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Trial lawyers oppose special med-mal courts
Legal News ^ | 9-11-09 | C.Rizo

Posted on 09/11/2009 11:00:52 AM PDT by Ja7430

WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline)- A U.S. Senate panel is considering proposals aimed at decreasing the number of medical malpractice lawsuits filed in already bogged down courts.

(Excerpt) Read more at legalnewsline.com ...


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KEYWORDS: obama; triallawyers
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1 posted on 09/11/2009 11:00:52 AM PDT by Ja7430
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To: Ja7430
"Trial lawyers oppose special med-mal courts"

It looks like Capt. Obvious has found gainful employment as the editor of LegalNewsLine.com. Good for him.

Why would the trial lawyers cook their golden goose (or geese)?

2 posted on 09/11/2009 11:14:05 AM PDT by OldDeckHand (No Socialized Medicine, No Way, No How, No Time)
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To: Ja7430

I can already hear the wailing of personal injury lawyers wafting across foggy bottom.


3 posted on 09/11/2009 11:16:02 AM PDT by Liberty Valance (Keep a simple manner for a happy life :o)
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To: Ja7430

Could you please call them plaintiff tort lawyers and not trial lawyers? Not all trial lawyers are tort plaintiff attorneys. Some actually support the defense.


4 posted on 09/11/2009 11:16:54 AM PDT by Darren McCarty (We do what we have to do.)
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To: Ja7430

Med mal is 99% a STATE issue, not federal.

I am no fan of trial shysters, but Obama has no say in state matters.


5 posted on 09/11/2009 11:18:16 AM PDT by FormerACLUmember (When the past no longer illuminates the future, the spirit walks in darkness.)
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To: FormerACLUmember

“Med mal is 99% a STATE issue, not federal.”

Damn you and your facts! ;)

The insurance company agitprop has the sheeple running about over lawyers for years, a very convenient distraction.


6 posted on 09/11/2009 11:32:25 AM PDT by Shermy (Space For Rent)
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To: Ja7430

Last Friday I totaled out my Suburban in a head on crash with an elderly man who was “confused” and made a left hand turn directly into me.

I now have a stack, and I mean a STACK of mailings from local lawyers advertising their prowess of milking insurance companies, many of them are about 20 pages thick.

Both vehicles destroyed but neither one of us was hurt, yet they send this crap to me anyway. One even mentioned that I was not found to be in any fault so they do read the police reports before they mail them.

Makes me sick.


7 posted on 09/11/2009 11:41:59 AM PDT by Abathar (Proudly posting without reading the article carefully since 2004)
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To: Ja7430

Believe me - Obama supports WHATEVER the Trial Lawyers want.

WHATEVER THEY WANT - including NOT addressing Tort Reform in ObamaCare.


8 posted on 09/11/2009 11:45:27 AM PDT by BP2 (I think, therefore I'm a conservative)
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To: BP2

Our economic problems are structural and will not be repaired until the parasitic take of total production by the legal / regulatory and financial services scams are sharply reduced. Not only do they take from production but they inhibit production.


9 posted on 09/11/2009 12:05:10 PM PDT by AndyJackson
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To: OldDeckHand

How many med mal cases are filed in federal court?
How many in state court?

What is this going to accomplish then?


10 posted on 09/11/2009 12:12:32 PM PDT by steviep96
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To: steviep96
"What is this going to accomplish then?"

Well, it's not my area of practice, at all. But, I'll give it a shot.

Trial lawyers are vehemently against better medically trained (perhaps familiar is a better word) jurist because the less scientifically competent or proficient the judge is, the easier it is for plaintiff's attorneys to work their voodoo in court. If the judge was more knowledgeable and better versed in all things medical, especially with respect to legal culpability, then that would favor the defense, relative to where they are today, IMHO.

If more frivolous lawsuits have a reduced chance of succeeding, or better trained jurist will reach more medically sound decisions, then that's the benefit - at least to the people who are looking at reducing tort claims, payouts and the defensive medicine that results from such folly. As for the number of medical malpractice lawsuits filed in federal district court, or some of these medmal courts that the states have setup, I have no earthly idea.

11 posted on 09/11/2009 12:21:19 PM PDT by OldDeckHand (No Socialized Medicine, No Way, No How, No Time)
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To: Darren McCarty
Could you please call them plaintiff tort lawyers and not trial lawyers? Not all trial lawyers are tort plaintiff attorneys. Some actually support the defense.

Hear hear! I'm sick of them smearing all litigators by appropriating that term. Besides, they've soiled the name "trial lawyer" so badly that even they don't use it any more. Notice how all the national and state "Associations/Academies of Trial Lawyers" have changed their names in the last couple years to "Associations/Advocates for Justice"?
12 posted on 09/11/2009 12:36:26 PM PDT by The Pack Knight (Duty, Honor, Country)
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To: Shermy
The insurance company agitprop has the sheeple running about over lawyers for years, a very convenient distraction.

John Edwards.

