Bork settles lawsuit over fall at Yale Club

NEW YORK - One-time U.S. Supreme Court nominee Robert H. Bork settled a $1 million lawsuit Friday against the Yale Club after he fell stepping onto a platform to speak.

His lawyer, Randy Mastro, said terms of the deal were confidential and he had no comment.

Bork, 81, sued in Manhattan federal court last year, saying he injured himself so badly at the June 2006 event sponsored by the New Criterion magazine that he needed surgery and was left with a limp. He faulted the club for not having stairs or a handrail leading up to the platform.

Lawyers for the New York City chapter blamed Bork, saying any injuries he sustained were at least partially his fault for not recognizing potential risks, which the club said were "open, obvious and apparent." [AP]

Conservative icon Robert H. Bork settled his lawsuit over injuries he sustained when he fell off the platform at the Yale Club. Because tort reform is for the little people.... 

I shot an event at the Yale Club a couple months ago. I didn't see any obvious platform hazards in our room, but you never know.

Comments

[Eric Jaffa]

Maybe they improved the platform area between the start of the lawsuit and when you went to the club two months ago.

That would be an argument against tort reform.

[Cass]

Perhaps the parents of little Bob failed to expose him to enough open, obvious, and apparent risk in his childhood, so he'd know something about ascending to platforms and Supreme Court appointments without personal injury. (Balance yourself, and avoid being written into textbooks as a corrupt president's hatchet man.)

[Lindsay Beyerstein]

That's entirely possible, Eric.

I'm against what conservatives call "tort reform," which is just an excuse to keep people from suing corporations that hurt them.

I think it's delicious that when Bork had a beef with the Yale Club, he had no compunctions about filing a lawsuit. For all I know, his suit was 100% justified, but even if it was bogus, I would have been happy to let a judge decide that.

Karl Rove's political consulting career is based on a handful of inflammatory anecdotes about frivolous lawsuits. Elections sometimes attract nuisance candidates, too. Doesn't mean we should give up on democracy.

[Eric Jaffa]

George W. Bush got the "Military Commissions Act" passed which stops victims of torture from suing.

But when his daughter was in a fender-bender, he sued:
==========================================================
"In 1999, Bush sued Enterprise Rent-A-Car over a minor fender-bender involving one of his daughters in which no one was hurt. Although his insurance would have covered the repair costs making a lawsuit unnecessary, Bush sought additional money from Enterprise, which had rented a car to someone with a suspended license. In this case, Bush seemed to understand one of the most important functions of civil lawsuits — to deter further wrongdoing. The case settled for $2,000 to $2,500. Burger, Timothy, “Bush sued Enterprise Rent-A-Car over daughter’s fender bender,” Daily News, August 26, 2000; “Bush sued rental agency over fender bender,” Houston Chronicle, August 26, 2000."
==========================================================

[cfrost]

What a disappointment. Here I thought Bork was one of the tough guys who was capable of assessing and assuming risk and responsibility. Now it turns out he's just like any crybaby liberal sobbing into his mama's apron.

[The Phantom]

--What a disappointment. Here I thought Bork was one of the tough guys who was capable of assessing and assuming risk and responsibility. Now it turns out he's just like any crybaby liberal sobbing into his mama's apron.--

You speak in jest, but what you say is probably true.

One of the reasons why the legal system never gets reformed is that the politicians ( Republicans too ) like it the way it is. And most politicians are lawyers.

It's a disgrace, and long term the victim/liability/whinger culture has harmed this country a great deal.

[Janus Daniels]

(chuckle)
The parents of the Yalies made the same mistake.
Serves them right for inviting him.

[Left_Wing_Fox]

It's a disgrace, and long term the victim/liability/whinger culture has harmed this country a great deal.

I think it's absolutely the opposite. The whole "Me" culture of the US has made the individual responsible for EVERYTHING, while removing the responsibility of others.

If I slip and break my ankle in a McDonalds, even if I'm insured, I still have to deal with deductables and co-pays. Does McDonalds contribute to that payment for not keeping their store safe? Or is it solely my fault for not paying peoper attention to absolutely every little detail and action that could keep me safe drom harm? In reality, it's an accident. Nobody's perfect enough to avoid absolutely every financial misfortune, or capable of preparing adequately in advance.

With a universal healthcare system, I'm paying in advance, and afterwards, for the care I recieve through taxes. McDonalds contributes as well through their taxes. I don't deal with Co-pays, deductables or increased insurance. I simply get my ankle fixed. There's MUCH less incentive for me to sue, if I don't have to pay over $1000 or more out of my own pocket for the broken ankle.

