Posted on 10/24/2005 5:56:40 AM PDT by aceintx
Another skeleton Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers was deeply involved in an American Bar Association scheme that forces lawyers to pool their clients' funds into checking accounts and pass on the interest to "public interest" law firms, Evan Gahr reports at www.chimpstein.com. The program, known as Interest on Lawyers' Trust Accounts, or IOLTA, was intended to provide legal services to the poor but often ends up promoting left-wing causes, Mr. Gahr said. IOLTA has helped fund "a panoply of left-wing advocates, including a California group that sued to overturn the state's parental consent law for abortion, a gay organization that tried to force the organizers of St. Patrick's Day Parade in Boston to include a contingent of gay marchers, and a Texas outfit that sued to disqualify military absentee ballots," he writes. Mr. Gahr added: "Now, Chimpstein.com has discovered an obscure report which places Miers at the forefront of the American Bar Association's successful effort to foist IOLTA on the nation. This is the smoking gun which at least one conservative group tried to locate and failed." Law professor Charles Rounds, who opposed the scheme, said, "IOLTA is a program, created by state supreme courts or state legislation, whereby lawyers pool client funds -- small sums and large sums held for short periods of time -- into a designated interest-bearing checking account. The interest that is generated on those pooled funds is then funneled through a judicially created legal foundation to various 'public interest' legal firms." Miss Miers in the 1990s served on the American Bar Association's Consortium on Legal Services and the Public, which pushed the idea, Mr. Gahr said.
(Excerpt) Read more at washtimes.com ...
Dubya has a Harvard MBA.
He'll support any plan to create "new accounts".
He LUVS them!!!
I suppose you don't even get the irony of that statement??
Pray for W and Harriet Miers
. . . how they can in the space of one paragraph say the IOLTA "allows" attorneys to "pool" such money and then a moment later indicate that each attorney is required to "establish" an account by himself.
What is the penalty for someone refusing to participate, from a suspicion that like so many do-gooder projects, the moral claim of helping the poor is frequently a cover for other causes?
If there is a penalty, (for refusing to participate in government-mandated charity to a favored "non-profit") is that not also a symptom of a socialist mindset?
I certainly have no ready answer. I'm looking though, which is one benefit derived from reading these threads--moving someone to look for facts and possible answers.
Both our Republican Senators, however, seem to support the program. From the Spring 2005 Legal Services Corporation Magazine:
Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C., Texas Senators Kay Bailey Hutchison and John Cornyn have joined a coalition of Senators who are making the case that the Legal Services Corporation deserves additional federal funding—even in today’s difficult budgetary environment. Success in that endeavor obviously would be welcomed by the three federally funded legal aid programs in the state: Texas Rural Legal Aid, Lone Star Legal Aid, and Legal Aid of NorthWest Texas.
“Making sure that we have access to the legal system for all people is the right goal, and Texas has done a good job of fulfilling that goal,” Hutchison says. “People who are in general familiar with the legal system know and appreciate the job that legal services does.”
One of the priority areas for Texas legal services providers has been helping the state’s more than 185,000 reported victims of domestic violence each year. On April 23, Texas First Lady Anita Perry and Attorney General Greg Abbott joined Justice O’Neill to unveil a new kit that will enable victims of domestic violence to file their own applications for protective orders when they are unable to secure a lawyer to assist them. The free, step-by-step protective order kit comes with detailed instructions for filling out the relevant paperwork, having a temporary order signed by a judge, and requesting a hearing date to grant the protective order. The kit also provides tips for victims on how to prepare for the hearing. It is available online at www.oag.state.tx.usCornyn, during his time as Texas Attorney General, approved the expenditure of state dollars from the Crime Victims’ Compensation Fund to support legal services initiatives that help victims of domestic abuse. The Fund continues to disperse $2.5 million annually to the Equal Access to Justice Foundation. More recently, First Lady Perry has championed the role of legal aid in helping battered spouses end the cycle of violence. “Domestic violence has serious repercussions for our society. Victims may not be able to afford health care or legal help, which may cause them to remain in the violent situation,” Perry says. The First Lady praises the role of legal aid in helping victims “obtain protection from abusive partners” but notes “these free programs cannot assist everyone who needs help; the need is unfortunately too great.”
At least you did not post my picture with the label of dumbass. hehehehe
Good point.
