First of all, I'm all for PI attorneys in most cases, especially when battling the insurance companies. My experience was I got rear-ended by an 18 year old kid. Herniated two disks in my neck, but I didn't know that at the time. The kid's insurance paid some money for damages, but not nearly enough to cover the surgery, the loss of income, the permanent damage, etc. The attorney I initially hired took the case on contingency. He got me a settlement fairly quickly. However, because the kid's insurance was bare minimums, he really didn't pursue it much further. Ultimately, he referred me to another PI attorney in the Twin Cities. Since I had "Under-insured motorist" insurance on my insurance, the "new" attorney called and asked why didn't they want to pay?? They fought us and it came down to the day that I had to give my statement to the opposing side and answer questions posed to me by them. Ultimately, they asked one question to which they obviously didn't know the answer to and were totally unprepared for the answer. Did I have any witnesses to the accident? I answered, "yes" and named the witness. They folded up their notebooks and concluded the session. I saw the sinking look on their faces. At that moment, I knew that we had them!! (The police statement was vague, ambiguous and full of erroneous reporting.)
Now, as far as things that require the usage of a little common sense, like the McDonald's fiasco, I don't agree with those. First of all, to brew a decent cup of coffee requires a temp of 190°F MINIMUM. One doesn't necessarily want to boil the coffee, but it needs to be hot. Hell, even their coffee cups were marked "HOT" for many years. Like, duh, coffee IS HOT!! That's something we should have learned by the time we were three years old. As a result of the McDonald's lawsuit, we now have substandard coffee makers that won't brew a decent cup of coffee. In short, the temperature isn't high enough to do the job.
The facts of life are that if one is stupid, careless or simply abuses things, Murphy's law will strike. Look at playgrounds. How the hell did any of us over 40 survive our childhood?? What about seat belts?? I never had to wear a seat belt until long after I was an adult. Sometimes I did, sometimes, I didn't. Even with a seatbelt in use, I still suffered a whiplash injury. Did I sue Ford because the seats weren't designed for my height and caused my neck to hit the headrest at the wrong height?? No. By today's thinking, most of us would have been seriously injured or killed by the things we grew up with and even enjoyed. The bigger fact is that we can't protect everybody from every thing. People need to "man up" and take some responsibility for their lives.
