There are conflicting reports on the reality of this trailer. Some say it’s a real Mexploitation flick that, in one of life’s little ironies, manages to coincide with one of our latest examples of extremely racist asshattery.  Others insist it is merely a  star-studded Cinco de Mayo rebuttal to Arizona (a la Prop: the Musical).

Either way: Brilliant.

On a marginally-related tangent, I have noticed a significant drop in jobs for Arizona-based immigration attorneys and their ilk these last few weeks. I guess the new regime has no place for lawyers with their pesky notions of due process and human rights.

Ah, the Obamessiah, once again providing hope for the happy queer-friendly liberal utopian future.

He’s getting some good press (among the blogosphere) for his latest executive order that allows queer families visitation in hospitals. Here’s the money shot:

Yet every day, all across America, patients are denied the kindnesses and caring of a loved one at their sides — whether in a sudden medical emergency or a prolonged hospital stay. Often, a widow or widower with no children is denied the support and comfort of a good friend. Members of religious orders are sometimes unable to choose someone other than an immediate family member to visit them and make medical decisions on their behalf. Also uniquely affected are gay and lesbian Americans who are often barred from the bedsides of the partners with whom they may have spent decades of their lives — unable to be there for the person they love, and unable to act as a legal surrogate if their partner is incapacitated.

Well that sounds lovely, doesn’t it? And, as the roommate pointed out to me,  it will allow all dying people the ability to have their loved ones with them when they are ill – regardless of family connection. It won’t just help the queers – but all those people whose family is made up of friends rather than relations. This is a good thing.

So why is Draconismoi so snarky on this beautiful day? Because this Presidential Memorandum doesn’t do jack shit. The blurb getting all the press, the poetic statement about queer families and childless widows? It is not part of the actual order.

Is anyone else getting the strangest sense of deja-vu? I feel like I am right back in the middle of the election campaign, trying desperately to explain to all my liberal and progressive acquaintances why I am not on the Obamessiah bandwagon. Nothing is actually being said or done. It is all style and no substance.  WHY IS NO ONE PAYING ATTENTION?!

Let’s take a look at the entire text in play – with particular focus on those parts requiring action. Though “requiring” may be too strong a word, as the memo actually requests action be taken. How strong a request from the President is remains to be seen.

Initiate appropriate rulemaking, pursuant to your authority under 42 U.S.C. 1395x and other relevant provisions of law, to ensure that hospitals that participate in Medicare or Medicaid respect the rights of patients to designate visitors.

Okay, this seems good. Federal funding always comes with strings. These strings are logical – patients pick who can visit them. Thank you Mr. President for standing up for patient’s rights.

Nevermind that hospitals already allow patients to choose who can visit them. This is just enforcing the provision. Reminding hospital administrators and staff that they can’t just ban people from the visitation willy-nilly. If the patient wants their best friend to drop during designated visiting hours, then you damn well better let them in. No matter how queer, black, disabled, trans, foreign, female or religious said visitor happens to be.

You should also provide that participating hospitals may not deny visitation privileges on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability.

I admit it, that bit there. That is something. Sort of. Federal law does not currently prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity. Obviously if the patient is conscious and capable of requesting visitors, or was sometime previously conscious and requested said visitor, hospitals never had grounds to deny admittance regardless of any perceived queerness. What they could do was deny visitation for medical reasons. For example, a transphobic surgeon could oppose any potential contamination with The Trans™.  So, assuming the Department of Health and Human Services, per Obama’s request, chooses to draft regulations, Homophobic hospital staffers would have to proffer an actual (real or imagined) medical or administrative basis for denying visitation by queers.

Sounds awfully easy to work around doesn’t it? That’s because it is. Especially considering the closing line of the memo in question.

This memorandum is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

It is shockingly easy to completely disregard any rule, regulation or suggestion that expressly prohibits any consequences for said disregard. Obama has not created any rights or benefits here. The goddamn memo specifically states it. When you feel a hospital has prevented you from visiting a loved one due to sexual orientation or gender identity, unless you live a a queer-friendly state, with it’s own anti-discrimination law, your recourse is to…..write an angry letter? Complain to the staff?

