This is making me feel really old. I can’t believe Legal Insurrection has an author who has a 10th anniversary.
We’re only 14 years old (next October), and the first two years were just me, then in the third year just me and Cornell student Kathleen McCaffrey (Breitman). Mike joined us in August of that fourth year (2012). Mike initially worked behind the scenes to help us launch College Insurrection (subsequently rolled into Legal Insurrection), and his first post at CI was August 26, 2012.
Here was Mike’s introductory post at College Insurrection, Meet the Team – Aleister:
Hello College Insurrection readers!You may know me as Aleister of American Glob.You may also remember me as the guy who created this video.I’m still writing at American Glob but now I’m writing here too. I’m very grateful to William Jacobson for the opportunity to join the Insurrection team and I look forward to the rest of College Insurrection’s freshman year.When I think about what led me to this point, I have no choice but to quote a hippie.What a long strange trip it’s been.I launched American Glob in 2004 as a parody news site inspired by The Onion. I updated the site only once a week and I knew nothing about blogging. Bostonians sometimes refer to the Boston Globe as the Boston Glob. My concept was to make fun of national news using the same nomenclature.After two years of writing fake news stories for American Glob, I gave up. The site just sat there for three years, completely untouched. Then the 2008 election happened and I felt compelled to speak out. I dusted off the cobwebs and reinvented American Glob as a political blog.As a lifelong New Englander, I always assumed I was a liberal. I was wrong. As a member of Generation X, I knew Obama was a bullshit artist the first time I heard him speak. I was right.William Jacobson and Legal Insurrection have been a constant source of inspiration for me and I’m absolutely psyched for the opportunity to participate in the dialogue here.As someone who’s worked in education for most of my life, I feel uniquely qualified to address the issues you’ll read about here at College Insurrection in the months to come.Finally, if you’re wondering about my pen name just Google it.I’m aspiring to be the wickedest man in New England.All the best and thanks for reading,Aleister
I summarized much of Mike’s background and those early years in his 5th Anniversary post in 2017. In the early years Mike wasn’t Mike, he was “Aleister” until 2017 because he worked at a liberal theater company and feared outing himself could cause work problems. So many people used aliases because cancel culture existed long before people called it cancel culture.
The statistics on our dashboard say that Mike has had 10,020 posts at Legal Insurrection, but I don’t think that includes hundreds more at College Insurrection. Mike has been guarding the walls reliably and without any drama day and night.
Mike also has become a good friend to me and our other team members over the past decade.
But enough about Mike. I want to talk to you about Finn, Mike’s owner and Legal Insurrection’s on-site supervisor of Mike. Finn rescued Mike on June 9, 2014. I remember Mike contacting me with excitement: “So I got a dog … He’s a black Dachshund and I’ve named him Finn. Just picked him up tonight.”
My contribution to Finn’s mental well-being was suggesting Mike give him pig’s ears to chew on (it went over bigly with him). I’ve enjoyed all the Finn stories (there are plenty) and photos. I have more photos of Finn than I do of my own dog.
I’ve never met Finn. That’s on my bucket list. Somehow I doubt meeting me is on Finn’s bucket list.
Finn has contributed posts to Legal Insurrection. I’m not sure which of Mike’s more than 10k posts were created by paw, although I have my suspicions.
Finn is getting a little gray around the edges (who among us isn’t?), but he is still a snappy dresser.
But enough about Finn.
This post is about Mike. A great friend to me, my wife, and the rest of the Legal Insurrection family.
Thank you Mike for a great 10 years, and we now raise our glasses in toast to the next 10 years.
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