“The question isn’t ‘what are we going to do,’ the question is ‘what aren’t we going to do?’

Friends:

100 Emails!

I can honestly tell you that when I started this way back when, I never envisioned it getting this far.  But friends, this week, your inbox is being visited (or infested, depending upon how you view it) with a missive from me for the 100th time.  Yep, you read that right… for the past 101 weeks (recall, only one misstep), you have received your weekly visitor in the form of my narcissistic diatribes.  Whether they be comedic or serious, legally tinged or socially alert, you have seen and read who I am or, in some respects, who I aim to be.

We have discussed history and literature, sports and current events, leadership and entertainment and I hope that you have enjoyed reading them as much as I have enjoyed writing them.  And boy how the writings have changed, not just from the first day to now, but from week to week as well.

I would like to think that I have succeeded in my mission… not that I intend to stop, mind you.  But the idea was a simple one:  find a way to keep in touch with those whom I care about and by whom I want to be remembered.  The inspiration was borne of the numerous newsletters and email blasts that I received on a daily basis by colleagues and marketeers attempting to prove to me how smart they were.  At the end of the day, I didn’t care how smart they were, I was more concerned with whether I liked them. 

What I did know, however, is that, truth be told, people generally tend to like me and I generally tend to like everyone else.  But it is impossible to touch everybody every day or every week and stay current with them, to stay on their radar, to stay memorable.  So I came up with this weekly blog.

I confess, at the outset it seemed like an easy task.  My mom always told me that growing up I never stopped talking, so how hard could it be to fill a weekly email post?  But as weeks turned into months, it got to be more difficult and, as you may have noticed, the tone and tenor of the emails changed.  Sure, I started out primarily with general observations and sophomoric commentaries, quips and phrases and silly discourses, but I feel that eventually it found its own groove.  It morphed into blogs that I hope you consider to be pensive, thought provoking and, in some ways, academic and engaging.  Yes, I sometimes regress back into irreverence, whether it be complaining about television shows or remarking that graduation ceremonies should be held every year, but hey, I am still human and sometimes that’s where my mind goes.

Because every Sunday night, as I sit in front of the computer, letting my mind wander, I try to think of a topic that you would find interesting which would also give you further insight into me.  Seriously, did you ever think you would find Charles Dickens interesting?  Or stop to consider how to fix our jury system or the issues concerning teenage drivers?  Or, or, or… crap, I can’t remember what I wrote about all those weeks.

I started out email number 1 with a quote from Dickens:  “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…”  In a lot of ways, that was apropos of the time; an economy in distress and uncertainty from day to day.  It could not have been a better time to begin this journey, for my objective then, as it has been each week since and continues today and beyond, is that I am here for you, to support you, to assist you, and to encourage and champion you.

Now, I gave a lot of thought to how I would approach the 100^th email of this journey.  I thought about giving you some highlights, pointing out my favorite posts, and meditating on what I have learned about myself along the way.  But as I thought about how to approach such a monumental task as that I figured, “Ain’t no freaking way.”  I can’t remember what I wrote last week, let along 56 posts ago!  And it is one thing to get so caught up in myself as to write these each week, but it is even more self-absorbed to re-read them all.  This is aside from the fact that we are our own worst critics and I went back a few weeks ago and read some of the early posts and was immediately embarrassed that I let them be read by anyone. 

(But if you are interested in taking the walk back in time, I have done my absolute best to place them on a separate webpage to enjoy anytime you want.  Go to www.robcohen13.wordpress.com and they are all there.)

So next week, back with new material and I make no promises.  It could be about anything and I would like to think that this is what keeps you reading each week.  A little bit of the, “What will Rob chat about this week?”  Because I guarantee, you will always be surprised.  I mean seriously, have you ever not been surprised by where these things go?  Most of the time it shocks the crap out of me…

So with all of that, I offer this: My most heartfelt and gracious appreciation for being with me along this expedition.  I couldn’t have done it without all of you.  If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to witness it, does it still make a sound?  And if Rob writes a weekly blog and no one reads it, does it…?  Crud, I don’t know how that one is supposed to go…

But, Thank You.

