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MEDIA REVIEWS The How-to-Win Appeal Manual By Ralph Adam Fine JurisNet, LLC; 310 pages, $85.00 Reviewed by Don RogersThe How-to-Win Appeal Manual, Revised Second Edition, is a useful resource, particularly for appellate practitioners. The book is divided into nine chapters. The first and second chapters are especially interesting as they address to some degree the relationship between current heavy appellate court caseloads and judicial decision making, and how successful appellate advocates should approach appeals in light of those considerations. Chapter I, entitled “How Judges Decide Cases and Why That is Important to You,” discusses, among other things, the notion that while appellate judges ordinarily want to do what is right, their view of both “the law” and what is right is affected by what they bring with them to their judicial roles. The chapter points out that appellate judges may have “hot buttons” that can affect the way they decide cases resulting from their backgrounds, ideas, predilections, philosophies, and biases, and the fact that many, if not most, get their positions as appellate judges because they are either politicians or friends of politicians, and therefore may be influenced by political agendas. It states in that regard, “You must know this, and use it to help you win your appeal. Recognize the ‘hot buttons’ of the judges before whom you appear. Know how to frame your issues, marshall your facts, and make your arguments to hit those ‘hot buttons’ dead center.” Chapter II, entitled “Too Many Cases,” while short, points out that heavy caseloads in appellate courts often cause appellate judges not to “[e]ven read the briefs that are submitted, but rather follow the recommendations made by staff counsel.” It accordingly recommends that appellate advocates cause their appeals to be the ones to which the appellate courts will devote serious attention by presenting submissions that cut through the clutter to “[m]ake the judges, law clerks and staff attorneys want you to win,” and giving those officials the tools necessary for a favorable decision. Chapters III through VII discuss the mechanics of successfully handling an appeal. Chapter III addresses the brief, “[t]he backbone of appellate advocacy,” and discusses the keys to writing an effective brief. Chapter IV discusses the standards of review through which appellate courts evaluate the merits of appellate issues. Chapter V discusses the fundamentals of successful oral argument before an appellate court. Chapter VI discusses preservation of error, and how to avoid the trap of “waiver” or forfeiture of appellate complaints. And Chapter VII discusses common habits that hinder effective appellate advocacy. Chapter VIII, entitled “Advocacy in the Real World,” presents a part-by-part analysis of actual briefs filed in two cases, one civil and one criminal, and evaluates “[w]hat was done right, what was done wrong, and what could have been done to make the briefs forceful, persuasive tools.” Finally, in Chapter IX, a one page conclusion, the author expresses his belief that appellate advocates will increase the odds of winning on appeal by following the suggestions made throughout the book. The book may be of interest to both trial and appellate practitioners who want to improve their advocacy skills, and enhance the likelihood of successful outcomes in civil or criminal appeals. Don Rogers is an assistant district attorney with the Harris County District Attorney’s Office. He is the Media Reviews editor for The Houston Lawyer. Logitech MX
Revolution Mouse Logitech Inc.: 1-800-231-7717; www.logitech.com ; List price $99.95 Reviewed by Al HarrisonLogitech has established leadership standing in the peripherals marketplace since the mid-1980’s, and has been affording microcomputer users a plethora of innovative benefits attributable to its MX family of mouse pointers since the arrival of the 2000’s. Contemporary MX mouse models that should be of particular interest to lawyers and law firm support staff are the MX Revolution Mouse and its successor, the MX Performance Mouse. Indeed, an MX mouse is so comfortable and fits so naturally into the (right) hand, that it seems like the MX has achieved oneness with virtually all hand movements. The unavoidable first impression of the MX Revolution mouse (“MXR”) is its distinctive ergonomic naturally-sculpted shape including a convex surface configured for comfortably accommodating the user’s right hand and a rubberized contoured thumb-rest situated on the MXR’s left side. Thus, upon emplacing the right hand atop the MXR mouse and seating the thumb within its specially-contoured resting place, the remaining fingers and heel of the right hand are inherently properly situated on the MXR’s front and rear surfaces, respectively. Besides