My unwelcome diagnosis and resulting detour into our dysfunctional medical system diverted my attention from scrutinizing commentators who make dubious assertions about the current state of the legal profession.

Well, I'm back for this one. At first, I thought that Professor Steven Davidoff Solomon's article in the April 1 edition of the The New York Times, “Despite Forecasts of Doom, Signs of Life in the Legal Industry,” was an April Fools' joke. But the expected punch line at the end of his essay never appeared.

To keep this post a manageable length, here's a list of points that Solomon got wrong in his enthusiastic account of why the legal industry is on the rise (as a professor of law at Berkeley, he should know better):