LAWYERSCHILE EL MUNDO INTERNACIONAL DEL ABOGADO

Rodrigo González Fernández y un grupo de egresados de la Facultad de Derecho de la Universidad la Republica en Chile ha decidido poner al alcance de todo el mundo de la profesion legal importantes materias en Ingles para ir practicando el trabajo en materia de Tratados internacionales y que nuestra profesión estará en primera linea. Invitamos a todos a opinar, debatir, participar activamente.Es el primer blog legal en inglés de latinoamerica.

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Law Professor Wins Pulitzer Prize

Law Professor Wins Pulitzer Prize

The 2009 Pulitzer Prize for history was awarded this week to Annette Gordon-Reed, a professor of law at New York Law School. Gordon-Reed won the $10,000 prize for her book, The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family, which the prize committee described as "a painstaking exploration of a sprawling multi-generation slave family that casts provocative new light on the relationship between Sally Hemings and her master, Thomas Jefferson."

The Harvard Law School graduate also won the 2008 National Book Award for the book, her second on the relationship between Hemings and Jefferson. Her first book, Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: An American Controversy, published in 1997, explored the possibility of their relationship without taking a definitive position on whether it was true. When DNA tests later confirmed a genetic link between Jefferson and Hemings' youngest child, Gordon-Reed rewrote the first book's introduction.

Also a professor of history at Rutgers University in Newark, Gordon-Reed is now working on a third volume in this series, according to the Star-Ledger. It traces the Hemings family history into the 20th century. She has published two other books, Vernon Can Read!: A Memoir, a profile of civil rights leader Vernon Jordan written together with him, and Race on Trial: Law and Justice in American History, in which she edits 12 original essays that illustrate how race determined the outcome of trials.

Gordon-Reed started her career as an associate at Cahill Gordon & Reindel and as counsel to the New York City Board of Corrections. She is a 1981 graduate of Dartmouth College and was a member of the Law Review at Harvard.

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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on April 22, 2009

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Law Blogger Runs Marathon, Finds Beer and Kisses

Law Blogger Runs Marathon, Finds Beer and Kisses

I missed watching the running of the 113th Boston Marathon this year. For many years, standing along the marathon route was a rite of spring for me. I went to Boston College Law School, just down the street from the marathon route, and later lived in Wellesley, a town the route passes through. My favorite place to watch was near the top of the notorious Heartbreak Hill, where I could help cheer the runners on with the encouragement that they were almost over the worst of it.

Had I been there this year, I would have been able to watch fellow legal blogger Eric Turkewitz tackle the grueling route from Hopkinton to Boston. But Turkewitz, blogger that he is, offers the next best thing to being there, as he recounts his run in a lengthy post at his New York Personal Injury Law Blog. Although he has run in marathons since 1994, this was the first time he qualified for the Boston Marathon, which is the only public marathon that requires a qualifying time.

It is an accomplishment Turkewitz relishes. "When I was a kid, I suffered repeated injuries in 7th, 8th and 9th grades," he writes. "While everyone else moved forward athletically, I went backwards. I strove to be mediocre." Now he finds himself among "the largest and most concentrated collection of physically fit people on the planet."

Early on, the going is easy. "The hard part is qualifying," he writes. "The race is dessert." At mile 8.2, he watches for but misses a former blogger he knows who is supposed to pass him a beer from along the sidelines. Shortly afterwards, he finds another group handing beer to the runners and he grabs a few ounces. Soon after the beer came the kisses:

The Wellesley College "scream tunnel" near the 13 mile mark can be heard 1/4 mile away. The women are standing on the barricades, cheek to jowl,leaning into the race, screaming for kisses and holding up imploring signs. Who am I to disappoint them? Was it six that I kissed? Eight? Ten? Another runner and I contemplate circling back for more.

Fueled by kisses and even more beer, Turkewitz ascends Heartbreak Hill. As he makes it over the hump and begins the final leg towards Boston, "the crowds thicken more as the terrain turns definitively urban." Then he approaches the finish line:

I turn from Commonwealth Avenue onto Hereford Street and then onto Boylston, thick with Bostonians several people deep on both sides of the road. I see the finish line ahead, with a temporary bridge over the street to hold the cameras and press. Through the exhaustion I ham it up once more for the crowds, again waving in an up swept motion to get them louder and louder. I raise my arms up in advance of the finish line.

