US Elections: When Murder isn't Murder

[Tywin et al.]

13 minutes ago, GrapefruitPerrier said:

Every time a plane crashes, the airline, manufacturer, maker of any part, software developers, and tha irport and repair guys are all used.  Do most of these have any actual liability, no.

If a plane crashes due to a mechanical malfunction, it makes perfect sense for the families of the victims to sue the manufacture of the plane, just like you can sue a gun manufacture if the gun backfires and blows up in your face. But if a pilot purposely crashes a plane because they're a homicidal maniac trying to maximize the number of casualties why should the manufacture be held accountable?

[NestorMakhnosLovechild]

31 minutes ago, Shryke said:

Exactly. There's no reason gun manufacturers should not-so-randomly be exempt from the proud american tradition of bullshit lawsuits.

Except, of course, if you want to treat guns as a special industry.

This has everything to do with guns. It's why it applies to guns and not anything else. It's why Sanders supported the measure as a way to pick up rural white votes. This has been his standard position for a long time now on the issue.

Well, a couple of separate points.

First, the gun industry is not the only industry that receives special kinds of protections. It is not uncommon for Congress or even state legislatures to create special rules about the types of things that certain industries can be held to be responsible for, and limit liability in certain ways. 

For example, the Communications Decency Act prohibits victims of online defamation from suing service providers (Verizon, Comcast, ATT) and content providers (Youtube, Twitter, etc.) for failing to monitor or remove defamatory posts that are uploaded by customers. 

The 1986 National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act provides immunity to vaccine manufacturers who improperly design vaccines that injure or kill people. 

Ironically, you asked about immunity for airline accidents, and in fact pursuant to the 1994 General Aviation Revitalization Act, small aircraft manufacturers are immune from lawsuits involving aircraft they manufactured that are more than 18 years old. 

In terms of state laws, if you live in a state where certain recreational activities - downhill skiing is a really good example - are very popular and a big source of revenue, it's completely common for that state to have adopted laws that severely limit liability for the types of claims that can be brought against, for example, ski area operators.

I'm not suggesting that these are all necessarily good laws, or that they all protect the industries in exactly the same way or to exactly the same extent, but the idea of a legislature creating special limits for liability is not terribly uncommon and not unheard of and the firearms industry is certainly not the only industry to benefit from this. 

Second, the issue of who should bear liability for what kind of actions - is an issue which has always been socially mediated. What constitutes "negligence" or "recklessness" and things like that have always been matters of social judgment. It's clear that there's a not insignificant group of people in America who think that the mere idea of making handguns or assault rifles available for purchase to the average person in America is, per se, an irresponsible, perhaps even negligent, action.

And there's a world in which I think you could make that argument and it wouldn't be absurd. But we have an even larger group of people, and a Constitution that backs them up, that says that this behavior is constitutionally protected. And while it may seem like a "fairer" argument to just let the Court system sort this issue out, there is an equally plausible argument for the legislature stepping in and passing laws which clarify what types of harms are actionable and what types of harms are not actionable, given societal judgments and our Constitutional framework. The legislature has the power to strike that balance in society, whether it comes to guns or vaccines or small aircraft or communications networks, and they act in that capacity all the time. It doesn't mean you have to think it's a good law, but it's not a law that, facially, offends common sense or common decency.

Third, there is a history here that led up the passage of the law. And that history has more to do with current political debates about the 2nd Amendment than anything else. The Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act was very much a response to anti-firearm liberals like Richard Daley (then mayor of Chicago), Joseph Ganim (then mayor of Bridgeport, Connecticut), Andrew Cuomo and Eliot Spitzer making very public statements and filing very public lawsuits sometimes on behalf of their cities, indicating that they had every intention of attempting to "creat[e] law with litigation" because they didn't like the actual laws that were on the books and promises to kill gun manufacturers with a "death by a thousand cuts." And that's creative and that's novel, and sometimes that works and it's a good thing, and sometimes that works and it's a bad thing, and sometimes what happens is that the legislature responds by plugging in the gaps that might make these types of novel lawsuits difficult or impossible. And that's what happened. This has always, really, truly been about liberals and conservatives fighting over the role of the 2nd Amendment in America.

