Originally Posted by
shanbaum
No, just against any corporation that acts in a way so as to cause harm. Do you really want our society to work in the way you appear to propose - where people who are harmed by either the negligence or outright malice of businesses simply bear the burden of the injuries that result from those actions?
I'm sure you would not support the European alternative, where bureaucrats prescribe detailed rules for most of what businesses do. In fact, the U.S. tort system is the perfect companion for your cherised laisser faire system of commerce - businesses get to do what they want, right up to (indeed, beyond) the point at which others get hurt and complain in the form of lawsuits.
Are there abuses? Of course - just as there are abuses of free speech, which serve as the measure of our freedom to speak; the marginal actions are the price we pay for a free legal "market". The abuses aren't the cases you usually hear about, by the way - a case in which someone wins what appears to be a disproportionate award is by definition not frivolous. The truly frivolous ones never go anywhere, but they're completely uninteresting, and politically useless.
What your Congress is actually doing - and doing with unbounded enthusiasm - is constraining the ability of individuals to seek legal redress against the wealthy (and therefore powerful) individuals and corporations who simply don't want to be sued (and who, incidentally, paid for their election). I have no doubt that there are people of average means who, despite the fact that the changes that are being made in our legal landscape work to their disadvantage, have been convinced by the right wing's propaganda that the lawyers - not the actual injuries - are "the problem". To you, I say, "Good Luck!" You'll need it, if you ever suffer any harm caused by a corporation, or a pharmaceutical company, or an oil company, or any of the other powerful interests that conspired to bring us this absurd government. Those kinds of interests will no longer be held responsible for having caused your injuries. You're going to be on your own, and that's exactly what they want. Not because they're evil, but because they just don't want to pay.
And when you're bankrupted from paying for your injuries - oh, wait, you can't exactly be bankrupted anymore, because that's really no longer an option. Now, you will pay, and pay, and pay. Citigroup thanks you.
So, good luck. And if you're luck fails, well, there's always the thousand points of light...
And by the way, Pete, the American Heart Association is a thoroughly noble organization.
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