He ended with an official time of 3:36:43. For Turkewitz, this was a marathon -- and an achievement -- on many levels:

In one sense this was a 26.2 mile journey. In another it was a three-day weekend. In yet another sense it started in 1994 when I finished my first marathon and I realized that I had never tested the limits of what I was capable of. And in another sense the journey started in 7th grade when I ground to a halt athletically while my peers surged forward.

But after long efforts I finally qualified for one of the most prestigious races in the world. And I toed the line at Hopkinton and arrived on Boylston Street. I ran Boston.

This post took me an hour or two to write, but it took years to get here.

And all I can add to that is: Congratulations Eric!

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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on April 22, 2009

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Hoping to Revitalize Legal Scholarship

Hoping to Revitalize Legal Scholarship

Is legal scholarship on its death bed? The current and former editors of several law reviews suggest it is and they believe they have a way to revitalize it. In what they are calling an unprecedented online collaboration, seven of the most influential U.S. law reviews are collaborating to launch The Legal Workshop, an online magazine featuring plain-English articles based on scholarly counterparts published in traditional law journals. Here is how they describe it:

The Legal Workshop features short, plain-English articles about legal issues and ideas, written by an author whose related, full-length work of scholarship is forthcoming in one of the participating law reviews. But The Legal Workshop does not house a collection of abstracts. Instead, it offers an engaging alternative to traditional academic articles that run 30,000 words with footnotes, enabling scholars to present their well-formulated opinions and their research to a wider audience. In addition to making legal ideas understandable, The Legal Workshop seeks to house the best of legal scholarship in one place -- making it easier for readers to find the best writing about all areas of law.

The seven participating law reviews are Stanford Law Review, New York University Law Review, Cornell Law Review, Duke Law Journal, Georgetown Law Journal, Northwestern Law Review and University of Chicago Law Review.

In announcing their non-profit venture, the editors say that law reviews have been losing influence and readership in recent years. "The problem is that most law reviews make little effort to reach non-academic audiences," said Michael Montaño, a Stanford Law Review editor and one of the developers of the new magazine. "And because they still effectively help professors gain tenure -- 'publish or perish' is here to stay -- there is little incentive to innovate. But as a profession we owe it to the public to produce work that is relevant to society as a whole."

The announcement includes praise for the venture from Slate legal columnist Dahlia Lithwick. "It's really the best of both worlds," Lithwick says. "The general public can be better engaged with the latest thinking about the law while knowing that what they're reading is serious scholarship; not just fad or opinion." And a University of Chicago Law School item about the new publication quotes a member of its faculty, Richard Epstein, offering this scholarly sounding endorsement: "The migration of knowledge from paper to cyberspace is an inescapable part of our intellectual culture. The appearance of the legalworkshop.org is yet another indicator of that inexorable transition. And it is a benevolent one."

The concept certainly warrants praise. But with introductory articles on such topics as textualism in statutory interpretation, Kelo and private takings, and the public forum doctrine, it seems unlikely that the site will engage any appreciable segment of the general public. What it will do, I suspect, is make some current scholarship more accessible to the general population of lawyers. That, alone, is worth the effort.

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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on April 22, 2009

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Monday, April 20, 2009

Lawyer Owes Ethics Duty to Non-Client

Lawyer Owes Ethics Duty to Non-Client

Hat tip to the blog The Ethical Quandary for pointing out this potential ethical pitfall. The D.C. Bar Legal Ethics Committee has issued an opinion finding that a lawyer owes a duty to maintain the confidences of someone who never hired him and never spoke to him. Here is the scenario as set out in the opinion:

A would-be client comes to Lawyer A to speak with her about taking on his case. After listening to the prospective client's story, Lawyer A determines that she is not in a position to be of assistance. However, Lawyer A believes that a different lawyer would be better suited to meet the prospective client's needs. Lawyer A asks the prospective client whether he would like her to call Lawyer B on his behalf to discuss the possibility of Lawyer B taking on the representation, and the prospective client says "yes." Lawyer A calls Lawyer B, who works at a different firm, and explains the person's predicament. After hearing the story from Lawyer A, Lawyer B determines that he has a conflict of interest and cannot represent the person.

