-like the 2nd Amendment!-, it is The Law! It’s another sacred Bible!…”
“Yes, I’ve seen,” said Barbara, “how the ultimate argument for the enforcers, the cops on the road, is to tell you in your face that: ‘It is the Law.’ And of course lawyers have concocted all the laws. Perhaps some major changes (reducing the number of lawyers, closing most or all law schools!) could be tried down the road in smaller countries. Or in the US, only in small confines like some cities or counties -or ONE state!- throwing out all their laws and starting from scratch… Which won’t happen!”
“Not bad, Barbara, not bad! Perhaps you may have something there… But to have less Law schools or to graduate less students -of any profession- you know how unlikely that is these days when colleges and universities have more programs, more schools, more applicants and more graduates for revenue and business, not because society needs this or that number or type of professionals…”
“Actually” she said, “a doctor i’ve heard of, a prolific writer who happens to live in this state, not too far from here, a Dr…… I can't remember his real name… or his pen name… did write about all that in his last books and blasting against lawyers; but they were not blockbusters. I did have a copy, but I gave it to your sister Marie…
Both munched their ham steak and pineapple in silence for a while.
“And from your side, Barb, the medical world, any news?” he asked.
“Nothing major of today’s news, but plenty, continuously, as you in your judicial position, also in personal dissatisfaction of the docs and the public with the new Obama Care. They hate the costs and profits of pharmaceutical products, and the upper and middle class hate social ‘entitlements’ but most love getting something-for-nothing, anything, everything, especially medical stuff, without paying.”
“And on matters of liability?
“Yes, Ken. All is nasty. You often see the liability issues in your court. Medical malpractice stuff and the horrible oversight of licenses and misconduct by the States’ Health and Education Departments, by OPC: The Office of Professional Conduct, a corrupt and hideous state agency empowered by awful state laws, by legislation aimed only at sacking, wiping out professionals, ruining lives. It is equivalent to legal murder of many, especially doctors; all made ‘legal’ by state legislators, all lawyers.
“Remember, Ken?” We watched together last week, on PBS, Stanley Cramer’s Judgment at Nuremberg. Spencer Tracy, as Presiding Judge Haywood, in his closing comments before sentencing the four villain Nazi judges to prison-for-life, tells them that existing directives from above (called Laws, a Government!) do not justify the individual judges for committing acts, for issuing rulings, against decency, humanity and morality, against basic human rights.
“And now in the US the similarities of how many innocent professionals are also literally destroyed have not been acknowledged; it is all ignored and forgotten! In the same film, the German defense lawyer played by Maximillian Schell, blames ‘others’ -besides Germany- the US, Russia and even the Vatican, for committing too, ‘legal’ atrocities against humanity. Indeed our Constitution, a legislation, the Law, existing nasty but ‘legal’ state laws, justify ‘officially’ evil policies carried out by Government agencies, by its lawyers, to destroy precious, dear professional lives, often innocent. The law enforcers thus enjoy a free hand to kill, wipe out lives…”
Both paused.
“You are really bitter and disgusted with our system, aren’t you?” He asked.
“I think as much as you! I wish I could…” After another pause, she went on:
“By the way, Ken, I have a friend, a woman child neurologist that I don’t think you’ve met yet, being shaken up by our State Health Department. I want to ask your opinion about what I know of her case. She fears for her license, though she does not think she’s done anything wrong -just a disliked report she wrote on a tough kid- but perhaps she has been targeted by state officials for her leaning towards ‘our genes’ as the cause of children’s learning and behavior problems -and she is often against the famous ‘Early Intervention’- and they are after her head. Perhaps you may have some ideas or concrete steps for her to take to shake them off her back. Any advice I can pass along?”
“Those cases are very tough once the State gets their eyes on them. The Department, OPC, is run more by lawyers than doctors. And they have nearly total control of each case rendering the accused professionals, AND the targeted doctor’s own lawyer, totally powerless. They can’t extricate themselves without a stain in their record at a minimum, and often worse, they end up losing their license.”
“Why?”
“Because they have managed to talk their lawyer-colleagues in the state legislature into drafting state laws that are nearly unassailable, meant to call the process ‘legal,’ to facilitate the sacking of the accused with total disregard for their civil rights!… They are like those Nazi judges you just mentioned, with total power to sack, regardless of any exculpatory evidence. Like by getting access to ALL the records of the accused -to build their case against him or her- even when there are no criminal charges, no real professional blunder, illegal or dangerous conduct and they have no proof of anything; they are masters at suppressing evidence. They disregard witnesses and experts who favor the accused. Does ‘transparency’ exist for them? Transparency? What is that!”
“But that is unconstitutional, immoral,” said Barbara, “Isn’t it?”
“Yes, it is,” her husband went on, “and since their ways to hang the doc are written into the state law, they appear perfectly O.K., all’s perfectly legal; the ‘morality’ of such laws does not even count and if the accused brings the case to a law suit, no state judge touches them, not even the Court of Appeals.”
“Why again?”
“Because the state discipline department -through the dozens of lawyers in the State Attorney General’s office, often a band of heartless hoodlums- manages to easily dismiss every case, just about always, in front of a single judge, without jurors, just on paper, wrapping the dismissal in technicalities that hit the accused and his counsel like an unassailable cement wall.”
“And the federal courts?”
“Neither the federal ‘District’ courts nor the federal appeals ‘Circuit’ courts touch the subject either. They dismiss these cases on paper, without a trial, often bringing up sovereignty, executive privilege of the state -‘eminent domain’ they call it- on which the federal government and its courts supposedly does not interfere with the state.”
“Even if the accused is denied civil rights?”
“That’s right. Even if those state laws are totally against the most basic civil rights -and they are-, the federal courts often look the other way.”
“So the doctor targeted and under investigation, the accused, has no chance with the state courts! Is that it?”
“Yes,” her husband the judge admitted.
“Even in your court?”
“That’s right! In such cases we judges, even if sympathetic to the doctor-in-trouble, find ourselves with our hands tied. Like judge Janning in Nuremberg! So most of my colleagues recuse themselves from taking medical misconduct cases to possibly side against the State, our employer!… I probably would too…”
“But
