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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (19074)	5/18/2006 12:35:07 PM
From: JohnM	Respond to of 544238

Don't you have to demonstrate damage to win a lawsuit? Or has that become a quaint rudiment of civil law? So now us non-lawyers can argue legal stuff?? ;-) I presume the worries, that have been written about in several newspapers, are less about who wins a lawsuit, than the costs of ramping up for lawsuits and, more important, the costs to the public image of the telco companies. But the point I'm making is that their response, the Verizon and BellSouth response, was crafted within the context of worries about legal issues. And I should have added they were undoubtedly worried about hits to their reputation. And, thus, I read their disclaimers right now with the usual large bit of cynicism.

To: Lane3 who wrote (19074)	5/18/2006 12:56:05 PM
From: Ilaine	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 544238

For a lot of statutory offenses, you just have to prove violation of the statute. Example, violation of the Fair Credit act. If someone peeks into your credit report without your permission, that's an automatic violation and you get a small amount of damages but more important to the lawyers, you get legal fees and costs. A lot of consumer protection statutes are like that. It's too hard to prove real damages. Deliberate violation of the act is per se damage.