Circuit Judge Larry Seidlin – The Most Famous Judge in the World

It has been a very, very difficult week to not only pick the week’s worst Villain but to gaze over the vast panorama of our national ferment a find a Hero. Circuit Judge Larry Seidlin would not be anyone’s — not anyone’s expected choice.

I’m trying to keep my Good & Bad Posts ‘clean,’ that is to say not get sarcastic here in the Hero side of the equation; but it’s been a difficult week and that is my point.

Poor  Circuit Judge Larry Seidlin works out of a basement office deciding who gets bodies for burial. This is not normally Big Time News but suddenly, one day, last week, he became the focus of the USA’s latest — hideous — national trash gossip sick story:  The Tale of Anna Nicole Smith — yes, no writer in the country will be able to avoid using her name, someday, sometime, somewhere in his or her life.

The Tale of Anna Nicole Smith is full of bloodsucking, really excessive drug use (most of them prescribed), over-indulgence, greed, betrayal, love and hate, a child dying, a child being born, who’s gets the money, who gets the baby, who gets the body, who has jurisdiction, and more.

All these many conflicts, high-powered lawyers, high stakes, media frenzy was just too much for the judge who worked out of the basement of a small and previously insignificant courthouse. No doubt about that.  When you hear more about the judges life than the case, you know things are not going well. When the judge finally breaks down in tears as he announces his decision you’d have to be worried.

When the decision turns out to be no decision at all, you have to shake your head in disbelief. When  the decision has to be made without the most common sense question resolved: Who is the Daddy of Anna’s newborn daughter?
well then it’s time to realize that we’re all riding on a Titanic; such is life; one way or the other.

But lets give credit where credit is due. Opponents in an emotional and significant financial and paternal tug of war sat in a basement courthouse, within feet of each other, and no fights broke out, nobody was killed.

Lets give credit where credit is due: a totally dysfunctional court, dealing with issues impossible to untangle, dealing with laws that not only conflict with themselves but sometimes conflict with human nature, was able to gravel towards it sad end.  (and nobody killed each other).

Lets give credit where credit is due. All the lawyers from Texas, California, Florida and the Bahamas got to keep on earning their nice paychecks.

This show perhaps the greatest strength of our country: We can survive chaos and  dysfunction.

 How can a nation of such great strength and vast potential every be defeated!?
And for showing us that  Circuit Judge Larry Seidlin  deserves the Hero of the Week accolade and may be remembered as ‘The Most Famous Judge in the World,’ because all the bull*shit behind the scenes, all the pretense of perfection have dissolved in front of our eyes forever.

Funny thing. I use to get annoyed at this British cliche: “We need not only justice, but the appearance of justice.”

What I cop-out, I thought: ‘the appearance of justice?”  but perhaps I wasn’t understanding it’s English intent, but one thing for sure, none of us Yanks can question what is meant by the ‘appearance of justice,’ because :

We can’t even come up with a ‘pretense of justice.’

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BELOW IS AN ADDENDUM. A LITTLE ESSAY ABOUT THIS WRITTEN FOR ANOTHER FORUM:

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TITLE: Spin Symbols For the USA: FEMA & Anna Nicole Smith 

When the British recently announced they would begin withdrawing their troops from Iraq, response from the White House Press Secretary Tony Snow was: “This shows that success is being made on the ground.”

How long, I wonder, can this Alice in White House Wonderland spin-city charade go on an on?

Bush told former FEMA Director he “was doing a great job.”

The neo-cons talk of a ‘multi-national coalition,’ that now is pretty much to us, Guatamalia and Poland — apparently the only remaining defenders of the Free World — and always a charade coalition from the beginning; like one ‘partner’ in a business invests $150,000-thousand and another partner puts up $50-bucks.

Spin City seems to be the only ideology we have left.

Anna Nicole Smith’s body lies rotting in the morgue; her baby kidnapped by a man who won’t step forward to take a paternity test — the father of the baby in dispute — questions still remaining surrounding the suspicious death of her older son — a will left behind, written before her new baby was born a few months ago — a will with a clause saying that none of her money would go to any future children!?

Her own death either a dazed fall into conscious or unconscious suicide or planned.

Lots of money in dispute: Big Time bucks with teams of lawyers and clients circling like sharks and on the attack. Her possessions tossed out on the street after claims she didn’t pay her “rent.: Embrassing video tapes taken and show on the Internet. Questionable photos of her in bed with the Bahama’s Immigration official…so…

Her money in dispute.
Father of her baby in dispute
Ownership of her home in dispute.
Where she is going to be buried in dispute.

And they can’t even get the body out of the morgue.

Welcome to America. Welcome to Iraq. O.J. Simpson, Richard Blake, Michael Jackson with be giving the guided tours of Hollywood star’s homes; Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie & Britney Spears will escort; a trail of cameras will be in tow.

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I added my own ‘Comments’ to this brief essay (a new Internet ‘phenomon,’ commenting on your own story or submitted newsclips.

My Comment (about my own Anna Nicole FEMA metaphor)

“I’ve read, politely spoken, these brief ideas about America & criticism:

“The Declaration of Independence directly criticizes the ruling king with no fewer than 27 paragraphs – six or eight of which criticize military activities and policies.

One could say that criticizing our leaders is the most American of activities.

For it is from criticism that we identify our faults and learn to improve.”

I, on the other hand, want to see impeachment trials start right away. Cheney first (so he doens’t then become president). Also we could start petitions for Recall Elections of all Republican governors, ASAP. Defeat the 21 Republican senators up for reelection in 2008 and House Republicans as well. Elect a Democrat president — any Democrat — then we could start some criminal trials for these neo-con thugs and work to build a better country and better political system from this new starting point.

This would be even better than criticism, IMHO; even better than the popular idea of “sending a signal,” This would a real change of power and policy — sort of a ‘democratic coupe,’ to kick the wicked out of office, kick-start a new direction, offer hope for change, and be a better metaphor for the future of America/USA”

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Some nice guy said this:
David Mc Girr (wrote)

“Really potent stuff.

Very well written.

Wish i could vote for this more than once.

-Dave
#1.1 – Wed Feb 21, 2007 8:06 PM MST

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That’s a nice comment for a writer to hear.