I am ambivalent about Congressional intervention.

But I am as confused as you are about why this commercial is supposed to generate sympathy and therefore support for its proposition.

Way back in the dark ages, monetary compensation was 1) loss of earning potential, i.e. real damages, and 2) compensation for pain and suffering. 2 rarely outweighed 1.

Now it seems that pain and suffering is off the charts, and loss of earning potential seems trivial.

I don't know. The doctors and nurses that treated my mother 2 years ago screwed up, and we could have sued them successfully (opinion of two lawyer friends). They made a mistake, they knew it was a mistake.

But I don't want any money from them. I just want my mom back, and I can't have that.

I can - based on the quote at the beginning of your post - see the logic of the Congressional Special Fund. Especially the part about ending the waves of lawsuits.

But yeah... sheesh, people, can't you find anyone more sympathetic to use as your poster child?

D'you really think she's that old, Rosemary? She looks to me to be in her 50s.

But anyway, that doesn't really make any difference in regards to your basic point. I'd only add that she looks to me like she has a perpetual scowl on her face. She leaves me with the impression that I wouldn't want to even meet her, much less spend any time around her. Which translates into an unlikeable person, which translates into not supporting what she's advocating.

Kinda makes you wonder how they pinpointed the cause of his cancer to asbestos he may have encountered 50+ years earlier. Wow. Doctors are good nowadays.

As I'm sure y'all know asbestos was used as a fire retardant. No one knew it caused cancer. I remember we had to close the "Asbestos Curtain" in my Junior High School auditorium, when we used power tools or painted, to control the spread of fire. Ceiling tiles contained it for the same reason. I'm sure there are more than a few stories about those curtains keeping a fire from spreading, saving lives and property in the process. When my school had a fire in one of the classrooms, the fire didn't spread any further than the one room—the fire couldn't get past the tiles.

We find out years later that it causes cancer.

Life is full of risks.

I do not understand what his WWII service has to do with anything. He'd have died whether he was exposed to asbestos or not. For all we know he could have died in a horrible fire, prevented by asbestos.

Blood sucking leeches.

Hi, the Blood Sucking Leach is here to chime in. :-)
I get the weird feeling that if we met in person, Mrs. du Toit and I would hit it of famously. As it is here in the Blogoshere, she hates the fact that I breath air better reserved for more deserving primates than my ilk.

OK, I don't do products liability cases, nor have I seen the commercial, but the sentiment is there for some narrow tort reform on this one issue to stop the maddness. You guys gotta love that.

Maybe (having only your descriptions to go by) her story and your reaction to it makes the very point that the ad is trying to impart. Her damages should naturally be limited because the projected life-span of the plaintiff is always used in the calculation of damages.

What's new is not the idea of proper compensation for pain & suffering which had been a common law tradition long before there was a USA, and was codified by Justinian over a millenia ago, but now, in a post-industrialist, modern society, one small group like asbsetos manufacturers could cause such wide-spread injury.

Once an industry is subject to stricter liability than mere negligence, the consequence is that there will always be the potential for the list of comensatable plaintiffs to overwhelm the available funds to make them whole, which is the essence of basic tort law.

My reaction was actually just like the Mrs., I immediately thought blood sucker.

A guy that lived to around 80, is going to die of something. I mean he is OLD, right? Now, this granny wants cash because her daddy had Cancer.

I'll bet you, that if asbestos hadn't been to blame, they would have managed to blame cigarettes. Cha-ching.

My sentiments exactly, and ditto for birth defects, car accidents and so on. I am so tired of compensation lawyers advertising. Any kind of misfortune is liable to be turned into a lottery jackpot, it is disgusting.
I'm not sure about the legislation either. The simplest thing to eliminate the bloodsucking ads is to go back to the days when lawyers were not allowed to advertise. If you needed a good one word of mouth would do it.

There is a never ending stream of lawyer ads here in Dallas for this asswipe who says "I'll fight for you." He shows perfectly agile and healthy people in the ad, each holding up a sign showing how much they got in their car accident settlement awards.

