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Democratic National Convention tonight...
- Thread starter GodsTyro
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videogamer
Banned
Gruco said:Bah, who is responsible for preventing posts that are just quotes?
Are you calling me out, Gruco? Because I know you didn't just call me out.
Seriously though, I've been unexpectedly busy. I had planned on having the weekend largely free, but then got asked by my ex-boss to manage the restaurant I used to work at today (just got home), and yesterday some friends from out of town came in without notice and called me up to hang out. I'm not sure exactly when I'll get around to it, because I really am quite busy lately (during the weeks), but I'll get to it. I'm pretty sure others will tell you that I'm not one to "run away" from a conversation.
Hitokage said:I know one person who will disagree.
I likely know exactly who you're talking about, and the specific incident you're alluding to; I just felt, upon further reflection, that I had said everything I wanted to say, and that my logic was sound and this "other" person's wasn't based upon their comments in that thread.
The poster's name starts with an "M", no?
Not only am I not stupid, but I have an excellent memory. EDIT: Unless you meant that you personally disagree-- but I don't recall ever really getting into it with you. At least not in the last couple of years.
Hitokage said:Yeah, I am referring to somebody else, but just to poke fun.
Does the poster's name start with an "M"? Not that I'd get upset or anything, because I did walk away from a thread where I was conversing/debating with this person after promising I'd reply, but only for the previously mentioned reasons. I've only "walked away" like that from 2 threads in the 6-7 years I've been on GA, and I recall who both posters I was conversing with were. Just curious to see if this person is actually that egotistical that he'd boast or put me down over the incident, especially since I had made several very lengthy posts and felt that all I needed to say was said, despite my promise to respond further.
Feel free to PM me the answer if you don't feel like answering here (as to the first initial, not the whole name-- I'm just looking to confirm my suspicions; if it's somebody else entirely, I don't really care who it is, to be honest
). -- Very Curious in NY
Hitokage said:
Now I feel bad that I didn't do so.
Oh well, I'll live. I have the thread archived, and I just felt (even now if I look at it) that I said all I needed to say to get my point across, and that he was being somewhat inconsistent on a few points. I didn't think it best to belabor those points (because if there's one thing I can do, it's "belabor"
). That was a fun thread. Loki is totally delusional; he was being soundly thrashed by "the white Barack Obama," as that poster is commonly referred to.
About Edwards: As far as I know, the argument is that cerebral palsy is very rarely caused by physician neglect, so changing birthing procedures to avoid it doesn't make sense. Edward claims that the only cases he represented were those exceptions where a C-section may have changed things.
There are more C-section births now, apparently to avoid lawsuits, though C-sections have fewer complications than natural births, and cost less as a result.
The larger issue of junk science is still relevent, though corporations pose the greatest threat in that department by a long shot, thanks to their financial resources and lobbying power.
The issue of trial lawyers vs. corporations is basically about an imperfect system for consumer redress. The obvious (but maybe not best) alternative is increased government oversight, but neither side will lobby for that anytime soon.
About Edwards: As far as I know, the argument is that cerebral palsy is very rarely caused by physician neglect, so changing birthing procedures to avoid it doesn't make sense. Edward claims that the only cases he represented were those exceptions where a C-section may have changed things.
There are more C-section births now, apparently to avoid lawsuits, though C-sections have fewer complications than natural births, and cost less as a result.
The larger issue of junk science is still relevent, though corporations pose the greatest threat in that department by a long shot, thanks to their financial resources and lobbying power.
The issue of trial lawyers vs. corporations is basically about an imperfect system for consumer redress. The obvious (but maybe not best) alternative is increased government oversight, but neither side will lobby for that anytime soon.
Mandark said:
Now, as it was then, you shouldn't flatter yourself, "Sexy Mr. Mandark".
"Thrashed" is a terrible word to use in place of "equivocation" and "straddling the fence". But anyway, I'm not about to dredge up old issues, which is why I didn't mention you by name. You seem to have no such reservations, however. Good points on the nature of the beast re: our system of redress. Though they have their advantages, C-sections are still invasive surgery with their own inherent (and avoidable, since many are performed solely to "cover one's ass", as it were) risks. Particularly if one opts for vaginal delivery during subsequent births.
Fact: 85% of medical malpractice cases brought to trial are found in favor of the doctor/hospital being sued. Moreover, independent arbitration and oversight panels composed of physicians, judges, and attorneys have examined the scientific merits of hundreds of malpractice cases brought and concluded that upwards of 85% of them are not meritorious (i.e., there was no negligence, gross or otherwise). These two facts should tell you something. The question is how best to reign in these frivolous suits seeing as how the cost of bringing them is low to nil. If an unscupulous attorney brings 10 fivolous cases, losing each time (and also spending his own money prosecuting the case, which he doesn't recover), it is more than offset by the alarming frequency of jackpot verdicts which are not commensurate with the injuries sustained-- assuming such injuries were actually caused by avoidable negligence (which not all are-- some juries are just overly suggestible and too sympathetic). So if a lawyer tries 10 cases and loses $20-40G a pop, but then wins a $3M verdict for his client on the eleventh case, he nets ~$600K+, assuming he takes one-third of that $3M (it's more likely 40%, actually). Thus, there is little disincentive for these people to stop bringing nonmeritorious suits in hopes of that big payday somewhere down the road. Dollar signs are flashing everywhere for whorish attorneys, even as increasing numbers of hospitals are having to be financially bailed out by their home states just to stay afloat (though those financial woes are not solely attributable to malpractice issues, much of it is).