Fourth, while the actual law is very protective over the gun industry, it still does provide an avenue for lawsuits. Manufacturers are still liable for manufacturing defects and breach of contract, and they are still liable for "negligence per se" and "negligent entrustment" claims. And that's what the Newton lawsuit is about, really. It's an attempt to shove a novel issue into the framework of a "negligent entrustment" suit. And while I think it is all but likely to be doomed, it's an interesting attempt. 

 

 

[Kalbear]

Quote

But if a pilot purposely crashes a plane because they're a homicidal maniac trying to maximize the number of casualties why should the manufacture be held accountable?

If the plane supposedly has features that would disallow something like that, yes, it should be. The point is that it should be up for discussion, and you shouldn't be automatically exempt because you're a plane manufacturer. 

It's certainly not a ridiculous notion per se, as Nestor indicates above. It is something that likely should be a conversation. And conversations in the law invariably involve either new laws or new lawsuits.

[Tywin et al.]

39 minutes ago, Shryke said:

No, they want to sue them for marketing the gun as having civilian applications despite them saying it doesn't. That's what they suit is. Stop lying.

Regardless of whether or not you think the suit has merit, why shouldn't they have their day in court for the judge, if nothing else, to simply throw it out. That's how it works elsewhere.

 

There's simply no defending this bullshit. It's a special exemption carved out for gun manufacturers by the NRA in order to let american politicians wank off american gun-crazy voters.

Where did I lie? Maybe read the article, where their lawyer said exactly what I said. 

Either way, if you want the gun banned then petition the Congress, don't sue the people who legally made it.

[Kalbear]

Quote

Either way, if you want the gun banned then petition the Congress, don't sue the people who legally made it.

Why? 

If they made a gun and marketed a gun specifically to do illegal actions and knowingly did so, why wouldn't that be something that should be a lawsuit? The idea that the only way to get the market to change is by having congress ban something is ludicrous. That is one avenue; that isn't and shouldn't be the only one. 

Think of this like tobacco. Yes, congress can ban cigarettes. Or the market can basically decide that cigarettes have risk and that that risk costs money. Both are completely reasonable ways to get the universe to change, and both are well-provisioned by our government and the way things work in our society. 

It really isn't a ludicrous idea. You might not agree with it or why they're doing it, but the idea that I can't sue a gun manufacturer for making a gun whose only real value is to slaughter humans indiscriminately is not a ludicrous idea on its face. 

[NestorMakhnosLovechild]

11 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

If the plane supposedly has features that would disallow something like that, yes, it should be. The point is that it should be up for discussion, and you shouldn't be automatically exempt because you're a plane manufacturer. 

It's certainly not a ridiculous notion per se, as Nestor indicates above. It is something that likely should be a conversation. And conversations in the law invariably involve either new laws or new lawsuits.

These are always tough issues. Right after 9/11 Congress went and bailed out the airline industry and limited their liability for terrorist attacks. Was that the right call in every particular? I honestly just do not know. But without some kind of limits on airline liability, the entire industry, which is already heavily reliant upon government intervention, might have become completely unininsurable. 

Even without the threat of terrorist attacks, the logistics of maintaining our commercial aviation system are already so daunting and they are already so reliant upon state intervention to stay solvent. It seems completely crazy to me that we would even consider burdening airlines with the entire responsibility of thinking up ways to prevent possible terror attacks. It seems much better for the government, as it did right after 9/11, to simply mandate new safety standards in consultation with the airlines, and come to some system, which we seem to have, that strikes a balance between individual liability (the companies pay) and "socialized" liability (we all pay).  

 

[Kalbear]

That all seems fair, but it's also a conversation we had (and continue to have). It's not a conversation we've had to any degree with gun manufacturers, and the notion that we shouldn't even be allowed to talk about it is not a reasonable one, IMO. 

[Altherion]

New national poll from PRRI / the Atlantic:

Quote

Sanders had the support of 47 percent of Democratic or Democratic-leaning voters while Clinton had 46 percent—a narrow gap that fell within the poll’s 2.5 percent margin of error. The national survey was conducted in the days before the Vermont senator handily defeated the former secretary of state in the Wisconsin primary, and it tracks other polls in the last week that found Sanders erasing Clinton’s edge across the country. In a poll that PRRI conducted in January, Clinton had a 20-point lead.

