Clara Barton Is Very Unhappy

I’ve spent most of my adult life negotiating and litigating disputes. The older I get, the less litigation make sense. Seldom does anyone “win.” For the most part, litigation seems the logical result of a dysfunctional society. “Oh yeah, take this. And I’ve got lots of money to pay lawyers to bury you.”

I’ve been a lawyer for twenty years. Over all those years, I’ve played the game of making a call, writing a letter and suing. Almost always before the trial starts, a settlement is reached.

But, it seems the ritual of the antagonistic call, threatening letter and escalating lawsuit is necessary to get people to sit down and talk. It’s how I make a living; but, it makes me a bit sad.

Did you know that Clara Barton started the American Red Cross? Did you know that her symbol for the organization, the now ubiquitous “red cross” was stolen by a lot of companies in the late Nineteenth Century? Did you know that Johnson & Johnson was one of those companies; but, that it worked a deal to share the symbol, it commercially and the Red Cross non-commercially?

They’ve fought ever since as you can read in Johnson & Johnson Sues the American Red Cross in an online New Jersey paper.

J&J is pissed because the Red Cross is making about $2 million bucks a year licensing disaster preparedness kits with the cross logo on them versus the billions it is making selling band aids and drugs.

From what I can gather from the article neither has a trademark on the cross. We seem to have mega company pissing on mega charity, with mega charity pissing right back.

Boys and girls, come down to Atlanta. I don’t have room for more than one CEO and one lawyer from each of you; but, we’ll start the day having breakfast at the Pot ‘n Pan, a greasy spoon on Piedmont. You will be surrounded by blue collar and gay guys, a taste of getting along.

We’ll repair to the small conference room at the office. Upstairs in the building is always warm. It will stay that way so you aren’t comfortable and want to wrap things up and go to a better clime.

We’ll order in Varsity hot dogs, onion rings and peach fried pies so as to upset your gastro-intestinal tracts, further discomforting you and giving you an incentive to settle your differences.

Late afternoon will bring you a sugar rush with some Krispy Kremes. Heart attacks beckon if you don’t talk nice.

Stylishly late, we’ll go to the Colonnade on Cheshire Bridge if you haven’t solved your differences. You can mix with the little blue haired ladies, the flaming old gay guys, their young consorts and the Buppie influx till you learn that getting along is an acquired, but satisfying taste.

You still fighting? We’re on our way to the Grady Hospital emergency room so that you can look at the moaning and dying people you both purport to serve. You are going to stay there until you get over your stupidity and quit this foolishness.

My hourly rates are reasonable; and, other than Pot ‘n Pan and the Colonnade, I won’t be eating with you so my expenses will be minimal.

Ya'll come on down!