The following people are also law school graduates:
Barack Obama
Michelle Obama
Bill Clinton
Hillary Clinton
Van Jones
Cass Sunstein
Harold Koh
Deval Patrick
Eliot Spitzer
Janet Napolitano
Valerie Jarrett
Richard Danzig, "advisor" to Obama on military issues.
All the Brzezinskis -- Zbigniew, Mark and Mika
Ron Kirk, US trade representative
Paul Monteiro, religious liaison in its Office of Public Liaison
George H. Cohen, Director of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS)

In fact, no matter what job there is in the Obama administration, it seems that 3 years of law school is necessary and sufficient training to do that job. By no means to I have a comprehensive list and I left out those who have actual lawyer jobs.

These people have never worked an honest job and, of course, rule from their law connections even though most of them chose law almost exclusively because they are too stupid to do mathematics. (The smartest woman in the world -- Hillary Clinton -- admitted that math is too hard for her. There ain't no mathematicians who cower in fear at the complicated concepts in Constitutional law.) That is why they major in political science or one of the other wussmanities. That is why they go to law school. Math is too hard for them. This is why I call it the lawligarchy. It is rule by a few and not by the best and brightest. Opportunities for lawyers are far too lucrative and actual bright people are choosing the law because productive fields such as science and engineering are not as profitable.

Lawyering produces nothing. It is nothing but friction to the motion of the economy.

If tort lawsuits are so great and help the consumer so much, how come lawyers don't get sued more often?

It's a protection racket and it has to stop. If the American law-ocracy won't go with the rest of civilization and adopt loser pays, then something has to be done.

There is nothing bad that can happen to the legal-government industrial complex that is not good for America.

13 posted on 09/11/2009 12:38:55 PM PDT by AmishDude
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To: OldDeckHand

I know what these courts stand to accomplish in theory.

Practically, if the states don’t follow the federal lead here, it won’t matter.


14 posted on 09/11/2009 12:45:21 PM PDT by steviep96
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To: steviep96
"Practically, if the states don’t follow the federal lead here, it won’t matter."

Again, not my area of practice, but aren't there several states that have already taken this path? And, isn't the federal disposition of these medmal courts especially germane with respect to these massive class-action suits.

Sure, individual doctor and hospital actions are a great impetus for defensive medicine, but these enormous class-action awards have got to be increase the development costs of our next generation medicines and medical equipment - raising the total cost of health care for everyone. Or, am I all wet?

15 posted on 09/11/2009 12:53:43 PM PDT by OldDeckHand (No Socialized Medicine, No Way, No How, No Time)
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To: OldDeckHand

I don’t know if any states have taken this specific approach. Several states, including Texas, have capped med mal awards - and there has been no noticeable change in healthcare costs.


16 posted on 09/11/2009 12:58:49 PM PDT by steviep96
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To: OldDeckHand
The main thing I'd say is that med mal is pretty purely a creature of state tort law, so the only way a federal court currently has jurisdiction is through diversity. As to class-actions, I think it would almost be impossible to get complete diversity in a med mal suit, as it's hard to fathom all of a doctor or hospital's harmed patients coming from a different state.

In setting up a special court, they could give it jurisdiction even in cases of minimum diversity. I'm not sure what percentage of med mal cases even meet that, though.

Congress could also try and formulate a federal body of medical tort law under the Commerce Clause to get these cases in under federal question jurisdiction, but I don't see how even a patient crossing state lines for treatment constitutes interstate commerce. Of course, that hasn't stopped Congress in the past.

In short, I don't see how the majority of med mal cases even fall under the constitutional judicial power of the United States.
17 posted on 09/11/2009 1:08:20 PM PDT by The Pack Knight (Duty, Honor, Country)
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To: steviep96

Some states, like North Carolina, have capped punitive damages only to see juries compensate with excessive general compensatory damages. I’m not sure if that’s the case in Texas, though.


18 posted on 09/11/2009 1:09:57 PM PDT by The Pack Knight (Duty, Honor, Country)
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To: The Pack Knight
"I'm not sure what percentage of med mal cases even meet that, though."

I'm sure it's a small percentage, but not an insignificant percentage. I have seen estimates of the so-called "litigation tax", or the percentage of additional costs that litigation liability increases every product in America at around 2.5%. But, for medical products and especially drugs or vaccines, that number is MUCH higher. I don't think it's an irresponsible assumption to believe that most of those drug and vaccine torts originate in US Federal court, because of the very interstate commerce that you've mentioned.

I don't believe substantive tort reform is a panacea for America's health care problems, but to try an address those problems without addressing torts, borders on insane.

And, I'm not alone in that belief. Every developed country that has adopted socialized medicine, has also adopted some tort reform - with much of it being draconian. If the jury awards didn't increase the cost of health care in a material way, countries that foot the bill through single-payer systems, wouldn't be worried about them. It's that simple.

19 posted on 09/11/2009 1:21:38 PM PDT by OldDeckHand (No Socialized Medicine, No Way, No How, No Time)
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To: AmishDude

To do math requires the ability to think. To study law requires a good memory for cases and precedents.


20 posted on 09/11/2009 1:23:49 PM PDT by SauronOfMordor (When injustice becomes law, rebellion becomes duty)
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