I
started
writing
for
Above
the
Law
in
2018.
Almost
immediately
I
began
to
get
intensely
pressured
about
the
contents
of
my
columns,
not
from
anyone
within
ATL,
but
from
the
partnership
at
the
law
firm
where
I
was
then
employed.
My
God,
what
if
someone
realized
their
lawyer
wasn’t
the
intellectual
equivalent
of
a
genital-less
Ken
doll
and
was
instead
a
real,
live
person
with
agency
who
actually
had
opinions
about
things?
The
whole
dispute
eventually
settled
into
an
uneasy
armistice
after
I
made
it
clear
I
cared
more
about
this
job
than
I
did
about
that
one.
It
is
not
like
external
pressure
on
journalists
to
slant
or
cease
their
reporting
is
a
new
thing.
What
is
relatively
novel,
however,
are
the
levers
of
power
now
being
thrown
against
individual
writers
from
inside
their
own
houses.
Gone
are
the
days
of
“The
Washington
Post”
valiantly
seeking
to
publicize
its
reporters’
work
on
the
Pentagon
Papers
in
defiance
of
a
hostile
federal
government.
Instead
we’ve
got
the
very
same
paper
axing
cartoons
for
being
too
critical
of
Donald
Trump’s
media
crackdown
as
it
bleeds
real
journalists
due
to
its
billionaire
owner’s
mandates
in
defense
of
rapacious
capitalism.
Earlier
this
year,
my
colleague
Mark
Herrmann
wrote
an
excellent
column
about
how
the
intertwined
business
empires
of
truly
rich
media
magnates
prevent
them
from
speaking
the
truth
in
the
face
of
a
presidential
administration
unfettered
from
the
standards
of
decent
behavior.
If
Trump
doesn’t
like
what
Stephen
Colbert
has
to
say
on
his
show,
for
instance,
it’s
easy
enough
for
Trump’s
goons
to
use
the
federal
government’s
regulatory
authority
to
subtly
threaten
the
Skydance
Media
and
Paramount
Global
merger
until
Colbert’s
bosses
capitulate
—
that
sort
of
thing.
Mark
also
pointed
out
that
for
what
Above
the
Law
pays
us
for
these
columns,
we
are
not
exactly
rolling
in
the
Benjamins
as
a
result
of
this
work.
You
know
what
Above
the
Law
does
provide
for
its
writers
though?
Independence.
Integrity.
Incorruptibility.
Sure,
I’ve
been
asked
to
focus
on
different
general
topic
areas
over
the
years
for
different
projects,
but
do
you
know
how
many
times
I’ve
been
directed
at
ATL
to
avoid
writing
about
a
specific
person,
company,
or
idea?
Zero
times,
that’s
how
many.
I
have
written
about
sponsors
of
our
site,
to
whom
I
am
immensely
grateful
for
the
support
they
give
this
sort
of
work
even
as
I’ve
never
gone
out
of
my
way
to
spare
them
from
the
indisputable
facts.
Nobody
has
ever
said
a
word
to
me
about
it
one
way
or
the
other.
Of
course,
my
editors
have
been
brilliant
in
catching
an
occasional
factual
error,
and
have
always
made
the
final
work
product
better
by
fixing
an
awkward
turn
of
phrase
here
or
a
tone-deaf
insult
there.
But
they
have
never
told
me
what
I
can
and
can’t
write
in
service
to
the
delicate
feelings
of
some
corporate
overlord,
nor
have
they
ever
shackled
me
as
to
the
manner
in
which
I
express
the
truth
as
I
see
it.
Plenty
of
other
proudly
defiant
media
outlets
are
still
out
there.
The
Trump
administration
is
chilling
more
of
them
into
submission
every
day
though.
The
legal
media
is
especially
prone
to
this
sort
of
pressure.
Despite
marketing
about
how
hard
it
likes
to
fight
for
its
clients,
the
legal
profession
has
always
internally
valued
silence,
acquiescence,
capitulation
to
power
—
see
my
experience
in
2018,
or
more
recently,
several
of
the
hugest
firms
in
the
country
cringing
like
kicked
dogs
before
offering
hundreds
of
millions
of
dollars’
worth
of
free
legal
services
to
Trump’s
causes
rather
than
fight
baldly
unconstitutional
executive
orders.
Not
here.
Not
today.
Not
ever.
I
hate
ass-kissing
and
try
to
avoid
it,
so
forgive
me
just
this
once.
Thank
you
to
everyone
at
Above
the
Law
for
the
courage
it
takes
to
produce
this
site’s
range
of
unsparing
content.
Thank
you
to
the
advertisers
selling
great
products
and
services
while
supporting
real
coverage
of
important
issues.
Most
of
all,
thank
you
to
the
readers.
While
I
always
hope
that
getting
relevant,
entertainingly
presented
information
in
lieu
of
AI-generated
slop
or
some
hack’s
regurgitated
White
House
talking
points
is
its
own
reward,
plenty
of
people
nonetheless
fail
to
make
the
right
choices
about
their
media
consumption.
I’m
really
glad
that
you
did.
Jonathan
Wolf
is
a
civil
litigator
and
author
of Your
Debt-Free
JD (affiliate
link).
He
has
taught
legal
writing,
written
for
a
wide
variety
of
publications,
and
made
it
both
his
business
and
his
pleasure
to
be
financially
and
scientifically
literate.
Any
views
he
expresses
are
probably
pure
gold,
but
are
nonetheless
solely
his
own
and
should
not
be
attributed
to
any
organization
with
which
he
is
affiliated.
He
wouldn’t
want
to
share
the
credit
anyway.
He
can
be
reached
at [email protected].