Given Sanders' recent streak of victories and the national polls, it looks more and more like the tide is turning against Clinton. Question is: will it turn far enough and fast enough for him to catch up in terms of delegates...

[lokisnow]

A profile of the monstrous Kansas crusader (secretary of state Kobach) who is becoming one of the most powerful national figures in actively disenfranchising citizens and actively suppressing voting and actively preventing voter registration. A profoundly evil man, he recently got Obama to appoint a Kobach crony to the EAC and the EAC has now been issuing on behalf of Kobach unilateral voter suppression rules to states that did not even ask for such rulings.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/the-conservative-gladiator-from-kansas-behind-restrictive-voting-laws/2016/04/06/57ad18d2-eaed-11e5-b0fd-073d5930a7b7_story.html?postshare=6311459997972449&tid=ss_tw

[Kalbear]

4 minutes ago, Altherion said:

New national poll from PRRI / the Atlantic:

Given Sanders' recent streak of victories and the national polls, it looks more and more like the tide is turning against Clinton. Question is: will it turn far enough and fast enough for him to catch up in terms of delegates...

Maybe. It's also just two polls. A poll on April 1st had Clinton +6, and the PPP poll had Clinton +15 and that was on March 29th. 

Not that national polls matter that much anyway; what matters is the state polls, and even they aren't that big a deal. New York still has a double digit Clinton lead.

[NestorMakhnosLovechild]

9 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

That all seems fair, but it's also a conversation we had (and continue to have). It's not a conversation we've had to any degree with gun manufacturers, and the notion that we shouldn't even be allowed to talk about it is not a reasonable one, IMO. 

I agree, and I think it's totally fair to make the case for the law's repeal. I think that some of the rhetoric surrounding the law is overblown and some of the things that have been said about it (specifically by Clinton) are not true.

[Tywin et al.]

21 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

If the plane supposedly has features that would disallow something like that, yes, it should be. The point is that it should be up for discussion, and you shouldn't be automatically exempt because you're a plane manufacturer. 

It's certainly not a ridiculous notion per se, as Nestor indicates above. It is something that likely should be a conversation. And conversations in the law invariably involve either new laws or new lawsuits.

I philosophically disagree. I don't think any manufacture should have to fear the threat of a lawsuit because someone took their product and misused it. If there is a feature of the product that failed, then we have different situation. Say I own a company that makes hammers. If someone goes and buys one with no indication that they intend to misuse it, and then goes and attacks someone with it, I should not have to fear that I may be sued because of the person's actions. Now if that same person goes to hammer a nail in and the head breaks off and flies back and hits them in the face, they should be able to sue me/my company.

16 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Why? 

If they made a gun and marketed a gun specifically to do illegal actions and knowingly did so, why wouldn't that be something that should be a lawsuit? The idea that the only way to get the market to change is by having congress ban something is ludicrous. That is one avenue; that isn't and shouldn't be the only one. 

Think of this like tobacco. Yes, congress can ban cigarettes. Or the market can basically decide that cigarettes have risk and that that risk costs money. Both are completely reasonable ways to get the universe to change, and both are well-provisioned by our government and the way things work in our society. 

It really isn't a ludicrous idea. You might not agree with it or why they're doing it, but the idea that I can't sue a gun manufacturer for making a gun whose only real value is to slaughter humans indiscriminately is not a ludicrous idea on its face. 

I want to say upfront that I personally think guns like the AR-15 should be banned. But I don't think suing the people who make them is the right way to go about it, if the current laws say they can make it.

That said, did they market the gun specifically to do illegal actions? I've never seen any evidence that they did, but if that were to be the case then I think it's fair to sue them. But suing them over their marketing strategy is not the same thing as suing them because they made a legal product.

[Kalbear]

Quote

That said, did they market the gun specifically to do illegal actions? I've never seen any evidence that they did, but if that were to be the case then I think it's fair to sue them. But suing them over their marketing strategy is not the same thing as suing them because they made a legal product.

And currently the gun manufacturers cannot be sued for either, by law. That was the law that Sanders voted to continue to uphold. 

