[Genuine Realist]

I share your sentiments GR (with the whole field of wills and estates law as a prime example of unnecessary complexity), but I'm sure you know that a primary cause of legal complexity is that one of the main functions of lawyers is to generate work for other lawyers, and vice versa.

When I was about to take the MPRE (multiple choice legal ethics exam required to join the bar), I was told I should just apply the following test to each question: choose the answer that produces the most income for the legal profession as a whole. Turns out it worked every time it was possible to apply it, and it applied to nearly every question on the 50-question test (for the 1 or 2 remaining questions it did not produce any answer so I was on my own). I concluded from this experience that to be an ethical lawyer, all one had to do was generate the most income possible for the legal profession. (fortunately for the public, I never did practice law)

Oh, no question. I don't like most other lawyers, and prosecuted a few of them. The profession has become a catch-all for liberal arts majors with nothing better to do. Many of them graduate from law school with some vague notion that all arguments are colorable, none as a practical matter is conclusive, and that's the state of reality. 

In 2009, there was a once-in-a-generation chance for real financial reform, which Obama completely f---ked up. My own thought was simple. Rather than let investment banks do business as corporations (which was never done before 1984), require they adopt the form of limited partnership, with all members of the firm above a certain managerial level (the exact level would have to be determined by regulation) required to participate as general partners. In other words, you use GIGO type analysis of financial risk, which was the type of deluded analysis that got us into the 2008 mess, at your own risk - your own money is on the table. Simple, elegant, relatively foolproof - it was the form of organization that they all had before 1984, so hardly all that radical.

Chance of enactment? Zero. Instead, Barack Obama, aka Pretty Boy, stalled for two years, squandered the mandate, and gave us another 1,000 page legal briar patch in the form of Dodd-Frank [ironically named after two of the principal architects of the disaster].  Typical.

[Genuine Realist]

I share your sentiments GR (with the whole field of wills and estates law as a prime example of unnecessary complexity), but I'm sure you know that a primary cause of legal complexity is that one of the main functions of lawyers is to generate work for other lawyers, and vice versa.

When I was about to take the MPRE (multiple choice legal ethics exam required to join the bar), I was told I should just apply the following test to each question: choose the answer that produces the most income for the legal profession as a whole. Turns out it worked every time it was possible to apply it, and it applied to nearly every question on the 50-question test (for the 1 or 2 remaining questions it did not produce any answer so I was on my own). I concluded from this experience that to be an ethical lawyer, all one had to do was generate the most income possible for the legal profession. (fortunately for the public, I never did practice law)

Oh, no question. I don't like most other lawyers, and prosecuted a few of them. The profession has become a catch-all for liberal arts majors with nothing better to do. Many of them graduate from law school with some vague notion that all arguments are colorable, none as a practical matter is conclusive, and that's the state of reality. 

In 2009, there was a once-in-a-generation chance for real financial reform, which Obama completely f---ked up. My own thought was simple. Rather than let investment banks do business as corporations (which was never done before 1984), require they adopt the form of limited partnership, with all members of the firm above a certain managerial level (the exact level would have to be determined by regulation) required to participate as general partners. In other words, you use GIGO type analysis of financial risk, which was the type of deluded analysis that got us into the 2008 mess, at your own risk - your own money is on the table. Simple, elegant, relatively foolproof - it was the form of organization that they all had before 1984, so hardly all that radical.

Chance of enactment? Zero. Instead, Barack Obama, aka Pretty Boy, stalled for two years, squandered the mandate, and gave us another 1,000 page legal briar patch in the form of Dodd-Frank [ironically named after two of the principal architects of the disaster].  Typical.