Youngest Son, as if that explained everything. And, I guess, to an over-hormoned 18-year old, maybe it did.

Eventually, Tim's mother supplied a solution: Youngest Son said the boys would sleep over at her house.

Fast forward now to Saturday afternoon. Youngest Son returned home after shivering through a doubleheader (the temperature probably never got above 50 Saturday and it was windy and damp). He was excited to advise that there'd be no practice Sunday. "So now we can go to Brian's house in Wisconsin Sunday," suggested Youngest Son. Brian's summer home was one of the Saturday night destinations we'd previously vetoed. Even with no alcohol involved, driving in the wee small hours of the morning, across state lines, sounded to me like a recipe for disaster.

"We'd have to return the suits Sunday anyway," said Youngest Son. "So we'd go up after that."

"What's so great about Brian's place?"

"Fishing."

"Oh, come on now. Fishing?"

"Yeah. The house is on a lake."

"Don't you have school Monday?"

"Didn't I tell you?"

"Do you ever?"

"Oh. Well, school's cancelled for the seniors Monday. It's tradition. We'll have a game, but that won't be until later." He disappeared upstairs to shower and shave and don his tux.

Long Suffering Spouse and I discussed the matter while he was preparing. After some hand-wringing, we agreed, between ourselves, that we would approve this trip, under the stated circumstances.

We might have told Youngest Son this, too, only he came flying down the stairs just as Younger Daughter came bursting through the front door. She'd been working, but she hurried home because she didn't want to miss the picture-taking. A big sister has an important role to play in embarrassing her brother by taking all sorts of pictures on prom night.

Somewhere, in finding out that the pictures would be taken at Donny's house, and finding out where Donny's house was, we never did actually tell Youngest Son that he could go on the trip Sunday. Somehow he had managed, despite the chaos, to lighten my wallet, however.

Some of you will recall the recent Royal Wedding in England. The pageantry, the paparazzi, the horse-drawn phaeton between the church and the country club or wherever it was that they held the reception for Balding Billy and Bonnie Kate.

Well, except for the horses (usually), the picture-taking on prom night is much like this. Youngest Son led the way and Long Suffering Spouse, Younger Daughter and I followed behind in the family van. Long Suffering Spouse and Younger Daughter were both brandishing cameras.

Donny's house was a showplace. It didn't look that large from the street, but there was an enormous front hall inside, complete with a formal staircase on which all five couples could pose. There was a kitchen and great room beyond. In the kitchen was an enormous spread of sandwiches and chicken wings. "I got the chicken wings just for you," Donny's mom told Youngest Son as he dived into the spread with gusto. He certainly seemed at home there. Of course, Youngest Son spends far more time at his friends' houses these days than he does at our house -- at least time awake.

I was a little apprehensive about barbecue sauce staining the pink vest or tie (yes, his otherwise traditional black tux had pink accoutrements to match his date's gown) but Youngest Son had no difficulties. In this, at least, I have to hand it to the boy: If you can stay looking sharp and eat chicken wings, you've really got poise.

There were pictures in the great room. There were pictures of the boys. There were pictures of the girls. There were pictures of the girls pinning boutonnieres on the boys' lapels. There were pictures of each couple. Then there were pictures in the front hall, especially on the stairway. Tess seemed to be directing several of the photographers. I was trying to blend into any corner that would contain me.

Eventually, though, it looked like there might soon be an opportunity to escape this madness. So I grabbed Youngest Son and Long Suffering Spouse and I dragged him to a corner of the kitchen for final instructions. His date and her parents tagged along.

There was the usual: You can call for a ride if you need it. If you need to come home, at any point, the door will be unlocked. No booze. Text me when you get downtown.

"OK," I said, moving from the general to the specific, "you're staying at Tim's tonight, right?" The boy nodded. "Fine. Now, how is your date getting home?"

The boy's eyes widened. His date looked at her parents in confusion. "I'm coming home?"

Here is where I found out that Tim's parents had agreed to take in both the boys and the girls. Apparently, Tess insisted.

I have learned, finally, not to impose myself into others' parenting arrangements. I mean, what could I say? "Yes, you're going home, young lady. What would your parents think?" Not when her parents were standing right there clearly thinking that their daughter was staying the night at Tim's.

A few more questions revealed that the "fishing" trip Sunday would likewise be co-ed. Not all of the girls could stay Sunday night; the mother of my son's date was planning to pick up those who were coming home that night. I'll bet any sum you care to wager that Tess stayed up in Wisconsin last night.

Sometimes I think I must be hopelessly old-fashioned. Sometimes, like Saturday, I prove it.

The past intrudes on the present

Her husband and her sons loved her longer and they loved her more. They will bury her this weekend.

We were very young when I knew her. She was just starting college and I was finishing up, but we were only a few months distant in age. (I'd been double promoted early in my school days, and I was finishing college in three years.) She was beautiful. Short blond hair. Petite. Whip smart. I was 19 -- and I was smitten.

It had taken me nearly all 19 of those years to find the courage to talk to girls. I was a bit backward, I know, especially during the 1970s when the Sexual Revolution was supposedly in full flower. But I found the courage to talk to her. She thought I was funny. Sometimes I was trying to be.

We were a couple most of my senior year and into the summer after. I almost died driving home on the Tollway one night from her home. (I was living with my folks during the summer, a good 50 miles away.) I must have dozed behind the wheel. As I remember it, though, it was the guardrail that jumped in front of the car and tried to surround me.

I would have married her. I was ready (at least I thought I was).

She was not.

And, of course, she was right not to be rushed. She was just starting college; she had ambitions to become a doctor. Marriage -- even a really serious relationship -- would have been an impediment to those ambitions, perhaps an insurmountable one. She was right -- but it didn't stop me from trying to drown myself in alcohol during my entire first year of law school. I darn near succeeded a couple of times.

But, eventually, I moved on. I finished law school. I met Long Suffering Spouse.

A few years after we broke up, she was ready to settle down too. She married a doctor. She didn't get into medical school, but she became a dentist. We didn't see each other. In fact, I think the first time I saw her in 20 years was also the last time -- a few years back, at a party given by mutual friends on the occasion of their 25th wedding anniversary.

She was still beautiful. We had a nice chat. Long Suffering Spouse knew her husband from undergrad. They chatted with us. I bragged on my kids. She bragged on hers. We didn't pretend we were going to stay in touch. There was no reason to stay in touch.

Then, yesterday morning, I saw a posting on Facebook: My friend -- the one who'd had that 25th anniversary party -- wrote, "I really, really hate cancer."

This friend (Peg, we'll call her, because I'm afraid of getting lost among all the pronouns) is very social. Though her post had only been up a few hours there were all sorts of comments -- a lot of inquiries, mostly. And Peg answered that she and her husband were about to fly to Chicago (they live out East these days) to bury "a dear friend from college."

