So Many Republican Hypocrites, So Little Time - Bork Sues Yale Club

[EV_Ares]

Welcome back to the BuzzFlash GOP Hypocrite of the Week.

Robert Bork has made a living out of being the bilious, hateful symbol of right wing jurists. Since he was "Borked" and denied a seat on the Supreme Court in 1987, the former Nixon hit man has become even more embittered.

According to Wikipedia, "Bork served as acting Attorney General of the United States from 1973 to 1974. As acting Attorney General, he is known for carrying out U.S. President Richard Nixon's order to fire Watergate Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox following Cox's request for tapes of Oval Office conversations. The firing incident is known as the "Saturday Night Massacre." Nixon's Attorney General Elliot Richardson and Richardson's Deputy Attorney General, William Ruckelshaus, resigned rather than carry out the order. Bork, next in line after Richardson and Ruckelshaus, became acting head of the Justice Department, and Nixon reiterated his order to fire Cox. Bork complied with Nixon's order and fired Cox. He subsequently resumed his duties as Solicitor General."

Wow, what a pedigree! And at the favored right wing "think tank" of Cheney and Bush -- the American Enterprise Institute -- Bork championed such favorite GOP goals as "tort reform" in the ongoing Republican effort to please corporations by limiting the right to sue for injuries and damages. So it came as a bit of a hypocritical surprise that Bork recently sued the Yale Club of New York for $1 million. What was the basis of the suit?

You guessed it. Bork is asking for damages on the basis of claiming he suffered a disabling injury due to the negligence of the Yale Club. According to Wikipedia, "On June 6, 2007, Bork filed suit in federal court in New York City against the Yale Club over an incident that had occurred a year earlier. Bork alleged that, while trying to reach the dais to speak at an event, he fell, because of the Yale Club's failure to provide any steps or handrail between the floor and the dais. According to the complaint, Bork's injuries required surgery, immobilized him for months, forced him to use a cane, and left him with a limp. Ted Frank, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, who, like Bork, has been a proponent of 'tort reform' measures to restrict plaintiffs' rights, criticized the suit as 'embarrassingly silly.'"

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[MADem]

1. Ah, yes: Robert Bork--the MONICA GOODLING of the Nixon Justice Department!!!

What a pedigree, indeed!

Gee, is he, by any chance, advising the "Drycleaner-Pants" judge?

[EV_Ares]

2. As the Right Wingers; probably Fox News included are making such

an issue of the judge and his pants, wonder if Fox will mention Bork's lawsuit!

[whoneedstickets]

3. Richardson and Ruckelshaus resigned...

..Ah the good old days when individual integrity, ethics and loyalty to the constitution weren't subordinated to partisan loyalty.

[WiseButAngrySara]

4. Hey, what's frivolous for some is altogether justifiable for

others. Their hypocrisy galls me, but it has long since been a 'surprise.'

[EV_Ares]

5. Bork vs Bork - NY Times Editorial

There are many versions of the cliché that “a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged,” and Robert Bork has just given rise to another. A tort plaintiff, it turns out, is a critic of tort lawsuits who has slipped and fallen at the Yale Club.

Mr. Bork, of course, is the former federal appeals court judge who was nominated to the Supreme Court in 1987 but not confirmed by the Senate. He has long been famous for his lack of sympathy for people who go to court with claims of race or sex discrimination, or other injustices. He has gotten particularly exercised about accident victims driving up the cost of business by filing lawsuits. In an op-ed article, he once complained that “juries dispense lottery-like windfalls,” and compared the civil justice system to “Barbary pirates.”

That was before Mr. Bork spoke at the Yale Club last year, and fell on his way to the dais, injuring his leg and bumping his head. Mr. Bork is not merely suing the club for failing to provide a set of stairs and a handrail between the floor and the dais. He has filed a suit that is so aggressive about the law that, if he had not filed it himself, we suspect he might regard it as, well, piratical.

Mr. Bork puts the actual damages for his apparently non-life-threatening injuries (after his fall, he was reportedly able to go on and deliver his speech) at “in excess of $1,000,000.” He is also claiming punitive damages. And he is demanding that the Yale Club pay his attorney’s fees.

We can imagine what Mr. Bork the legal scholar would ask if he had a chance to question Mr. Bork the plaintiff. If it was “reasonably foreseeable” that without stairs and a handrail, “a guest such as Mr. Bork” would be injured, why did Mr. Bork try to climb up to the dais? Where does personal responsibility enter in? And wouldn’t $1 million-plus punitive damages amount to a “lottery-like windfall”?

Since we believe in the tort system, when properly used, all we would ask is whether Mr. Bork’s unfortunate experience at the Yale Club has led him to re-evaluate any of the harsh things he has said in the past about injured people, much like himself, who simply wanted their day in court.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/14/opinion/14thu4.html?_r=1&oref=slogin