Free Republic

Some Georgia legislators are trying to stop the "McLawsuit" before it happens. Speaker Pro Tem Rep. DuBose Porter (D-Dublin) is sponsoring a bill that would prohibit people from suing restaurants and food and beverage manufacturers for obesity-related health problems. Porter said he was not aware of any such lawsuits in Georgia. But the food industry has been targeted in other states, including a highly publicized lawsuit against McDonald's filed on behalf of obese children in New York City. The "McLawsuit," as critics derided it, was dismissed by a federal judge last year. Lawyers had sought to hold McDonald's liable for...

<p>Big Tobacco paid dearly for the public's choices over the years. And plaintiffs' lawyers licked their chops. The next target in the lucrative war against personal choice and individual responsibility will be Americans' growing waistlines. After all, "One of the most effective ways to get social change is to sue people."</p>

Joanne Borgerding was sitting in a packed Eagan McDonald's at lunchtime, eating a chicken sandwich and reading a book when something moved beneath her booth. Dancing in the air by her legs were "little movable eyes" that were attached to a dark, 2-foot-long snake. "I looked face to face at it," Borgerding said. "I know people in the drive-up heard me — I screamed that loud." Borgerding also flew out of her booth and in the process injured her foot so badly that she says she has permanent nerve damage. She asked McDonald's insurance company to pay her medical bills,...

Cable TV made a West Bend man addicted to TV, caused his wife to be overweight and his kids to be lazy, he says. And he’s threatening to sue the cable company. Timothy Dumouchel of West Bend wants $5,000 or three computers, and a lifetime supply of free Internet service from Charter Communications to settle what he says will be a small claims suit. Dumouchel blames Charter for his TV addiction, his wife’s 50-pound weight gain and his children’s being “lazy channel surfers,” according to a Fond du Lac police report. Charter employees called police to the local office at...

WASHINGTON - George W. Bush came to office without a majority of voters behind him, fueling widespread expectations that he would seek to forge a bipartisan coalition and govern cautiously from the center. Instead he rules as though he had won the White House in a landslide. He has stamped his mark on America and the world with a big, bold and, in some ways, radical presidency. Emboldened by self-confidence - critics call it arrogance - Bush has made striking departures from American and Republican traditions. "He's trying to forge a new definition of conservative," said Lee Edwards, an expert...

WASHINGTON (AdAge.com) -- In a legal strategy similar to how state attorneys general successfully pursued tobacco companies, a class action lawsuit has been filed to recover "billions of dollars in ill-gotten profits" from alcohol makers that falsely denied their ads targeted underage drinkers. The suit accuses brewers Coors Brewing Co. and Heineken; distilled spirits makers Mark Anthony Brands (maker of Mike's Hard Lemonade), Bacardi USA, Bacardi Group, Brown-Forman, Diageo and Kobrand (maker of Alize cognac); and the Beer Institute of a "long-running, sophisticated and deceptive scheme ... to market alcoholic beverages to children and other underage consumers." Absent from suit...

Got this email yesterday from Townhall.com and wanted to spread the word: Are you one of the millions who are tired of lawsuit abuse? Do you believe that personal injury lawyers are destroying our healthcare system? You can do something! Please join our Million Email March -- a campaign to let Congress and President Bush know that frivolous lawsuits are jeopardizing our healthcare system and that healthcare litigation reform is a priority for you. Let them know that it's time to put the healthcare of hard-working Americans before the profits of personal injury lawyers. Sick Of Lawsuits needs your help...

Parents file lawsuit over Star Wars video Humiliation forced Quebec teenager to drop out of school, document says By TU THANH HA From Wednesday's Globe and Mail MONTREAL — The parents of Ghyslain Raza, the Quebec teenager who became a celebrity this spring after classmates posted on the Internet a video of him mimicking a Star Wars character, allege that their son was so humiliated by the experience that he had to get psychiatric care. The revelation is made in a lawsuit his parents have filed against the families of four classmates they accuse of maliciously turning their son into...

Stanley Hilton now figures his case is stronger because of a coalition of attorneys, victims' families and bipartisan legislators who gathered in Washington on Monday to condemn the government's lack of action in preventing the Sept. 11 attacks. Hilton is the San Francisco attorney who filed a $7 billion lawsuit in U.S. District Court on June 3 against President Bush and other government officials for "allowing" the terrorist attacks to occur. Among Hilton's allegations: Bush conspired to create the Sept. 11 attacks for his own political gain and has been using Osama bin Laden as a scapegoat. Hilton said he...

While Texas Democrats pay lip service to improving health care access, state records indicate that the trial lawyers financing the effort to defeat Proposition 12 on next week’s ballot are many of the same individuals who regularly contribute 40% of all funds raised by the Texas Democrat Party. Proposition 12 will make health care more accessible and affordable by ensuring that each doctor sued in a malpractice case is liable for no more than $250,000 in non-economic damages, such as the often ambiguous "pain and suffering" award. There would still be no limit on economic damages, like lost wages and...