being comfortably and safely gripped by the user’s the right hand, the MXR glides virtually effortlessly across smooth surfaces due to the placement of four Teflon-padded feet underneath. As with all members of the MX mouse family, the left top-side surface constitutes the left-button and the right top-side surface constitutes the right-button. On the dividing line between the left and right mouse buttons is located another common MX feature: the tiltable scroll wheel. This novel scroll wheel enables the user to conveniently scroll both vertically and horizontally without physically moving the mouse. By simply applying thumb-pressure laterally upon the wheel, the user causes it to tilt either to the left or to the right and then effectuate horizontal mouse movement in the same direction. Invoking this tilt scroll wheel is particularly advantageous when reading long documents and/or wide spreadsheets. As a laser mouse having a generously-sized sensor, the MX affords the user heightened resolution of the image seen by the mouse. Compared to conventional optical mice, this laser protocol imparts a several fold improvement in surface tracking capabilities which ramify upon its superlative navigation behavior. Also, unlike mechanical mice, which eventually become clogged with lint and like debris, the MX has no exposed rolling components. Accordingly, the MX mouse requires no regular maintenance implicated by mouse movement malfunction. The MX Revolution appears to engender a strong signal commensurate with uninterrupted wireless operation. The rechargeable integrated Li-Ion battery should be deposited into its cradle-like charging station to assure that the mouse has sufficient power to be ready for instantaneous action. Happily, Logitech included a power switch beneath the MX so that battery life may be prolonged during protracted periods of non-use such as while traveling. Among its plethora of advanced features, the MXR provides a tilting scroll wheel having astounding precision based upon an underlying micro-gear infrastructure. The user may conveniently press the scroll wheel into service either for scrolling apace through long documents or for scrolling in an incremental click-to-click mode for navigating lists, through images, slides, etc. Another useful feature is its uncanny ability to “SmartShift” depending upon the nature of the application at-hand. That is, the MX automatically adjusts its scrolling m.o. as a function of the current application and implicated mouse movements. Thus, mouse movements are adjusted in real-time to accommodate a user’s slow scrolling (incremental clicking) or rapid scrolling (free-wheeling). How about that for handy ergonomic ecstasy? Other profoundly useful options of the Logitech MX Revolution are Document Quick-Flip, One-Touch searching, and instantaneous zooming. These functions may be assigned either to the MX’s thumb-side wheel, to the button located immediately beneath the tilting scroll wheel, or to the pair of (default Web browser) forward and backward buttons located on the side above the thumb-side wheel. For example, using the thumb-side wheel, the mouse pointer may promptly cut and paste between applications, move between different documents, compare multiple documents, etc. For two-monitor environments, this option is especially advantageous but it is preferable that users have the benefit of excellent peripheral vision. Alternatively, the thumb-side wheel may be invoked to instantaneously invoke the zoom function. It should be noted that this “wheel” does not spin for continuous scrolling, but actually ratchets similar to a rocker switch. The small button located behind the tilt wheel is useful for invoking the MX One-Touch search function. After highlighting a word or phrase, the user simply presses the One-Touch search button to trigger display results from a designated Web search engine. Changing the default assignment of these various functions to different buttons and the side-thumb wheel, and the behavior of each button is accomplished via Logitech’s SetPoint software. SetPoint also enables the user to tweak the scrolling characteristics in each of the vertical and horizontal directions. The user may also opt to activate SmartShift and to specify its default behavior. The MXR performs well on a variety of surfaces normally encountered in a law office but not on glass. The new-generation MX Performance Mouse apparently is capable of exhibiting customary excellent MX mouse performance even on glass surfaces. But, unless an attorney has a glass-top desk, the Logitech MX Revolution should afford fabulous mouse functionality and ergonomic excellences. Al Harrison is a member of The Houston Lawyer Editorial Board. He is a patent attorney and intellectual property lawyer practicing with the firm of Harrison Law Office, P.C. |
