Did you know the ins and outs of how big-firm attorneys charged?

I didn’t either.

[Reform toward flat-fee or contingency representation is] good for the client, certainly: no more $200 phone calls that last only 5 minutes (but which get billed in 15- and 30-minute increments). No more charges for an attorney to attend a firm-wide half-hour meeting wherein numerous cases are discussed in one-sentence summaries, with each of those clients being billed for the attorney’s full half-hour.

It’s good for the legal system, too. Nothing brings on superflous, unnecessary motion practice like a corporate attorney’s representation of a client with deep pockets.

Yowza. I guess I’m fortunate that so far my dealings with attorneys (as opposed to friends who are attorneys) have been limited to two specified services for two flat fees.

Bonus Venom: Heh.

Nevermind HRC’s arrogance in badgering the DoD about planning for a withdrawal that, as yet, has not been forced on them by the shrillers in the legislature. What I want to know is, when did people start talking like this, and why are they still?

Clinton has privately and publicly pushed Gates and Joint Chiefs Chairman Peter Pace two months ago to begin drafting the plans for what she said will be a complicated withdrawal of troops, trucks and equipment.

“If we’re not planning for it, it will be difficult to execute it in a safe and efficacious way,” she said then.

Emphasis mine. I see this usage all the time, from writers and speakers on all topics. Why? They’re called adverbs, and they are stronger, more efficient words than “do this in such-and-such a way” (or worse yet, “such-and-such a manner”).

“…execute it safely and efficiently,” are the words you’re looking for, Senator. Or “efficaciously” if you must.

So pretentious and annoying.

Oh, speaking of arrogant, how much chutzpah does it take to accuse the DoD of a political response to a serious inquiry when your whole motivation in asking was A) throwing your weight around and B) political grandstanding? Let’s see how “political” DoD’s response was:

“We are always evaluating and planning for possible contingencies. As you know, it is longstanding departmental policy that operational plans, including contingency plans, are not released outside of the department.”

Ouch. Yawn.

If you were a hairstylist in a SuperCuts-ish type of place, and you regularly cut the hair of locally based, nationally blogging columnist James Lileks, would you go on being just as surly to him as you were the first time you cut his hair?

And if you never knew who he was, might not you have some friends who would point out how you’re regularly being called out as sullen and “a miserable little scowling pill” on the web, so that you could improve your behavior somewhat?

A: Oh, right. You have no kind friends who might warn you of this depressing fact, because you’re surly. Never mind.