From what I hear, either Kerry or Edwards (or perhaps it was the legislature in some state) is proposing a "3 strikes and you're out rule" regarding the filing of frivolous lawsuits. If so, that would be a step in the right direction, but I would argue that "frivolity" should have to be ascertained by a pre-trial independent panel composed of physicians, judges and lawyers. If these people find merit in a claim (and they have found merit in less than 15% of cases brought), then by all means, file suit and seek whatever damages you can wring from the jury's bleeding heart. Actual victims of malpractice deserve to be adequately compensated-- nobody of sound mind would ever argue against that.
But yeah, the system is pretty broken as it stands.
EDIT:
Also, this:
Is simply not true
Maybe so, but in that case, I'm not the one making it up. From Brian Carnell:
PS Can we do something about this board's smileys? I read one of Loki's posts and I get the urge to print it out and stick it to my fridge.
PS Can we do something about this board's smileys? I read one of Loki's posts and I get the urge to print it out and stick it to my fridge.
ConfusingJazz
Member
Mandark said:
How about just Loki, everybody else seems to use them at appropriate times.
ConfusingJazz said:
I use them to convey sentiment and sometimes intonation (jesting, sarcasm etc.). So I use them when I mean to use them. Don't like it? Tough noogies-- don't read my posts then.
Haha.
Also, Mandark, your quote above seems contradictory to these excerpts from the report I linked to previously:
I don't mean to inundate you with quotes, but I feel that all of these go to the issue of cost; I'd also tend to take the word of a meticulously researched, annotated, peer-reviewed journal article authored by two Oxford Ph.D's and an MSc over some web pundit.
Who knows...
ConfusingJazz
Member
Just busting your balls Loki <- APPROPRIATE USE OF SMILEY
<- APPROPRIATE USE OF SMILEY Drinky Crow
Banned
Having just had a baby, I can't count the number of times our doctor encouraged a C-section over natural birth. Although doctors have been told to bring the C-section rate down over the past twenty years, I've been told that they still prefer C-sections due to the reduced risk of lawsuits -- a C-section is a very simple and orthodox surgical procedure that almost always results in a breathing baby when labor complications arise. It's an environment the surgeon completely controls and while it's harder on the mother, it's also an almost completely known quantity. Conversely, forcing natural birth runs a slightly higher risk for mother and child, since any one of a zillion complications can arise (baby positioning leads to umbilical strangulation; head/collarbone/arm damage during extraction; severe vaginal/rectal tearing from large-sized births; increased risk of fever/jaundice due to delayed birthing; there's a billion things like this).
Bluntly put: babies and moms rarely, if EVER, die from C-section. Vaginal birth, on the other hand, is much riskier, even if it is technically less invasive and works better in MOST cases.
ConfusingJazz said:Just busting your balls Loki
Hehe.
Doug: Yeah, obviously it's a more controlled scenario, being surgery and all, though as the study I cited pointed out, C-section mothers are 80% more likely to be rehospitalized for complications after the birth. Mandark's link said different, so I'd say the evidence is inconclusive, but still-- do you think it's a coincidence that C-section rates have skyrocketed in the last 10 years or so? We didn't have an epidemic of natural delivery deaths in this country. I'm just saying that surgery should, ideally, only be performed due to medical necessity or if the mother desires it. In many cases, the physician is now the one urging the mother to have the C-section just to save his ass, whether it's medically indicated or not. Being invasive (yet commonplace) surgery, I don't see how that's a situation to be defended or accepted. The overly litigious climate in this country has gotten out of hand imo.
Mandark: visit www.c-sectionbabiesaredumb.com for some info on the relative quality of children birthed by various methods.
Sirpopopop
Member
One day Loki & Mandark will buy an apartment and live together in Louisiana.
Mandark: So... are you finally going to respond to my thread?
Loki: ... as I said before, I think you're being quite obstinate here.
Mandark: Duh.
MAF: HI GUYS! I GOT HIT BY A GRANDMA ON THE RAAAOD! NOW I'M GOING TO SUE!
Loki: Damn litigation culture.
Mandark: MAF's car is wrecked and the entire right side of his face is crushed. I do think this isn't a frivolous lawsuit here.
Mandark: So... are you finally going to respond to my thread?
