As a political gambit, the method is tried and true. If you are an unpopular Vice President, refurbish your image by deriding an occupational group with an even lower approval rating than your own. Spiro Agnew popularized the ploy back in 1969 with his bitter denunciations of the news media. Following the same playbook, Vice President Dan Quayle -- a lawyer -- wangled an invitation to the American Bar Association convention in Atlanta and last week used the forum to mount a blistering attack on the legal profession.
"Our system of civil justice is, at times, a self-inflicted competitive disadvantage," Quayle...