I thought about asking who died. I know a lot of Peg's college friends. And then I thought, I probably don't want to know. I signed off and went to work.

My friend Steve called mid-day. I've mentioned Steve before, but I may not have previously mentioned his daily habit of reading the obituaries. He did this on a daily basis even before he retired. Steve and I had other things to talk about. His son just graduated from college and Steve wanted to tell me about that. But then he told me what he'd read in the obituaries. And then I found out I definitely didn't want to know.

Peg's filled me in on the details since. It sounds like she had a horrible ordeal.

I'm so sorry for her husband and her children. But I'm feeling a little sorry for myself, too. I know that makes me sound selfish. Does that also make me sound unfaithful to my wife and family? I hope not. It's just -- well, she was very special to me... a long time ago. I moved on. She moved on. I think she did OK for herself. I know I've been fortunate. But we all hold memories locked away. Today some of my memories have been unlocked.

Grannies launch crime wave -- haven't we seen this somewhere before?

Oh, yes, now I remember... Monty Python had this bit somewhere around 40 years ago... but then it was ridiculous... absurd... even silly....


Is this really progress?

Tearing up today's headlines -- Curmudgeon reviews the news

NEWS: Northwestern cancels human sexuality class for the fall term.

Views: Now rich suburban kids will never learn all the deviant sex acts they could have performed with only minor modifications to power tools commonly found in their parents' homes.

NEWS: Illinois congressman does beefcake photo shoot for Men's Health magazine

Views: Peoria Republican Aaron Schock obviously thinks that posing shirtless for a magazine is a better career move than posing shirtless for Craigslist.


Or has Chris Lee already been forgotten?

I think that legislation is urgently needed to stem this tide of shirtless Republicans.

NEWS: Crude oil prices rise -- gasoline prices rise also. Crude oil prices fall -- gasoline prices rise anyway

Views: Instead of running around shirtless, perhaps our legislators could look into this? Gasoline in my neighborhood has been retailing at $4.65 a gallon for several days now.

NEWS: Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich announces presidential bid

Views: Barack Obama still running for reelection unopposed.

NEWS: Oprah's final show coming May 25.

Views: The world may not make it all the way to December 2012.

Curmudgeon notes how wedding showers have changed

Long Suffering Spouse and I went to a wedding shower Saturday evening; the groom is the son of friends we've known since college.

It's a typical May in the Curmudgeon household: We didn't know we'd be able to go until the last minute; our niece's Communion, originally scheduled for the 7th, was mysteriously moved to the 21st at the last moment. Embracing the new plan, however, we printed out the greed lists Saturday afternoon before deciding which store we'd hit to buy a present.

I've called wedding registries "greed lists" since before I was a blushing bridegroom, but these have certainly changed.

Computers, and the ability to get the lists at home instead of only in the store, are part of it, but only part. The real change seems to be what's included.

We decided which store to hit and went over there forthwith. We found a set of casserole dishes that was on the list right away, but I wanted to add a little something else to the gift bag. "How about a corkscrew?" I suggested.

"They have one on their list, but that's not the right model number," Long Suffering Spouse responded, and looked again at the sheaf of papers in her hand. "And, besides, it's been 'fulfilled.'"

"Fulfilled?"

"They got it already."

"Oh." I looked around a little more. "Here's something no married couple should be without -- a rolling pin."

"It's not maple."

"Maple?" I asked.

"Yes," Long Suffering Spouse answered, consulting the list, "and it's not the right brand."

Now I can see that one can not have guests picking out china or flatware randomly. The bride and the groom have to select a pattern that they like. I can even understand that the bride and groom would be less than thrilled with appliances in assorted colors. But does a balloon whisk really have to be made by Kitchen Wiz? Does it really matter that the egg slicer be stock no. 23541 -- even when it bears an uncanny resemblance to the egg slicer listed as stock no. 23542?

Computers have made it too easy to list all sorts of nitpicky things. The happy couple might not really care if the Acme brand rubber spatula is substituted for the Uberkitchen brand. But who wants to take the risk?

The reason young men put up with wedding showers in the first place is that these are heaven-sent opportunities to acquire a lot of the "stuff" that the youngsters took for granted in their parents' homes. When a kid takes a shower at home, there's a towel. When a kid goes to sleep at night (even twenty-somethings sleep eventually) there are sheets on the bed. When someone needs a dish to put the leftovers in, there's one in the cabinet.

Though wedding showers are heaven-sent opportunities for the kids, the groom often has to go through the Other Place to achieve it. My wife's family had a "traditional" wedding shower when I was the groom. This was the cucumber sandwich, women-only, lots-of-ribbons-and-don't-you-dare-cut-one sort. The groom is trundled out at the end of these proceedings, ostensibly to rescue his bride from the hen party, but really to be inspected and patted and judged by the assembled womenfolk, some of whom are seeing him for the first time. Older female relatives pinch cheeks.

Long Suffering Spouse didn't much care for these types of gatherings either. When Older Daughter and Oldest Son married, we sponsored 'couples' showers. There was pizza and wine and beer and not a crustless bread triangle with an orange, gooey filling in sight. Our college friends chose to have a couples shower for their son, too, which was why I was along for the ride Saturday.

There wasn't any pizza Saturday -- this close to Cinco de Mayo, there was plenty of Corona and a pretty tasty buffet from a local Mexican restaurant. The party was in our hosts' backyard -- it being May, most people would not worry about frostbite. Life-long Chicagoans know better, however, and our hosts had thoughtfully procured a large tent and heaters. Long Suffering Spouse and I gravitated to the heaters forthwith.

The gift table was in our corner of the tent, too, and we were making book at our table about whether any of the tissue paper in the gift bags in front of the blowers might catch fire before the gifts could be opened (fortunately, this did not happen).

The gifts were in bags from Macy's and Target and Crate and Barrel -- all the places where the happy couple had established greed lists -- and it looks like they did very well indeed.

But not all of their requests were "fulfilled." And it's no wonder: At least, I can't imagine anyone buying a Playstation 3 as a shower or wedding gift -- and, yet, there it was on one of the greed lists. These kinds of devices certainly weren't on greed lists when I got married. (And not just because these kinds of devices hadn't been invented. I mean... there were TVs when I got married, but I don't remember anyone ever putting a TV on a wedding registry.)

I've been mulling this over all weekend now. Clearly, a Playstation 3 is not something essential to setting up housekeeping. But, then, neither are 12 place-settings of fine china. Yet, china would have been a perfectly acceptable gift.

Obviously, one or both of the happy couple enjoys games on Playstation. But whatever machine they have access to now must belong to someone else -- a parent, a roommate, a sibling. It would probably be used more than the fancy china.

So... having initially decided it was ridiculous and inappropriate, I now find myself torn. Is it appropriate for the bride and groom to request a Playstation 3 (or Wii or Xbox or whatever) or not? Readers, what say ye?

