Outlander of the Day ~ AVALA's Lewis Fuller

So why would I have Bernie Marcus (Home Depot co-founder and Daddy Warbucks behind many, many philanthropic efforts such as the Georgia Aquarium for instance) over to the left? That rascal Lewis Fuller (of Fuller Medical Supplies in Gadsden, Alabama and the Chairman of Alabama Voters Against Lawsuit Abuse or just AVALA) is why. Let me explain ...

Mr. Fuller has managed to get a Letter to the Editor into the B'ham News titled Economic Policy Institute study kowtows to greed of personal injury lawyers that has to be one of the classics for even Alabama.

Lewis is upset with a "prettily written" article from the Economic Policy Institute and warns us that "pretty words are not always truthful, and truthful words are not always pretty." He claims "the study ... has more holes in it than a bag of doughnuts" and tells us that EPI ... "is stuffed like a Christmas turkey with ultra-left-wing business haters and trial lawyer collaborators". Look out Alabama, "its directors contain ... union directors". The use of the "big mule unions" language alone would make George Wallace proud but Lewis is going all out to channel the Governor in this effort.

Mr. Fuller then writes

Since we now know the premise of "objectivity" was untrue, we start to recognize the entire study was nothing but personal-injury trial lawyer-inspired bombast and the same-old, same-old.

Lewis, what exactly do we know and how do we know this to be so? You were writing of bombast and the same-old, same-old? Let he who is without sin ... Lewis. He continues:

The bogus EPI report attacks a bona fide and righteous study by the distinguished Pacific Research Institute that proves each American family of four is saddled with an annual "tort tax," brought about by lawsuit abuse, of almost $10,000.

That, as noted, is one of the two glaring differences in the reports: The PRI study says there is not only lawsuit abuse in America, but extreme lawsuit abuse that we all pay for. The EPI says lawsuits do not increase product and insurance costs. Here is Bernie Marcus, co-founder of Home Depot: "Every item we sell has a built-in cost for litigation expense." That alone belies the trial lawyer web of deceit.

Bernie said so! That's some research or authority for you Alabama. Bernie and Arthur Blanks seems to be doing OK, as in thirty billion worth of OK, notwithstanding last week's news of Arthur's QB going to Club Fed and his coach leaving the Falcons for the Razorbacks.

Alternatively, the PRI study is "righteous". Is Lewis a surfer dude? Or merely an authority on morality? PRI's "righteous research" has also attracted the attention of Public Citizen. Mr. Fuller would perhap blow a gasket over Ralph Nader's organization criticising PRI.

And the idea that a glaring difference between the two studies is that each entity did their own study is an especially odd way of Mr. Fuller ranting.

Lewis continues:

The other glaring difference in the two reports is that EPI says the "transfer of funds," money going from business to pay for lawsuits, is not a cost. Eh?
Here is Lawrence McQuillan, author of the righteous PRI study: "A good economist knows transfers are not a social cost. But the PRI study correctly notes that tort transfers are an accounting cost to individual businesses that negatively influences decisions on jobs, investments, innovation and health care."
The blighted EPI study also claims the tort tax might be "only" $82 billion per year, and one portion of the study calls a $14.5 billion part of the cost "insignificant." Nice to know trial lawyers and their dupes are rich enough to call $14.5 billion
insignificant.
Predictably, wealthy personal- injury trial lawyers continue to troll out the old line that if there were no unsafe products, it would not be necessary to hire trial lawyers in the first place. Words fly from their mouths. It is blather. If it were not for lawsuit abuse, there would be no need for tort reform.

Blather? Dupes? Troll the old line? Web of deciet? And do you merely focus on unsafe products for a logical reason Lewis?

The actual EPI work from Ross Eisenberry, an obvious "pointy headed intellectual" controlled by his union masters, is labeled Tort costs and the economy: Myths, exaggerations, and propaganda. Lewis found so "prettily written" and I'd just offer that it is relatively clear given its complexity and scope. However, it is hardly easy to quickly distill, and I've gone on too long anyways with this post. So I'll let the thing go by with just a link and offering that I found it "righteous" and hardly "blighted". Nice graphics also make it worth a visit. If you're looking for "bombast" I'm afraid you'll be disappointed.

You've got to buy the PRI's study "Jackpot Justice" unfortunately. Dr. Lawrence J. McQuillan has I'm sure pounded out a stellar piece of scholarship. His ideas on Social Security privatization followed the agreed upon language and selling points of the right. McQuillan earned his Ph.D. in economics from George Mason University and has been a Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution. Nuff said if we reverse Mr. Fuller's arguments? His colleague Anthony P. Archie earned his degrees from Pepperdine. Reckon if he ran across Special Persecutor now Dean Kenneth Starr while he was earning his paper? He's also working for a right wing "paper" to boot. Right wing welfare at work out way out on the Left Coast making its way to Alabama. Who'd have thunk it?

I also found it interesting that Lewis has been a favored LTE source for the PRI. Over the summer he managed to get a LTE in the T-Town News that was worthy of note, at least for the distinguished PRI. They've also linked to one he got into the Montgomery Advertiser this summer. Maybe Lewis Fuller could help them out on other causes? After all, by visiting Pacific Research Institute you can get a book on why the middle class needs school choice. Also, there's the obligatory climate change denial. PRI is a true friend to Big Oil. PRI is "distinguished" certainly Lewis, if only for their funding by big business and right wing foundations.

Finally, I've previously posted some of the "reasoning" of AVALA's partner in crime, the Alabama Policy Institute. I'm still unsure if the AVALA official that came to a Lions Club meeting in Roanoke some years ago and tried to tell the poor Lions that Workermen's Comp cases involved runaway punitive damages was their current Executive Director Skip Tucker. I caught whomever was there from AVALA in so many lies that he pretty much started a combination of attacking and distraction. I guess he figured if he could get away with lying he'd try it.

If it was Skip then bless his heart and I must note that he definitely married up. Skip's lovely and apparently very capable bride Lissa Astilla Tucker is the Director of Governmental Relations of the Alabama Association of School Boards where she is advertised as an "experienced lobbyist". She previously was a high roller with the Washington-based American Tort Reform Association. I've surely scolded Skip before and Barbara Evans, late of the apparently defunct or at least struggling Alabama Watch, isn't too happy with him either for his recent attacks on Alabama Chief Justice Sue Bell Cobb and ... in relation to the ExxonMobil reversal by "the erudite and fair members of the Alabama Supreme Court".

Corporate funded "scholarship" and advocacy get parroted by a small time medical supplies salesman from Gadsden Alabama. How the right wing's message machine works is truly impressive. And scary. Peace ... or War!