By: Dr. Ken Broda Bahm – Those who count on the human ability to prioritize reason and evidence over unshakable conviction — and all participants in the litigation process ought to count themselves in that group — should take note of the persistence of questions over the President’s place of birth, and the sad take-away […]
Convert Your Conspiracy Theorists: Research Shows it Can Be Done Read More »
By: Dr. Ken Broda Bahm – When the public answers current polling on the health insurance reform law, only a minority of 46 percent will say that they support it. But when attention turns to the details of the plan, a majority supports the individual elements. Even opposition to the dreaded “individual mandate” falls to just 35
Don’t Defend A Strawman (And Don’t Attack One Either) Read More »
By: Dr. Ken Broda Bahm – The need for a theme that communicates, simplifies, and unites your case has become common sense to litigators. But the way that we come up with a theme is a little more mysterious. Some see theme creation as an act of laborious analysis, developed out of a painstaking accounting
Know Your ‘God Terms’ and Your ‘Devil Terms’ Read More »
By: Dr. Ken Broda Bahm – The role of a positive example in creating a “demonstration effect” has long been noted in the fields of political science and international relations, with one of the classic examples being the American Revolution that was closely followed by the French revolution. We’re seeing it now on a near daily
By: Dr. Ken Broda Bahm – With our current nationwide surplus of wintry weather, it has become a familiar feeling: The car you are driving loses traction and starts to slide. Your every impulse is to wrench the steering wheel hard in the opposite direction. Then the voice of your long-ago high school drivers’ ed
When It Comes to Your Greatest Case Weakness, Steer Into the Skid Read More »
By: Dr. Ken Broda Bahm – One stereotype of the litigious American society suggests that jurors are willing to hold manufacturers and sellers responsible for even the most obvious product dangers: a ladder that allows its user to fall, or a cup of coffee that turns out to be hot. While anecdotes abound — some true, and
Address the Most Dangerous Feature of Your Product: Dishonesty Read More »
By: Dr. Ken Broda Bahm – Watching the Wizard of Oz recently with my three (and a half!)-year-old daughter, we came to the familiar scene of the fearless Toto interrupting the Wizard’s speech by pulling back the curtain on a man furiously working levers and wheels. When Dorothy and company ignore the instruction to “pay
In Jury Selection, Pay All Kinds of Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain Read More »
By: Dr. Ken Broda Bahm – So, a retired Brazilian judge, two American litigators, and three German engineers walk into a bar… Okay, so it wasn’t a bar, it was an international arbitration, but the potential for miscommunication is just as great as the joke intro would imply. This one took place in Sao Paulo, Brazil and
Keep Your International Arbitration out of the Tower of Babel Read More »
By: Dr. Ken Broda Bahm – When dealing with the number of plaintiffs in a class action, mass tort, or other large scale litigation, is “Super-Size Me” the plaintiff’s best choice? At a legal level, the U.S. Supreme Court will get a chance to weigh in, after the decision last week to determine whether as
By: Dr. Ken Broda Bahm – As closing arguments finished in a recent employment jury trial that I sat through, the defense team and I felt, predictably, that we had the overwhelming weight of evidence on our side of the case. But still, we worried as the jury filed in to deliberate. We had faced a Plaintiff’s case
Understand Juror Bias, But Bet On The Evidence Read More »