You come across them in every field, and they're not uncommon in the law profession: guys who think they're much cleverer than they really are. They think they're being entertainingly suggestive when they're really just vulgar. They think they're being undetectably crafty when they're utterly transparent.
Belleville plaintiffs attorney Tom Keefe stepped down as interim dean of St. Louis University School of Law in March 2013, with half of his one-year term completed, after school officials questioned the propriety of numerous comments he'd made as the public face of SLU Law.
“Life is a bitch,” Keefe was quoted as saying, “and if it was easy, we would call it a slut.”
This from the interim dean of a prestigious Catholic law school.
Showing up late for a speech because he'd stopped to use the men's room, Keefe excused his tardiness on that cold day with a reference to “shrinkage” and “having a problem finding the little guy.”
Apparently, some members of the audience would have preferred to know less about the dean's private parts and word got out.
On another occasion, Keefe asked a newlywed colleague if she'd consummated her marriage. Classy fellow.
Coarseness hasn't worked out well for Keefe, so now he's trying coyness.
This Tuesday, coy Keefe held a press conference to challenge the integrity of Supreme Court Justice Lloyd Karmeier, all the while pretending that he wasn't doing that very thing.
“I’m just telling you the facts I have,” Keefe claimed. “I’m not here to cast any aspersions.”
Oh no, of course not. That was the furthest thing from his mind.
“I’m not here to politicize this,” Keefe insisted, exactly one week before an election in which voters will decide whether or not to retain Judge Karmeier, the nemesis of some plaintiffs attorneys, for a second 10-year term.
As usual, Keefe's comments reveal more about him than anyone or anything else. That “little guy” he couldn't find is Keefe himself.