In an interview of Senator Barack Obama on Fox News, Chris Wallace questioned Obama’s claims of being a post-partisan leader who reached across the aisle. In response, Obama identified his support of the Class Action Fairness Act tort reform bill. Is this persuasive evidence of bipartisan behavior? I explore the question in today’s Examiner.
Archive for May, 2008
New features: browse by tag, related posts
Continuing our WordPress site overhaul, we’ve added two new ways to navigate through Overlawyered to find relevant past material.
Our new browse by tag page lets you zero in quickly on posts that relate to your topic of interest or locality. We’ve assembled an uneasy mix of the old post categories, automatically generated new tags on old posts (e.g., “Detroit” will yield stories linking to the Detroit News even when there is no local angle) and tags newly selected by Ted and me, with the balance, we assume, gradually shifting toward the latter over time. We’ve tended to avoid autotagging the most common terms as well as the very largest cities and states; remember that you can still try our regular search function.
And here’s a neat trick: by tinkering with tag URLs, you can combine tags to find a subset of posts with overlapping tags. For example, the URL http://overlawyered.com/tag/illinois+family-law/ calls up all posts that are tagged with both “Illinois” and “family law”. (Note the required placement of the plus sign and hyphen(s).) Likewise with “Bill Lerach” + “politics” or whatever other combination of tags you like.
Finally, we’re experimenting on individual posts with suggested “Related posts”. These are auto-generated by the tag program based on shared tags, so they will inevitably be less than perfect, but may make a helpful place to start.
“Whatever is Greek, wherever in the world, we want back.”
Why does the idea of cultural property have so many advocates? “It seems to establish a bulwark against the plunder of antiquities.” And yet how quickly it’s turned into a way of looting premodern artifacts from Western owners whose claim of title is stronger than that of foreign governments or indigenous/Indian tribes. “But if cultural property really did exist, the Enlightenment museum would be an example of it: an institution that evolved, almost uniquely, out of Western civilization. And the cultural property movement could be seen as a persistent attempt to undermine it. And take illicit possession.” (Edward Rothstein, “Antiquities, the World Is Your Homeland”, New York Times, May 27).
Mark Steyn on the suing-OPEC bill
“[Then Congress] went off and passed by 324 to 82 votes the so-called NOPEC bill. The NOPEC bill is, in effect, a suit against OPEC, which, if I recall correctly, stands for the Oil Price-Exploiting Club. “No War For Oil!,” as the bumper stickers say. But a massive suit for oil — now that’s the American way! …
“Congress hauls Big Oil execs in for the dinner-theatre version of a Soviet show trial and then passes irrelevant poseur legislation like the NOPEC bill. Plus ca change you can believe in, plus c’est la meme chose. The NOPEC bill is really the NO PECS bill — a waste of photocopier paper passed by what C. S. Lewis called ‘men without chests’.” (“Fill Her Up with Hot Air”, National Review Online, May 24)(via Lindgren @ Volokh).
Defensive medicine debate
A doctor writes on the Kevin MD blog: “[M]eaningful control of the cost of medicine will have to go hand in hand with tort reform.” Read the comments, also.
Kentucky fen-phen judge bought silence of plaintiff objector
Judge Joseph Bamberger rubber-stamped a Kentucky fen-phen settlement agreement where plaintiffs’ attorneys cheated class members out of tens of millions of dollars. In the process, his former law partner was paid millions by the settlement, which he used to buy a Florida house with Bamberger, and Bamberger himself received a $5000/month sinecure. At trial of the three lead attorneys yesterday, jurors were shown a videotape where one of the plaintiffs questioned the judge on how low her settlement was and the validity of her release; the videotape shows Bamberger browbeating the plaintiff, but then awarding her an additional $100,000 and a $1200/month life annuity on the condition that she cease talking about the settlement and her objections to it. (Jim Hannah, “Judge dressed down victim”, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 24) (h/t R.U.). For some reason yet undisclosed by prosecutors, Bamberger is on the witness stand rather than in the dock with Gallion, Mills, and Cunningham.
Grand Theft Auto: Class Action Settlement – $26,505 for the unrepresented class, $1 million fee request
We now know how many people signed up for the Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas class action settlement out of the millions of members in the purported class.
Tier 1 (up to $35.00) (no exchange required): 416
Tier 2 (up to $17.50) (exchange required): 22
Tier 3 ($10.00) (exchange required): 131
Tier 4 ($5.00) (no exchange required): 2,050
Disc Exchange w/o cash: 57
2676 total claimants, receiving a total cash value of at most $26,505, though likely even less than that, given that the plaintiffs’ attorneys record no actual cash distribution.
The seven “representative” class members are asking for approval to receive another $24,500, or nearly half of the total cash recovery.
Of course, as we’ve discussed, none of these people had a legitimate cause of action or suffered any legally cognizable injury. But how much are the plaintiffs’ attorneys (from thirteen different offices of twelve different law firms!) asking for for this travesty of a lawsuit and settlement–one that was entirely redundant of the taxpayer-funded investigation conducted by the Los Angeles district attorney? They claim their time devoted to the litigation was worth $1,317,433, but are “generously” claiming a 28% discount for a total fees-and-costs request of $1 million.
Recognizing that this 3774% contingent fee looks fishy to the least scrutinizing of judges applying Rule 23 review, the plaintiffs have sought to inflate the appearance of accomplishment through a $870,000 cy pres award to the National PTA and ESRB. (As I’ve discussed, cy pres awards that do not directly benefit class members should not be used to justify fee awards.) They also inflate the award by claiming that the costs of notice, administration and disk replacement should be attributed to the size of the accomplished result, thus puffing matters up to over $2 million, consisting nearly entirely of empty calories for the plaintiffs they purport to be representing.
Alas, I was the only class member to docket a formal objection to this rip-off. (While it was my idea to object, I can take no credit for the objection brief, which was written by my attorney, Larry Schonbrun.) On Thursday, the plaintiffs’ attorneys filed a brief defending the settlement, with many cites to Overlawyered as ad hominem attacks on the objection. The court’s hearing is June 25.
Shugar Law Offices want your business
Via R.L., the Shugar Law Offices’ web ad for traffic law clients features a blonde wearing a police cap and a too-small halter top. Maybe she’s one of the associates. Related: Corri Fetman, who posed for her law firm’s tasteless billboard in a low-cut bra.
Alex Beam on Eskimo global-warming suit
Don’t expect the much-hyped Kivalina suit to bring down Big Energy, the columnist says, but it might just keep the lawyers at Hagens Berman in BMWs:
The Inupiat Eskimos are perfect, jury-worthy plaintiffs. They have occupied their tiny barrier reef, just a few feet above sea level, “since time immemorial,” according to the lawsuit. They are poor. They live in harmony with nature, according to the documentary. (Pay no attention to those all-terrain vehicles zipping around town, and the kid flashing the gang sign.) …
Some judges may be liberal, but they’re not idiots. They know that utilities sold electricity to Americans because their customers wanted to jack up the AC. In fact, there isn’t a utility in America that hasn’t spent the past 20 years begging its customers to use less oil and gas. There is an inconvenient truth if I ever saw one.
Not to be missed (“Eskimos, whales, and luaus…Oh my!”, Boston Globe, May 24).
Red light cameras, cont’d
Turns out their economic appeal for municipalities isn’t so closely related to whether drivers are plowing through cross traffic against the stop light: “In Los Angeles, officials estimate that 80% of red light camera tickets go not to those running through intersections but to drivers making rolling right turns”. (L.A. Times via Bainbridge and Drum).