Why don't we hear about this in the debates?

Bush has talked up a storm in the debates about how we need to curb frivolous lawsuits to lower the cost of insurance?

Well, it's all a lie.

.."False Alarm," by Stephanie Mencimer in October's Washington Monthly. It's an eye-opening exposé of how the insurance industry -- aided by gullible reporters -- has hyped a "lawsuit crisis" by disseminating dubious stories of idiotic lawsuits.

Remember the story of the guy who won a $500,000 lawsuit against a lawn mower manufacturer after he hurt himself while using the mower as a hedge clipper? It never happened.

How about the guy who won a $300,000 jury verdict against a ladder manufacturer after he fell off a ladder he'd set in a pile of manure? Pure baloney -- there was no manure. And the story of the woman who threw a drink at her boyfriend in a restaurant, then won $100,000 suing the restaurant because she slipped in the puddle and hurt herself? More baloney.

All those stories were reported in the mainstream media and, Mencimer says, all were either totally fictitious or wildly distorted.

Yes, but, but, aren't more people suing and costing the insurance companies millions of dollars?! No.

the rate of lawsuits has been falling since 1975, and the median jury award to plaintiffs who manage to win has dropped from $65,000 in 1992 to $37,000 in 2001.

Kerry needs to bring this up in his finally meeting with the monster.