The Talis of Colberg doth savagely rip the Bard asunder to pluck glittering gems for which to festoon bovine excrement most foul.

If you click the title it will take you to The State of Alaska Department of Law 2008 Annual Report. (You may have to hurry as we do not expect access to this report to remain available for long. But in case it does disappear fear not for I have copied the introduction below. And then provided the Immoral Minority "translations", doncha know?)

December 2008

Dear Governor Palin, Alaska Legislators and Fellow Alaskans,

Shakespeare, in the play Henry V provides the ultimate team-building speech for King Henry in what is now known as the “St. Crispin’s Day” speech. The real King Henry V may or may not have given a rousing speech to his outnumbered army on the eve of the Battle of Agincourt in 1215 ( I got totally hammered the night before this lecture on Elizabethan literature and do not fully remember the lesson), but as with so much, fact has become con­flated with myth (It is all just confusing bullshit anyway.)—and the result is inspiration. I think we have an inspiring story to tell, based largely on facts.

In 1959 our team was smaller. The Department of Law was six attorneys (including Attorney General John Rader). Now we are about five hundred fifty two. Nearly a hundred-fold increase in the same fifty-year period that the rest of the population increased by only six times. Oddly enough, although we are far more numerous than we were in 1959, we often still feel outnumbered. Our civil attorneys are divided into thirteen sections and our criminal divi­sion is spread over thirteen offices. There is no community where the criminal division is not outnumbered by lo­cal public defenders, the Office of Public Advocacy, and the private defense bar. Likewise, while the outside world sees the civil division as a monolith, it is in fact divided into small sections, all of which are likewise outnumbered by opposing counsel. However, there is a sense of cohesion and team unity that is both pleasant and effective throughout the department. How can we have grown so large and still find ourselves constantly trying to keep up?

In his book The Richness of Life (Another really hard book I read which proves that I am awesomely smart.), science writer Stephen Jay Gould observed:

Most knowledgeable students of life’s history have always sensed the failure of the fossil record to supply the most desired ingredient of Western comfort: a clear signal of progress measured as some form of steadily increasing complexity for life as a whole through time. The basic evidence cannot support such a view. (In other words the theory of Evolution does not work!)

Gould was not writing about law. However, lawyers are perceived to be a major source increasing com­plexity in the modern world and some legitimately reason that legal complexity may not be progress. Law­yers often stand in the way of the appealing simple solutions. Our job is in part to uphold the law and at the same time not lose the confidence of the public in doing so. (Nailed it!) We don’t write the laws, but we are charged with trying to make sense of them and enforce them. It is a tough, but honorable, job.

As Henry said in his speech, “The fewer men [Shakespeare did not go out of his way to an­ticipate the advancement of women], the greater share of honour.” Tell that to the Collec­tions Section—that it is a greater honor because you have fewer colleagues? The point is, that the Department of Law does a lot and does it honorably and can be proud of it.

Henry called on his team to look to the future:

He that outlives this day, and comes safe home
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam’d,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbors
And say, ‘Tomorrow is Saint Crispian.’
(Finally I get the chance to use some of that "literature" they made me memorize at Pepperdine.)

Well, maybe the staff at the Department of Law will not commemorate their service to the state with a yearly vigil and declare, “I was there when…” but they have reason to. (Our fat overpaid staff are totally like the Saints Crispin and Crispinia, who were tortured and beheaded for their Chrisitan faith. The metaphor fits like a glove.)

In his conclusion, Henry declares:

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers [and sisters] (My boss is a chick);
For he today that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

Brought into a modern Alaskan translation, “Those poor attorneys who have never known the privilege of stand­ing in the ranks of the Department of Law during the Fiftieth Year of Statehood will think themselves accursed.” (Working for the Department of Law during the first fifty years of Statehood is the bomb fo shizzle. Anybody working here after that is totally whack.)

We (relatively) few. We happy few.

Sincerely,
Talis J. Colberg
Attorney Genera

(Now THAT is tight writing! It is almost as well done as the dissertation I wrote at UAA called "M.D. Snodgrass: The Founder of the Alaska State Fair".)

God what a pompous windbag this guy is! And the fact that he attempts to disguise his incompetence and lack of ethical moorings by using Shakespearean references is almost reason enough to demand that he be removed from office without the addition of his numerous ethical violations. Clearly he has more in common with disgraced Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich then simply sharing a room with him at Pepperdine University. (Wow! How proud do you think that school is right about now? I bet they are scrubbing these names off their alumni list as fast as they can)