The Goat Pen

And then I wouldn't have got the clap. Thrice!

Professor Tiger wrote:Hey, the EU just won the Nobel Prize. It sounds like a raging alcoholic can get huge recognition if he/she simply makes an appointment to visit an AA group.

I think the award is deserved. Nothing has done more to demasculate European countries than the EU system. The Mediterranean countries just let the Germans roll them. If this was 100 years ago, Merkel would have been assassinated when she visited Athens

The Greeks think the EZ bailout was German payback for the asskicking that the Greeks think they gave them during WWII combined with a conspiracy by those dirty rotten Jewish bankers that already secretly control the world.

Six famous "frivolous lawsuit" stories that are total BS

http://www.cracked.com/article_19150_6- ... -b.s..html

And that's exactly the thought process of everybody who endlessly repeats these stories. It's why the guy in the cubicle next to you is happy to tell you about the burglar who broke into a house, tripped over the coffee table and then sued the owners of the home into bankruptcy. Sure, he doesn't know exactly where that happened or where he read about it, but we all know that stuff happens, so what does it matter if that story is true? After all, this is a country where you can sue for millions if your coffee was too hot.

The McDonald's coffee lawsuit was frivolous:


1). My home coffee maker brews it at 190. As a coffee enthusiast, I prefer it that hot. The reason why many home brewers are NOW brewing at cooler temps is because of fear of copycat lawsuits (see some of the Starbucks suits- most of which Starbuck's won)...But the lower brew temp is not optimal.

2). Yes, she had bad burns. She was 200-years-old and was wearing nylon pants which held in the hot coffee. I've spilled just-as-hot coffee on myself and have yet to require skin grafts.

3). She bought the coffee through the drive-thru and carelessly balanced it between her knees to add cream and sugar in a moving car and spilled it as the driver (her son, I believe) lurched the car forward.

4). Yes, I know McD's had received complaints. They have a bazillion restaurants. They've had complaints about everything. I'm sure Chicago Cutlery has had complaints about knives being too sharp, Exxon about gasoline being too flammable and Stanley, I'm sure, have heard that their hammers are too hard and can break fingers when you miss the nail


Didn't even look at the rest of the article because their 1st example was so bad.

I agree with AA. Only socialist bleeding hearts and trial attorneys out of make a buc would think the coffee incident was a jusified case. The woman chose to try to drink it while driving. It is her own fault.

I haven't heard of the other ones before, were not as famous as the McDonald's case, I guess.

I have heard of a rumor of a guy suing a lawn mower company for getting cut while trying to trim shrubs with his mower. I would hate to see that one proven "never happened" because i've used that myself in arguments.

Semi-related question: I never drink coffee, but what makes it better when it's brewed to a temp that takes 15 minutes to cool down and be drinkable?

Arlen Specter has died. Age 82

http://news.yahoo.com/longtime-gop-sena ... itics.html

1.2 Temperature
For coffee brewing, the Specialty Coffee Association of America (SCAA) prescribes a water temperature of 92 - 96 degrees C (195 - 205 degrees F); see The Basics of Brewing Coffee by SCAA Executive Director Ted Lingle. Avoid boiling then cooling the water to the proper range, or at least letting it boil for more than a few moments; boiling hot water rapidly loses dissolved air and will taste flat. If the water is too cool, the brew will be sour and underextracted. The temperature range during brewing should not vary by more then a few degrees, or extraction will not be optimal. Temperature loss often occurs as a result of heat absorption by the equipment itself (for example, if an espresso machine's portafilter is not kept warm between shots by storage in the machine) or into the atmosphere (as in a uninsulated glass French press during the approximately four minute steeping period). Pre-warming the equipment or insulating it, respectively, will solve these problems.

http://www.thecoffeefaq.com/1thebasics.html#besttemp

Turkey and Syria drawing closer to open war? Turkey bans all Syrian air flights from crossing its airspace in retaliation for Syria doing the same.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-19940506

Human Rights Watch and other advocacy groups accuse Syria of using cluster bombs against its own population

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2012/10/14 ... killing-4/

Joe Biden says not to worry.

He was grinning like a 'possum eating shit.

sardis wrote:Joe Biden says not to worry.

Whose side do you think we should take? The secularist, socialist dictator who hates America or the Islamist, Al-Qaeda linked rebels who hate America?

Why take sides? Nuke them all.

EFZ

lol

AlabamAlum wrote:The McDonald's coffee lawsuit was frivolous:


1). My home coffee maker brews it at 190. As a coffee enthusiast, I prefer it that hot. The reason why many home brewers are NOW brewing at cooler temps is because of fear of copycat lawsuits (see some of the Starbucks suits- most of which Starbuck's won)...But the lower brew temp is not optimal.

2). Yes, she had bad burns. She was 200-years-old and was wearing nylon pants which held in the hot coffee. I've spilled just-as-hot coffee on myself and have yet to require skin grafts.

3). She bought the coffee through the drive-thru and carelessly balanced it between her knees to add cream and sugar in a moving car and spilled it as the driver (her son, I believe) lurched the car forward.

4). Yes, I know McD's had received complaints. They have a bazillion restaurants. They've had complaints about everything. I'm sure Chicago Cutlery has had complaints about knives being too sharp, Exxon about gasoline being too flammable and Stanley, I'm sure, have heard that their hammers are too hard and can break fingers when you miss the nail


Didn't even look at the rest of the article because their 1st example was so bad.

She was 20% at fault and McDonald's was 80% at fault. McDonald's had lost previous suits on the same matter but still continued in its practices. The coffee was bought from another company that had a recommended temperature that was far exceeded by McDonad's practices. Keep doing something that multiple courts have found you negligent in, then you will get a ruling like the McDonald case. She was old (age 79), but she was a passenger. The car was not moving. She put it on the seat to take off the lid to put in cream and sugar. She asked to settle the claim for $20,000 for her 3rd degree burns but McDonald's refused.

At the time of the lawsuit, testimony found that most coffee establishments sold their coffee at between 130 and 140 degrees. McDonald's admitted that it knew that a burn hazard existed when coffee was above 140 degrees. Experts testified that at 180 degrees, 3rd degree burns would occur in less than 7 seconds. Testimony from McDonald's admitted that most people in cars consume their coffee in cars and they also admitted that they didn't give adequate warning of the risk of severe burn (just that it was hot).

The jury awarded the woman $200,000 (reduced to $160,000. Punitive damages were over $2.5 million. That's not what the woman ended up with, McDonald's ended up in a confidential settlement.

I was on the defense side. There are frivolous lawsuits. They tend not to get very far though because of the cost to bring them and because judges tend to throw out cases that have absolutely no merit. In addition, opposing counsel can seek Rule 11 sanctions against attorneys that bring frivolous suits.

Most attorneys don't intend to bring losing suits. The problem is that they don't know enough not to believe every thing that their client tells them

Bullshit. Why should someone else pay for your own stupidity?