But wait! This isn’t just about visiting people who are having babies or getting their appendixes out. This is about end-of-life care, such as you would see in the ICU or a prolonged hospital stay. Obviously patients who are coherent and awake aren’t going to have the same trouble with visitation as those lacking the capacity to express themselves. This memo is about them. It’s about the ability to provide care, love and support at the end. To be allowed to make those tough decisions concerning life support and organ donation. There is much injustice here! Right now people need to arrange powers of attorney or health care proxies (cha-ching says the lawyer) with their non-related loved ones before getting sick. And then they need to basically have those documents with them all the bloody time to prevent potentially life-threatening delays!

What are Obama’s thoughts regarding these situations?

It should be made clear that designated visitors, including individuals designated by legally valid advance directives (such as durable powers of attorney and health care proxies), should enjoy visitation privileges that are no more restrictive than those that immediate family members enjoy.

So, in order to be treated like an immediate family member, you have to be a designated visitor. Which means the patient either needs the capacity to express an interest in seeing you (see points above re: duh) or should have previously documented such an interest  - such as power of attorney or health care proxy (see points above re: the way things currently are).

But wait! There’s more.

Ensure that all hospitals participating in Medicare or Medicaid are in full compliance with regulations, codified at 42 CFR 482.13 and 42 CFR 489.102(a), promulgated to guarantee that all patients’ advance directives, such as durable powers of attorney and health care proxies, are respected, and that patients’ representatives otherwise have the right to make informed decisions regarding patients’ care.

Way to go Mr. President, asking hospitals to really stretch themselves by adhering to guidelines set out in binding legal documents created expressly for the type of situation at hand. Talk about change. And hope.

So tell me Blogosphere, why the hell are people rejoicing?! Nothing has been granted or changed. In fact, I’d argue this little bit of good press is more likely to hurt than help. Now there is some idea floating around that Obama said queer partners are guaranteed visitation and decision making authority – no matter if your state acknowledges the relationship. Obama said childless adults don’t have to worry – because their best friend will be put in charge of everything without a hitch.

But that is NOT true! If you live in a state that doesn’t acknowledge your relationship as legally binding – you need documentation of your wishes beforehand. You need that power of attorney and health care proxy. I don’t care what you think Obama did for the queer community this week. He didn’t do it. And by praising his name you are only setting yourself up for heartbreak down the line, when you find out that it was all style and no substance, when you haven’t set up those legal safeguards, when you have no more time.

The status quo remains – I’ll not be singing anyone’s praises.

™ Mick’s not-so-supportive Dad.

**Allow me to reiterate: No, I never expected Obama to be anything more than another politician in D.C. Yes, I am thrilled he was elected. My issues with Obama stem largely from the good credit he gets for NOTHING. I want him to be a powerful progressive President who will do everything in his power to further true equality. But until I seem some concrete proof  - I’m not giving him progressive cred just for being himself.

I’m not asking for nation-wide same-sex marriage, government-funded abortions no matter the situation, or a 50% tax on the upper class (though that would be awesome) because I am not a fucking idiot. But give me something to work with. How about a Health Care system that doesn’t throw women under the bus? Immigration reform? ENDA? Perhaps you could stop letting the extremists dictate your Supreme Court nominees?

He and Jon Stewart have been doing that a lot lately. I must be losing my touch.

And yes, I am posting this strictly for the “these 5 feminists” reference.

Well, that and the mocking of Justice Holmes (aka the One True God of U.S. law professors).

Bureaucrats have been hounding my miserable life for weeks now. Student loans, taxes…even trying to apply for food stamps…..it’s all been a never-ending paperwork and stonewalled level of hell.

Some of it made sense. I mean, taxes are never precisely simple. And it’s logical that the food stamp people would take a look at my residence history and give me hell (they totally think I am trying to con them, it’s kinda great).

But the student loan part was inexplicably difficult. They have acknowledged my unemployed status by giving me an unemployment deferment….so what the fuck is with this NEVER-ENDING cycle of “prove your income” garbage?

I finally got a hold of a real-live person today. Someone who could answer my questions about WHY THEY CAN’T JUST ACCEPT THAT I HAVE NO GODDAMNED MONEY.

Me: Hi, I just have a few questions about all this paperwork I am getting from the ICR department. They keep sending me duplicates of the same forms without any explanation. So either you aren’t getting them, or you don’t like how I’m filling them out.

