From: tostan@mars.lerc.nasa.gov (Stan Mohler (SVER))
Subject: INFO ON THE ATLA PLEASE
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: NASA Lewis Research Center
Distribution: na
Date:  6 Apr 1992 22:43 EDT  

Hello attorneys:

Please tell me about the American Trade Legal Association, if I've got the
name correct.  I want to know how popular this organisation is among lawyers.
Who joins, what do they do.

Let me explain why I ask.  I'm a Private Pilot.  I fly as safely as I can,
which is a reasonable amount of safety.  I fly airplanes such as Pipers and 
Cessnas, which meet exceptional safety standards.  The experience of flying,
all that it adds to life, is something precious beyond my ability to
explain here.  It is an activity that expands your mind and enhances life
to a degree comparable to, say, doing a stint in the Peace Corps
or something.  Americans should have the right to it.  The amount of freedom we
have in this country has created a culture of flying and of pilots of
a character and quality that no
other country has.  If you are not a pilot, or did not have a pilot as a
parent, you cannot know what I'm talking about.  

This freedom I'm talking about is being ruined.  Cessna and Piper DO NOT MAKE
small planes anymore.  They stopped in the 1980s.  Why?  Chiefly because of
an explosion of foolish lawsuits by greedy lawyers and their clients.  Sure,
in this country we all have the right to sue.  But it is beyond a reasonable
activity today.  Today, the courts are full of crybabies and busybodies who
don't give a damn about serving the society but only about making money for
themselves.  You don't see the legal community making flying safer.  You see
them destroying flying.  You see the manufacturers who still ARE making planes
refusing to improve their designs because some foolish lawyer will claim thatas proof that the older design was not safe!  I HAVE NEWS FOR YOU: there is;ssk)S|mimmvsafe!  

Many lawyers will see nothing wrong with making a living hurting General
Aviation, which some lawyers do.  They don't understand that just because 
something is legal it is not necessarily right.  I have the right to walk
around downtown spitting on the sidewalk.  So should I?  The right thing to
do is to use your credentials to pursue justice.  Fight the ATLA's lobbyists.
These jerks are weilding enormous influence over Congress, blocking the
efforts of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association to introduce legislation
to balance the needs of aircraft accident victims and those of the flying and
manufacturing public.  The AOPA has an interest in protecting the rights of
pilots to both fly AND to fly in safe airplanes.  But the ATLA is only
interested in maintaining free and easy access to the court room and to
the corporate profits of this nation's businesses for any stupid reason they
see fit to raise.  

Lawyers should be sentinals of freedom, not drooling reptiles who eat the
goose who lays the golden egg.  It is a failure to get reforming legislation
through our Congress that is hurting our country.  A bunch of selfish lawyers
are in the way.  Please, lawyers, explain to me what this ATLA is, and how we
can fight this.  

+------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|  Stan Mohler Jr.  <---------internet--------->  tostan@scivax.lerc.nasa.gov  |
|  Research Engineer, aircraft icing                                           |
|  NASA Lewis Research Center, Cleveland, OH                                   |
+------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Newsgroups: alt.sex,misc.legal,rec.arts.tv