I Want to be a Sniper When I Grow Up

A friend of mine, who is a juvenile court probation officer, noted the other day that one of her little probationers answered her question, “When I grow up, I want to become a sniper.”

A fruitful and worthwhile occupation, I guess.

What’s concerning to me is that a young child would look forward to something like this. Whatever …

Too "Real" for Reality TV

I’m often asked where writers get their ideas. Here are a couple from real life…

Having practiced in the courts for over 30 years, I’ve seen just about everything you can imagine concerning human behavior. I’d like to share some of the funnier/tragic ones with you.

Uncle Charles is upstairs in his bedroom

During a cold spell a …

Elected or Picked by Politicians?

How should we select our judges?

Which would you rather have: a corrupt, incompetent governor appoints his lackey, corrupt friends to be judges across the state to decide the most serious cases or a small, well-funded group that raises enough money to swing judicial elections to ensure candidates that will always agree with their extreme positions are elected?…

What Made Tom Petters Run?

In Minneapolis last week, business mogul Tom Petters was found guilty on all 20 counts for running a Ponzi scheme that defrauded people out of over $3 billion. What kind of a person would do this?

Although I don’t know Mr. Petters, I’ve worked as a criminal defense lawyer for over 30 years and have represented/defended a few …

Somali Women Wonder Where Their Boys Went

Not only in Minneapolis/St. Paul are young Somali men (so young, each one is almost a child victim) mysteriously disappearing, it’s happening across the globe. In a recent article from the StarTribune by James Walsh and Richard Meryhew, entitled, “Jihad draws young men across globe back to Somalia,” www.startribune.com, it appears that the recruiting of these men …

Can You Imagine?

Try to imagine living in a neighborhood of small homes. Your neighbors pay attention to each other and have become friendly. Some even offer barbeque on the weekends in their front yards.

But there are odd things about this neighborhood that you learn after you’ve moved in. For one thing, your next door neighbor is a sausage making …