If I ever see any of these people on the street, I will slap them silly. Here's a clue for these dickheads: Driving or riding in a car is not 100% safe. If you want to be 100% safe, stay home.

Here's the tort reform I want: Unless you can prove beyond a SHADOW of a doubt (not just a "reasonable" doubt) that you were harmed by the malicious and intentional actions (not accidental and not bad luck and CERTAINLY NOT a later discovery of harm, that was not known at the time) of someone else, you get SQUAT. AND you have to pay the attorney fees of the other side if you lose.

These lawsuits cost all of us money. We pay for those asswipes awards in every rate increase. And then they have the NERVE to parade the awards in front of me??

You touched a nerve, Rosemary. Makes me crazy!

And, Mark, not all lawyers are bad. Just most of 'em. ;)

don't....start.....lawyer....jokes......ahhhhhhh

Why is it they bury lawyers 10 feet deep but everybody else only 6 feet deep?

Cause deep down lawyers are really good.

Glad I'm not the only one. Every single time I see those commercials -- I get pissed off.

I had some complications after my last surgery. They screwed me up. It was major abdominal surgery. I was on morphine and dilaudid[sp] and high doses of iron (anemia). Nobody thought to give me a stool softner or something. Four days later I was released -- with an intestinal blockage. That almost killed me and I'm not over reacting. I literally almost died.

Anyway, they fixed it. I didn't die and luckily I have no permanent damage. Everyone thought I should sue, except me. It was a mistake and everything turned out fine. I'm not about to destroy a man's career over an accident that wasn't entirely his fault.

Rose, see the way it works is that even if you did sue, you probably would not get anything, or very little. Malpractice is expecially unique in the burden of proof, a great deal different than ordinary negligence, and a far cry from the strict liability of products liability. I understand Mrs. du Toit's visceral gut reaction, she's a reactionary, that's how she deals with everything. It's terribly overbroad and unenlightened, but that's her style and she likes coming off like a crackpot.

I also find the advertising that I see slipping over the boarder from Detroit TV to Toledo in bad tatste. I like the standards here in Ohio. We can advertise but must follow very strong guidlines. Absolutely NO testimonials like you guys see, no bragging about past awards won, no fluffing about rates. I can list my affiliations and my areas of practice and years of experience, and that's about it.

The TV ads we do have here simply say If this is your legal problem, maybe I can help. The biggest step we have taken is to allow direct mailing about 14 years ago, and even then we have to use the exact pre-approved language the Ohio Supreme Court designates. If you think about it, a listing in the Yellow Pages and just handing out a business card is advertising.

The vast majority of lawyers (at least here) do that and get on referral lists from the bar associations and that's all. I am one of the few who do direct mail ads, but only to people who are suddenly in need of my peculiar services (settle down) and have little time to get one. They know the cost before I even meet them and enough about me to decide if they should even bother calling me to make an appointment. I don't have to waste a lot of time and they find someone who can do exactly what they need.

I know from what I have seen that many of the injury firms in Michigan are over the top, Florida too, but certainly these guys are only doing what their Top Courts allow. Sounds like Texas is out of control, but consider the source :-) Remember, unlike in the federal system, the folks who regulate the lawyers, your Supreme Court Justices (or their equivalent) are Elected. let them know that what you see disgusts you. Force it to be a campaign issue. That is something they can actually DO with widely seen results. Better than the same old tough on crime memes when they are faced with madatory sentencing guidlenes.

We lawyers have far fewer first amendment rights than any other profession when it comes to advertising because we are sworn to uphold the integrity of the bar. So if the intellectuals who wear those black robes say we have to rub blue die on our heads or we can't advertise, you will suddenly see a lot of strange looking lawyers on TV.

is this thing on?

What's black and brown and looks good on a lawyer?

a doberman.

(just in good fun Counselor.)

heard 'em all, you got a good new one, and I promise to steal it. ;-)

Dying to chime in on this subject but I work in the asbestos/tobacco litigation dept at a large firm that represents corporations in their defense and I'm afraid I might breach confidentiality if I tell you what I think about the tactics some of our corporate clients utilize to avoid having to pay a penny to a single plaintiff in one of these suits.

