Commentary: Unlocking the potential in business relationships
By Dolan Media Newswires
POSTED: March 28, 2012
Tags: Commentary
The right side of your brain, neurologists say, is where the capacity for empathy resides. And, empathy, it appears, is the key to building long-lasting, powerful and solid relationships. Empathy is described as the ability to recognize and understand another’s situation, feelings, concerns and motives. It’s often described colloquially as: “putting oneself in another person’s [...]
Commentary: Ultrasound politics
By Scott Forsyth
POSTED: March 27, 2012
Tags: Commentary
The Virginia legislature received much negative publicity last month when it passed a bill requiring a woman wanting an abortion to undergo a transvaginal ultrasound in some circumstances. The governor rightly sent the bill back to the legislature. Less well known is the fact that this month the legislature passed and the governor signed into [...]
Commentary: Pop quiz: Do you have what it takes to start a firm?
By Edward Poll
POSTED: March 26, 2012
Tags: Commentary
I have often argued that that law schools do little to prepare graduates for dealing with the business of law — finance, practice management, client relations — that determines practice success. That puts the onus on new lawyers to do the preparation themselves, especially if they are starting a practice on their own. Solo or [...]
Commentary: When is an assassination not an assasination?
By Scott Forsyth
POSTED: March 13, 2012
Tags: Commentary, Scott Forsyth
Everybody knows the United States targets for killing the leaders of al-Qaida and the Taliban in the war zones of Afghanistan. It tracks down and kills the leaders in neighboring countries. It also targets for killing the leaders of groups linked to al-Qaida, far from Afghanistan. And it targets those leaders even though they may [...]
Commentary: Are you sitting down?
By John Stodder Jr.
POSTED: March 9, 2012
Tags: Commentary
Despite a wave of evidence that too much sitting on the job triggers life-shortening illnesses, most companies and safety regulators are in no hurry to change employees’ sedentary working conditions. Among the entities reporting a connection between sitting and cancer, heart disease and other serious health problems are the American Cancer Society, the American Institute [...]
Commentary: Turning $500 into a million bucks in just five hours
By Robert L. Brenna Jr.
POSTED: February 29, 2012
Tags: Commentary
Several years ago, overlooking the Pacific, spinner dolphins were literally jumping for joy and more humpback whales were surrounding Kauai than had been there in years. They were down to only 500 worldwide at their lowest population ebb, but they’ve survived. The worst seemed inevitable, but they’ve come back. They’re now 10,000 strong. Anyway, my [...]
Commentary: Twisting religious freedom
By Scott Forsyth
POSTED: February 28, 2012
Tags: Commentary
“This is not about women. This is about religious freedom,” so proclaimed Rep. Joe Walsh indignantly at a House hearing two weeks ago. The “this” is the regulation of the Department of Health and Human Services requiring an employer to include contraception, at no cost to the patient, in all health insurance plans the employer [...]
Commentary: Businesses – Higher ed fails to train students for work 
By John Stodder Jr.
POSTED: February 21, 2012
Tags: Commentary
U.S. business leaders are losing faith in the ability of higher education to train the work force of the future. That’s the takeaway from a report entitled “Hiring and Higher Education,” released Feb. 13 by two think tanks, The Committee for Economic Development in Washington, and Public Agenda in New York. The report compiles comments [...]
Commentary: Taxing Arizona
By Scott Forsyth
POSTED: February 15, 2012
Tags: Commentary
It is February, time to collect the data to prepare your income tax return. You would think that the laws underlying the task would focus on raising revenue, with deductions going to favored businesses and activities. Protecting civil liberties should not be a concern. Think again. States will use the income tax laws to further [...]
Commentary: USCIS takes step toward fairness for foreign nationals
By Jill A. Apa
POSTED: February 6, 2012
Tags: Commentary
On Jan. 9, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the immigration benefits branch of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, announced in The Federal Register a notice of intent to change the visa application procedures for certain foreign nationals who cannot legalize their immigration status from inside the United States. This proposed change represents a significant [...]
Commentary: Pleas and bad lawyering
By Scott Forsyth
POSTED: January 31, 2012
Tags: Commentary
Twenty years ago, two law professors wrote, “plea bargaining … is not some adjunct to the criminal justice system; it is the criminal justice system.” How true they were and are. In 2010, 97 percent of criminal convictions in federal court were obtained by pleas of guilty or no contest. In 2006, 94 percent of [...]
Recent developments in FLSA litigation
By Dolan Media Newswires
POSTED: January 31, 2012
Tags: Commentary, FLSA
On the somewhat arcane topic of paying non-exempt employees under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act’s “fluctuating workweek” method, there have been some significant developments in 2011. Under the FLSA, employers can pay non-exempt employees under the method by paying a fixed salary for fluctuating work hours and paying one-half the regular hourly rate for [...]
