Tobacco Settlement
In “Anti-Tobacco Lawyers Rebuked Over Fees” ( Nov. 26), outgoing Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren compares his recent accomplishments in the state attorneys general tobacco industry settlement to those of Mark McGwire, and castigates trial attorneys for “their pursuit of the gravy train.”
A more accurate analogy in this case would be a situation where other team members actually hit the ball out of the park while Lungren merely trotted the bases and tipped his hat to the crowd. All of the work on the state suit was done by private attorneys, and the settlement was obviously written by tobacco industry lawyers.
If these anti-tobacco lawyers want to get on the tobacco industry gravy train, they should go about it in the time-honored manner. They should run for public office, and get their gravy the way that Lungren did, in campaign contributions and soft money.
FREDERIC W. GRANNIS JR. Long Beach
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