Osama dead -- but his death raises troubling questions

It is a cliche in Western movies. Someone, the grizzled old prospector perhaps, or the comely schoolmarm, must absolve the hero for shooting the bad guy down like a dog.

"If ever a man needed killin', that one did," the character would intone, and, as the end credits roll, the hero would begin to come to grips with the idea that, if what he'd done was evil, it was a necessary one.

"If ever a man needed killin', that one did" is as fitting an epitaph as any for Osama bin Laden. But I think President Obama overstated the case last night when he said that "justice" has been done.

As a lawyer, I can never agree that "justice" can be done with helicopters and Navy SEALs and firefights. But I'm not unhappy that bin Laden is dead.

Osama bin Laden -- architect of, or at least the inspiration for, 9/11 -- and one-time friend and ally of the United States -- is dead.

Or had you forgotten about bin Laden's past as our pal? Remember how the Soviets invaded Afghanistan? The United States couldn't do much about it at the time. Jimmy Carter forbade the U.S. Olympics Team from going to the Moscow Games in 1980. And we also backed "freedom fighters," like young Osama, who swarmed into Afghanistan via Peshawar, Pakistan to make jihad on those godless communists.

We Americans are too friendly. We want everyone to like us, even young Osama. But he didn't really like us; he just liked our money and weapons. First chance he got, he turned on us. When his native Saudi Arabia allowed American troops to assemble in that country in preparation for the liberation of Kuwait, the die was cast. The first bombing of the World Trade Center, the attack on the Cole, the bombing of American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, Al Qaeda, 9/11 all followed thereafter.

The circumstances of the weekend raid on Osama's secret fortress could make a thrilling adventure movie (though it probably will never be made because it is unlikely to do well overseas) but the raid itself carries serious implications for America's future.

Osama's secret hideaway was not in some remote mountain cave, either in Afghanistan or Pakistan's North West Frontier Province (Khyber Pakhtunkhwa) or Federally Administered Tribal Areas. It was, we learn, only about 60 miles away from the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, in

Abbottabad, a city of about 500,000, in a large and highly secured compound that, a resident of the city said, sits virtually adjacent to the grounds of a military academy. In an ironic twist, the academy was visited just last month by the Pakistani military chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, where he proclaimed that Pakistan had “cracked” the forces of terrorism, an assessment that was greeted with skepticism in Washington.

In addition, the city hosts numerous Pakistani forces — three different regiments, and a unit of the Army Medical Corps. According to some reports, the compound and its elaborate walls and security gates may have been built specifically for the Qaeda leader in 2005, hardly an obscure undertaking in a part of the city that the resident described as highly secure.

Jane Perlez's article in the New York Times, from which the preceding snippet is taken, adds that it is "too soon to say whether Bin Laden’s presence in Abbottabad reflected Pakistani complicity or incompetence."

NPR posts an AP article this morning in which Pakistan's High Commissioner to Britain, Wajid Shamsul Hasan, insists that the country's authorities were not aware of bin Laden's presence in Abbottabad:

"Had we known it we would have done it ourselves," Hasan told the BBC. "The fact is that the Americans knew it and they carried out the operation themselves and they killed Osama bin Laden and then later our president of Pakistan was informed that the operation was successful, and that's it."

Stop right there.

The United States launched a military operation on the sovereign territory of a nation which is a supposed friend and ally of the United States without prior permission?

Another AP article, by Kimberly Dozier and David Espo, posted this morning on Yahoo! News, stresses that, in his statement last night, President Obama said that "it was 'important to note that our counter-terrorism cooperation with Pakistan helped lead us to bin Laden and the compound where he was hiding.'" But, here again, Dozier and Espo note that President Obama called Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari after the raid.

This is troubling on at least two levels. First, friends don't invade friends. Sending military units into another country without the permission of that country's government is called an invasion. Maybe even a sneak attack.

Second, and also obviously, we must not think Pakistan is much of a friend. Clearly we didn't seek Pakistan's permission for the raid because we must have believed that someone high up in the Pakistani government would have warned Osama. Our dear friend would have told our most hated enemy that the heat was on.

On that level, it doesn't matter whether Pakistan was protecting Osama as a specific government policy or whether the Pakistani government is so impotent that it can't ferret out people high up in government circles who were shielding Osama: If we asked for permission, Osama would not have been there when we arrived.

Of course, on another level, it matters a lot whether the Pakistani government is duplicitous or merely weak: They have nuclear weapons.

I tried to explain all this to Youngest Son this morning. He's 18. There's a reason why every nation taps its 18-year olds to fight its wars: Everything is so black and white.

Youngest Son had no doubts about Osama's demise whatsoever. After I explained, he said, "What are you? Afraid that Al Qaeda will retaliate?"

"No," I said, sadly. "Although that will happen anyway." Our enemies will not be deterred by Osama's death, even if a few of the more self-aware ones will look over their shoulders nervously just a bit more today than yesterday. But what about everyone else?

Santo subito? Not so fast, please

Among the many opinions that no one in the world is clamoring to hear are mine concerning the pending beatification of the late Pope, John Paul II.

At his funeral, crowds in St. Peter's Square unfurled banners and chanted "santo subito," which means (I am told) "sainthood now." And the canonization process, streamlined under John Paul II himself, was really fast-tracked for JPII by his successor, Benedict XVI.

John Paul II is, and I think will continue to be, regarded as one of the heroes of the 20th Century.

I imagine Joseph Stalin, skewered and rotating on a spit over an open flame in one of the hotter regions of the Netherworld. Long before John Paul II's reign, Stalin once famously sneered, "How many divisions does the Pope have?" Now, roasting in eternity, Stalin has his answer -- and JPII provided it: Enough. There are others deserving of credit, too, but John Paul II, as much as any other man, is responsible for the destruction of Soviet Communism.

But is John Paul II a saint?

The horrors that some (and far too many) Catholic priests and brothers inflicted on minors were revealed, in nation after nation, during John Paul's papacy. Reforms were adopted in America during his reign -- important reforms, badly needed, and, for the most part (as far as I can tell) sincerely implemented to date -- but the Church has never seemed to completely understand, acknowledge and accept its complicity in so many crimes over so many years.

As long as there are children there will be evil, sick or twisted individuals who will seek to exploit them. The Catholic Church was never alone in this. The Boy Scouts, protestant churches, even public schools -- there have been abusers in all of these, too. And in far too many cases, abusers in all of these settings were allowed to resign quietly, and even given carefully neutral references. But in none of these other settings were abusers systematically protected and moved to other fields of opportunity. To protect the Church. To protect the Church! To descend, for a moment, into kid-speak, but only because it seems particularly appropriate: OMG. But it wasn't just evil or venal or incredibly short-sighted bishops. There were well-meaning people involved there, too. Ironically, and tragically, an institution built on faith too many of these put their faith in science, hoping and relying on doctors and psychiatrists to "cure" errant clergy. It didn't work. We know better now. We hope.