Based on those facts, the question for the ethics committee was whether Lawyer B had a duty to safeguard the client information relayed by Lawyer A. Here is how the bar answered:

When a prospective client consents to having a lawyer speak to a second lawyer on his behalf regarding the possibility of establishing an attorney-client relationship, the second lawyer has an obligation under Rules 1.6 and 1.18 to treat the communication as confidential, even if the second lawyer never speaks directly with the prospective client.

Given the importance of maintaining confidentiality of any information received by the first lawyer, it is advisable that the first lawyer disclose at the outset of the conversation with the second lawyer that the purpose of the discussion is to consider taking on a new case for someone, and to limit initial disclosures to the essential facts until it can be determined whether the second lawyer has a conflict of interest.

The decision is based on D.C. rules that track the ABA model rules. So next time a colleague calls to ask about a potential referral, consider the implications of this opinion.

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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on April 20, 2009

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The Things Lawyers Do to Get Disbarred

The Things Lawyers Do to Get Disbarred

I am an unabashed fan of Legal Profession Blog for its never-ceases-to-amaze chronicles of lawyer discipline from around the country. It's not that I take some perverse joy in seeing lawyers get disciplined -- I don't. It is just that I find so many of the stories of what led to the discipline to be right out of the legal-affairs edition of "Believe it or Not." I mean, aren't lawyers supposed to be smart? Consider these two recent examples:

Drunk drag racing results in death, bar resignation. This Oklahoma lawyer resigned from the bar after his foolish prank ended up killing his law partner. Here is an excerpt from the Oklahoma Supreme Court opinion accepting the resignation: "The charges in Tulsa County District Court Case No. CF-2008-1108, stemmed from occurrences on December 22, 2007, when Respondent was drag racing another vehicle on a public road while under the influence of alcohol. The Information in the criminal case sets out that the driver of the other vehicle swerved into Respondent's lane, Respondent lost control of his vehicle and it struck a third vehicle. As a result of the collision a passenger in Respondent's car was killed and two other people were injured."

Disbarment for bank robbery. This was no sophisticated bank fraud, but a good old-fashioned robbery: "On March 27, 2007, respondent entered the bank and requested to open a new account and rent a safety deposit box. After respondent waited a few moments for assistance, a bank employee took him into the vault to see the safety deposit boxes. Once in the vault, respondent revealed a handgun in a holster under his suit jacket and ordered the employee to open the bank's safe. He then removed the currency from the safe and fled the bank." In ordering the lawyer's permanent disbarment, the Louisiana Supreme Court noted that the lawyer had confessed to committing "a string of bank robberies."

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Posted by Robert J. Ambrogi on April 20, 2009

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Wednesday, April 08, 2009

TOM PETERS

Customer Experience--A Competitive Edge?

Experience and Social Media Strategies

Resources--Tom Blogs and More

The War of Inflight Entertainment!

Tom Peters Times, April 2009

Customer Experience--A Competitive Edge?
Customer Experience--A Competitive Edge?

A client huffed to me recently "I sent four email requests out to different suppliers. I heard nothing back from two, one referred me to their website, and only one took the trouble to give me a full response!"

I confess that I have never understood how any business can afford to be so noncommittal to their customer service. I don't believe that stakeholders ever set out to offer indifferent service or to risk losing precious revenue. Yet in today's environment of deficit language, it is still a rare pleasure to be on the receiving end of an exceptional customer experience. We all know that businesses that deliver "wow" customer experiences will be winners in the future. But knowing and doing are quite different things.

There is overwhelming pressure on managers these days to review the value added by each area of their business and to use the data to target cost reduction initiatives. This all seems quite logical, but, in my experience at least, where the cuts are made largely depends on how "value added" is measured. Areas like customer service and employee care are extremely vulnerable to the cost cutter's knife, but hasty cutbacks can and do have a serious long-term impact on how a business is regarded by its customers, especially in today's oversupplied markets.

On the other hand, companies that are smart enough to stay in touch with what their customers value in these changing times can target their spending in those value adding areas, reinventing product lines and service delivery systems alike. Taking this thought further, new value streams can be set up with the express purpose of offering exceptional customer service to their most valuable customers.

