caomhin10p
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« Reply #3 on: June 09, 2008, 11:12:32 pm » |
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The judicial branch is absoultely not perfect in any means. Decisions on emminent domain and other activist decisions are just a few examples. At the risk of sounding brash, jury selecting is definitely tricky, as, for lack of better terms, we do not need opportunists or people with bad judgement on the jury. There is no justification, going so far back as the McDonalds coffee case, that juries should be tricked in to awarding large settlements to people when simple common sense would have prevented such accidents. I think it is also a good example to point out the Vioxx problem. After the risks of the pill were made fully aware, should a massive settlement have followed? I personally know a few people for whom Vioxx was an acceptable risk as it made their life better, at least they were able to move around and get by on it, even if it did present higher risks. At that point it was their decision. Further more, if the FDA and Merck, or any other organization had passed the threshold for being considered viably safe, then absolutely awards should be limited. Think of it this way, too, if a pill came out to cure AIDS, but then a few years later it turned out that based on new scientific evidence it were to cause, say, a peanut allergy, should that pill be outlawed or should the companies be held liable for something they were unaware of at the time? Shouldn't consumers be free to assume that risk on their own? Large settlements for insane lawsuits have led to a large movement of doctors in particular, out of the state. We also see the brain drain effect on other issues too, where we have excellent educational institutions but we continually see well educated, well trained people leave the state for less oppressive taxes and more common sense law applications.
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