The stain of clergy abuse clings to John Paul II, and not just because it was revealed on his watch. He appears to have defended or supported Marcial Maciel, the Mexican priest who founded the Legion of Christ and who also, according to Wikipedia, "was found guilty of raping underaged males and... also fathered at least one child."

Now the Pope -- any Pope -- sits atop a very steep pyramid. Not everything that goes on in the Church is or could be known by the Pope. In many ways the Pope -- any Pope -- is a figurehead, a prisoner of the Vatican bureaucracy, the Curia. The Curia is practically a living creature and, as such, is certainly far older than the Catholic Church. It is the bureaucracy of Rome -- Republican Rome, Imperial Rome -- still living on, adapting, growing. Like any living creature, the Curia responds to stimulation. And Maciel sent a lot of it to Rome during his heyday -- money, favors, money. When rumors swirled, they could be put down. Buried. Ignored. Dismissed as the mutterings of jealous rivals. What the Pope knew, therefore, and what the Pope should have known, on this issue or on many others, is not necessarily obvious.

But with these uncertainties I can not get too excited about John Paul II's coming beatification, unlike so many of my fellow Catholics here in Chicago. Cardinal George is heading up a large Chicago delegation to the ceremony this weekend. Part of it is ethnic pride: Chicago is the largest Polish city in the world after Warsaw (and home to more Poles than Warsaw at one time).

I take solace in this: Beatification is not sainthood. The media don't quite understand all this Catholic mumbo-jumbo and don't trouble themselves to learn, either. A man or woman who is beatified may be venerated by the faithful, but the Church does not declare, by beatification, that this man or woman is worthy of veneration as a friend and true servant of God.

I'd love to have met John Paul II. I was at his Mass in Chicago's Grant Park in 1979 -- me and a million or so of my closest friends. As I've already said, he is surely a hero for his role in bringing down the Soviet bloc. But there's no hurry, so far as I'm concerned, to declare the man a saint. Time will tell.

Easter dinner involves more than chow at Curmudgeon home

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Most of us were gathered here at the Curmudgeon Manse for Easter Dinner this past Sunday. Only Older Daughter and her husband Hank were absent. (When one's a nurse and the other gets paid to sing in church and they live 185 miles away, they'll miss their share of holiday dinners. It's OK.)

We don't sit down together as a family for dinner that often. We never did. Long Suffering Spouse ate with the kids when they were little; I would generally come home long after they'd eaten, sometimes even after they'd gone to bed. Long Suffering Spouse didn't mind so much, not really, because without me there to set a bad example, she could get most of the kids to eat exotic things like fruits or vegetables. Only Oldest Son's picky palate proved that bad eating habits are not just learned behavior.

But we generally sit down together for dinner at the holidays. Dinner conversation on those occasions is pretty much a contact sport. I think it's all good-natured. I'd better think it's all good natured -- I give at least as good as I get even though I'm picking on people who are going to pick out my nursing home some day.

Sunday the focus of the table talk was on Middle Son. I discovered late last week that he'd gone "Facebook official," confirming that he is actually dating a girl.

It is important to pause here and consider the magnitude of my achievement. Younger Daughter is one of the all-time great Facebook snoops -- but I was the one to make this discovery.

I noted, too, that the girl in question hails from Michigan. So I asked Middle Son whether the girl was going to be in Chicago over the holiday weekend. If she wasn't going to be going home to her family, she could always have dinner with us, I told him.

"We'll see," said Middle Son. In this context, "we'll see" means "absolutely no freaking way in the world." So I was not terribly surprised that Middle Son showed up to dinner alone.

If he thought, though, that he would evade discussion of what may or may not be a budding relationship by this omission, he was sadly mistaken.

I mentioned to my daughter-in-law, Abby, how much this situation reminded me of a similar situation just three years ago. I told Abby how we'd been so worried about her on that occasion, a thousand miles from her family, alone in her studio apartment, eating beans out of a tin can... and, now, it seemed, some other poor girl was in the same predicament. This little speech made Abby, Oldest Son and Middle Son all uncomfortable at the same time.

Middle Son tried to change the subject. It seems that he'd had a party at his place to celebrate the end of tax season (it's an accounting thing) and Younger Daughter had invited herself over. In fact, she'd gotten there a couple of hours before Middle Son arrived. He'd had to go to a client dinner in the south suburbs that night -- he wasn't planning on that -- so he was the last to arrive at his own party. He wanted to talk about how freely Younger Daughter had partaken of the spirits on offer at the apartment prior to his arrival -- but Younger Daughter turned the tables on him. Yes, she'd overindulged, Younger Daughter admitted -- and Long Suffering Spouse was not amused -- but, when Middle Son finally arrived, who was he with but the girl with whom he is now linked on Facebook?

I don't know if anything will come of this, of course. This is Middle Son's problem, not mine.

But the consensus among the women-folk in the Curmudgeon family (and, believe me, Older Daughter has since weighed in on this topic as well) is that acknowledging a relationship on Facebook is an Important Step.

Chicago's #1 -- Our gas price leads the nation

The Chicago Tribune reports today that the average gasoline price in Chicago is $4.27 a gallon. That's what I paid yesterday morning; I guess this news that makes me feel a little better. At least, according to the article, I didn't overpay.

One of the gas stations closest to my house is at $4.45. I haven't been by the BP a little further north on Harlem, at Devon. That's usually the most expensive anywhere around. For obvious reasons, I'm not driving anywhere I don't have to these days.

Now the question comes up: Is there gouging going on here? This is a question on the order of 'is the sky blue'?

I did a post whining about gasoline prices in late June 2008, when the national price was $4.08 a gallon (it's $3.88 currently, according to the linked Tribune article). At the time of that June 26, 2008 post, crude oil prices were fluctuating from a high of $139.89 to around $134 when the post appeared. Today, oil prices are dropping from around $113 to $111.75 a barrel.

Yet, prices at the pump are higher. At least in Chicago. It's over $4 a gallon in California, too.

I hope I'm as fond of capitalism as anyone. But thievery is thievery. And someone should be going to jail.

Curmudgeon gets conspiracy-minded about 1918 Cubs World Series loss

This morning's Sun-Times carries a story about the possibility that the infamous 1919 Chicago White Sox (the "Black Sox") were not the first Chicago baseball team to throw a World Series.

Indeed, if a sworn statement by Black Sox pitcher Eddie Cicotte is to be believed, Cicotte and the other "Eight Men Out" may have been inspired to throw the 1919 Series to the Cincinnati Reds by a rumor that the Cubs had purposely tanked in the 1918 Series, against the Boston Red Sox.

That's the series in which Babe Ruth pitched for the BoSox. His contract was sold to the Yankees soon thereafter, the start of the pervasive New England myth -- "the Curse of the Bambino."

