Female attorneys may want to think twice before applying at Mike Papantonio's law firm.
Papantonio, who also co-hosts the "Ring of Fire" weekend radio show, was filling in on Ed Schultz's radio program May 25 and complaining with guest Cliff Schecter about what he considers spineless Democrats who aren't aggressive enough against Republicans (audio) --
SCHECTER: The Democrats have two groups of people that, let's face it, overall are core Democrats that understand fundamentals about how to win battles or influence people. One, we'll start with and say it's Hollywood who creates these, you know, characters that are emotionally moving and compelling in what they do, but then on the Democratic side when we go after Republicans we talk all in logic and don't appeal to people's emotion and point out that, you know, the individual stories of how people have been so hurt. I mean, we've done better lately and Obama did it with that Bain ad ...
PAPANTONIO (interrupting): We are doing better if he'll, if we won't back down, if he'll allow the people who are talking some damn sense into him. Look, we don't need ...
SCHECTER: The second key group though ...
PAPANTONIO: ... we don't need Mary Beth Cahill types who lost the Kerry election.
SCHECTER (trying to get word in edgewise): Right ...
PAPANTONIO: We don't need Laura Schwartz who was a Democratic strategist who shows up on Fox.
SCHECTER (deflated): Right.
PAPANTONIO: We don't need Susan Estrich, a Dukakis advisor who lost that election.
SCHECTER: Oh God ...
PAPANTONIO: We don't need Donna Brazile who lost the Gore election. We don't need these people who don't understand that there is a tactic to a fight.
SCHECTER (valiantly but in vain): And you know, let me, I ...
PAPANTONIO: And you know what the tactic is? The tactic is, inflict pain first and never let up.
And never let the other guy talk, even when he agrees with you.
In fairness to Papantonio, he did something else Friday I've not seen him do before while sitting in for Schultz -- he mentioned that one of his guests, a lawyer, also happens to be one of his law partners. (Papantonio has neglected to do this at least three times since November, as I described at the end of this post from April).
Here he is introducing attorney James Kauffman (audio) --
I've got James Kauffman with me. Kauffman honestly is one of the finest securities and financial fraud litigators that I know. And, uh, he happens to be one of my partners. That makes it, that makes it even better. I just wanted to tell you.
The two men work in the Florida-based law firm of Levin, Papantonio, Thomas, Mitchell, Rafferty & Proctor. Not incidentally, only a single person of color is included in the 35 attorneys listed on the firm's website -- and he's conveniently situated right up top of the non-alphabetical listing, though not a senior partner -- and only five women.
Did I mention how much Papantonio likes to vilify the racist, misogynistic tea party?
In case you were wondering, Schecter cited trial lawyers as the second group of "core Democrats" after Papantonio eventually stopped talking.