[Guest]

24 minutes ago, Altherion said:

New national poll from PRRI / the Atlantic:

Given Sanders' recent streak of victories and the national polls, it looks more and more like the tide is turning against Clinton. Question is: will it turn far enough and fast enough for him to catch up in terms of delegates...

Wow.  Of course, the only states that are left that really matter are NY, PA and CA and he would would need to win them all, big.

[DireWolfSpirit]

I dont expect this to be the case, BUT If Hillary cant carry NY she needs to do some soul searching over why she isnt being sucessful at bringing less moderate voters into the tent. My guess would be its over that Hawkish image she has cultivated since 9/11. 

After all these years of pivoting to the center. "Hillary" projects more like Thatcher than the original Hillary Rodham Clinton and I think it concerns people on foreign policy, at least for a large segment of the more left leaning primary base voters. Voters that are definately dragging their feet to fall in line. Like I said, if she cant carry NY, that would really be quite the shot over the bow so to speak.

[Altherion]

15 minutes ago, GrapefruitPerrier said:

Wow.  Of course, the only states that are left that really matter are NY, PA and CA and he would would need to win them all, big.

Yes and no. Those are certainly the three largest states and they comprise more than half of the remaining delegates, but only slightly more than half (911 of the 1661 still up for grabs). Sanders does need to win them all, but the victories need not be dramatic in all three. In fact, it would be sufficient to win big in California which has the beneficial feature of voting in June. If you look at the history of national Democratic primary polls, there's obviously a lot of fluctuation, but there is also a clear trend of Sanders getting better and better results. If the trend continues, by June he should be up by a substantial margin and a dramatic victory in California would not be out of reach... but for him to plausibly have a chance at that point, he first needs to win New York.

[Weeping Sore]

There's no way she'd drop out even if she loses NY narrowly, which, let's face it, is the only way she loses NY. She's got the delegate lead. She can lose every contest going forward and still get the nomination as long as she keeps it close enough. Though nice job by team Bernie in Wisconsin getting 56.5% of the vote when he needs to keep up a pace of 57% of pledged delegates.

What bothers me about Hillary's Iraq vote is that I'm convinced she knew better at the time and just voted out of political expediency, not wanting to be seen as a left-wing peacenik.

As for her stint as Secretary of State, my guess is that the appointment was quid pro quo for calling off the PUMAs in 2008. Obama added some new state department czars for Pakistan & Afghanistan, and the Middle East as a hedge to limit Clinton's influence over foreign policy.

[Tywin et al.]

49 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

And currently the gun manufacturers cannot be sued for either, by law. That was the law that Sanders voted to continue to uphold. 

What are you talking about? If they marketed the gun with the implication that it could be used to do illegal things then they could absolutely be sued.

[Kalbear]

Quote

After all these years of pivoting to the center. "Hillary" projects more like Thatcher than the original Hillary Rodham Clinton and I think it concerns people on foreign policy, at least for a large segment of the more left leaning primary base voters. 

This is another FUD point from republicans that I still don't understand. She openly supports LGBT rights. She supports immigration expansion. She supports police revision and jail revision. She openly opposes dramatic military intervention and multiple wars in the past. She openly advocates coalitions for intervention. The idea that she is remotely comparable to Thatcher is essentially rooted in that they're both women, and that's all. If that is what people believe, they were such low-information people that they were never going to vote for Clinton in a million years, and that's entirely because  their idea of what a woman politician should be like is so completely wrong.

[Kalbear]

Just now, Tywin et al. said:

What are you talking about? If they marketed the gun with the implication that it could be used to do illegal things then they could absolutely be sued.

Actually...no, they couldn't, not right now, not under the existing laws. Nor could they be sued if they marketed it as something that is impossible to be used for illegal purposes and it was used, unmodified for the purposes that they said it couldn't be.

They are completely not liable for any acts that people do with their firearms. They are only liable if the gun breaks consistently and often and they knew about it. That's it. 

 

Quote

 

Though nice job by team Bernie in Wisconsin getting 56.5% of the vote when he needs to keep up a pace of 57% of pledged delegates.

 

As stated before, this isn't actually a nice job when you factor in real demographics. It means he has to do even better in other races. Unless you assume that DC and Maryland are miraculously also going to go to Sanders at a 57-43% rate.