Maureen Mahoney, 50, is a leading appellate litigator for the Washington, D.C., firm Latham & Watkins, where she has represented clients including Union Pacific Railroad Co. and the government of Saudi Arabia. She clerked for Chief Justice William Rehnquist and was one of Kenneth Starr's deputies when he was solicitor general for President George H. W. Bush. During the last Supreme Court term, she won a unanimous reversal of Arthur Andersen's conviction for obstructing justice by destroying documents during the Enron investigation. She also helped successfully represent the University of Michigan Law School in the 2003 case in which the Supreme Court upheld diversity as a rationale for affirmative action. Asked in a 2004 interview with the University of Chicago Magazine why she had taken the case as a staunch Republican, Mahoney said that her personal views weren't relevant but added, "I certainly was very comfortable with Michigan's position."
http://www.slate.com/id/2122079/
Maureen E. Mahoney
Partner:
Litigation Department
Education:
JD, University of Chicago, 1978 With Honors; Order of the Coif; Member, University of Chicago Law Review
BA, Indiana University, 1974 Highest Honors; Phi Beta Kappa
Experience:
Maureen Mahoney is a partner in the Washington, D.C. office of Latham & Watkins, and leads the firm's appellate and constitutional practice. Ms. Mahoney originally joined the firm in 1980, but left in 1991 to accept an appointment as a United States Deputy Solicitor General. During her tenure in the Solicitor General's Office, President Bush nominated Ms. Mahoney to fill a vacancy on the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, but the Senate did not act on her nomination prior to the election. Ms. Mahoney returned to the partnership of Latham & Watkins in 1993.
Ms. Mahoney has handled a broad range of constitutional and appellate litigation in the Supreme Court and other courts throughout the country, representing clients as varied as the United States House of Representatives, Union Pacific Railroad Company and the Government of Saudi Arabia. She represented the University of Michigan before the Supreme Court and won the landmark case upholding the constitutionality of admissions programs that consider race as one of many factors in order to attain the educational benefits of a diverse student body. The Legal Times reported that this ruling was a “personal win” for Ms. Mahoney and called her “a skilled appellate advocate, unruffled and poised.” The Daily Journal awarded Ms. Mahoney the “Best Oral Argument” in the individual category accolade for that Supreme Court term and went on to say that she “withstood withering questioning from Justice Antonin Scalia while stressing the points relied upon by O'Connor in her opinion for the 5-4 court.” Most recently, she successfully argued her thirteenth case in the Supreme Court on behalf of Arthur Andersen in a challenge to the firm's criminal conviction. The Legal Times described the argument in Andersen as “one of the term's best.”
Ms. Mahoney argued her first case before the Supreme Court in 1988, when the Court specially selected her to argue a case. She won the case in a 5-4 decision, and the American Lawyer reported that “her presentation was so well-schooled, poised, and disciplined that, according to one justice, the justices passed notes among themselves during the argument praising Mahoney and asking questions about her background.” In 1993, Ms. Mahoney successfully defended a highly publicized challenge to US immigration policies. The American Lawyer reported that Ms. Mahoney used “forensic magic” in the argument, and David Broder's Washington Post column called her argument “superb.” She also represented the House of Representatives in its successful Supreme Court challenge to the Commerce Department's plans for the use of sampling in the 2000 census.
Ms. Mahoney is a member of the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers and the American College of Trial Lawyers. She has been recognized as one of the leading appellate lawyers by the Legal Times and Chambers USA; the National Law Journal identified her as one of America's top 50 women litigators; and she received the prestigious Rex Lee Advocacy Award from the J. Rueben Clark Law Society. Ms. Mahoney was appointed by the Chief Justice to serve as the Chair of the Supreme Court Fellows Commission and as a member of the Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules to the United States Judicial Conference. She serves on the Executive Committee of the Supreme Court Historical Society, served as the Chair of the Advisory Committee on Procedures for the D.C. Circuit and served on the Board of Visitors for the University of Chicago Law School.
Prior to entering private practice, Ms. Mahoney served as a law clerk to the Honorable William H. Rehnquist (then Associate Justice) and Seventh Circuit Judge Robert Sprecher (deceased).
http://www.lw.com/attorney/attorneysearch_profile.asp?attno=00571
Why couldn't President Bush nominate a QUALIFIED liberal, if he insisted on doing so?
First we have to see just how Bush got into this fix. Most of us suspect it was of his own doing. Will there be a price to pay for Bush??
Yes indeed. He has three long years to serve and he will be governing from a very weak position. He has spit in the faces of conservatives and the dems will rush in for the kill.
The Titanic is sinking and Bush is still saying trust me, all is well.
:-)
With respect to the specter of a Texas State Income Tax, any device used by state agencies to raise funds is a tax reductio scheme.
In Texas, there are three absolutely certain ways to insure defeat at the polls: advocate gun control; advocate raising property taxes, and even so much as whisper the phrase "state income tax."
Pray for W and Harriet Miers
He was-to the best of my recollection-in favor of all three things, and was still relatively popular when he ran for statewide office.
I gave hundreds the GW and the republicans, worked phone banks, and helped put out mailers. Never again. I will not support this rockerfeller republican.
With interest!!!!
You promise not to be around here looking for conservative votes in 06 and 08????
:-)
What caused them to retreat?
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