Well, I guess it was inevitable, much as I've ranted about incompetent and narcissistic politicians in these pages, that I would get around to ranting about where the vast majority of them sprung from, namely , the once honorable law profession (RIP).Let's face it folks, the days of the honorable, honest lawyer on the order of a Perry Mason have, sadly long passed. In it's place, is a world where the NORM is for a lawyer to be ruthless, not in the pursuit of truth and justice, but in the pursuit of profit and notoriety for themselves, and to hell with the consequences. Organizations like the ACLU are just one symptom of this greater dilemma, with their objective, NOT to uphold the constitutional rights of law abiding citizens, BUT RATHER to come to the aid of every criminal organiztion, purveyor of depravity, indecency and just plain outright stupidity (folks like NAMBLA, The KKK etc) while making a decent buck off of it. In fact, it becomes more and more obvious that the ACLU is NOT a champion of our civil liberties, but rather a grave threat to them, but that's another rant unto itself for another time.
And although in the end, it appears to have been a cynical, calculated bit of political rhetoric that the first Bush administration had ZERO intention of doing anything with, the fact that VP at the time Dan Quayle stopped just short of calling for lawyers to be tarred feathered or even hanged couldn't be ignored, at least he and Bush were aware of a steadily growing public outrage at the abuses, greed, arrogance and ever growing stupidity of the law profession in the US. A 1992 vintage Harvard Crimson article/opinion piece mentions this, written by a then law student who was calling for people to be more reasonable in their judgement of the profession, fair enough I guess.
Where does my anger and outrage at lawyers get directed the most? For me, it's mainly these shyster ambulance chasing vultures and criminal-coddling defense lawyers I feel the most venom and disdain for, in addition to word-twisting law-bending nimrods like the ACLU who ALWAYS take the side of depraved kooks and other miscreants.
The examples are countless of a legal profession horribly out of control. In one sense, it's a barometer of where we are as a society, in that we've pretty much thrown the concept of taking PERSONAL responsibility for our actions and choices completely out the window. Why admit we were wrong or did something inexcusably stupid, when for a fee, we can get a lawyer and collect BIG $$$$$$!? The infamous McDonalds Coffee lawsuit being one example, or, get this, a woman sued the Norfolk & Southern RR after she was nicked by a passing train (she was actually trespassing on RR property keep in mind), and get this, her grounds for the suit were that the railroad didn't notify people that trains travel on tracks!!!!?????? Hello lady, you must be a kindergarten dropout to NOT know that trains travel on tracks! And who could forget a rather infamous case in the 1980's in CA where a burgular while attempting to break in through the roof of a school, fell through a skylight. The dumbass then sued the L.A. School District for his injuries, and WON!!! Here is a Time Magazine article that mentions this among other legal stupidties, in addition to a pretty in-depth assessment of the sorry state we're in because of the rampant greed of trial lawyers and people who file frivolous lawsuits.
This blog page has some pretty biting commentary and some pretty right-on notions about tort reform that I found very enjoyable to read.On this website is just a small collection of some of the STUPIDEST, most idiotic, moronic and pointless lawsuits ever perpetrated. Very amusing and sad
Sad to note, there actually are people out there who can make a living being a Professional Victim. I mean, all you have to do is find a good slick ambulance chasing lawyer, get a few people ticked off at you, provoke them in some way or fake a fall or inflict some injury on yourself, and VOILA, instant BIG payoff!Well, this Owl opines, FWIW that we need to CRACK DOWN on these greedy lawyers AND the people who file idiotic, frivolous and ruinous lawsuits.
1) We need to set definite legal standards to establish what constitutes a frivolous lawsuit. Someone who files a lawsuit for circumstances under which the plaintiff was comitting a crime to begin with should be IMMEDIATELY jailed for attempted fraud and extortion, in addition to the initial crime itself.2) We need to make it A SERIOUS FELONY to file a frivolous lawsuit with HARSH criminal penalties (how about 10 years in jail to start), and better yet, strip the lawyer of their law license(s) FOREVER and send them up the river for 10 years too. Frivolous lawsuits should fall under the same umbrella as laws regarding extortion, fraud and blackmail. I for one would LOVE to see some of these shysters wearing orange prison overalls being forced to press license plates or break up rocks.
3) The plaintiff who filed the frivolous/unlawful suit should be forced to make restitution to the parties they bought the suit against (legal costs namely).
4) In our law schools, there needs to be some SERIOUS re-teaching of what being an attorney is all about. Far too many schools teach upcoming lawyers to be ruthless, arrogant, greedy scofflaws and to adopt a win-at-any-cost mindset. If one should pursue a career as a lawyer, it should be made clear from the outset that being one is about seeking and uncovering the truth of any situation and defending the rights of a citizen and upholding the rule of law, NOT lying, manipulating or obfuscating the truth so that somebody can literally get away with murder or extort money from others that they have no right to collect. The consequences of unethifcal behavior by lawyers in my opinion are FAR too lenient! We need to SEVERELY punish these greedy shysters who pervert justice, cause financial and personal ruin and suck untold billions out of our economy and your pockets. As far as I'm concerned, these ambulance-chasers are just as much criminals as thugs, rapists, murderers and the like!
This rant covers just the ambulance-chasers, a future one (not far off) will cover the criminal-coddlers.http://famguardian.org/Subjects/LawAndGovt/LegalEthics/42ReasonsHateLawyers.htm
And finally, a snippet of a famous Tom Paxton song "One Million Lawyers", listen HERE
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