Yeet the Rich

This week we wrap up our story on Cassie Chadwick. The walls are closing in on ole Cassie, and she's running out of ways to ask people for money. Her bankers are being arrested, her husband is overseas, and there's only a few more times she can say the check is in the mail

But she's finally in the same room as her alleged father Andrew Carnegie; that room just happens to be a courtroom, which isn't great for her. 

Enjoy the conclusion of our story of the Dutchess of Diamonds!

Sources: The Imposter Heiress- Cassie Chadwick The Greatest Grifter of the Gilded Age- byAnnie Reed

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This week we continue our story of the gilded age grifter, Cassie Chadwick. She's got herself a wealthy husband and as many gems as a person could want, but she still wanted more. Inventing a new story for herself as the illegitimate daughter of tycoon Andrew Carnegie, she weaves an incredibly complicated web of lies and manages to borrow hundreds of thousands of dollars before the walls start closing in. 

And she gets as far as she did because no one believed a woman could possibly forge paperwork. 

Sources: The Imposter Heiress- Cassie Chadwick The Greatest Grifter of the Gilded Age- byAnnie Reed

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This week we start our story with Cassie Chadwick! Aka Madame Devere, aka Lydia Hoover, aka a fraudster who stole money because people couldn't believe women could commit complicated crimes! She forged promissory notes, threw other people under the bus, and told fortunes? 

This is a nice silly mess around, without too much righteous indignation! Enjoy! 

Sources: The Imposter Heiress- Cassie Chadwick The Greatest Grifter of the Gilded Age- byAnnie Reed

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This week we are wrapping up the hot coffee case and the crazy push for tort reform starting in the mid 80s. Last week we talked specifically about one case but this week we get into the insidious and ultimately successful plan to make it as hard as possible for the everyday American to use the US Court system. 

We discussed the formation of ATRA, the American Tort Reform Association, a collection of likeminded business interests that were very interested in spending lots of money to shift public opinion on the topic of tort reform from Pro-Consumer to aggressively Pro-Business. 

From there we looked at Carl Rove and Former President George W Bush's Texas gubernatorial race. Bush, backed by Rove, ran on a platform pushing hard on tort reform with the goal of attracting as much big business funding as possible. In Texas Bush and rove completely crippled Tort Law and took that mindset and all of that big business money right to the white house. 

We talk about the formation of hundreds of astroturf movements  focused on enacting Bush and Rove's "ideas" all over the country. Including Mandatory Minimums, pro business court packing, and the expansion of forced arbitration clauses. 

Also Dishonorable Mention: did you know that the US Chamber of Commerce is not actually a government institution? It is in fact the largest single lobbying group in the country. Funneling millions and millions of dollars every year into state and local judicial races to uphold dubiously constitutional laws and strike down any lawsuits that make it through all of the other well constructed barriers to the US court system. 

We discovered way too many sadness tangents on this journey so despite all that I hope you all enjoy the episode! Thanks for listening!!

Sources:

“Hot Coffee” by Directed by Susan Saladoff (2011) (Rented from Youtube)

"DisTort-ing the Law: Politics, Media, And The Litigation Crisis"  By WIlliam Haltom and Michael McCann(2004)

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This week we are talking about Stella Liebeck and the Mcdonald's Hot Coffee Lawsuit. Almost everyone in America knows about the woman who received Millions after she was burned by a cup of Mcdonalds Coffee. But much of what we think is true about the case is exaggerated and misleading. 

In this episode we talk about the actual circumstances of Stella's injury and her recovery after receiving third degree burns from the spilt coffee. We get into her attempt to reach out to McDonalds for help with her medical bills attempting to come to some sort of settlement outside of court. And then after being snubbed by the company finally turning to the legal system for compensation. 

We get into the lawsuit and its final outcome of awarding Stella with $2.7 Million dollars in punitive damages. (Those damages were immediately decreased to less than 1/5th of the original sum) then we talk about how her story was sensationalized and turned into the butt of so many jokes. Also how her story was morphed into a tool to promote political change branding stellas case as the poster child for frivolous lawsuits and using it to push the idea of Tort reform making it harder and harder for average citizens to use the legal system to be compensated when wronged. 

Sources:

“Hot Coffee” by Directed by Susan Saladoff (2011) (Rented from Youtube)

"The misunderstood McDonald’s Hot coffee Lawsuit ” Retro report PBS

"DisTort-ing the Law: Politics, Media, And The Litigation Crisis"  By WIlliam Haltom and Michael McCann(2004)

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We are finally wrapping up our series on the Irish Potato Famine! We get into the third year of crop failures and the mass exodus of the Irish to ports unknown. People were desperate enough to leave on ships without shoes, without food or water sometimes, to Liverpool, North America and beyond. 

The famine didn't end with a big resolution or solution, it unfortunately faded out over time and many people continued to suffer for years. And while the English may not have intentionally killed 1.2 million Irish people, they certainly made choices that caused needless death. 

Sources: The Graves are Walking: The Great Famine and the Saga of the Irish People by John Kelly

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This week we continue our series on the Irish Potato Famine. And it's getting rough here folks. We're coping with the subject matter with a Irish whiskey tasting along with some rough information!

We're into a second year of crop failure, and the British government is finally realizing it might be helpful to just feed people? They replace their commissioner and decide to close the public worksites and open a network of soup kitchens but  its much too little much too late. 

Sources: The Graves are Walking: The Great Famine and the Saga of the Irish People by John Kelly

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This week we continue our series on the Irish Potato Famine. We are really getting into the thick of it. This episode starts in 1846, when the harsh reality of a second year with so much crop failure catches up to everyone. 

The new prime minister John Russell has a tough time filling his predecessor's shoes and Trevelyan is still there, mailing people books about scarcity and talking about the plans in generalities while ignoring true human suffering. The UK government continued to believe they didn't want to create a dependency on government, while the Irish struggled to simply stay alive.

The public works programs were changed and many less men were hired, while thousands of other people put aside their pride and went to the workhouses in droves. Mass famine is upon a huge population in Ireland, and winter is ushered in with a whole week of snow. 

It's getting bleak here folks, but I think we're all learning a lot!

Sources: The Graves are Walking: The Great Famine and the Saga of the Irish People by John Kelly

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This week we continue our series on the Irish Potato Famine of 1845. We start to dive into the committee relief programs that Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel instated. He wanted the Irish to work for wages to buy subsidized food, instead of bartering or getting food donated to them.  London also expected the middle class of Ireland to donate to the cause, but they were very hesitant because they feared for their own prosperity. 

Most of the country survives the 1845 harvest, although the prosperous Irish have started to leave the country in hopes of finding greener pastures. And while the public works programs paid several hundred thousand men, they mostly built roads to nowhere. And at the beginning of the harvest of 1846, the potato blight returns. 

Sources: The Graves are Walking: The Great Famine and the Saga of the Irish People by John Kelly

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This week we start our series on the potato famine that struck Ireland in 1845. Between 1845-1855 Ireland would lose a third of its population, 1.1 million to death and 2 million leaving the country because of the dire situation. 

In this episode we discuss how the Irish had become incredibly dependent on the potato in the years leading up to the famine and the UK's government inability to organize any real strategy to help.  Terrible weather, a lack of distribution systems, and a real misunderstanding of what was actually hurting the crop would delay any real help from getting to people for the first year. 

We will get into the government commissions, proposed solutions, and the British thinking that the Irish needed to simply work harder and be purer of heart. 

Sources: The Graves are Walking: The Great Famine and the Saga of the Irish People by John Kelly

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