Government Monkey: Well let me just pull up your file, see what we have, and I can go over it with you.

(blah blah blah identity verification)

Government Monkey: Well I see here that we have received at least one copy of all the forms needed to officially calculate your income.

Me: Exactly! This last letter was just duplicates of the same forms I’ve sent in before….so does that mean you don’t need anything else?

Government Monkey: Well I see were missing proof of your social security income.

Me: What social security? The only thing you should have to calculate is the percentage of 0 that indicates living in abject poverty.

Government Monkey: Oh well, then maybe it’s pension or life insurance payments we’re missing.

Me: There is none of that.

Government Monkey: Perhaps it’s for your children? We still need documentation, even if it is given to you for child maintenance.

Me: What kids? I don’t have kids!

Government Monkey: Oh. Well. Have you remarried recently?

Me: Remarried? I’ve never been freaking married. Very single. You have copies of my tax returns for the last couple years, and they’ve all been filed as a single adult. Where did you get the idea that I was married?

Government Monkey: Are you saying that you are not a widow?

Me: …..

Yeah. That’s right. The federal government is operating under the assumption that I am a widow. Hence the paperwork bullshit. As a widow I am clearly receiving pension, 401k, social security, or life insurance payments of some kind. They were very concerned that I wasn’t properly reporting it. Just because it’s not taxable income, doesn’t mean they can’t get their filthy claws in it.

So yeah. Widowed. Sometime in the last 6 years I managed to get married, off the guy, hide the body, and commit yearly incidents of tax fraud. Plus there was that whole becoming an attorney thing. What can I say? I’m a kick-ass multi-tasker.

Stalk Who We Want To,

Stalk Who We Want To,

You’d Be a Stalker Too if it Occurred to You.

(dum-dum-dum-dum-dum-da-da-da-da-da-da-da).

Shakesville points out that, pending felony charges aside, it is hugely fucking disturbing that the RNC doesn’t see anything ethically/morally wrong with using their bloody voter database to STALK AND HARASS a young woman.

If anyone needed more proof that the Republicans really don’t want any girl cooties in their precious tent, we have it now. Inflicting Sarah Palin on the world didn’t scare off enough vagina-voters, guess they had to ante up and literally run the girls off.

Anyone ever read Terry Pratchett’s Hogfather? If not, I highly recommend it. Excellent Chrismukkahwanztice story.

A line from that story is sticking with me this week. I may not remember it exactly, but it goes something like:

Education is a lot like a sexually communicable disease. It makes you unsuitable for a lot of jobs, and then you have the urge to pass it on.

In my case it seems that a legal education makes you unsuitable for any temporary holiday grunt work. I made the error of being honest about my educational history. (Susan pointed out how moronic this was. I should have just said I was a student needing work while on  Jan Term or whathaveyou. I am still young enough for this to be accepted without question).

Apparently managers don’t fancy hiring lawyers to help do inventory. I’m overqualified for the position (Dude, I admitted I don’t want to stay there for life, it’s freaking temp work. As not in any way shape or form to be construed as permanent). It’s almost as they knew about my extensive study of the Fair Labor Standards Act and how I would not hesitate to report violations thereof. Crazy how middlemanagement can read minds, isn’t it?

What have I learned about myself these last few weeks? As a first-year attorney I am unemployable in a recession that has glutted the market with more experienced lawyering folks and closed down hundreds of public interest firms. Conversely, as someone with a legal education I am un-underemployable because of my nasty communicable knowledge about worker’s rights.

This is the week of swearing-in ceremonies for all  brand-spanking-new California lawyers.

Congratulations! We did it! Woot! (Ohfuckmegentlywithachainsaw I just said woot).

You don’t have to go to California for the ceremonies if you reside out of state. You can get sworn in my judge or justice of peace or some other official person on a list that was sent to me. I will be doing that one. Partly because I’m not big on ceremonies, but mostly because I am flat-fucking-broke and can’t afford to fly to San Francisco (did I mention lately how much I loathe evil payroll lady who snatched my fellowship from my desperate little hands?).

Today though, I feel like I am 1L again. As I was looking through the ceremony instructions I found some stuff about an extra-swearing in for the specific districts. (Wtf?! Do I have to get sworn in for specific districts too? Does that mean I really needed to go to California after all? Because there isn’t a proxy-swearing-in mentioned for those. But do I really need them? Especially when I don’t even know where I will be living in 2010, much less working? Assuming I ever get a job. AAAAAHHHHHHH!).