The Chicago History Museum has posted part of Cicotte's statement online, in an article by Peter Alter entitled, "Did the Cubs lose the the 1918 WS on purpose?"

Even casual baseball fans know what happened to the Eight Men Out. Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis, a man with a hard face and a shock of white hair that made him look like an Old Testament prophet with a sour stomach, disregarded the 1921 court verdict in which the Black Sox were acquitted (despite confessions from Cicotte and "Shoeless Joe" Jackson) and banned all eight implicated players from baseball for life. You may even recall his famous quote on that occasion: "Regardless of the outcome of the juries, no player that throws a ball game, no man that entertains proposals or promises to throw a game, no player that sits in a conference with a bunch of crooked players where the ways and means of throwing games are discussed, and does not promptly tell his club about it, will ever again play professional baseball."

But was Judge Landis so tough on the Black Sox because he so hated gambling... or was his antipathy to the White Sox generally also involved?

Judge Landis was appointed to the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1905. He had a talent for grabbing headlines by his rulings, but these did not always stand up to the test of appellate review. From Wikipedia:

In 1907, [Landis] presided over a Standard Oil antitrust trial fining them $29 million for accepting rail freight rebates, although the verdict was later set aside.

In 1918, he presided over the trial of over 100 members of the Industrial Workers of the World (including Big Bill Haywood) on the charge of violating (by hindering the draft) the Espionage Act of 1917. He also presided over the December 1918 trial of 5 prominent Socialist Party of America leaders, including Victor Berger, SPA Executive Secretary Adolph Germer, youth section leader William Kruse, and editor of the party's national newspaper J. Louis Engdahl. While Landis oversaw the convictions of many in these trials, imposing draconian verdicts, many of the verdicts were reversed on appeal or nullified by presidential pardon. The convictions were overturned because Landis had demonstrated his lack of impartiality; notably, Landis said during the trial that "If anybody has said anything worse about the Germans than I have, I would like to know it so I can use it." 255 U.S. 22 at 28.

Landis was also instrumental in getting African-American heavyweight champion Jack Johnson banned from the sport by charging him with transporting a white woman over state lines for prostitution.

And Landis was an open and notorious Cub fan. I remember reading once that Judge Landis was frequently AWOL from his courtroom, taking in Cub games at the West Side Grounds or, later, at Wrigley Field.

This morning, I looked online to see what corroboration, if any, existed for this recollection.

MLB.com says that Landis "often found time to attend games at both Comiskey Park and Wrigley Field in Chicago," but an unofficial Cub history website, JustOneBadCentury.com, asserts, "Landis was... a regular at West Side Grounds, home of the Chicago Cubs. He openly rooted for the Cubs against the White Sox in the 1906 World Series, something White Sox fans never forgot. When the Cubs moved to what is now Wrigley Field, he was a regular there as well."

Now... I don't pretend that this is anything close to authoritative proof... but isn't it interesting that the man who thundered so angrily against ballplayers who consorted with gamblers -- threatening to ban for life even a player who "sits in a conference with a bunch of crooked players where the ways and means of throwing games are discussed, and does not promptly tell his club about it" -- seems not to have investigated the rumors swirling around his beloved Cubs? Jury verdicts may not have been the only thing disregarded by Judge Landis in his handling of baseball's gambling crisis.

Joe Jackson, it is widely believed, knew about the fix and took the gamblers' money (it may have been thrown on the floor of his hotel room after he refused it); there is some evidence to support the claim that he tried to tell Charles Comiskey about the fix, but the Old Roman wouldn't see him. Jackson's so-called "confession" may have been procured following the liberal administration of whiskey by a White Sox team attorney, Alfred Austrian. Even so, Jackson arguably sat "in conference" with crooked players, but he did hit .375 in the 1919 Series, going 12 for 32 -- including three doubles and a homer -- going 5 for 12 with runners in scoring position. He scored five times, driving in six runs and committed no errors. (See, linked Wikipedia article; see also, Shoeless Joe Jackson's Virtual Hall of Fame.)

Would Judge Landis have been as stern and unyielding toward Jackson if he had worn Cubbie blue?

There's snow on the ground in Chicago this morning

According to the Chicago Tribune (from which this image is also obtained), the .6 inches recorded at O'Hare this morning beats a record that has stood here since 1910.

More proof, if more were required, that anyone who predicts the weather according to the calendar is a fool, especially in Chicago.

Today's snow accumulation is mostly on cars and lawns, not on (the slightly warmer) streets and sidewalks. In other words, today's snow comes pre-shoveled. If only December snow were that considerate.

With the snow and the cold and the gloom, and with the White Sox on a four game losing streak, I needed a laugh this morning. This comic (which is reprinted from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, but which I saw today in the Chicago Sun-Times) filled the bill for me. Allow me to share (click to enlarge or clarify):

All dressed up and going nowhere: Curmudgeon tries to tie it all toghether

My late father-in-law approached nearly every day of his long life wearing a tie. He was a professional man, a doctor, and a tie was part of who he was. I can't remember him ever wearing blue jeans. He may not have ever owned any; I don't know for certain because I never saw him tending to his lawn and garden. (He'd not married until he was past 40; he was just two months short of 70 when I married his daughter.)

By the end of his life, a service was cutting the grass and his horticultural exploits were limited to a couple of rose bushes and a tomato plant or two that my wife would start for him, and plant for him. It's possible he may have worn blue jeans in his grass-cutting days. I suspect, though, he may have only loosened his tie.

My father, on the other hand, wore a tie only because it was required of him -- and only when it was required of him. Also a professional man, a lawyer, my father preferred jumpsuits, better suited to a garage mechanic than a lawyer. Then again, in his private time, my father liked working in his garage -- working on this car or that one, working on his lawn tractor, or one of the fleet of smaller, gasoline-powered hand mowers that he maintained. He built a canoe once, from a kit, using thin wood strips and canvas. He built a grandfather clock. He built a Bugatti kit car on a Volkswagen chassis.

I've often read (and I read more and more of these things as the years go by) that one must keep busy in retirement or the human machinery will simply... wind down... and... stop. If scheduled projects were themselves a guarantee of longevity, however, my father would still be alive today.

When he was working, though, my father would never appear without a tie. I don't think he would have been particularly receptive to "Casual Fridays." Of course, the ties he'd wear might be a tad colorful. Colorful? They'd be loud -- garish -- frequently populated by characters from Disney or Warner Brothers cartoons. We buried him in a Mickey Mouse tie. It was a solid color tie, covered with tiny, raised Mickey Mouse faces. You really couldn't tell if you didn't look closely... but I do remember the arched eyebrow of the funeral director. Little did he know my father would probably have thought the tie far too subdued for the occasion. My sister and I made the choice, as I recall, as something of a compromise -- my father might have wanted a louder tie, perhaps, but he probably wouldn't have wanted to shock the guests at his wake.