ORONTO, Aug. 30 — When David Andrew, a 41-year-old federal government employee, heard that the highest Ontario court had extended marriage rights to same-sex couples two months ago, he broke into a sweat. "I was dreading the conversation," he said, fearing that his partner would feel jilted when he told him that he did not believe in the institution. "Personally, I saw marriage as a dumbing down of gay relationships. My dread is that soon you will have a complacent bloc of gay and lesbian soccer moms." When he moved in with David Warren, a 41-year-old software company project officer,...

<p>EUGENE, Ore. -- A lesbian couple alleges that O'Hara Catholic School refused admission to their 4-year-old daughter because of their sexual orientation.</p> <p>The couple has complained to the Eugene Human Rights Commission and the Oregon Child Care Division.</p> <p>One of the women, Lee Inkmann, said O'Hara Principal Dianne Bert told her in mid-August that having a family with two mothers at the school would confuse other children, and that gay unions are in conflict with Vatican teachings.</p>

Tort reform is on the agenda in the Florida legislature. It has passed in the Florida House. That's the good news. The bad news is that it is being blocked in the Senate by a REPUBLICAN (!) Senator Jim King. Any comments, suggestions or help out there would be greatly appreciated, since physicians are packing up and leaving florida in droves. Maybe some FreePers could help us physicians during our next demonstration in Tallahassee. Also, any dirt on Senator King (payoffs from trial lawyers, etc. ) would be helpful. Thank you.

A New York teen-ager has alleged teachers violated her civil rights when they suspended her from school for wearing a "Barbie is a Lesbian" T-shirt. Lawyers who filed a lawsuit on her behalf in Manhattan federal court on Thursday said 14-year-old Natalie Young is openly lesbian and that a teacher laughed at her, calling the garment and its reference to the popular Barbie doll "inappropriate." Young alleged that the principal held her for three hours in an office at the school in the borough of Queens on April 10, 2002 and refused to allow her to return to class while...

Consensus hard to find this year By Joe Black Times-Union staff writer TALLAHASSEE -- Senate President Jim King has been known as a compromiser, the guy who can sum up legislative action with a one-liner and as a rebounder. The Jacksonville Republican's skills have drawn praise from colleagues and rivals. But King's moderate stances and penchant for bridging divides are making him the odd-man-out and an unlikely opponent for fellow GOP leaders Gov. Jeb Bush and House Speaker Johnnie Byrd of Plant City. Even before the current legislative session began, King made an unpopular announcement that he supported finding ways...

North Florida Surgeons and the medical liability crisis At-a-glance • Not a protest, but our only option: North Florida Surgeons’ decision to close its doors May 2 was not our way of protesting, but the result of crushing economic realities – soaring claims, losses and premiums are threatening our survival. • A high-quality, experienced practice: North Florida Surgeons was formed in 1996 by combining the practices of about 20 established general surgeons with a combined 140 years of surgical experience. We are a good, veteran practice caught up in this crisis. • Filling a community need: In its eight years...

Medical Malpractice Cap TV Ads Blame A Father’s Death on Lawyers http://nationaljournal.com/members/adspotlight/2003/04/0424carh1.htm 2003 POLITICAL ADS Californian Blames Dad's Death On Lawyers By Mark H. Rodeffer, NationalJournal.com © National Journal Group Inc. Thursday, April 24, 2003 In a TV commercial pushing caps on malpractice awards, Californian Mary Rasar tells the story of her father, Jim Lawson, who died last summer in Las Vegas after a trauma center there "was put out of business" by "frivolous lawsuits." "Emergency rooms across America are closing for the same reason, and people like my father are dying," Rasar says in the spot. Saying that "frivolous...

A group of Florida-based porn peddlers, penis enlargement and Viagra spammers has united to file suit against anti-spam organisations. Under the newly-registered name EmarketersAmerica.org, a front set up by notorious spammer Eddy Marin's lawyer Mark E. Felstein, the suit seeks to force prominent anti-spam organisations to stop blocking their spam.... Steve Linford, of The Spamhaus Project, told us the law suit was without merit and purely motivated by an attempt to waste the time and energy of those fighting against the spam menace. "Spammers will try anything. These lawsuits are intended to tie you up in defending it, wasting time...

(CNSNews.com) - A Southwest Airlines flight attendant's use of a popular children's rhyme - "Eenie, meenie, minie, moe" - has resulted in a federal racial discrimination lawsuit against the airline filed by two African American women asking for unspecified financial damages. One of the two women suing over the allegedly offensive nursery rhyme claims hearing the rhyme caused her to be bedridden for three days and suffer from "unexplained memory gaps," according to court documents. The trial was supposed to start Tuesday in Kansas City, Kan., but U.S. District Court Judge Kathryn Vratil delayed the case until Sept. 29. Southwest...

A widely recognized rhyme -- and how it was used on a flight -- are the focus of a case headed for trial in federal court in Kansas City, Kan.Louise Sawyer, 46, of Merriam, and Grace Fuller, 48, of Lenexa, have sued Southwest Airlines alleging that they were discriminated against and suffered physical and emotional distress on a crowded February 2001 flight after an attendant uttered the rhyme.Trying to get passengers to take their seats, Southwest Airlines flight attendant Jennifer Cundiff said over the intercom, "Eenie, meenie, minie, moe; pick a seat, we gotta go."The two African-American women, who are...