The clients from hell

All attorneys have had them, clients who take the fun out of practicing law. One sub-species is the client with a losing case who can’t understand why you’re not cleaning the other side’s clock. In fact, some otherwise agreeable clients are like this. Recall the story about the client who asked John Roberts how he could have lost a case in the Supreme Court 9-0, to which Roberts replied “because there are only nine Justices.”
The Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee have their own clients from hell — the juvenile left-wing of their party. During the Alito confirmation hearings, Senators Kennedy, Schumer, Durbin, et al. threw the kitchen sink at the nominee. They accused Alito of being unethical, of not caring about poor people and minorities, of associating himself with racists, of supporting police state tactics, etc. And most of them were full-throated about it. That none of the attacks stuck was down to reality, not lack of effort — the personal attacks were bogus and, on the substantive issues, Alito’s views were at least as close to the “mainstream” as those of his interrogators.
Now, in the deluded style that characterizes such clients, elements of the left, and certain bloggers in particular, are incensed at the performance of the Judiciary Committee Dems. If only they had pushed this or that pet theme harder, the public would have turned against Alito, thus completely altering the dynamic of the process. Or so the fantasy of the “reality based community” goes.
And, as is so often the case in the practice of law, there’s an opportunistic and mildly disreputable lawyer emerging from the shadows (or in this case the ski slopes) to pander, for his own purposes, to the pathologically wishful thinking of the client. He’s John Kerry, and he’s here to help.
UPDATE: Joan Vennochi of the Boston Globe has a similar, if somewhat gentler, take subject. (Via Real Clear Politics).

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