I wear ties, of course, because I too am a professional man. I fall somewhere between my father and my father-in-law, however. I don't favor loud clothes on any occasion (on one occasion, I seem to recall, at a family picnic, my father critiqued my casual attire as "boring" -- which it certainly was, at least by comparison to the fire engine red, short-sleeve jumpsuit he was wearing).

I wear blue jeans again at home these day -- after a couple of decades of doing without, mostly because, as I wrote in 2008, of an overdeveloped sense of gravitas. I never wear a tie at home, except for the annual Christmas picture. In the modern age, I can sometimes get away with not wearing a tie to the office as well. "Business casual" is a confusing, but wonderful thing. Unfortunately, on several days where I've gone business casual, a colleague has asked me to cover something up in court. On one occasion I came to work in a flannel shirt, prepared to spend the day moving stacks of paper in the comfort and privacy of my office, when I realized I had a status hearing in a Chancery case.

The judge in that case was someone against whom I'd had cases when she was in private practice. We were adversaries, but never enemies. (In other words, we got along quite civilly, the way lawyers are supposed to get along.) I well remembered running into her at the Daley Center, not too long after she went on the bench. We were chatting for a few moments, catching up, when she saw someone entering the building in cutoffs and a t-shirt. "Can you imagine someone coming to court like that?" she said. "How can she expect to be taken seriously?" She proceeded, then, to tell me a number of short anecdotes about oddly dressed persons who had appeared before her.

That conversation sprang to my active memory buffer that morning as I sat in my office, in my flannel shirt.

This happened a few years back, before I moved to this Undisclosed Location. I was a tenant in a bigger office then and I begged a colleague to borrow his suit jacket.

I stepped up on the case with the borrowed blue jacket covering as much of the flannel shirt as possible. It wasn't enough. It wasn't nearly enough. My colleague was at least as tall as I am, but I was a little wider. I seem to recall the sleeves only coming halfway down my arm. I hope my memory exaggerates. But the flannel shirt was still very visible.

I began with an apology, admitting (truthfully) that I'd misdiaried the court date and hadn't dressed for court.

"Yes, I see," said the judge. "But flannel? Really?"

Yesterday I didn't have court. I didn't wear a tie. But I otherwise dressed for work: Dressy dockers, sensible brown shoes, a tweed jacket, a button-down shirt. And that was to work from home.

I had two projects home with me. I had visions of finishing one before lunch, then running downtown for a CLE presentation that was right in my price range (free), then returning home to do the second project.

I started in diligently on the first project as soon as I dropped my wife off at school. Lunchtime came and went with the first project still undone. It remains undone. How often have I set two tasks for myself -- and finished only half of one?

I will wonder about this later -- but, now, I turn my attention to yesterday's unfinished projects. I think I will begin by loosening my tie.

What's wanting in public debate

The Chicago Sun-Times has a story this morning about a proposal to put pictures on Link cards, the ATM-like cards that have replaced paper food stamps for welfare recipients. The Sun-Times article, by Dave McKinney and Stephen Di Benedetto, quotes Ken Dunkin, a Democratic legislator from Chicago, asking the bill's sponsor, "Are you picking on poor people, representative?"

That's when the light bulb went on.

The recent federal budget compromise was attacked as mere 'accounting tricks' on the one hand and 'an assault on poor people' on the other.

Do you see the pattern?

No one, on either side of our increasingly wide political divide, can publicly admit that anyone on the other side might be motivated by good faith or good intentions.

Thus, the Democrats see any proposed reform of any government program as a Republican attempt to mug the poor and the Republicans see any revision of our Byzantine federal tax structure (the U.S. Tax Code is now 72,000 pages long according to a column today by Jacob Sullum) as an incitement to class warfare.

In the words of Rodney King, can't we all get along here?

Granted, if every dollar spent by government were wisely used, poverty might not be eradicated, every roadway might not be as smooth as a pool table -- but does this mean that no investigation can be made into the efficacy of our considerable expenditures? Can no program, once enacted, ever be abandoned? Why must any economy move be seen as an assault on the less fortunate?

On the other hand, while I hate paying taxes as much as anybody (and more than most since, as a self-employed person, I must withhold money from my own wages and personally send it off to Washington and Springfield), can no revision of the tax code be permitted? Deficits, like credit card balances, add up quickly. Rich people pay willingly for luxury cars and premium service; wouldn't most of us be willing to pay a little more in taxes for streamlined, more efficient government services? The two cents on the dollar Illinois income tax increase has supposedly resulted in a 71% increase in state revenues in March 2011 (when compared to revenues in March 2010). The pain involved in forking over the extra money would be greatly soothed by some assurance that it wasn't going to be entirely wasted.

Democrats are going to have to acknowledge that their Republican brothers and sisters are not heartless monsters bent on starving the unfortunate. Republicans are going to have to admit that their Democratic brothers and sisters are not communists bent on imposing a dictatorship of the proletariat on the Land of the Free. And, if they won't, we have got to get us some new Democrats and Republicans.

"Shut up, old man"

Today, I found out, is International Be Kind to Lawyers Day.

Yesterday was not.

I was in court yesterday morning on a case I should have won three years ago, but did not.

Success, it is said, has many fathers; failure is an orphan. That's not entirely true.

The first part -- success has many fathers -- is true. Brilliant as we all sometimes think ourselves to be, none of us succeeds in this life entirely on our own. The best athlete has had lots of coaches. And trainers. And at least one parent or parent-figure who drove the budding superstar to practices and games when he or she was just starting out. The doctor who discovers a miracle cure has had lots of teachers, lots of colleagues who listened attentively, an insight provided (maybe by pure chance) by a spouse or another relative. Yes, the movie goddess is beautiful, but there were others who had to give her the chance to succeed or recognize her talent.

But failure is not an orphan.

Oh, failure is the last kid to be chosen for pick-up basketball. Failure is the nerdy guy no one wants to be around. But the buck has to stop somewhere. And in this case I appeared on yesterday, it stops with me. The trial judge made the wrong decision, yes, but I must have been insufficiently persuasive. I should have worried less about the bill and more about winning in the Appellate Court. I didn't win there either.

And now my client is suffering for it. I don't think it any consolation for my client that I am suffering too.

And while you sometimes lose a close case to a respected opponent, the ones that really hurt are when you lose to a real jerk. In this case -- without getting into any identifying details -- it is the opposing client who is the real jerk.

I've represented real jerks before. Unless a lawyer is so financially independent that he or she can discriminate freely, every lawyer has had this experience. There are a couple of tricks for dealing with rotten clients. One trick, which I've more or less mastered, is to retain control of the case. The bum of a client isn't going to approve of anything you do anyway, so you might as well do what is right and appropriate and not get tainted by your association with the rat. The other trick, which I've not mastered at all, is get as much of your money as possible up front. Because the scummy client is never going to pay you in full.

