Lawyers Gettin’ Feisty

Well, we American lawyers have been put to shame by our peers in Pakistan. After President Pervez Musharraf (one of Bush’s A#1 allies, don’t forget) suspended the Constitution, dissolved the high courts, and got rid of private television media, the lawyers got mad. Despite being beaten by plainclothes and uniformed police officers and arrested in droves, they are taking to the streets to protest this dissolution of democracy (happening, perhaps not surprisingly, in the name of democracy. Sound familiar?). Of course, Musharraf’s crackdown has absolutely zero to do with shoring up democracy against terrorism and everything to do with his own power (familiar again)?

I’m ashamed to admit that I agree with an astute law professor of Robert’s acquaintance who pointed out by email that “[i]t’s difficult to imagine, even if Bush suspended the Constitution and disbanded the courts, U.S. lawyers taking such an active, in-the-streets role. We’d be sitting in our offices, just writing vitrolic postings to our blogs….”

Guilty as charged.