Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth (Post 1502302)

Which branches are those?

Originally Posted by Runscott (Post 1502299)

I can't think of any other profession where you can be successful by screwing people, and not be doing something illegal. The entire profession isn't sleazy - just certain branches.

Originally Posted by Mark17 (Post 1502308)

But, lawyers work for whomever hires them, and sometimes that's the jerk.

Originally Posted by Snapolit1 (Post 1502314)

A lawyers' job is to use every tool he or she possibly can to represent the interests of his client as long as they are within the ethical rules governing lawyering. A lawyers' obligation is not to you, or me, but to his/her client and the court. If you violate the rules and go over the line you should be punished.
Some times they're not, but for those of you outside the legal system you'd be surprised how many times state bar associations eventually catch up with the bad guys and root them out.

I always thought Johnny Cochrane gave the best legal performance of my lifetime, and I know he pissed off a couple of hundred million people. Was a zealous advocate. Did everything he could to get his client off the crime for a crime every one of us was probably convinced he did. Hell, people represented the Nazis in American courts. Representing unpopular people is I think the most noble part of the profession and upholds the values our country was founded on.

Originally Posted by Snapolit1 (Post 1502298)

I am actually always the guy defending teachers. I think it's beyond bizarre that people get their hackles up about a young guy or girl beginning their teaching career getting paid $21,000 a year, but no one seems to mind much that people are starting at an investment bank at five or ten or twenty times that and doing who knows what. Maybe it the whole summers off thing, but I see my brother grading papers on the weekends, making plans on the weekend, and always going the extra mile. It's a lot of hours if you care about what you are doing. As a society we think teachers of young kids are supposed to be both amazing babysitters and incredible educators, yet we treat them like second class citizens. Here where I live the teacher's unions haven't done them a whole lot of good (e.g., you can't fire the guy who inappropriately touched the kid without 27 hearings and have to keep him in a room somewhere collecting checks), but that's a different diatribe entirely.

Originally Posted by Runscott (Post 1502299)

I can't think of any other profession where you can be successful by screwing people, and not be doing something illegal. The entire profession isn't sleazy - just certain branches.

Originally Posted by masimen (Post 1502341)

How bout the record business? :)

Originally Posted by SAllen2556 (Post 1502329)

Someone once told me that teaching is the only career that demands the protection of a union while insisting on being treated as professionals.

There are great teachers out there who are grossly underpaid, but there are crappy ones who never get weeded out because of the union. I've never heard of a union for lawyers. At least they're wiling to make a living on their own merits.