The attorney currently representing the rotten client in this case (he's run through several so far) hasn't mastered even the first rule. He's letting his client tell him how to handle the case. It will get him in trouble, eventually; at least I sincerely hope so. Of course, I may stroke out before that happens. It was outrageous what counsel said in the written submission he gave to the judge before yesterday and what he said in defense of it in the courtroom yesterday morning was equally so. But the judge, having only read what my opponent provided, regarded me with a jaundiced eye.

But I get ahead of my story.

Before the case was called -- before the judge came out -- opposing counsel introduced himself to me. He was sitting in front of me. He turned around in the swivel chair at counsel table to face me (I'd been sitting behind him) pretending to be friendly. I can pretend lots of things -- what blogger doesn't? -- but I couldn't pretend to return the pretend bonhomie. Indeed, I was radiating hostility. I had, as the saying goes, my "war face" on.

Nevertheless, counsel tried to engage me in conversation about the case. Eventually, I obliged him. I began to tell him what I thought. This lasted about 30 seconds or so.

Abruptly, though, counsel said, "Shut up, old man. I am not afraid of you." He turned around in his swivel chair facing the front of the courtroom.

Yesterday was definitely not Be Kind to Lawyers Day. Tomorrow won't be either.

Curmudgeon conducts an Unscientific Survey about the Royal Wedding

On the Friday after Easter, a balding relic of an age gone by will marry a very pretty English girl at Westminster Abbey.

It is a sign of how little royalty counts any more -- even in England -- that the young couple couldn't even book the church on a Saturday.

Now, mind you, I'm happy for the kids and I wish them a long and happy marriage. But my republican (small-r) instincts are entirely on edge with all this "news" coverage of the forthcoming nuptials.

Yes, I understand that the news-gathering services are pleased to focus on a happy story for a change. It must be a relief for the chattering class to put aside the endless wars and famines and plagues and earthquakes and tsunamis and insane dictators for this event. But wall to wall coverage by every cable and broadcast outlet? I don't see how Balding Billy's marriage to Bonnie Kate rates more than a passing mention on the evening news in America.

See, I could have sworn we had a Revolution in this country to rid ourselves of kings and queens and "aristocrats" who think that they've got something over on the rest of us because one of their ancestors stole off to the no-tell motel with the reigning monarch. (Oh sure, many of England's hereditary titles were conferred for valor in battle, especially in more recent times, but an awful lot of titles seem to have been initially bestowed on the offspring of royal mistresses....)

I learned in school that the British Crown provides an apolitical symbol of national unity -- something that pretty much all Brits can rally round, whatever their political persuasion. The advantage of having a head of state separate from the head of government is frequently illustrated by comparison of the Crown to the President of the United States: Because the President is both head of state and head and government, no matter who occupies the Oval Office, the blood pressure of somewhere close to half the population rises every time he speaks -- even when he is trying to apply a healing balm to the body politic. And, besides, the English Crown is a big boost to tourism: People like to see the funny costumes and the carriages.

I can therefore understand that some folks in England might want to take time off to watch the pageantry. But in America?

And yet I've heard and read about people -- American people -- planning to take the day off of work to watch the wedding and attendant festivities on TV.

Why?

So I throw open the floor to you, Dear Readers. How much, if any, of the Royal Wedding festivities are you planning to watch... and why?

Friday introspection

In other words, not a lot of laughs here. At least, not intentional ones....

We generally fall asleep in front of the TV in the Curmudgeon home. I usually nod off first, sometimes despite Long Suffering Spouse's loud efforts to keep me awake. My wife is generally correcting student papers when she drops off. As near as I can tell, though, she has never made a long red line down the face of a page as consciousness fled. This is surely a gift.

Tuesday was a typical evening in our home, then, at least in that sense, as we both fell asleep waiting for the news to come on. I wanted to catch news of the election results. I did not.

When I awoke, around midnight, I fired up the computer to see what I had missed. I went right to the Chicago Board of Elections site so I could get the vote totals in the ward races that interested me -- including, of course, the race in the ward where I live.

The news disappointed. It's not that I dislike the candidate who won; it's just that I consider the candidate who lost to be a friend. So does Long Suffering Spouse. "I was almost tempted to vote for her opponent," she told me Wednesday, "because no one I vote for ever wins."

Still, I was all riled up about the election. All elections rile me up; I have an interest in elections and politics that borders, according to my friend Steve, on the unhealthy. Someday, he says at every opportunity, science will prove that all politicians are mentally ill -- the very thirst for office being the most telling symptom. Steve frequently cites Rod Blagojevich as Exhibit A for his theory.

I used to remind Steve that I have run for public office and would, therefore, according to his definition, be mentally ill. "Yours seems to be a mild case," he told me. I believe he was trying to be reassuring. I try to change the subject now whenever he brings it up.

So -- as I say -- I get riled up on every election day. I can feel the sap rising, as Adlai Stevenson III once said (to his eternal chagrin). But I must have been particularly riled up on Tuesday night because, having woken up enough to check the election results, I found it difficult to fall back asleep.

It's probably because I'm currently reading Martin Gilbert's biography of Winston Churchill (the one volume condensed version, not the full eight volume work).

Churchill was a man who was apparently fearless, and I do not refer just to his youthful military exploits. He seemed utterly unafraid to say, and write, what he pleased, knowing all the time that he would be, and was, making enemies in the process. He was unafraid to work with those whom he had alienated, converting some, in time, from enemies to admirers. Maybe the subject is covered in more depth in Gilbert's unabridged biography, but Churchill's recurring depression (his 'black dog') is merely hinted at. I suppose it may be because, when Churchill wasn't depressed, when his eyes burned with intensity and purpose, he churned out such a staggering pile of papers, memoranda, letters, articles, even books. Gilbert, and other Churchill biographers too, suggest that Churchill was so afraid of dying young (as his father had) that he lived his life on overdrive. By the time he realized he would (and had) long outlived his father, the habit was formed.

I, on the other hand, am a profile in timidity. If I've made few enemies, I also have few friends -- and no admirers. I can churn out sentences as pompous and grandiose as anything Churchill ever wrote... but mine sound pretentious, even to me. I think this comes from my unwillingness to come out, in the open, and take the risks that anyone takes in public life: The risks of defeat, humiliation, even ridicule. Steve would say that my attitude demonstrates reasonable mental health; Churchill's, on the other hand, shows that depression was not the only mental illness with which he coped. And, of course, at the end of the day, Churchill was the descendant of John Churchill, first Duke of Marlborough, the grandson of the 7th Duke, nephew of the 8th, cousin of the 9th... and related by blood or marriage to most of the rest of the English peerage. His mother was a 'confidante' of the future King Edward VII. (Churchill, I've learned, received a walking stick from King Edward as a wedding present. Churchill used this for the rest of his life -- even if Edward and his successors occasionally wished that Edward had knocked him over the head with the stick instead of making it a present.) Churchill's place in society was assured regardless of his successes or failures in politics. I, on the other hand, am merely one of 50,000 Cook County lawyers, as proud of my heritage as Churchill was of his -- but altogether conscious that my bloodlines confer upon me no social standing whatsoever.