Rob

“Devin, I’ve led a soldier’s life, and I’ve never seen anything as brutally clear as this.”

Friends:

Many of us have a hard time with the concept of death.  Sure, we have seen it first hand with our grandparents or close friends, celebrities and politicians, but anything further in the past from yesterday and we have a hard time conceiving of it.  Take war for instance.  Death tolls are just numbers to us.  Of course each number represents a loved one taken from a family too soon, but as a whole, the idea of thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of thousands of people dying in battle is difficult for us to grasp.

Maybe it is because we cannot visualize what “twenty thousand people” looks like or maybe it is because it happened before we were born, but the gravity of the death toll is lost on us.  They become numbers learned in a textbook or seen in a museum, not individual lives, personalities, names, histories.

This thought struck me a few weeks ago as I walked the battlefields of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, site of the bloodiest battle of the Civil War on July 1-3 of 1863, the battle with the most casualties of that war.  Between 46,000 and 51,000 people died over the course of that three-day period, however now, nearly 150 years after the battle, the magnitude of the carnage seems glossed over in favor of reenactments, celebrations, and good cheer.  Want to buy a key chain or a mock-up of a Union rifle?  Pick any of the numerous gift shops along the main drag and you can get any souvenir you like.  Coffee mugs, key chains, stuffed animals, t-shirts and bumper stickers are everywhere and you can have them.  It can be off-putting, attempting to understand the history and slaughter that took place there while inundated with commercialism.

Couple that with the experience we felt days later in Washington, D.C., as we visited the Holocaust Museum.  Talk about a difference in atmosphere.  Instead of re-enactors and toy guns, there were railroad cars and gas canisters and thousands of pairs of shoes taken from the victims of the Nazi atrocities before they were sent to the gas chambers.  While the concept of six million dead is still tough to grasp, it certainly wasn’t handled with the élan we had experienced in Gettysburg.  “Somber” is not a strong enough word.  It was as if, upon emerging from the elevator into the exhibit, a 100-pound weight had been placed on our shoulders. 

None of that is to mean that there were no aspects of commercialism, for the gift shop still held the usual trinkets to celebrate our visit, but they were at least, for the most part, geared towards the attitudes of tolerance and acceptance as well as education, with tremendous amounts of books, both fiction and non-fiction, designed to instruct and enlighten those who yearned for more.

Clearly, they were two different experiences in dealing with death, for that is what they both were—they were presentations of death.  Granted they were not identical for one was an actual theater where soldiers fought to the death and the other was a demonstration of genocide in which a people were persecuted and unable to strike back. 

And like all experiences in my life, it got me to thinking… will there come a time when scenes of horrific atrocities and death will become so commercialized and touristy such that the death toll is ignored or glossed over?  Seriously, will we one day be visiting concentration camps not with the feeling of solemnity but of glee and merriment?

I know I am being a bit facetious, but one can’t help but wonder at the “celebration” that we experienced at the site of America’s most bloody battlefield.  Where now stands a gift shop was where an 18-year old kid died a horrible and bloody death, a child with his whole life ahead of him, struck down before the prime of his life, before he had a chance to fall in love, have children, and die in old age surrounded by his family and loved ones.  150 years is a long time that we have difficulty fathoming the magnitude of the deaths.

So why is it acceptable?  Why do we flock to re-enactments, why do thousands of people dress up in Civil War-era clothing and “play?”  Well, you may be surprised, but I have a theory on the subject.  Just go with me on this…

While a tragic time in America’s history, the Civil War was a necessary evil.  The issues about which the sides fought were numerous, but clearly the end of slavery and a re-unification of the States were essential and allowed for our country to re-establish itself as true united states.  So while the war itself was unfortunate, our country’s success is because of it.  We can look back now and call each and every one of those soldiers, those dead, as heroes who fought to make this county what it is today.  Our country not only rose above the segregation of the states, but reunified stronger than ever to create an even more powerful and cohesive country.

