I'll weigh in on this one. I am aware of the problem of judicial elections and I agree that we definately need to work to make contested judicial races more common and learn more about the judges who are appointed (as almost all of them are, because of the way they work the system.)
However, I must say that I was quite unimpressed with Patricia's responses to the Minnesota Lawyer questionaire. (http://www.minnlawyer.com/elections/2004 - educate yourself!) She answered the question "What are the major issues facing the court on which you wish to serve? How can these realistically be addressed?" With "See below" but I saw nothing "below" that answered that question sufficiantly for me. The only thing after that was that she thought that Judges should not opine about political or legal issues from the bench. Is that the only major issue facing our judicial system in her eyes? If so then she sees the judicial system much differently than I. Now, granted, I could have emailed her and asked her that, but she had a forum on which to respond to this question and she did not. She also did not discuss at all the issue of uncontested judicial races which you site as your major reason for voting for her. I am unimpressed. Joelle Tegwen West Side --- John Birrenbach <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > We all know these judges go unchallenged and an uncontested election > is not democracy. Frankly I wish more lawyers would step up to the > plate and run against these judges. But many will tell you they > don't want to run against an incumbent judge who might hear a case > they have if they loose to them. So I have to hand it to someone who > actually has the guts to run against a judge. > > I don't think I know Judge Fetsch, can't recall him from anything I > have ever seen so have no reason to believe he is a bad judge, I also > > have no reason to believe he is a good one either. Maybe if more > people start to challenge these judges then we will learn more about > the incumbents because they will have to run a campaign and tell > people what they do. Right now once your appointed to a seat on the > bench, your there for life baby (well unless a seat on a higher court > comes open and you get appointed to that). > ===== Help bring them home! http://www.missingchildrenmn.org Big Media - "No News is Good News!" __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish. http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail _____________________________________________ To Join: St. Paul Issues Forum Rules Discussion Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] _____________________________________________ NEW ADDRESS FOR LIST: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To subscribe, modify subscription, or get your password - visit: http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/listinfo/stpaul Archive Address: http://www.mnforum.org/mailman/private/stpaul/