Right. See? Everyone knows something I do not. Because by lawyer standards I am not nearly neurotic enough about these ceremony things and I didn’t spend enough any time researching The Rules.

Now I am envisioning two versions of the swearing-in.

One is awesome. It involves standing ovations, wads of cash, the Secret California Lawyer Handshake, and job offers. Lots of job offers.

The other is creepy. It involves chanting, costumes, the Secret California Lawyer Handshake, and the sacrifice of a 1L. Or maybe a retired judge. Which would be more appropriately symbolic?

Basically I am now regretting my inability to go. And I am sure this has absolutely nothing to do with missing my California people. Good luck all, you will be official four days before me. (I expect you to pass on that handshake to me. And let me know about job offers. Or videotape the sacrifice and put it on youtube.).

If you know my real name it can be located here. On this list. As an individual who passed the July 2009 California Bar Exam. The most grueling professional legal exam in the U.S. per its financial, emotional, physical and psychological costs.

Whoo! I now am one of 4,888 newly unemployed lawyers!

Fuck that feels strange to say. I am a lawyer. A motherfucking lawyer before I am old enough to rent a car. Which is oh-so-bizarre that I must find a rental car company sometime soon so I can make that argument as to their bullshit arbitrary age restriction.

I went to Becky and Rachel’s house on Friday to look up the results. There was much concern for my mental state when I expressed a sudden interest in going for a run. We ate. We made margaritas. We agreed to look up the results on Rachel’s computer since she has a Mac and my instincts will always be to protect the Mac no matter the outcome.

Then I gave her my login info and made her check for me.

Rachel is sick. It didn’t occur to her to read the page to herself prior to reading it out-loud. Picture the most monotone and non-comprehending diction imaginable.

“The above Name (********* ******* ********) appears on the pass list……”

I may have screamed and cried like a little girl.

Note: My decision not to log on at 6 was probably one of my more genius moves. I’ve been perusing blog posts of fellow July 2009 test-takers…..and there was much IT related 6 PM drama. As expected. You don’t often describe law students, bar exam taxers or lawyers as “laid-back”.  Though by all above standards, I am. Yeah, that’s right, me.

Women are not a “special interest group”.  In fact, women comprise 51% of the U.S. population. That makes a majority.  Ergo, “women’s health” does not qualify as a fringe benefit of health care. It is a necessary basic component to any functioning health care system.

You have 92 vagina-colleagues in Congress right now. Not to mention howeverthefuckmany female aides, speechwriters, lobbyists and media personnel roaming the Capitol. It was very kind of you to consider how sad you would be if none of them had boobs due to lack of accessible breast cancer screening, but they do see medical professionals for other reasons. Now it’s time for you to pretend you think those women you see everyday are people, rather than walking-talking tits.

1. Fuck the bullshit Stupak-Pitts Amendment. Yes, I do mean to cover abortions with federal money. And before you bitch about costs, get out a fucking calculator and add up 9 months of prenatal care + birth + postnatal care + 70 or so years of general medical costs and subtract the cost of an abortion. See how much money you saved.
2. Cover birth control. In all forms. For everyone. At any age. This includes Plan B for people under 18 since you douchebags made it prescription-only for minors. If you complained about covering abortion your arguments against contraceptive are invalidated. Newsflash: birth control prevents unwanted pregnancies and subsequent so-called ‘elective’ abortions! Oh, and do you still have that number from before?  Good, now you can subtract 40 years of contraceptive from that number.  Can you see the cost savings? Math is fun!
3. Pap smears. Women go to the gynecologist/midwife/women’s practitioner once a year for a checkup. This involves a pap smear. The pap smear checks for cancer and STIs. Things that are, by they way, really expensive to treat when not caught early. (In fact, I am going to go way out there and suggest you just cover all STI screenings.  That way you and your illustrious colleagues can have unprotected sex with high priced escorts in airport bathroom stalls with no worries about herpasyphagonnorhitis.) There is no logical reason to cover mammograms but not paps.
4. Yes, you should cover illegal immigrants.  Why?  Because we have sex with illegal immigrants. Which means spreading STIs. And making babies. We work and consume alongside them, providing fertile ground for virus and bacteria reproduction. Wouldn’t it be nice to prevent pesky public health crises by offering low cost preventative care for any and all people who happen to be residing in the U.S?  Let’s not forget the number of illegal immigrants in this country who pay taxes and perform necessary work for the continued functioning of our economy. Not to mention the fun little fact about our international obligations to asylum seekers and refugees, who count as so-called ‘illegal immigrants’ but have every right, under one of the few treaties we willingly ratified, to live here with their families. Hey! You in the back who goes to Mexico/Canada a couple times a year for cheap prescription drugs! No bitching about damn foreigners sucking us dry.

