From a report on an Apr. 5 Phoenix symposium on health care sponsored by Arizona State University: “[Former Sen. and vice presidential candidate John] Edwards, once a highly successful plaintiff’s personal-injury lawyer, also pointed to lawyers as a problem. They need to be held accountable for frivolous lawsuits that help drive up the cost of malpractice insurance.” (Jodie Snyder, “Ex-senator urging changes in U.S. health care system”, Arizona Republic, Apr. 6).
Posts Tagged ‘politics’
James Guckert threatens suit
Media Matters may have to rethink its apparent bias against litigation reform. They’ll have to spend some unnecessary money on lawyers if Jeff Gannon/James Guckert follows up on his claim that he’ll be suing the group (along with liberal bloggers) for the non-existent cause of action of “political assassination” for revealing his strange double-life. (Newsweek, Feb. 28).
Specter’s pick
The American Spectator’s unsigned “Prowler” slams Sen. Arlen Specter for selecting as general counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee Carolyn Short Torsella, whom it describes without more as a “trial lawyer” and implies might prove unacceptably liberal to the GOP majority. (“Specter?s Trial Lawyer Appointee”, Jan. 26). It does not add — but probably should have — that Ms. Short’s renown with the firm of Reed Smith is on the defense side, where she has helped employers fight off discrimination suits. A profile of Ms. Short in Forbes three years ago (Joanne Gordon, “Get Shorty”, Dec. 24, 2001; same article reprinted at Reed Smith site) provides zero support for the depiction of Ms. Short as wild-eyed liberal: “The vast majority of discrimination cases are hogwash,” is the first thing it quotes her as saying.
Judicial selection discussion
Is justice better served if state court judges are selected by appointment, as opposed to popular election? Does it make a difference in “runaway verdict” cases? What about the propriety of judges’ raising campaign warchests from lawyers and interest groups with cases before their courts? An excellent discussion of this issue has been in progress at Point of Law between Alex Tabarrok, George Mason University economist and blogger at Marginal Revolution, and David Rottman of the National Center for State Courts. The discussion has now wrapped up and can be read in its entirety at this permalink.
At times they even talk alike
New York’s Eliot Spitzer and Connecticut’s Richard Blumenthal, both subjects of longstanding coverage in this space, go back quite a way together and share a similar approach toward the duties of the state attorney general. A new story from AP’s Hartford bureau is kind enough to quote me saying some not-very-acerbic things about them. (Jan. 23: Stephen Singer, “Friendship another tie between two like-minded attorneys general”, Newsday, and Stamford Advocate).
Finally appreciating Eliot Spitzer
It seems wayward scion Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. wants to be Spitzer’s replacement (Jonathan P. Hicks, “Only in New York: Kennedys, Cuomos and Voters, Oh, My”, New York Times, Jan. 18). Well, this should be entertaining, at least.
Discussion of judicial selection
Over at Point of Law, a new featured discussion has begun on the problem of state judicial selection, and what if anything to do about the problem of judicial campaigns funded (often very richly) by lawyers and litigants with interests before the courts in question. Discussing the topic are Alex Tabarrok of George Mason University, whose work (PDF, with Eric Helland) on the relation between judicial selection and tort awards has been widely talked about (he’s also a founder and principal of the excellent blog Marginal Revolution), and David Rottman, Principal Court Research Consultant the National Center for State Courts (more on panelists). It promises to be a highly illuminating week.
Finding an OB in Illinois
Dr. Benjamin Brewer, who writes the Wall Street Journal’s “The Doctor’s Office” column, discusses the OB shortage caused in Illinois by the medical malpractice problem. Trial lawyers like to blame the insurance industry’s investments and “business practices,” but the leading insurer in Illinois, ISMIE, has only 3% of its funds in the stock market. (Moreover, ISMIE is a mutual insurer–profits go back to its member doctors. The doctors aren’t conspiring to charge themselves too much; ISMIE’s rates reflect the payouts it makes in malpractice cases.) Large swaths of southern Illinois and nearly half the counties in the state have no obstetrical hospital services at all. Brewer concludes “it may take a federal law to stimulate the reform process in Illinois, where entrenched proponents of our broken system hold political and judicial sway.” (“When a Pregnant Patient Struggles to Find Care”, Jan. 4). Our sister site, Point of Law, comments on tomorrow’s Presidential visit to Madison County, where Bush will discuss his litigation reform agenda for the upcoming Congress. (Krysten Crawford, “Bush heads to ‘Judicial Hellhole'”, CNN/Money, Jan. 4; Ryan Keith, “Bush to Highlight Tort Reform in Ill.”, AP/Newsday, Jan. 4; Caleb Hale, “Doctors Are Eager To Hear What Bush Will Say About Crisis”, The Southern, Jan. 4; Mark Silva, “Bush’s tort reform efforts to start at ‘judicial hellhole'”, Chicago Tribune, Jan. 3).
Watch what you say about lawyers, cont’d
Madison County: Gordon Maag, the trial-lawyer-backed candidate who last month was defeated in a race for the Illinois Supreme Court in what is said to have been the most expensive judicial race in American history, has filed a $100 million defamation suit against an arm of the Illinois Chamber of Commerce for saying bad things about him during the recent campaign. (St. Louis Post-Dispatch/Edwardsville Intelligencer/Southern Illinoisan/Illinois Leader). Jim Copland comments at Point Of Law. For two other widely noted efforts by Madison County lawyers to silence or intimidate their critics, see Nov. 4 and Nov. 30, 1999 and Feb. 29, 2000 (class action lawyers sue Post-Dispatch columnist Bill McClellan for making fun of them) and Jun. 9, Jul. 12, Jul. 26, 2003 (dragging national tort reform groups to court). For efforts to suppress the airing of ads affecting the Maag-Karmeier race, see Oct. 27. For other watch-what-you-say-about-lawyers cases, see Mar. 16 and Nov. 15, 2004, Nov. 30, 2003, and earlier posts; and Point of Law, Oct. 25 and Dec. 22, 2004.
Real vote fraud
I wrote about the frivolous legal challenge to the Ohio presidential vote earlier today. But real vote fraud and voting shenanigans seem to be taking place in Washington state.
John Fund writes about a real threat to voting rights in Washington state — efforts to “find” votes for the gubernatorial candidates in what had been a close election, which became closer every time King County looked at its in-box.
UPDATE: And for more fun with voter intent and attempts to obtain executive office through fraud, check out the coverage of San Diego’s controversial mayoral election here.