The Holocaust, by contrast, is nothing like that… yet.  Currently the world Jewish population numbers just shy of thirteen million.  Make sure you read that right—the WORLD Jewish population.  Not the U.S.A., not Israel, not Hollywood– in the entire world.  And during the Holocaust, six million Jews were murdered.  Those numbers are staggering.  As things currently stand, the Jewish population is shrinking and the Holocaust only served to speed up the process of Jewish extinction. 

But, imagine this.  Imagine the Jewish population does a 180 and increases.  Through whatever methods, the number of Jews in the world skyrockets.  It exceeds twenty million, thirty million, fifty million.  Will we at that time view the Holocaust differently?  We will never, ever, ever forget the atrocities and horrors that were inflicted on the Jewish people, but if the Jewish population rallies from this and grows and grows and grows, will we look back at the Holocaust as a mere blip on the radar of the Jewish people?  Might we even (gulp!) laugh at the efforts of the Nazis?  “Ha ha ha—they killed six million of us, but we didn’t stop, we are more numerous and powerful than ever, so take that!  Bet you guys feel really silly… na na na na na!” (as we stick our tongues out at them and make faces…)

The running joke is that so many Jewish holidays are based on the premise that they (whoever they may have been) tried to kill us, they failed, we survived, let’s eat.  It has been sixty-six years since the end of World War II and the liberation of the concentration camps- in eighty-four years, will we view the concentration camps differently?

Like I said, the concept of death is foreign to us.  The idea that thousands and thousands of people died in one place over the course of three days is alien.  But it doesn’t mean that it didn’t happen.  Simply because we cannot conceptualize it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t give it its due somberness.  But hey, what didn’t kill us only made us stronger right?  So perhaps as we re-enact the Civil War battles and wear our t-shirts and wave our Confederate flags, we are celebrating that which made our country stronger. 

I can’t wait to celebrate the Holocaust simply as that blip on the radar, that event which didn’t kill us but made us stronger; not just as Jews, but as crusaders against villainy and tyranny.

Rob

“It’s always difficult to keep personal prejudice out of a thing like this.”

Friends: 

Well, I hope you missed me.  With all apologies, last week was an anomaly, the first week I have failed to deliver content since I began this foray into weekly missives almost two years ago.  A mere blip on the radar and I do apologize.

With that being said, there is a lot to talk about.  Obviously, you want to know about the trip we took to America’s beating heart, our capital (capitol), and also to the place of the Civil War’s most bloody battle, Gettysburg.  I am sure you are also interested in my thoughts regarding the last space shuttle launch that took place a few days ago.

But first and foremost, and the topic I couldn’t wait to discuss with you, is the verdict that was handed down early last week which caused such an uproar and once again put our jury system and its “failings” in the cross-hairs of pundits and pseudo-pundits alike.  The Casey Anthony trial, which will go down along the likes of the OJ Simpson verdict as a travesty of justice… or so many would have you think.  But perhaps, just perhaps, this was a demonstration not of how the justice system has failed, but of how it works. 

At the outset let me say one thing.  I don’t follow this stuff.  I don’t watch it on television, don’t read the news about it, don’t learn all of the minutiae.  One reason is that I don’t have the time.  The amount of hours it would take to intimately learn all of the details of this type of matter would be tantamount to taking on a full time job.  The talk show hosts, they get paid for it.  I don’t.  I get paid to learn all of the details about my own cases. 

The second reason why I don’t concern myself with the newsworthiness of a matter such as this is that I don’t want to be bothered by it.  As an attorney, you can imagine I get asked for my opinion on all types of “legal” subjects, whether it be the OJ verdict, Gloria Allred’s latest crusade, or the Madoff scandal.  Trust me, it is better to say that I don’t know anything than it is to try to talk intelligently about a subject, only to learn that I am not as well informed as my conversation partner. 

With that being said, here is my unqualified and ill-informed analysis of the Casey Anthony verdict—it demonstrated the beauty of our justice system at work and not, in any way, the travesty that Nancy Grace or other authorities would have you believe it to be.  I read the tweets, Facebook posts and headlines.  As an attorney who spends numerous hours in courtrooms, this is my response to all of you who criticized the jury who handed down the verdict of “not guilty”—You are all wrong.

