[PRCo] Re: Responsibility

[Jim Holland]

Jim Holland wrote:
.

> Great Thinking and Writing here by you two brings the following to 
> mind:::::::
> .
> .
> .
> There are two sides to every coin With.....
> .
> .....A Very Thin Line in between the two!!!!!!!
> .
> .
> .
> And two thoughts come to mind as well:::::::
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> .
> 01.>--The Golden Gate Bridge here is a Suicide Magnet and there is 
> much talk about building barriers to prevent the same.
> .
> 02.>--PBS special shot in Europe, of all places, showing people 
> "Choosing" to "Illegally" cross multiple RR tracks and getting killed 
> by trains. A pedestrian bridge was built over these RR tracks but 
> still the "Choice" was to be illegal and cross the tracks and still be 
> killed!!
> .
> 03.>--Even a Third Thought -- Laws are made for __OUR__ Protection and 
> Many times those laws are to Protect "Ourselves" from "Ourselves!!!"
> .
> .
> The PBS special is certainly an example of what Joshua said about the 
> Community being responsible to put up a Stop Sign after several deaths 
> ---- yet our InHumanity gets in the way and 'we' continue our old ways 
> voiding the good intentions of the Community.
> .
> That Thin Edge between the two sides of a coin apparently shifts with 
> time and if I were to 'guess' where we are currently and where we are 
> headed in the future, I would say we have swung about as far left as 
> is possible and that the pendulum should swing back to one of more 
> responsibility. I have seen examples of this recently but can't 
> remember them offhand. That's assuming that we are not at the end of 
> this Age and there should be another 100 or more years down the road!!
> .
> .
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> You guys have provided some Excellent Food For Thought!!
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> .

I tend to be  B&W  or  Wright//Wrong  type individual myself which 
definitely leans toward Personal Responsibility.       I also recognize 
that Compassion is a Very Necessary part of society which is what 
strongly contributes to where the line // edge is drawn between the two 
sides of the coin.       There will Always Be Those who are Poor beyond 
any means to help themselves;  to complicate the issue, there will also 
be those who take advantage of any programs offered to The poor making a 
mockery of compassion!!!
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We  CanNot  Win  For  Losing!!!
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> .
> trams2 at comcast.net wrote:
> .
>
>> I'm not sure that I'm quite as liberal as Joshua in the concept of 
>> "someone has to pay." If I am responsible and the damages exceed my 
>> assets, why should someone else have to cough up? That's income 
>> redistribution, not justice!
>> Ed
>
>
>>> Ed Lybarger wrote:
>>>
>>>> It has been my experience that lawyers, like all other 
>>>> professionals, have both good actors and bad actors. What bothers 
>>>> me more than the relative worthiness of any profession is the 
>>>> concept that American people don't have to be responsible for their 
>>>> own actions, choosing instead to blame everything on others.
>>>
>
> From: Joshua Dunfield <joshuad at cs.cmu.edu>
>
>>> If a pedestrian is run down in a Braddock Avenue crosswalk in the 
>>> same place as two previous crashes, should the people who decide not 
>>> to put in a stop sign have *no* responsibility? Sure, the driver who 
>>> failed to yield deserves most of the blame, but after two previous 
>>> incidents it should be incumbent on the people who control the 
>>> street to address the situation. In principle, the Wabash Tunnel is 
>>> no different from Braddock Avenue; in practice, I don't think 
>>> there's a genuine problem with the Wabash Tunnel...unlike Braddock 
>>> Avenue.
>>>
>>>> If it's our own fault that we kill ourselves, why should others pay?
>>>>
>>>> Ed
>>>
>
>>> They shouldn't. But juries in personal injury cases routinely find 
>>> that blame is shared. Sometimes the party most at blame can't pay, 
>>> which means that they get off and a third party (say, PAT) ends up 
>>> paying out of proportion to its responsibility. It's not ideal, but 
>>> do you have a better way? *Someone* needs to pay, if at all 
>>> possible, or a party that's really not at fault gets nothing.
>>>
>>> Seems to me that an awful lot of public concern about people "not 
>>> taking responsibility" is based on sensationalist accounts of 
>>> "runaway juries". People watch a 60 second news clip and think they 
>>> know more about the case than the jury, who sat through hours of 
>>> actual evidence.
>>>
>>> Best,
>>> -j.
>>