House of Eratosthenes

Gloria Allred, who seems to be steadfastly opposed to doing anything with her law degree that would make some sort of sense, volunteered her comments about how Michael Richards can keep from being sued. She didn’t use her law expertise to make any assurances that her advice from keeping the comedian from getting sued. All she really did, was act like a European narcissistic control-freak and start dishing out a whole lot of must, ought, should, gotta gotta must must must.

Frank McBride and Kyle Doss said they were part of a group of about 20 people who had gathered at West Hollywood’s Laugh Factory to celebrate a friend’s birthday. According to their attorney, Gloria Allred, they were ordering drinks when Richards berated them for interrupting his act.

When one of their group replied that he wasn’t funny, Richards launched into a string of obscenities and repeatedly used the n-word. A video cell phone captured the outburst.

Richards, who played Jerry Seinfeld’s wacky neighbor Kramer on the TV sitcom “Seinfeld,” made a nationally televised apology on the “Late Show with David Letterman” earlier this week. He has since apologized to the Revs. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, both civil rights leaders.

But Doss, 26, said Friday he wanted a “face-to-face apology.”
:
Allred, speaking by phone from Colorado, said Richards should meet McBride and Doss in front of a retired judge to “acknowledge his behavior and to apologize to them” and allow the judge to decide on monetary compensation.

“It’s not enough to say ‘I’m sorry’ on ‘David Letterman,'” she said.

She did not mention a specific figure, but pitched the idea as a way for the comic to avoid a lawsuit.

“Our clients were vulnerable,” Allred said. “He went after them. He singled them out and he taunted them, and he did it in a closed room where they were captive.”

Richards may deserve to have his career ended for his one known offense against decency. For her pattern of such offenses, Allred deserves the same without question. What a spectacle. Here she is, “pitch[ing] the idea as a way for [Richards] to avoid a lawsuit” — the illusion that she’s engaged in something besides blackmail, apparently, is no longer worth keeping up.

I’m still hearing the phrase “common good” thrown around a lot. Tax the rich to promote the common good, put the government in charge of the common good, businesses are too selfish to contribute to the common good…blah, blah, blah. Common good this, common good that. Question: Why are attorneys so seldom placed under any pressure to contribute to the common good?

Is there any other profession in which consideration for the “common good” would make more sense? Is there any profession in which a contribution toward, or an injury against, the common good would be more measurable?

And if you accept that it is measurably possible for an attorney to take a case that is beneficial to the common good, or is deleterious to it — how does it come to pass that there are attorneys like Allred, who seem to work against it with such remarkable consistency? Would we really be damaging our Constitution by taking the effort to notice what they’re doing?

If a man is convicted of killing a little girl and chopping her up, and he writes an autobiography and stands to make a killing from it — an injunction against any profits going to him personally, I think we would all agree, would be helpful to the “common good.” Whether that phrase is helpful, or whether such a thing is constitutional, is another question altogether. But by virtue of the intentions involved if by nothing else…such an action might reflect well on our society. Allred would not be the one filing it. Never. Now, something harmful to whatever passes for the “common good”…let’s say, a burglar breaking into a home, injuring himself in the process, bringing suit against the homeowner’s insurance company. We can argue about whether that is within the burglar’s rights, but I would hope anyone who accepts such a thing as common good, would agree such a suit would be harmful to it. Would Allred take that one? Not only yeah, but hell yeah. So it’s easy to see what this woman is all about.

She is such a sleazy and repulsive bottom-feeder. Every time I see her name in print, I am more and more impressed by the consistency of her actions. It’s like she’s working around the clock to make America just like Rome, at the overripe stage when the lions and Christians were running low. It seems there is no exception to it. Not even a token one.

Evil people do some good stuff once in awhile. Sometimes you’ll catch a conservative doing liberal things, and vice-versa. Every now and then, a churchgoer may decide to skip services. But Gloria Allred — she’s like a force of nature. Like gravity always going down. Like the sun always rising. Count on her.

In fact, the best use to which she could be put, I’m thinking, is as a unit of measurement. As a yardstick. That’s it, Gloria Allred is my “common good” yardstick. Anyone demanding this business or that national government or that homeowner be coerced into destroying itself or himself “for the common good,” I don’t wanna hear another word about it until I hear how Gloria Allred is going to promote that common good. Anyone arguing for our country’s richest to be taxed at a higher rate just because they’re rich, and for no other reason…I want Gloria Allred to be the first one paying it. In fact, every time she takes a civil case solely for the purpose of extorting someone — a case where there is no benefit for soceity-as-a-whole, and nobody can quite muster up the energy to assert such a potential benefit even exists, Allred herself included — I want her income tax rate to go up by one percent.

“Allow the judge to decide on monetary compensation.” I think I’m gonna barf.

Update 11/25/06: Tom Green’s comments make a surprising amount of sense, considering the source.

The star writes on his blog, “Unlike Mel Gibson, who probably does hold racist attitudes, I don’t think Michael Richards doesn’t like black people. I think he was just trying to say the craziest and most vile thing in that room he could possibly muster. And I think he dug deep, into the darkest corners of his mind, to say those evil things to those men.

“But he did it in a small room, in an exchange, during a performance, and it wasn’t meant for us. It was just meant for that room. So why don’t we just let them settle it? Let’s leave Michael Richards alone.”

Update 11/25/06: The real-life Kramer agrees.

[…] Anyway, the bathroom scale had said unkind things to me so I was taking a long, incendiary bath trying to melt the lard off my body. During said bath I chopped through half the book rather effortlessly. At the end of it, the radio guys explored in some depth Gloria Allred’s quasi-legal shenanigans with regard to the fellas who were oh so injured by Michael Richards, including quotes from the lawyer in red herself…and I was left thinking. I believe I know why the writer is “Unanimous.” It is impossible for me to track the guy down and find out what he thinks of Gloria Allred. […]
- House of Eratosthenes | 12/02/2006 @ 13:01
[…] Here’s a great question for a non-racist. Let’s say Michael Richards apologized for that silly outburst thing. Again. You’re at home watching the boob-tube, and Michael Richards made yet another apology for his outburst, this one somehow more fascinating than the other apologies. You go to work and you want to talk about the apology with someone. Or…you don’t care, but when you go get some coffee there are people in the breakroom talking about the latest apology. And you happen to have an opinion about it yourself. You think something needs to be pointed out and you don’t see it being pointed out, so you want to share it. […]
- House of Eratosthenes | 12/13/2006 @ 12:14

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