In the end, I'll finish Gilbert's biography and move on to the next book. Perhaps then the urge to do something will pass or the regret subside.

Don't criticize President Obama for starting campaign early

There are some who have criticized the President's decision to formally announce his candidacy this week for reelection in 2012. To these critics, November 2012 seems so far away.

But, of course, it isn't, not if you're from Chicago.

Indeed, Mr. Obama is following the time-honored Cook County political calendar: The next election cycle begins as the last one ends. We had a municipal election in Chicago yesterday (Mr. Emmanuel avoided the runoff, but there were runoff elections in 14 of Chicago's 50 wards).

The 2012 primary campaign officially started in Cook County last night when the polls closed. If Mr. Obama jumped the gun in any sense, it was by no more than a day or so.

You may complain that this is a terrible way to do things; you may believe that the public should have some respite from perpetual campaigns; you may even think that elected officials should spend some time at the jobs they were elected to perform instead of always campaigning to keep those jobs -- or eying the next rung on the cursus honorum. I may even sympathize with these complaints, if you have them. But that is not how things work in politics in 2011 -- or, should I say, 2012.

Check engine light means sanity check imminent

I had to drop Youngest Son off at school a week ago. His baseball team was gathering there for a Spring Break trip to California to test itself against high-powered West Coast competition.

I started the car that the kid usually drives -- and lost my mind.

A sickly yellow light remained glowing on the dashboard as the engine engaged. Taking off my glasses so I could attempt to interpret this glyph, I realized it was the "check engine" light.

We live in a post-literate age. Sometimes I don't know why I bothered to learn to read at all, given the way 'glyphs' or 'icons' are used instead of words these days.

Of course, in the case of the evil omen on the dashboard, I am obliged to concede that providing accurate words would have taken up too much space. The "check engine" light does not necessarily mean that the engine is not working -- in my case the car was on -- but, rather, serves as a warning that one's credit is in for a major hit. A light that read, "Prepare your wallet for a major hit because something -- and we haven't the foggiest idea what -- isn't working but if you don't pay immediate heed to this warning you will be stranded in the middle of nowhere," would not leave room on the dashboard for the speedometer. Even in an SUV.

I dropped Youngest Son off at school and continued straightaway to the nearest Ford dealer. (The car in question happens to be a Ford Focus, a smallish, utilitarian vehicle, quite the opposite of an SUV. I do not indict this brand in particular. I have had similar problems to those related here while in possession of vehicles manufactured by others.)

I had not anticipated this problem, but I did (thankfully) anticipate that there might be some unforeseen complication in getting the boy off on his journey. I therefore had scheduled nothing in court for that morning.

Incidentally, for the record, the young man denied ever seeing the "check engine" light on the dash. It must have gone on, he insisted, for the first time that very morning. I almost believe him.

I waited nearly two full hours at the Ford dealer waiting for some word on the car's condition. There was one problem I expected: The brakes were allegedly on the point of failure. I had noticed no troubles with the brakes on this vehicle, and my son had not reported any, but it seems almost impossible to go to a dealer these days without receiving a recommendation along these lines. It is my belief that a new car can be secured from the showroom floor, driven around the block, and into the service bay -- at which point, at least as long as the new car sales sticker has been removed, a very sober-faced man will insist that at least two brakes must be replaced.

So the bad news about the brakes was hardly unexpected. This would not, however, explain the check engine light.

Well, the sober-faced man in my case said, your four tires are very worn and in need of replacement.

I have someone that I will take the car to for that work, I told him, but what about the check engine light?

Oh, that's the good news, the sober-faced man said -- without, of course, actually smiling. It seems there is a failure of pollution control whatchamacallit-fizzbin, but that's covered by the extended warranty. (I may not have heard him exactly, but that's the gist of what he said.) Of course, he added gravely, it may take some time to get this part. That's alright, I reassured him, and he gave me a loaner car and I made my way home.

We picked up the car Wednesday. With Youngest Son out of town, we didn't need to drive it again until Saturday, when we took it to get new tires.

We had no difficulty getting to or from.

Now we get to last night. Lightning was flashing in the clouds and the temperature was unseasonably warm. The wind was whipping leaves and papers and dust, but there could have been ghosts or evil spirits abroad in the land as well. I took the family van to pick up Youngest Son (he had just returned from his trip). In the meantime, Long Suffering Spouse decided to use the newly-repaired car to take the recycling to her mother's house.

(I'm sure I've mentioned before how we smuggle our recycling into a nearby suburb each week, the City of Chicago's recycling program ranging from dubious to non-existent.)

As Youngest Son and I pulled up to the house, we saw Long Suffering Spouse getting out of the other vehicle. She yelled something at us, but we couldn't hear her over the wind. I walked over to where she was. The recycling bag was still in the car.

That's when I found out:

The car -- with the new brakes and the new tires and the new pollution control whatchamacallit-fizzbin -- that car would not start. All the dashboard lights lit up in mockery when the key was turned, but no engine noise of any kind resulted.

One of the hardest thing to teach children or politicians is cause and effect. It is not always easy to distinguish between consequence and coincidence.

My mother-in-law stopped having her furnace cleaned annually because, over a period of several years, without exception, some four to six weeks after this annual service, her heat would fail. She began to suspect that there was a causal connection between these events. She field-tested this hypothesis the following year by not scheduling her furnace for its annual cleaning. That winter, she enjoyed uninterrupted heat.

I have on numerous occasions, with several cars, serviced at several different dealerships, noted that one service visit seems to lead, shortly thereafter, to another. Cause? Or coincidence?

I suspect that this dealer, like others before, jiggled something, loosened a wire, or unplugged some cable, thereby guaranteeing that an additional service call would be required. Unlike my mother-in-law's furnace, though, I can not field test this suspicion by doing nothing: The car is too big to be a paperweight and, at the moment, it is capable of no other function.

So I will go home soon, hoping to work on an appellate brief while I wait for AAA to show up and see if it can get the car started. If AAA fails, I will have the car towed to the dealer where, with a straight face, a sober-faced man will explain to me that the reason that my car will not start is that I bought the tires somewhere else.

Today may not be the best day to search Wikipedia

I'm pretty sure that the on-line Encyclopedia Britannica never changed its front page like Wikipedia has done this morning. If you happen upon this post today, April 1, you really should click over and check that out. If not, never mind.

Junior high school students, be warned: Today may not be the best of days to do your research entirely on line.

I did see a quote attributed to Mark Twain that strikes me as appropriate to the occasion: "April 1. This is the day upon which we are reminded of what we are on the other three hundred and sixty-four." Self-awareness is a blessing and a curse.