Just when we get a glimmer of hope on the unemployment front, Washington Times reports that nuisance lawsuits are going to cost 500 West Virginian’s their jobs!

A Pittsburgh-based coal company, CONSOL Energy, will lay off nearly 500 of its West Virginia workers next year and its CEO blames environmentalists dead-set against mountaintop mining who have waged “nuisance” lawsuits for the job loss.

One again a broken legal system collides with a struggling economy to cause even more pain among hard working families.  Read the full story here.

Eight hours and twenty minutes.

For some it’s a typical working day with a twenty-minute lunch break.

For others it’s the time it takes to travel coast-to-coast with a connecting flight.

But for Dallas trial lawyer Joseph Kendall it’s the amount of time he needs to lace up his track shoes and sprint to the courthouse to try to squeeze some dough out of a $26 billion deal. Apparently Kendall has super-powers that allow him to digest huge business deals, pen a lawsuit challenging them and deliver them to the courthouse all in a single day!

Forbes Magazine reports that while Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hatahway’s $26 billion to bid to buy Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp hit the newswires at 6:30am - Kendall filed suit to block the deal a mere 8 hours and 20 minutes later!

For most folks, Buffett’s bid was a welcome sign that the Oracle of Omaha was willing to make a huge investment in America’s railroads. But to trial lawyers like Kendall it’s just another firing of the starter’s pistol for a race to the court house to seek a payday when there’s been no harm committed.

In a piece titled The Lawyers Go After Buffett Forbes articulates the implications of this sordid tale in detail. A couple of highlights include:

Berkshire’s offer of $100 a share was a 31% premium to the previous day’s closing price and only a little below the railroad’s all-time high of $113 a share in May 2008. But according to the suits drafted within hours of the deal’s announcement, management could–and should–have gotten more.

With a speed that stretches the bounds of credulity, lawyers file suits soon after a takeover is announced in hopes of settling the case for a generous fee.

In the case of takeovers, lawyers sue hoping the ultimate purchase price is increased. If it happens they can petition the judge for a percentage of the increase, claiming it is due to their litigation.

In an interview with Dow Jones Newswires, Jerry Davis, chairman of the $310 million New Orleans fund, said he approved the lawsuit against Burlington Northern for “shareholders to determine whether the Buffett offer is the best available deal, whether other offers have been properly analyzed.”

In theory, a lawsuit is supposed to reflect the plaintiff’s good-faith belief that duties have been breached.  In this case, apparently the lawsuit is designed to determine whether that has happened at all.”

Please read the entire Forbes piece to fully appreciate the economic drag caused by these types of pirate lawsuits. It’ll make you wonder how many jobs could be grown by ridding the courts of this type of selfish profiteer that does little but toss sludge into our economic engine.

Is there dissension among the ranks at the Trial Bar?   S.A. Miller & Kara Rowland report that at the very least a declining membership is taking a toll on the groups coffers.  Trial lawyers lobby sinks $6.2m in debt offers an interesting account of financial strain and declining membership at the American Association for Justice aka the big trial lawyer lobby.  From the Washington Times:

The most striking evidence of its financial woes is a swift decline in income, which resulted in a more than $6.2 million deficit in its operating budget for the fiscal year ending July 31, 2008, the most recent year for which data are available.

The biggest hit to its books was in membership dues, which dropped from $28.6 million in 2005 to $19.2 million in 2008, according to the annual AAJ financial report for that fiscal year filed with the Internal Revenue Service.

Of course, rather than tighten their belts, the trial bar lobby will still spare no expense to stymie reasonable legal reforms - even when they’re just the baby steps proposed by President Obama:

Budget issues didn’t stop the group from rolling out a nationwide advertising campaign this week, a response to Mr. Obama’s decision to conduct state-run pilot programs that will test alternatives to lawsuits for settling medical malpractice claims.

All this raises an interesting question: Are members fleeing the Association for Justice because financial times are tough or are more responsible members of the trial bar just tired of their “leaders” undermining any improvements in our legal system that don’t line their members pockets?