With corporations, it's worse, since corporations can more effectively lobby for reduced oversight, reduced regulation, and now that they aren't stopped from harming people through due dilligence in advance, can prevent people from suing them afterwards. Fear of punitive lawsuits are the only thing really keeping them in check anymore.

But for the individual, a punitive lawsuit looks like a gold mine. We don't have a retirement plan, a scial security plan, real wages are falling, and healthcare is largely unaffordable. Individuals have every economic incentive for go for the biggest punitive damage suits they can, jstified or not.

Take care of the people COLLECTIVELY like a society should do, and that "whiner and victim" mentality caused by rampant stoic individualism fades into the background.

[Bill Altreuter]

Left Wing Fox has it about right. The United States' tort system in unique in the industrialized world: it assigns responsibility for harm to individuals to wrongdoers, rather than spreading that risk over society as a whole. (We can leave damages for pain and suffering and punitive damages out of the discussion for now.)

So called "tort reform" amounts to trying to further whittle away the rights of persons injured by reason of another's fault, usually in favor of a particular industry (pharmaceuticals, or manufacturers in general), or a particular profession (usually doctors). Why should someone who has, for example, lost a leg due medical malpractice, have her damages capped, while a person sustaining the same injury in an accident with a truck receives the benefit of an award that fully compensates him?

The way to fix the system is not to deprive the injured, it is to provide for the injured through state-supported medical and welfare benefits. I'd support the elimination of medical malpractice lawsuits in a heartbeat in exchange for a single payer health care system.

As for Bork, what a jerk.

[witless chum]

Orson Scott Card (I know) called America's system in general regulation by trial lawyer rather than by laws and bureaucrats.

[ewan]

Because tort reform is for the little people....

You believe taxes should be higher. Are you voluntarily paying higher taxes, or are you maintaining a single set of rules until you can effect change? I think that's what Bork is doing.

[theo]

You believe taxes should be higher. Are you voluntarily paying higher taxes

What a sadly typical conservative misapprehension.

"Paying higher taxes" isn't an end, it's a means to an end. I can (and do) take the taxes I don't pay and spend them on, say, cyclone relief. If I didn't contribute to causes I believed in, you might be able to claim hypocrisy.

Tort reform, the way ideologues like Bork approach it, is an end in itself. He wants undeserving people with "frivolous" claims to be denied access to the legal system.

Since his claim appears completely frivolous, he's acting hypocritically by maintaining that he's entitled to torts (but you're not).

[Autumnal Harvest]

I think Ewan's point is valid. There are all kinds of laws and government policies that I think are bad, and should be changed. Some help me, and some hurt me. I'm stuck with the negatives of the ones that hurt me, so why not take advantage of the positive's of the ones that help me? Bork could reasonably say "No one should be able to file these sort of frivolous lawsuits, but so long as the law lets other people cash in, I'll give it a shot too" [1]. I think this $600 tax rebate is irresponsible and stupid pandering, but I'm going to cash my check, and it's not going to cause me to increase my charitable donations by $600.

[1] Of course, I doubt that Bork actually sees his suit as frivolous. More likely he feels victimized in a way that he would be contemptuous of, if this had happened to someone else. . .

[Left_Wing_Fox]

I understand your point Autumnal, many people take advantage of services they want to eliminate. Also, when dealing with collective issues, individual action has much less impact than systemic change.

That said, Ewan may be neglecting the fact that I paid more in the US for taxes + health insurance than I do in Canada for taxes with health insurance included, while receiving far more comprehensive coverage here than I ever did in the States. So no, I don't want to pay "more taxes"; I want better bang for my buck as has been proven possible outside the US.

[Lindsay Beyerstein]

I'd be more sympathetic if the tort reformers weren't so self-righteous. Lawsuits are supposed to be about justice, as they like to remind us. Tort reformers cast corporations as the victims of greedy lawyers and their clients who sue to extort money. They try to convince people that suing for "groundless" damages is something one morally must not do--not just a legitimate legal maneuver like to discourage for the general welfare.

Bork is a judge who ostensibly spent his career in the service of justice. If he were suing just to cadge money out of the Yale Club, that would be pretty hypocritical.

I think our tax system should be different, but I don't think rich people are bad or evil for not spontaneously paying more taxes. In fact, if people did that, it might serve as an incentive not to reform the system as a whole. I.e. if the system becomes dependent on the surplus voluntary contributions of the rich, the rich get even more influence, compared to ordinary people who pay only what they are legally required to contribute. This isn't some far-fetched fantasy. You see it playing out in public institutions all over the country. Look how much influence rich corporate and private donors have at public universities.