Quote Originally Posted by Y33TREKker View Post
How is it paranoia if what you've just said verifies that what was being promoted in the early 90's as "necessary tort reform" is in need of reform ?

Plenty of people may still be making nice sums, but you're not including the people who have been prevented from receiving legitimate sums or receiving reasonable due course in the meantime.
Liberal paranoia. As in attributing every problem in the world to something Bush, Cheney, Rove, Big Oil, Multi-National corporations, etc. have done. If you want to say that companies are lobbying politicians in general to crush the little guy, I would say that is more likely. But if you're trying to attribute negative (from the little guy's perspective) policy change to one party I think it demonstrates a partisan paranoia.

IMHO the problem is that tort law, class action suits, etc. are used to accomplish what the criminal code was unable to do, i.e. punish the corporation for repeated abuse rather than simply award the actual $$$ required to make the plaintiff "whole." The reason the courts awarded the McDonald's lady so much money was directly because of the company's clearly demonstrated apathy for the situation - they wanted to send a message to McDonald's to change its ways. The problem is that removing limits on damages and due course encourages lawyers (if not victims) to sue too often and for too much, increasing (in the medical arena) malpractice insurance rates which therefore increase premiums, co-pays, etc. In the McDonald's example I would think a better practice would be to make them reimburse the plaintiff for her real (not pain & suffering) costs and then sick the DoJ on them for willful negligence.