Zappos, the successful shoe and clothing retailer, is an illustration of this philosophy in action. Their structure, processes, and culture are all focused on ensuring their customers' experiences are "wow!" Zappos uses the modern networking tools (Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and other social media, including the telephone!), to "develop more personal, emotional connections with customers and employees." Zappos is able to act quickly on customer intelligence received and to implement changes. For example, they are currently working on offering web pages where customers can create their own bespoke shopping experience. Zappos is thriving in the current tough economic climate through their emphasis on customer experience excellence.

The Zappos story is nothing new for contemporary business thinkers. Successful organisations are all about engaging people, employees, partners, and customers. So, why does the cost-cutting mindset still dominate most management agendas today? I would add one more factor to my earlier "knowing-doing" remark, and that is being! I think it has to do with a "knowing-doing-being gap."

In their excellent book The Knowing-Doing Gap, J. Pfeffer and R.I. Sutton explore why organisations find it so difficult to convert what they know into actions. These days, we've all read the books, heard the talks, struggled with the latest models and theories, and tried to apply the correct strategies to maximise our business position. But, after all is said and done, more is said than gets done! After an initial burst of change, things all too often revert to their previous "natural" state.

To genuinely make things different, to create a sustainable change, we have to change our way of looking at ourselves relative to our work. In the immortal words of Ghandi, one of Tom's favourite quotes, "We have to be the change we want to see in the world." People being the change is what makes real change possible in organisations.

Managers have to take a fresh look at what the organisation values most and how that value added is measured. Management job #1, then, becomes to create a work context where talented people in the business can work together to deliver exceptional value added for customers, as defined now and redefined in the future. There isn't a fixed ten-point plan to do customer experience; rather the best strategy is to make the necessary changes so that your people can be different and act differently to different customer preferences and requests, depending on the nature and requirements of your business.

If more organisations approached things this way, perhaps more of their people would feel able to respond to incoming customer requests?

Ruth Smith
Consultant
Tom Peters Company, UK

Experience and Social Media Strategies

Start-ups aren't the only companies using social media tools like Twitter, Facebook, and blogging to improve customer experience.

Southwest Airlines used its very popular blog, Nuts about Southwest, to connect with customers and collect feedback about their unusual open seating policy. As a result of this feedback, they changed the boarding procedure from first come, first serve (which created a bit of chaos as passengers struggled to board first) to a more orderly numbered system based on the order of check-in. By listening closely to customer feedback, Southwest was able to retain some of its brand's originality by keeping the open seating policy while improving the experience of boarding their planes.

Perhaps the most dramatic turnaround in customer experience as a result of using social media tools can be found with Comcast. In 2005 and 2006, the cable company was repeatedly in the news with tales of customer service nightmares (Remember this video of the service technician who fell asleep while he was on hold with his own technical support office? Or this poor woman?)

Today, through the efforts of Frank Eliason--his customer service team monitors what people are saying on Twitter about Comcast and step in quickly to resolve issues--they've become a paradigm of using social media tools to create remarkable customer experiences.

People ARE talking about their experiences with your organization. Are you listening?

Shelley Dolley
Leap7.com

Resources--Tom Blogs and More

If you'd like to read Tom's observations on Experience, you might find these blog entries of interest: I'll Miss You! (I Already Do) and its follow-up, Success Tip #120. Another on the topic is Sorting Out Causes and Effects.

On tompeters.co.uk, you can find a practical tool, a way to measure the importance of experience in the culture at your organization, titled "The Smell of the Customer." (You'll have to download it to find out the meaning.)

The War of Inflight Entertainment!

The Experience of traveling with Southwest Airlines (love 'em or hate 'em) has become legendary. John O'Leary recently pointed tompeters.com readers to a video of a flight attendant rapping to put his own unique spin on the statutory pre-flight safety announcement.

When this same item was picked up by the UK's Economist newspaper, a flurry of comments appeared on their blog, including a competitive retort from an unnamed European airline. Irish rugby fans returning from an away match in Paris were treated to the cabin crew's performance of the same safety announcement set in a Macarena dance routine!

