I suppose it could be pretty frightening as a lawyer to enter a courtroom knowing that standing just five meters to your left is your legal counterpart who also happens to be an Israeli-trained dentist with a black belt in Taekwondo. In theory, said lawyer could forego a simple objection to your cross-examinations and go straight to jabbing a Novocaine syringe into the base of your spine. As the old lawyer saying goes, it’s hard to win a case when you’re dead.

Perhaps that’s why (a Clinton appointed) federal judge in Orange County granted a hearing for a lawsuit filed by a Mission Viejo dentist by the name who moonlights as a lawyer.

A 47 year old woman born in present day Moldova (known as the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic when she was born in 1962), Dr. Orly Taitz, Esq emigrated to Israel with her family in 1981. She attended Hebrew University in Jersualem, where she trained for what would become her day job in dentistry. By 1990, she was married in a Vegas wedding and settling down in Orange County, CA to set up a dental practice.

When seeing her speak or talk with the press, you find out quickly that Dr. Taitz is most certainly a product of her environment. Raised under the sickle and hammer and educated in a nation under a permanent state of declared war from its inception, her Type A personality seems almost a child of necessity in retrospect. It’s an upbringing that she wears on her sleeve in her most intense moments, and even in her more reserved periods she remains about as subtle as a sledgehammer to your kneecaps. Her rapid-fire voice, a deeply affected dialect unmistakably shared by so many other Jerusalem ex-pats from Eastern Europe, delivers piece after stunning piece of evidence, each supposedly more damning than the last, that our Republic as we know it has been hijacked.

By whom, we ask? The Chicago Gang currently residing (illegally, don’t forget that part) in the White House? The shadowy New World Order and its transnational cast of characters ensconced in faraway cities? The gay mafia? Radical Islamists with their very own Manchurian Candidate taking over our children’s brains from his unlawful residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue? An hour’s visit to Dr. Taitz’s blog finds that nothing, truly nothing, is off the table for her or her followers, because this “Administration” (because remember, it’s an illegitimate one) is just that out of control and, dare we call it, evil. 

In fairness to her, there is a certain level of enabling from the Obama Administration, an enabling that is more than deliberate due to the very real political benefits keeping Birthers around provides said Administration. While the President’s qualifications to be President are settled, it has withheld a number of documents relating to his past activities overseas and in college stateside. As noted in yesterday’s comments, this lack of transparency provides those with an attention seeking tendency to use it as a means of inventing a crisis where one may or may not exist in reality.

Perhaps Ms. Taitz is in fact a true believer in this whole conspiracy theory business, not a mere entrepreneur in the business. But that discussion is quite irrelevant to the very instructive fact that the way she conducts herself as a leader of the Birther movement causes both serious legal problems for herself and serious public relations problems for any and all conservatives and Republicans who aren’t forceful in speaking against them.

The problems for Ms. Taitz start with the simple fact that by most objective standards, she is not even legally qualified to act as counsel to anybody anywhere. Her law degree was awarded by a William Howard Taft University in California. Taft is a non-accredited law school that offers law classes over the Internet. The American Bar Association does not recognize online universities that grant law degrees. However, the California Bar does allow people who receive law degrees from Taft to sit for the state bar. Sure, it was not long ago when America had justices on the Supreme Court of the United States who didn’t have law degrees. But a lot has changed in a century of American jurisprudence, and her conduct as a “lawyer” suggests that if Taft wants to award law degrees, they have some serious holes in their curriculum that need plugging.

Consider the very illegal practice of “judge-shopping”. Most ethical guidelines sanction the practice of actively seeking out judges who would appear favorable to a counselor’s cause. It is usually hard to prove its being practiced, a fact that has allowed the creation of “judicial hellholes” across the country (areas of America where an abnormally high amount of medical malpractice suits are filed). But when Ms. Taitz exhorts her readers on her blog to look for judges who are favorable to conservative ideals and issues, the burden of proof is lightened considerably.

Speaking of medical malpractice suits, Taft might also want to look into boning up on their online lessons on frivolous lawsuits. Ms. Taitz has filed multiple lawsuits in multiple jurisdictions with identical arguments questioning President Obama’s qualifications to serve as President. One of her favorite tactics is to find a disenchanted member of the armed forces, convince them that their Commander in Chief is illegitimate, then have them put their name on a lawsuit claiming they don’t have to comply with any deployment order issued by the President.

At least two of these lawsuits have been filed in the southeastern United States. One was dismissed with extreme prejudice by a Bush-appointed federal judge in Atlanta by the name of Clay Land. In an eviscerating 14 page ruling, Land not only enumerated the reasons why these lawsuits are not merely frivolous, but dangerous precedent for the judiciary undermining the authority of the President’s singular control of the armed forces. He concluded by informing Taitz that fines in the five digit range would result from future lawsuits of this nature being filed. Taitz’s response? Call Judge Land a traitor to the country. Not unethical, but probably not the best way to win friends and influence people. 

A further example of the frivolous nature of many of her lawsuits is the fact that under the Constitution and federal law, the President’s qualifications to serve have been validated by all the proper authorities. The Constitution provides that Congress shall certify the results of the electoral college and the qualifications of the President and its members. Congress did both of these things in January of 2009, which would render any lawsuit challenging his qualifications effectively moot. By attacking his eligibility after it has been settled, such lawsuits are not within the jurisdiction of the federal courts and not worthy of consideration. Such lawsuits are inherently frivolous in nature.

Will Judge David Carter follow Judge Land’s path and send his Birther case on its merry way? Or will Ms. Taitz and her followers find their judge-shopping skills vindicated? We’ll find out the answer to that question tomorrow, as arguments on the case begin. And tomorrow, we'll go in detail and look at the truth behind most of the principal Birther arguments and conspiracies.