Let’s examine the three primary participants in a criminal trial:  the prosecutor, the defense attorney, and the jury.  We all know what the prosecutor is supposed to do.  Her job is to present the evidence to support the charges she has levied against the defendant and convince the jury “beyond a reasonable doubt” that the defendant committed the crime for which he was charged.  And the defense attorney?  Well, let’s be clear on this—the defense attorney’s job is not to get the defendant off.  The defense attorney’s job is to make sure the prosecutor does her job.

And the jury?  The jury’s job is to listen, consider, and decide, all within the vacuum that is the four walls of the courtroom and not to allow outside information or personal prejudices impact their consideration of the evidence presented.

With the Casey Anthony trial, so much attention has been given to the jury—how could the jury have failed so miserably to convict this woman against whom so much evidence existed?  Look to the prosecutor, not the jury.  The jury did their job and, in fact, they should be commended (not lambasted) for their efforts.

Clearly the world thought that Casey Anthony committed the crime; the evidence seemed to be overwhelming in favor of conviction.  But was this evidence properly placed in front of the jury?  Was it delivered to the jury in the form of unimpeachable testimony, direct evidence (as opposed to circumstantial evidence), and incontrovertible scientific data?

The jury sat in the courtroom day after day and they did what they were ordered to do: they listened and made a decision based on what they heard.  They refrained from watching television and reading newspapers (if there are any anymore) and the Internet, and they kept an open mind as to the evidence as it was presented.  They then considered the evidence that they heard, not their personal prejudices or beliefs, and rendered a verdict.

Did they get it right?  Who knows…  Many will say they didn’t, but at the end of the day, they were the twelve people who heard all of the evidence.  They weren’t watching Court TV to get its take on the testimony, listening to Rush Limbaugh or Larry Elder, and they weren’t reading the Huffington Post or tmz. 

If I may offer an analogy, and please forgive the baseball references, but you know me well enough by now.  Imagine the 1927 Yankees, considered by many to be the best baseball team ever, with the names of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig on the line-up card.  In 1927, the Yankees finished in first place while the Boston Red Sox finished last, a staggering 59 games back in the standings.  The two teams play a game and the Yankees simply don’t have it.  They commit 6 errors, get only 3 hits and lose to the Red Sox 12-0.  Are you going to blame the umpires for the Yankees’ loss?  Of course not, you blame the Yankees for failing to perform that day.

So why do you blame the jurors in the Anthony trial?  They are similar to the umpires; they call it like they see it.  They don’t have a dog in the race, a care as to who wins and who loses.  They just make the decision from what they see and hear.

If you haven’t seen the movie “12 Angry Men” I highly recommend it.  It takes place entirely in the jury room as the 12 jurors deliberate after the trial has concluded.  What began as an apparent slam-dunk conviction for the prosecution devolves into an acquittal by the time the movie is over.  But we the viewers who are confined to the jury room with the jurors don’t know what really happened.  We can piece together the details of the crime from the deliberations, but we weren’t present at the time the crime was committed.  But by the end of the movie we feel elated that the jury decided to acquit the defendant; is it at least possible that the defendant actually committed the crime?  We applaud the method by which the jury system did its job.  Why don’t we feel the same elation after hearing of the Anthony verdict?  It isn’t that much different…

We the public who are so inundated with information through a myriad of sources formulate opinions about subjects, but we aren’t sitting there every day, listening and watching.  We don’t know what happened inside the jury room and we don’t know what they heard or saw to cause them to vote the way they did. 

But we can interpret the decision of the jurors as a reflection of the capability of the prosecution in presenting its case and in the defense’s ability to poke enough holes in the prosecution’s case to create that ever so cryptic “reasonable doubt” to warrant acquittal.

Good on them!  The system does work sometimes.  Don’t criticize it because you disagree with the outcome.  If the outcomes were forgone conclusions, we wouldn’t even need trials… what kind of a world would we live in then?

Rob