Monday, July 06, 2009

Thoughts on the Palin resignation

...on my part are not too many except for one; if it is indeed true that the Palins have accrued $500,000 in legal bills, and the state of Alaska four times as much, it's a wonderful demonstration of the need for a "loser pays" legal system--where plaintiffs who lose their case (all 15 ethics complaints against the Palins were dismissed) pay the legal bills of the winning defendants.

Most of the other claims don't make sense to me, but reality is that if the (frivolous) ethics complaints were truly bleeding her and her family dry, I can see a move like this to stem it.

This also seems to be a clear demonstration of the fact that many people apparently cannot get it through their heads that the courts are intended for real issues, not this kind of harassment.

3 comments:

TRex said...

Many states already have some mechanism in place to make the loser pay. It is supposed to be just for frivolous cases, but the rules vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and enforcement is even less consistant (how are you going to make a judge pass a judgement?)

Gino said...

in this case, the charges were political in nature, designed to cripple and harass her.

what makes you think a partsian judge will be fair,anyway?

first, you need a judge to declare frivolity.

Bike Bubba said...

Good points. The answer is that some places (like England) have "loser pay" laws that more or less say that if you don't win, you automatically pay reasonable legal bills of your opponent.

No decision required on the part of the judge. Completely automatic, and it cuts down on lawsuits with weak evidence really quickly.

I would assert, though, that since all 15 cases were "dismissed," that it would take quite a judge to ignore the basic frivolousness of it. It would take, say, Sonia Sotomayor.