[extropy-chat] Professor Being Sued Over Anti-Aging Comments

[Mike Lorrey]

--- Brent Neal <brentn at freeshell.org> wrote:

>  (6/22/05 12:00) Mike Lorrey <mlorrey at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> >You have no clue. It certainly provides no benefit to potential
> >plaintiffs who never join a class action. Can any member of this
> list
> >make the claim they've ever joined a class action? I have, on my
> >defective Firestone Wilderness A/T tires. I received full value,
> >thanks. I've also read the filings for a number of other class
> action
> >suits in my work, such as the suit against JP Morgan and Barrack
> Gold
> >for their manipulation of world gold markets in the late 1990's.
> 
> Yes, Mike, I have joined in class actions.  And where on earth did I
> say that it provided benefits to people who didn't join? Maybe you
> should learn to read before telling me to get a clue, eh?

You seemed to imply that lots of people make little or nothing on class
actions. In my experience, the only people who stay shafted are those
who don't participate.
> 
> 
> >
> >Certainly some class action lawsuits against many defendants have
> >historically failed miserably. That is how the system works: you
> take
> >your chances. You may have higher losses than what you wind up with,
> if
> >you wind up with anything. Those are the calculations you make when
> you
> >decide whether to join a class action or pursue your own action
> >independently.
> 
> And pursuing independently is, of course, even riskier since the
> person you're up against can afford more lawyers than you can.

Not if every shafted customer pursues legal action. The consumer has
the advantage of numbers, such that if a corporation had 100,000
customers of defective products upon which they earned, say, $10.00,
and even just 10% of those 100,000 customers filed lawsuits against the
firm, the firm would rack up thousands of dollars in expenses for each
lawsuit, far in excess of profits earned, and would quickly verge on
bankruptcy. In such a case, it would be to the benefit of the defective
manufacturer if all plaintiffs were required to engage in a class
action.

> >
> >Mr. Neal, please list the number of times that any government has
> >actually distributed cash earned in fines to the actual people who
> >suffered the damage the government prosecutes businesses over? They
> >NEVER do, so your side of the equation has a score of ZERO.
> 
> Its Dr. Neal.  And your failure in logic is that you assume that it
> has to actually hurt people for the government to have stopped it.
> That's the beauty of things like the FDA and the USDA. You try to nip
> the problem in the bud, rather than waiting for bad stuff to happen
> first.

The basis of law for centuries has always been that there must be a
victim for a crime to have been committed. The phrase "no harm, no
foul" is a legal maxim. You also evaded the question: When, EVER, has
ANY government actually distributed the fines it imposes against makers
of defective products, to the victims of those defective products?
NEVER is the proper answer.

> 
> Have you ever read "The Jungle?"

Yes, I have, and I am also aware that most of its claims were false,
propaganda produced by Sinclair Lewis and his fabian socialist cohorts
for political purposes, a fact which is well documented in the
historical literature.
 
> >Your failure of logic here is that you assume that the number of
> cases
> >would increase in an unregulated world. Not so, since regulations
> >generally protect manufacturers from liabilities, a lack of such (or
> of
> >bankruptcy and liability protections, etc) would result in
> businesses
> >being operated much more scrupulously for fear of their corporate
> veils
> >being pierced.
> 
> The FDA does not absolve pharma companies of any liability in re
> their products.  Take any of the recent painkillers that have been
> pulled from the market as an example. FDA approval of the drug does
> not prevent suits for damages incurred.  Once again, a bit of reality
> with your idealism would be helpful....
> 

That isn't the point being made. The point is that there are liability
protections for investors enforced by government which protect them
against the fact that they elected directors of their corporation who
hired criminal management (if the directors themselves were not also
complicit).

The reforms of recent years only hold executives responsible for the
claims made in reports made to investors and to regulators. This will
most certainly improve things, but not completely.

Mike Lorrey
Vice-Chair, 2nd District, Libertarian Party of NH
"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom.
It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves."
                                      -William Pitt (1759-1806) 
Blog: http://intlib.blogspot.com


		
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