Overlawyered: Chronicling The High Cost Of Our Legal System

Posts Tagged ‘Michael Moore’

“Lawyers Hope to Do to Opioid Makers What They Did to Big Tobacco”

As the Wall Street Journal reports, former Mississippi attorney general and longtime Overlawyered favorite Michael Moore has been collaborating with Ohio Attorney General Michael DeWine, with other elected government attorneys, and with other trial lawyers to seek lift-off of suits against painkiller makers and distributors. The headline was “Lawyers Hope to Do to Opioid Makers What They Did to Big Tobacco,” which got several of us going on Twitter:

Which in turn played off Jonathan Adler’s:

And Gabriel Malor’s:

Mine drew a number of responses, including this from Bloomberg View business columnist Joe Nocera:

And:

In a more conventional op-ed vein, there’s this from Tiger Joyce.

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Hood hires Moore for Mississippi BP suit

The cozy dealings between the state of Mississippi and well-connected private lawyers — especially the way the state comes to hire those lawyers on contingency fee to pursue high-ticket suits against outside defendants — have long furnished grist for this site. Now, opening a new chapter, Mississippi AG Jim Hood has hired former AG Michael Moore, like Hood a longtime Overlawyered favorite, to sue BP over the effects of the Transocean oil spill on the state. [AP, YallPolitics] Per YallPolitics, “Interestingly, there is no specific financial arrangement. Moore and Hood contractually agree to work it out later and have fees paid directly by BP to the as yet to be named legal team led by Moore.” When Moore hired later-disgraced Dickie Scruggs to represent Mississippi what was to develop into the most profitable litigation in history — the multistate tobacco caper — the financial details were likewise shrouded in secrecy, and it was later claimed that there was no written agreement.

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June 7 roundup

  • Pennsylvania Department of Labor launches probe on whether reality-TV show “Jon & Kate Plus 8” violates child labor laws [Pennsylvania Labor & Employment Blog, Hirsch/Workplace Law Prof via Ohio Employer’s Law]
  • Dispute over termination of Navy aircraft contract called “Jarndyce v. Jarndyce of U.S. legal system” [WSJ Law Blog]
  • Medical tourism, cont’d: “It appears that ‘we’re easier to sue’ is the uniquely American defense to medicine outsourcing.” [KevinMD]
  • New Oklahoma law protects farmers from neighbors’ suits complaining of nuisance from farm activity [Enid, Okla., News]
  • For unusually bad advice on how to save GM and Detroit, Michael Moore as usual comes through [Popehat]
  • Lawyer reprimanded for telling party she should be cut up, shipped overseas [NJLJ, ABA Journal]
  • Call for reform of UK laws banning press interviews of jurors after verdict [Times Online first, second articles and commentary]
  • Coming soon: campaign against depiction of smoking in Raymond Chandler books, Edward Hopper paintings [CEI “Open Market”]

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Welcome National Journal, Salon, Dallas Morning News readers

Stuart Taylor, Jr. takes a hard look at the Kerry/Edwards ticket and weighs the likelihood that it will do much to rein in the litigation biz. Quotes my comment comparing Sen. Edwards to a cleaned-up Michael Moore (“Edwards and the Problem with the Trial-Lawyer Lobby”, National Journal/Atlantic Online, Jul. 13). At Salon, reporter Tim Grieve pens an all-out defense of Edwards which is kind enough to quote me in two places (“The GOP war on trial lawyers”, Jul. 13 (subscription or ad-based “day pass”)). And the Dallas Morning News, in the person of editorial columnist Rod Dreher, includes this site in a short list of recommended weblogs, coincidentally quoting an item of mine on locally based lawyer Fred Baron and his involvement with this year’s Democratic ticket (“Welcome to the blogosphere”, Jun. 23).

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Authors: sue us, please

“Paradoxically, a lawsuit, especially a flimsy one, can be a boon to a book’s fortunes. And increasingly, some writers and publishers admit to hoping they’ll attract one.” Humorist Al Franken was widely envied by other authors when Fox News filed its much-derided suit against his book title (see Nov. 22), and just this past week a small publisher, Soft Skull Press, got a windfall of coverage when publisher HarperCollins sent a cease and desist order (from which it soon retreated) suggesting that the title of one of its new books, “How to Get Stupid White Men Out of Office” was too close to the title of Michael Moore’s “Stupid White Men”. Of course, things can get sticky fast if the legal complaint really does have merit. (Christopher Dreher, “So sue me… please!”, Boston Globe, Mar. 21) (via Tyler Cowen, Volokh).

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Welcome InstaPundit readers

Leftist filmmaker Michael Moore is again drawing fire for not being willing to submit himself to the sorts of borderline-harassment journalistic investigation to which he has long subjected others. Thanks to reader Robert Racansky, our Sept. 16, 1999 coverage of Moore’s hypocrisy has now become the subject of a Glenn Reynolds Instalanche (Sept. 27). Also, welcome readers from Law.com which linked to our recent Wilbur Wright item.

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