April 9, 2008
One Of My Greatest Pet Peeves In The Last Several Years…
…has been the provision within our legal system that allows conscienceless scumbags with law degrees to victimize anyone they please via frivolous, fraudulent and/or overstated lawsuits. I say “victimize” because our legal system compels people who are subjected to these lawsuits to hire attorneys to defend them and, win or lose, they are out the cost of their defense. Some of us can weather these costs, others can’t: The latter lose businesses, homes and sometimes the very money needed to survive.
John Stossel has a column up at today’s Jewish World Review that tells it like it is.
“We cannot use force.”
That was my response last week when a lawyer shouted at me, “You media types are bullies, too!”
We were arguing about my Wall Street Journal op-ed that called class-action and securities lawyers bullies and parasites who enrich themselves through extortion. It’s legal extortion, but extortion nonetheless.
These aggressive lawyers and their Naderite defenders don’t get it. Or they pretend they don’t.
Oh, they get it all right, they simply suffer from any lack of morals — can anybody say “parasite”?
Hmmmm, for some inexplicable reason, John Edwards comes to mind…
There are only two ways to do things in life: voluntarily or forced. We reporters may be obnoxious, intrusive, stupid, rude, etc., but we cannot force anyone to do anything. All our work is in the voluntary sector.
But litigation is force. When a plaintiff sues, a defendant is forced to mount a defense. If he settles or loses, he’s forced to pay. Government is the enforcer.
Exactly.
Just look at organizations like CAIR (Council on American Islamic Relations) in the aftermath of the Flying Imams debacle, where they opted to intimidate anyone who reported suspicious activity on the part of Muslims on airplanes by suing the people, causing them to have to spend money they couldn’t afford to spend on defense council (thankfully, Congress established the John Doe clause, nipping that one in the bud), or any ever-hungry, rank & file liberal trial lawyer.
Our legal system invites lawyers to act like bullies. Only in America can I sue you for dubious reasons, force you to spend thousands of dollars on lawyers (not to mention the psychic costs — the anxiety and lost sleep that lawsuits create), and when a judge rules that my claim is bunk, I don’t even have to say “sorry.” I can blithely move on to sue someone else. In other countries, I would have to pay your legal fees to at least compensate you for some of the financial damage I caused. “Loser pays,” it’s called.
As Shoprat pointed out in a comment on one of my recent posts, this is a result of our electing lawyers (and in context, since the post was a rant about complicated tax laws, accountants) to Congress — they can always be counted upon to enact laws that generate profitable work for their colleagues, and for them as well, should they lose an election and have to go back to work in the private sector.
“Loser Pays” is an excellent concept, and while I’ve never been an advocate of applying foreign law to our own, I think this is something we ought to emulate. Remember when SCOTUS applied Euro-law to their deliberations re GITMO/Camp Delta? Well….
“Loser Pays” would definitely put a damper on frivolous lawsuits!
However,
The trial lawyers have even gamed the language. They call “loser pays” the “English Rule,” as if it’s some weird British law. But it’s not. It’s really the Rest of the World Rule. America is the odd man out because we rarely punish litigators who misuse force.
Litigators fight for a living, day after day. Practice makes perfect. They get good at winning. Because of their clout, “loser pays” never gets though the legislature.
Which just goes to show that “justice” and “the law” are nowhere near synonymous in many cases. Like Arlo Guthrie said in Alice’s Restaurant, “…and Officer Obie realized that this was a typical case of American blind justice, and there wasn’t a thing he could do about it!”
An example John Stossel cites, a response to the airing of the issue on 20/20,
“After a real estate deal fell through, the owner of the property, a lawyer, sued me for $25,000 in damages. After two years, I won a summary judgment, which he immediately appealed. We are still in litigation over this, and there is nothing I can do to stop the process. I have offered settlements all along the way, but at this point I have paid more for my mandatory defense than the entire case was worth. If that’s not bullying, I don’t know what is. He continues to do everything in his power to prolong the case, knowing full well what it is costing me. By the time this is all over and I ‘win,’ I will have spent $35,000 and dealt with the stress of the case for more than five years. We are a modest, middle-class family. What was once the hope of being able to pay for my children’s college education now lines a lawyer’s pockets. I have had no recourse but to take it.”
Great, some litigation “professional”, in demonstration of the remorseless greed of his ilk, lines his pockets at the expense of some childrens’ futures. Bravo, Mr. Lawyer! Use the money to put a jacuzzi in your condo! Buy a new Porsche! Put hotels on Boardwalk and Park Place!
Scumbag!
America needs judges willing to say no to the lawyer bullies. America also needs “loser pays.” Otherwise, the parasites will bully away your money and your choices.
Amen to that, brother John! I always knew there was a reason you number among my personal Top 5 columnists!
http://hardastarboard.mu.nu/wp-trackback.php?p=805
April 9th, 2008 at 12:58 pm
Well I think you covered just about every awful thing a lawyer can do to you.
I have had some legal frustrations myself.
Oh, they get it all right, they simply suffer from any lack of morals — can anybody say “parasite”?
Hmmmm, for some inexplicable reason, John Edwards comes to mind…
LOL!
You have a folder name “Assholes” LMAO!
April 9th, 2008 at 1:21 pm
Marie –
I recall a really old biographical western about Jesse and Frank James in which the local newspaper editor has a formula editorial along the lines of, “If there was justice in America, we would take all the lawyers (or whomever he was targeting) out in the street, and shoot ‘em down like dogs!”
Well…
I believe John Stossel has a point, defendants in B.S. lawsuits shouldn’t have to be victimized by legal costs, the plaintiffs should have to pay all the legal fees and court costs if they lose. This is a serious flaw in our legal system that needs to be addressed.