As for lawyers advertising, I believe there are classy ways to go about it, and television commercials and ads on bus stops and subways can be a turnoff, but this is their industry and they want to advertise like everyone else! Why is it more of a bloodsucking tactic than what any company does to sell you a product? Attorneys sell their services. Why shouldn't they be able to advertise the services that they offer without being scoffed and sneared at? Everyone else is allowed to advertise!

Good question. I guess that depends on how they do it. There are a lot of ads that annoy me. I'm sick and tired of hearing about that one chick's vagina. First, it's not so fresh (FDS), then it's itchy (Vagisil), then it's yeasty (Monostat), then the chick has bad periods -- bad enough that her tampon can stop a boat from sinking...

Maybe it's how some of them do it. They (lawyers) always look sleazy on T.V..

ok, Mark, here's my best 'you haven't heard it' lawyer joke shot.

Why do lawyers wear neckties?

To keep the foreskin from rolling over their faces.

I understand Mrs. du Toit's visceral gut reaction, she's a reactionary, that's how she deals with everything. It's terribly overbroad and unenlightened, but that's her style and she likes coming off like a crackpot.

I understand Mark Adam's reaction to my comment. He's a lawyer. He discounts honest, open dialogue, supported by facts and evidence he cannot dispute, so he attacks the messenger instead--classic ad hominem attack. He's terribly rude and full of himself, but that's his style. He likes coming off like an arrogant prick.

Mark Adams:

The singular of "millennia" is "millenium", and it's "border" not "boarder", if we're going to split hairs and argue the fine points.

Sorry, Rosemary, but this twerp is the kind who gives all lawyers a bad name.

I just love to feel the hate from you two. Truce? I'll lay off if you do.

Admitted bad speller, always was. Rented fingers. Originally typed "couple of millennia" checked my dates on the Corpus Iurus Civilis issued by Emporer Justinian (interesting reading BTW) and deleted the "couple of" but forgot to change the "ia" to "um." My bad. Been screwing that "boarder" thing up since high school. Read carefully, I got a million of them.

Speaking of which, sorry Dave, heard that one too.

Actually my problem with what I consider the du Toits' often narrow-minded absolutist rhetoric is my problem, not yours. I'll keep my opinions to myself about how I feel about how you say things. Or try to. It usually is style over substance that I react to with you. I'll get over it. I'm sorry and I'll do my best in the future.

Which is all I can do with the profession as a whole. Do my job well and go after the bad ones. I've brought a few of my less conscientious collegues down for malpractice and won't hesitate to do it again.

Few people, even few lawyers, see how we actually police ourselves. All things considered, we do a remarkable job.

I'll leave you with the absolute best commercial I ever saw for an attorney, played to an ethics seminar on attorney advertising I took. A couple is getting a divorce, snarling at each other. The narrator says something to the effect of: "Divorce? Simple. You take yours, I'll take mine, split the rest in half."
The couple smiles, puts on safety glasses, grabs chain saws and starts chopping all the furniture in half. The whole house gets trashed to the sound of the saws and crashing pianos and beds. They finish, satified but tired.
Narrator: "See, nothing to it." They smile, then their very confused and somwhat nervous Jack Russell Terrier looks in the room to see what the heck is going on. The couple exchange worried glances with each other and the dog.
Narrator: "Not everything is cut and dried. If you need a divorce lawyer call......."

Maybe you had to see it, but I laughed my butt off.

what I consider the du Toits' often narrow-minded absolutist rhetoric is my problem, not yours.

Good job, Mark.

Now, I don't have slam you. :-)

You know what I love about the duToits? Consistency. You may call it narrow minded and absolutist, I call it consistent.

Unlike many, the du Toits don't change their opinion based on who is in office.

Most left-wingers will slam a president solely because he's a Republican. Even, if he did the same stuff a Democrat would have done. Same with right-wingers.

The du Toits don't. If they think X is wrong today, it will still be wrong next year. Political affilliation be damned.