June 09, 2005

A group calling itself the Senate Accountability Project is running TV ads in Alabama blasting Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions for supporting federal asbestos legislation, a stance which they charge creates "a liberal entitlement program" and thus violates the conservative principles on which he campaigned for office. According to the Birmingham News, the SAP turns out to be headed by Texas asbestos lawyer Mark Iola. The ads, Iola tells the paper, are aimed in part at "the conservatives who form [Sessions's] base". So does that mean Iola's group itself is conservative in outlook, as its pejorative talk of liberal entitlement programs would lead you to assume? Well, no, doesn't sound like it: "Iola said the group is interested [in] progressive politics on several issues". For more examples of how some trial lawyers opportunistically adapt conservative rhetoric to their ends, see The Rule of Lawyers, pp. 276-77 and 279-80.