You have no hope in hell of this single-payer system working if you can’t handle basic coverage for all people. No matter the location of their reproductive organs.

The Dems have a veto-proof majority going for them right now. First I propose a discussion about what a person is. And once we’ve established that women and immigrants are of the same species as Congressmen, I fervently recommend you get off your fucking asses and do something!

The Big Corporate Firms hire associates during their first year of law school. These students are guaranteed high-paying job upon graduation. They also have their Bar fees taken care of. It’s a cushy life.

One I abhor. Corporate law? Secured Transactions? Tax? Why-Enron-Wasn’t-So-Bad 101?  Those are courses I avoided like the plague.

Most law schools have three tracks of students. You have the associates (THEM), the activists (US), and the middle road people who start their own firms and such.

Due to the recession, 2009 associates have almost all been deferred to 2010. But rather than just paying their non-working associates $40k for a year, firms are offering to double that if the newbies will work at nonprofits. (Note that this is not pure generosity on behalf of the firms. In such a manner the firms can meet the bar required pro bono hours for the entire staff without requiring their attorneys to actually engage in free labor.)

The nonprofit job market has thus been glutted with a bunch of overpaid asshats who have never shown even an inkling of interest in the plights of humanity. But they are totally free – no need to pay health insurance or Westlaw bills (the legal research databases are offering free access to deferred associates to ‘help’ – but not, of course, to the piddling first year grad who actually wanted to work for the public interest). One can overlook their lack of passion in the face of such numbers (or lack thereof). It’s only for one year after all.

I see how this is helpful to an overburdened sector of the legal market. I really do.

But it’s pissing me the fuck off. People like myself and my peers, who went into law school knowing we wanted to do this work, knowing that it would not be a road to wealth, taking on the debt anyways, and gearing all our internships in the appropriate way, are being shut out of the job market because we aren’t free.

In a blatant effort to boost post-graduate employment numbers, Law School has started offering $3000 fellowships to work on a project for a non-profit firm this winter. I immediately contacted area firms, foolishly assuming they’d be very into the free aspect, only to be summarily rejected because the supervisors are full up with the glut of deferred associates they snagged this year. It’s not that they don’t want my help, or wouldn’t appreciate having a newbie on staff who knew whatthefuck was going on – they just don’t have the ability to take on anyone else. Not with all the associates around.

So now the deferrals have not only torpedoed my chances of landing a real job, but also managed to block my attempts at snagging a third-party funded spot. Nevermind that people like me wouldn’t require nearly the amount of supervision the d.a.’s will.  See above re: knowing whatthefuck is going on.

I start out pissed about how people who deserve these jobs can’t land them, and circle back to the ridiculous nature of the whole scenario. There are first year attorneys in non-profits making more than executive directors this year. Said attorneys are shocked and dismayed to discover that non-profit work is real work (omg! you mean you people who 60+ hour weeks? who knew this would be hard?). People who have been trained to shut down discrimination suits are suddenly expected to advocate for them.  While we’re at it, why not start using prosecutors as defense attorneys? Totally the same thing. There isn’t a different approach at all.

But the most grating aspect is how the Bar Associations have bent over backwards to find places for these people who are drawing a salary REGARDLESS and worked so hard at soothing the fears of these kids.  The fear that that $100k job might not be there forever. That the mere $75k they’ll draw this year might be the highest it will get.  As opposed to the legitimate problems facing the non-profit job seekers who were squeezed out. How we know we’ll never be hitting six figure salaries, making loan deferments useless. How all those LFPs are dependent upon being employed – something none of us are, because the associates snagged our spots. Sure, our jobs will be there in September 2010…..but what should we do until then?