So in response to the 9/11 attacks and the now (the VT killings), the government (at various levels) has acted to create funds of wealth to compensate those who were harmed. The (spoken) idea being that litigation would be difficult considering the circumstances. This (spoken) approach to compensation acknowledges that litigation is brutal business. At the very least, it acknowledges that it is undesirable to litigate when the victim's families are in distress.

Isn't most tort litigation under distress? So the stress of the tort system is ok if your Mother, trapped in her car, drowns in mud, but not okay if you've lost family members in 9/11?

"Socialism for the rich and Capitalism for the poor..."

I'm not implying that the victims of the above atrocities are rich, but that those scenarios threatened the rich... with great problems... from the streets.

Maybe we should move to a universal tort system... like New Zealand? It is sad that anyone should have to litigate for wrongful death.

Sorry, if this is either just an explicit recap of last class or if it is just way off base.

-- JosephMacias - 19 Apr 2008

Maybe I'm wrong, but each time the U.S. government responds as it did in 9/11, isn't that an unofficial New Zealand-like compromise? If the pendulum keeps moving in this direction, maybe we'll gradually inch our way toward an eclipse of the tort system, but it's going to take a lot more tragedies to build general tolerance for this approach. How ironic.

-- BarbPitman - 20 Apr 2008