Has anyone read John Grisham's "The Appeal"?

[MindPilot]

Its a story about how big business uses big money to create candidates, build front corporations, manipulate campaigns, fabricate wedge issues and get the right judge in the right place at the right time to swing the law in favor of the aforementioned big business.

Chillingly prescient in light of the Citizens United decision; they just don't have to do it behind closed doors anymore.

[babylonsister]

1. I haven't, but now I want to, I think. Thanks. Sounds chilling. nt

[proud2BlibKansan]

5. Yes. Read it.

You'll like it.

[Staph]

2. Based on a real case

Don Blankenship (CEO of A.T. Massey Coal Company -- in the news this week for debating RFK Jr. on the merits of mountaintop mining) decided that he was going to lose a big verdict in a fraud lawsuit with an independent mining company. So Blankenship found his own pet judge, financed his campaign (spending more than $3 million) and got Brent Benjamin elected to a 12 year term on the West Virginia Supreme Court.

When Massey's case came up before the WV Supreme Court, Benjamin refused to recuse himself, saying that the $3 million that got him elected didn't affect his opinion. That case was taken to the U.S. Supreme Court, and they (the usual 5 to 4 gang!) ruled that the appearance of conflict of interest was so extreme that Benjamin's failure to recuse himself constituted a threat to the plaintiff's Constitutional right to due process under the Fourteenth Amendment.

[proud2BlibKansan]

6. Sadly Grisham's book doesn't end like that

I both loved and hated the ending.

[MindPilot]

8. Yeah, that didn't work out well for anyone.

Except for Carl Trudeau; the very last line is about him, and very descriptive, "Now that he had three billion, he really wanted six."

[MindPilot]

7. good info...thanks for that

Grisham's stuff is almost always based in reality; in the book it was a chemical company that had polluted an entire town.

[Brother Buzz]

3. I still reflect on Grisham's dull-witted President in "The Pelican Brief"

"I want young conservative white men opposed to abortion, pornography, queers, gun control, racial quotas. I want judges who hate dope and criminals and are enthusiastic about the death penalty. Understand?"

Remind you of anyone?

[proud2BlibKansan]

4. I read it over Thanksgiving and it's been on my mind a lot these last few days

And every time I think of this book I get sick to my stomach.