You’re not the first person who’s commented on my “Assholes” file, LOL, but I could see no alternative but to create it — it applies to so many of the anal cavities in our society who deserve the title.
April 9th, 2008 at 2:25 pm
One of the major problems that creates this bully crap is that Judges are more interested in creating policy from the bench than judging the merits of a case and determining whether it should be allowed before the court in the first place.
This along with the good ole boy system of buddies between Judges and lawyers allows bully tactics and frivilous law suites to take up unnecessary court time and money.
The legal system needs to back up and take a good look at the Constitution and start following those sacred American principles by the letter which is what our Founders intended for this Nation. We have become so far removed from those founding principles that George Washington, were he alive today would raise up another Continental Army to fight in rebellion for Independance from our on Government and judicial system.
I would be his first volunteer!!!!!
April 9th, 2008 at 2:45 pm
Ken –
Spot on!
I’d be right there with you!
It’s disappointing in an extreme that so many people who are licensed to practice law have so little use for the Constitution. For such people, disbarment and/or prison time should be mandatory.
Unfortunately, abuse of the law is apparently acceptable, and even fashionable, these days.
This truly needs to be changed.
April 9th, 2008 at 7:25 pm
Your bang on Seth, it’s the same up here. One thing that is even worse is these damn Human Rights Commissions, or Kangaroo Courts for short. Your guilty until proven innocent, have no rights, and they are not even ruled on by judges, as if that would make a difference. The person filing the complaint has the full power and money of the state behind them, and the defendant is hung out on a ledge by the finger tips. Now they give the word bully a new meaning…..
Bloggers, and talk radio, have really gone after them up here, and maybe, just maybe, we’ve all made enough noise to get the feds ear….
April 9th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
There are ways to deal with it, but since lawyers control the Democratic party it isn’t going to happen.
April 9th, 2008 at 8:37 pm
AB –
That sounds suspiciously like the Napoleonic Code to me (unless things have changed since I last lived there, that’s still the law in the state of Louisiana).
I know one or two lawyers who know the meaning of the word “compassion”, but they comprise part of a collective who are few and far between and rarely practice in the arena of common litigation. Most attorneys are more concerned with making money than with seeing actual justice done, or are intent upon dragging our society in a leftward direction — witness the American ACLU, which was founded by a communist. It’s interesting that most of those who go into politics are lawyers, wouldn’t you say?
I’d sure love to have the option of voting for a carpenter, a roofer or an electrician for a change, or even a “sanitation engineer”.
But as long as lawyers rule the proverbial roost, we’re screwed.
Shoprat –
Exactly.
The Democrats of today worship frivolous and/or politically portside oriented lawsuits, and since they run Congress, holding our breaths while waiting for any kind of fair & impartial justice will only result in self-inflicted suffocation.
In the words of some, “That sucks”.
April 10th, 2008 at 5:11 pm
Seth,
I agree. It seems there is a wide gap between Law and Justice. Many years back, we had a kid on night shift
throw a drinking party in the parking lot; he accelerated his Mustang right into a light pole, wrecking both. He sued the company for putting a light pole in the lot and allowing him to get drunk..and won a nice settlement. An associate testified as an expert witness in a fire arms accident, explaining the technical reasons for a misfire…the defense lawyer ripped him apart, although the lawyer knew nothing of thermodynamics.
Call me a curmudgeon, but I find the folks in the jury
just as culpable in these cases..$$$ million for spilling your own hot McDonalds coffee in your own lap?
(back when I was a kid-officer in the Army, one of my
extra-curricular duties was assistant defense counsel
in courts-martial..we pulled every dirty trick in the book to ’spring’ a defendant…it was our ‘duty’..so,
I can understand the lawyer, slime & all) But, now that I’m an old curmudgeon, heck, the whole legal system could use a huge dose of common sense.
April 10th, 2008 at 6:41 pm
Seth, check it out…
http://tinyurl.com/3mmaqd
These things are being fought hard up here before they get a chance to form their own SS to break down doors.
April 11th, 2008 at 12:51 am
BB –
The litigators from hell have certainly done their share to damage our society in order to line their own pockets.
led to a lawsuit against my employers. I was very good at it, that is, thorough, and testified in numerous cases, and really saw some sleazy lawyers in action, representing equally sleazy clients. If the casino was at fault, we had no problem settling out of court for reasonable sums, but if we weren’t, we fought the cases and generally won them.
The MacDonalds case was pure terrorism: It has cowed so many companies to the point that they are constantly looking over their shoulders, knowing that they can be sued into oblivion for doing absolutely nothing wrong.
A perfect example appears in the labelling of Cup o’ Soup type products, where you see a warning, Caution: Hot. They are warning the consumer that the water he or she personally heats to a boil and then pours in the styrofoam container will be hot, because they know that, like the guy, in the example you cite, who got himself drunk and ran into the light pole, one of these parasite lawyers will more than likely convince a jury that the company is culpable in the event that the person spills his/her own hot water and gets burned.
They’ve driven up the price of malpractice insurance to unreasonable sums, ruined people who were guilty of no wrongdoing, chizzled megabucks out of companies that have done no wrong and generally proven that we need some serious revisions in our legal system, starting with “loser pays” and, while you know how much I disapprove of government interference in civil matters, placing caps on lawsuit awards that will render frivolous, fraudulent and overstated lawsuits much less profitable to these bloodsuckers.
AB –
Man, that CHRC has got to go, and fast, before it gives the lefties down here ideas!
From what I read in the linked article and the additional links it provides, it does look as though right-thinking Canadians are on the road to fixing that problem, and thank G-d for it!