Left Flank

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The Orlando Sentinel offers two analyses showing how a public good, environmental protection or transportation, hits the wall of interest-group retrenchment. It's a good example of good intentions and rhetoric withering in the face of the latest rationalization.

Welcome to the state of Florida. The nation is on the brink of a fuel crisis. Prices are headed toward $4 a gallon and destined for even greater heights as the thirst for fuel grows in China and India. God forbid the terrorists ever pull off a major attack on a Saudi oil facility.

Florida responds by killing one mass-transit project and crippling another. On top of that, the Legislature also has jeopardized a major I-4 widening project because there isn't an alternative transportation network to use during construction.

Meanwhile, Orlando has moved to fourth in a national ranking of congested cities.

You expect the Tallahassee trial-lawyer lobby to view the world through the myopic lens of huge settlements. You also would hope that political leaders, for once, could set aside that cynicism and look at the big picture.

Alas, this is Florida.

This state not only needs commuter rail but a corridor linking Orlando and Tampa, which are slowly merging into one huge megalopolis. It needs to connect this rail line to the East Coast and hopefully hook up with a passenger service that one day will link Miami and Jacksonville.

And off of these main routes we need to build a feeder network of smaller rail lines and buses.

We can't plan 50 years ahead based on the notion that we'll always be able to drive to the Mobil station and fill up with gas at prices the middle class can afford.

The target of the Florida Justice Association's ire was a proposed $100,000 cap on jury awards for accidental injuries or deaths.

«A lot of the reason for this is the frustration a lot of the senators had with the way this deal was put together,» said Paul Jess, an official with the trial-lawyers association.

«It never came to them originally. It was a done deal and presented to them on a take-it-or-leave-it basis.»

The commuter-rail bill would have granted sovereign-immunity protection to the private contractors hired by government to run the commuter-rail line -- handling everything from switching to security. This protection would cap jury awards at $100,000 per victim in cases of accidental injuries or deaths.

In 2002, the Legislature gave that protection to the Tri-Rail commuter system in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties. Trial lawyers didn't want the same arrangement cropping up elsewhere, even though the state has regularly waived that cap to settle with injury victims on Tri-Rail.

«Another governor or DOT secretary could come in, wave their hand and say 'No more,' » Jess said.

Two weeks ago, Webster tried to, in effect, buy off the trial lawyers with higher sovereign-immunity caps and doubled attorneys fees. To appeal to South Florida Democrats -- the trial lawyers' base in the Senate -- he offered a $2-a-day rental-car surtax to help pay for Tri-Rail and Central Florida's trains.

But Jess said the group had never sought that concession -- and was insulted by it.

Webster and Senate Minority Leader Steve Geller, D- Cooper City, ultimately met with the trial lawyers late Thursday with a desperation deal: eliminating the sovereign-immunity protection from both Tri-Rail and Central Florida's rail line.

But it was too little, too late. The lawyers had dug in.

«We're just trying to keep them from repeating a mistake they made in 2002,» Jess said.

No, Mr. Jess, the mistake happened when you received a college degree.