What a great way for employees to express their creativity, and also to create great experiences for customers!

.............................!.............................

Subscribe at http://www.tompeters.com/your_world/join_the_fray/

(C) 2009 tompeters!company

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Friday, April 03, 2009

Living with climate change in Europe

Precipitation: change in annual amount The earth's climate is changing and the impacts are already being felt in Europe and across the world.

Global temperatures are predicted to continue rising, bringing changes in weather patterns, rising sea levels and increased frequency and intensity of extreme weather events such as storms, floods, droughts and heat waves. Such climatic events can have a major impact on households, businesses, critical infrastructure (transport, energy and water supply) and vulnerable sections of society (elderly, disabled, poor income households) as well as having a major economic impact. We must therefore prepare to cope with living in a changing climate. This process is known as adaptation.

In April 2009 the European Commission presented a policy paper known as a White Paper which presents the framework for adaptation measures and policies to reduce the European Union's vulnerability to the impacts of climate change.

Decisions on how best to adapt to climate change must be based on solid scientific and economic analysis. It is therefore important to increase the understanding of climate change and the impacts it will have. The White Paper outlines the need to create a Clearing House Mechanism by 2011 where information on climate change risks, impacts and best practices would be exchanged between governments, agencies, and organisations working on adaptation policies.

Since the impacts of climate change will vary by region - with coastal and mountain areas and flood plains particularly vulnerable – many of the adaptation measures will need to be carried out nationally or regionally. The role of the European Union will be to support and complement these efforts through an integrated and coordinated approach, particularly in cross-border issues and policies which are highly integrated at EU level.

Adapting to climate change will be integrated into all EU policies and will feature prominently in the Union's external policies to assist those countries most affected.

Documents and links

White Paper on adapting to climate change (April 2009)
Impact assessment on the White Paper on adapting to climate change (April 2009)
Executive summary of the impact assessment (April 2009)
Citizens' summary on the White Paper (April 2009)
Discussion paper on agriculture (April 2009)
Discussion paper on health (April 2009)
Policy paper on Water, Coasts and Marine issues (April 2009)
Press release on adapting to climate change (April 2009)
Questions and answers on adaptation to climate change (April 2009)
Consultation in preparation to the White Paper (May 2008)

A number of EU Member States have adopted National Adaptation Strategies:

The building of a framework to adapt to climate change

In June 2007, the European Commission presented a discussion paper known as a Green Paper on adapting to the impacts of climate change. The paper builds upon the work and findings of the European Climate Change Programme.

The paper argues that next to deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions we also need to adapt to the changing climate conditions. It describes possible avenues for action at EU level.

Green Paper on adaptation to climate change (June 2007)
Annex to the Green Paper (June 2007) (pdf 1MB)
Press release on lessening the impacts of current and future warming (June 2007)

Major conference launching the public debate on adaptation in Europe (Brussels, 3 July 2007)
Web-based public consultation (July-November 2007)
Regional workshops (Finland, Portugal, United Kingdom and Hungary, 2007)

The Green Paper was also the subject of opinions and resolutions by the Committee of the Regions, the European Economic and Social Committee and the European Parliament:

Committee of the Regions opinion (November 2007) (Rapporteur: Ms Twitchen )
European Economic and Social opinion (December 2007) (Rapporteur Mr Osborn)
European Parliament resolution (April 2008) (Rapporteur: Mr Sacconi)

Over the last few years the EU has financed several large research projects on regional climate modelling and impact assessment. Some projects have produced high-resolution maps representing the projected changes in climate variables, such as mean temperature and precipitation, and projected impacts, e.g. agricultural yields, conditions for tourism, cold- and heat-related mortality and biodiversity losses.

These maps illustrate what can be expected in Europe by the end of the century, according to the IPCC scenario (SRES A2) whereby no action is taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, so that the global mean temperature increases by about 3.4°C by the 2080s compared to 1990 levels. Under this scenario, nearly all European regions are expected to be negatively affected and up to half of Europe's plant species could be vulnerable or threatened by 2080.

