The lawsuit filed by 9/11 conspiracy nutcase "Philip J. Berg, Esquire" against Barack Obama seeking to disqualify Obama from seeking the Presidency by challenging his citizenship is an hilarious example of how not to write a legal pleading. It appears to be little more than a compendium of rumors and unsubstantiated gossip floating around the internet, lashed together with eccentric Capitalization And haphazard spacing, written by a high school sophomore, and put into service of a ludicrous legal theory.
Having taught legal writing before, I may use Mr. Esquire's complaint in this case as an amusing example of what to avoid in drafting pleadings. Real pleadings
--do not cite either the English or Italian versions of Wikipedia;
--do not contain bizarre sentences like "The Democratic National Committee and 'We the People' who believe in the Democratic Vision."
--do not present allegations derived from "further references circulating on the internet."
--do not cite news accounts of the findings of a GOP "research team."
--do not take the findings of "Inside Edition" seriously.
--do not cite allegations "posted all over the internet."
--do not contain horribly written sentences like "All the efforts of supporters of legitimate citizens were for nothing because the Obama cheated his way into a fraudulent candidacy and cheated legitimately eligible natural born citizens from competing in a fair process and the supporters of their citizen choice for the nomination."
--contain requests for relief directed to the court, rather than the defendant.
Of course, this lawsuit is not intended for hearing by the court system, but by the media. When it is laughed out of court, the right wing will claim that it's all a conspiracy to cover up the truth, and thereby keep the smears alive.
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