Loki: ... as I said before, I think you're being quite obstinate here.
Mandark: Duh.
MAF: HI GUYS! I GOT HIT BY A GRANDMA ON THE RAAAOD! NOW I'M GOING TO SUE!
Loki: Damn litigation culture.
Mandark: MAF's car is wrecked and the entire right side of his face is crushed. I do think this isn't a frivolous lawsuit here.
Sirpopopop said:
lol
Heh, I hope you're not trying to say that I don't believe that victims of legitimate malpractice or injury shouldn't be compensated, because I certainly believe that they should be. But the facts suggest that not nearly every case brought is a meritorious one (likely, < 15-20% are, as borne out by independent review panels), and that there is little disincentive to bringing frivolous cases, which has cost taxpayers millions of dollars.
Did you know that tort costs constitute 2.2% of the US' GDP? And that that percentage is twice as high as the average for 11 of the most prosperous nations besides the US? Tort costs cost each American taxpayer an average of $800+ per year, and, adjusted for inflation, tort costs per citizen have increased by over 800% since the 1950's ($89 in 1950 vs. $809 in 2002; the $89 was actually $12 in the 50's, adjusted for inflation); in addition, since the 1950's, tort cost growth has outpaced GDP gains (9.8% per year vs. 7.1%). From 2000-2002, tort costs increased nearly 30%.
All this info is from an independent study presented to the United States Senate Judiciary Committee, seen here
If you don't see anything wrong here, I honestly don't know what to tell you.
I realize you were likely just joking around, but on the off chance that you were trying to assert that nothing was wrong with our litigation system, and that I was somehow overreacting, well, I figured I'd throw out some facts. andthebeatgoeson
Junior Member
Uh, to piss off the conservative Gaffers, can we have the official Republican National Convention not-stickied and deleted multiple times?
fart said:
No, my main problem with our tort system is not its financial cost, but rather that it is simply not just in many (if not most) instances. The costs are simply one angle to attack it from in order to make systemic reform more palatable to those concerned with economics instead of justice. Our tort system is presently concerned with neither. Those who are blind to the gross injustices perpetrated under our current tort system may perhaps be amenable to change if it is couched in the more pragmatic language of economics.
All I am personally concerned with is justice, as high-minded and pretentious as that may sound. Not once have I suggested or even hinted that "justice" consists of "limiting (legitimate) liability", be that liability coporate or medical/personal injury. The interests of justice would be served by reigning in frivolous lawsuits, which are currently clogging the system and contributing to its astronomical costs. Meritorious suits in all spheres should, of course, be entertained and prosecuted. The problem is that there is currently no deterrent-- either intrinsic to the system or from without, via legislation-- which would help to weed out the spurious claims from the legitimate ones. This trend is exacerbated by the prevailing social climate, in which the disavowal of personal responsibility figures prominently.
Believe me, I am far from a friend of corporations; in fact, they are the only form of life beneath trial lawyers in my personal moral schema-- any number of "liberals" on this board will vouch for that fact. In fact, I am more concerned with the medical malpractice and personal injury aspect of the tort system than its effect on corporations, because a company's prior knowledge of the detrimental effects of its product is, comparatively, a simple thing to ascertain; in medical cases, however, all too often the standard of "negligence" in determining liability has been supplanted by the notion of "bad outcomes", regardless of the soundness of the medical protocols followed in each particular case. There are hundreds of cases in which there was deemed to have been no negligence at all by independent professional panels, yet in which the claimants received millions of dollars from sympathetic juries. This unjust state of affairs is aided and abetted by suggestible, overly emotional juries and sophistic attorneys who prey upon our society's oratory idolatry in order to obscure the truth and render the pertinent issues turbid through mere rhetoric.
Only those unconcerned with justice do not take issue with the system as-is. Because though our litigation system serves as a legitimate and needed check on corporate and institutional excess, as a sensible means of redress it is in dire need of reform. I take no issue with the concept of our tort system-- but our current implementation of it is horribly flawed, and the way we've allowed it to spiral out of control due to the naked self-interest of a few (read: ATLA) suggests that the American populace has been hoodwinked. Its costs are borne in many sectors by all Americans, yet its rewards are reaped by only a select few. All I take issue with is the way the system is constituted currently, and all I personally agitate for is sensible reform-- not an "end to liability" in any sense, corporate or otherwise.
Skinny, if you were trying to suggest that I'm a "conservative", well, that's not entirely true. Socially, sure, but quite a few of my personal beliefs and opinions do not coincide with the Republican party line, which is why not only have I never registered for either party, but I don't vote at all. The system is irreparably broken and unashamedly promotes binary thinking among its adherents while sensible (read: uncompromised and uninfluenced) reform is scuttled, as it would <teh gasp! teh horror!> benefit the majority, as opposed to solely the monied interests.
And if you weren't referring to me, well then, please disregard the preceding paragraph.
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