Maps on Climate conditions in Europe:
- precipitation (pdf ~200KB),
- temperature (pdf ~175KB)
Maps on Climate impacts:
- agriculture: Crop yield changes according to the ECHAM model (pdf ~170KB) and to the HadCM model (pdf ~175KB)
- heat related mortality (pdf ~68KB),
- cold related mortality (pdf ~170KB),
- tourism: climate index in 1990 (pdf ~192KB) and in the 2080s (pdf ~189KB)
- river discharge: change in 100-year return level (pdf ~216KB)
- extinction in plant communities: local extinction (pdf ~1665KB) and extinction average by biogeographical regions (ATEAM project, Thuiller, W., Lavorel, S., Araújo, M. B., Sykes, M. T. and Prentice, I. C. (2005), pdf ~161KB)

Summary of Peseta Study (pdf ~19KB)
Link to Peseta Website

Flooded areas for three sea levels in the absence of dykes: Animation on sea level rise (swf - Marbaix, P. and J.P van Ypersele (ed.), 2004).

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Thursday, April 02, 2009

The Answer for Zhou Xiao Chuan

The answer for Zhou is already written here - as advocated by Prof Stephen NS Cheung and I recapped some 3.5 years ago. All issues Zhou raised are addressed in this system, which Zhou lamented for its being shelved some 70 years ago. China can go ahead with this solution alone while persuading G20/IMF/WB to follow suit. This is an area where China can and should lead, by doing it first, because China does not have the legacy of the developed nations. If China does so, it would surely be first joined by most nations which are now pegging their currencies to the USD or Basket (eg the gulf nations, ASEAN, some Eastern European non-Euro countries including Russia, may also follow suit)

Zhou's said, in an essay (in Chinese original here)

国际储备货币的币值首先应有一个稳定的基准和明确的发行规则以保证供给的有序；其次，其供给总量还可及时、灵活地根据需求的变化进行增减调节；第三，这种调节必须是超脱于任何一国的经济状况和利益
an international reserve currency should first be anchored to a stable benchmark and issued according to a clear set of rules, therefore to ensure orderly supply; second, its supply should be flexible enough to allow timely adjustment according to the changing demand; third, such adjustments should be disconnected from economic conditions and sovereign interests of any single country. The acceptance of credit-based national currencies as major international reserve currencies, as is the case in the current system, is a rare special case in history. The crisis again calls for creative reform of the existing international monetary system towards an international reserve currency with a stable value, rule-based issuance and manageable supply, so as to achieve the objective of safeguarding global economic and financial stability.
超主权储备货币的主张虽然由来以久，但至今没有实质性进展。上世纪四十年代凯恩斯就曾提出采用30种有代表性的商品作为定值基础建立国际货币单位"Bancor"的设想，遗憾的是未能实施
Though the super-sovereign reserve currency has long since been proposed, yet no substantive progress has been achieved to date. Back in the 1940s, Keynes had already proposed to introduce an international currency unit named "Bancor", based on the value of 30 representative commodities. Unfortunately, the proposal was not accepted.
超主权储备货币不仅克服了主权信用货币的内在风险，也为调节全球流动性提供了可能。由一个全球性机构管理的国际储备货币将使全球流动性的创造和调控成为可能，当一国主权货币不再做为全球贸易的尺度和参照基准时，该国汇率政策对失衡的调节效果会大大增强。这些能极大地降低未来危机发生的风险、增强危机处理的能力
A super-sovereign reserve currency not only eliminates the inherent risks of credit-based sovereign currency, but also makes it possible to manage global liquidity. A super-sovereign reserve currency managed by a global institution could be used to both create and control the global liquidity. And when a country's currency is no longer used as the yardstick for global trade and as the benchmark for other currencies, the exchange rate policy of the country would be far more effective in adjusting economic imbalances. This will significantly reduce the risks of a future crisis and enhance crisis management capability.
改革应从大处着眼，小处着手，循序渐进，寻求共赢
he reform should be guided by a grand vision and begin with specific deliverables. It should be a gradual process that yields win-win results for all

(English recap from AP, and WSJ seems to have missed some key points above)

Zhou said the proposed new currency also should be used for trade, investment, pricing commodities and corporate bookkeeping.
"A super-sovereign reserve currency managed by a global institution could be used to both create and control global liquidity," Zhou wrote. "This will significantly reduce the risks of a future crisis and enhance crisis management capability." Zhou also called for changing how SDRs are valued. Currently, they are based on the value of four currencies — the dollar, euro, yen and British pound. "The basket of currencies forming the basis for SDR valuation should be expanded to include currencies of all major economies," Zhou wrote. "The allocation of the SDR can be shifted from a purely calculation-based system to one backed by real assets, such as a reserve pool, to further boost market confidence in its value."

