Is the Obama campaign violating the fundamental tenet of American jurisprudence, the sacred bond of trust between a lawyer and their client? Under the rules of every bar association, based on tradition going back centuries of Anglo-Saxon legal principles, a lawyer must never exploit the intimate relationship with a client for other purposes that might benefit the lawyer. For this breach of trust, lawyers have regularly been disbarred.

Who is the possible ethical pirate operating at the beck and call of the Obama campaign?

Greg Craig, top adviser to Obama, holding a rank equal to recently disgraced and resigned aide Samantha Power, is a longtime partner at the Washington law firm, Williams and Connally. Now he’s Obama’s designated hatchet man, sent out on cable TV to deliver negative attack lines against Hillary Clinton. Craig knows no limits in his frenzied assaults on a person he has known well since they attended Yale Law School together. Craig knows better. He knows Hillary is a person of values and integrity, even as he smears her.

[The NYT photo caption, above right: CANDIDATE CABINET Foreign-policy advisers of Senator Obama (at head of table) include, from left around table, Gregory Craig, Susan Rice, Anthony Lake, Maj. Gen. Scott Gration and Samantha Power.]

But as nasty as this picture is, it’s actually much worse–and potentially a legal problem for the high-flying Craig.

Attorney Craig is ethically challenged. He and his firm, Williams and Connally, have been the attorneys of record for Bill and Hillary Clinton for more than a decade. (more…)