The Economists spelled out what China's objective really is (we all know it is neither practical or feasible to replace the USD in the medium term, as most media reported superficially, or the Chinese wishfully)

Mr Zhou's proposal is China's way of making clear that it is worried that the Fed's response to the crisis—printing loads of money—will hurt the dollar and hence the value of China's huge foreign reserves, of which around two-thirds are in dollars.

The key issue is how to make the transition "gradual" (大处着眼，小处着手，循序渐进) to minimize potential risk. And the only way to a first step is to (i) shift the RMB peg from USD to a basket of currencies then (ii) to a basket of commodities. China did the (i) in 2005 but it needs to do (ii), perhaps but making a gradual shift, by, e.g. first with a 90% currency b. basket + 10% commodiy basket, then lowering the weight of currency basket smoothly

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Wednesday, April 01, 2009

Department of Justice Changes Its Tune on D.C. Voting Rights

Department of Justice Changes Its Tune on D.C. Voting Rights

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, the nation's top lawyer, overruled the opinions of his own lawyers within the Office of Legal Counsel on the question of the constitutionality of giving the District of Columbia voting rights in the House of Representatives, reports The Washington Post. Like the Bush Administration's lawyers two years back, lawyers in Obama's OLC agreed that giving the District voting rights is unconstitutional because the it is not a state. The United States Constitution provides that members of the House must be chosen "by the people of several states," which disqualifies the District.

Holder disagrees, so he sought opinions from other lawyers within the Justice Department, as well as legal scholars. The Solicitor's Office assured Holder that it could defend the constitutionality of a voting rights proposal before the Supreme Court, which convinced him that a voting rights bill would pass constitutional muster. Holder is not alone. Other leaders in the legal community -- including the American Bar Association, former federal appellate judge Kenneth W. Starr and former Justice Department lawyer Viet D. Dinh -- support the bill.

The bill could reach the full House for a vote by May.

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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on April 1, 2009

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Rodrigo González Fernández
Diplomado en RSE de la ONU

Like 'Craigslist for Lawyers'

Like 'Craigslist for Lawyers'

The American Lawyer interviews Laurel Edgeworth, a lawyer and creator of a new Web site that's bound to be a hit with recently unemployed lawyers as well as new grads who can't find jobs: Law Clerk Connection. Working as a law clerk at a small firm during law school, Edgeworth noticed that her firm would sporadically need to staff up for document review within a tight time frame. Enter Law Clerk Connection, where unemployed lawyers and law students pay a small membership fee to upload a profile to the site and view jobs posted by potential employers. Participants can bid on a project, offering a price and time frame for completion.

The Law Clerk Connection site is intended to allow for placement of short-term, discrete tasks like drafting, document production and legal research. The site will also provide networking opportunities for participants. Edgeworth explains that two factors set her site apart from other placement or contract sites. First, Legal Clerk Connection is an entirely on-shore operation; projects are not sent overseas. Second, Law Clerk Connection seems aimed at smaller projects rather than large document review matters.

Right now, the site generates revenue through membership fees for law clerks. But ultimately the company intends to charge fees based on a small percentage of each project from the lawyers' side.

As a small-firm lawyer myself, I can't say whether I'd use the Law Clerk Connection site, though it sounds like a good idea. But typically, when I have small projects to outsource I'll go to Craigslist, while for more serious matters that demand top skills, I prefer personal referrals. The Law Clerk Connection site might be useful for situations where I can't find referrals, particularly if it incorporated a rating system that allowed hiring lawyers to comment on the quality of the work product provided.

Is this a service that you would use? Post your comments below.

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Posted by Carolyn Elefant on April 1, 2009

Difundan este artículo
CONSULTEN, OPINEN , ESCRIBAN LIBREMENTE
Saludos
Rodrigo González Fernández
Diplomado en RSE de la ONU