Monday, May 07, 2007

Dennis v. Experian Information Svcs (9th Cir. - May 7, 2007)

Judge Kozinski waxes poetic about the importance, but danger, of credit reporting services in this dissent. An interesting confluence.

The last sentence is also funny, in a crazy (but classic Kozinski) way. It argues for a liberal result -- stronger judicial regulation of the credit reporting industry -- with the typical conservative argument (focusing on an increase in price to consumers that results from regulation) by asserting that unless we regulate a little bit (e.g., here), Congress (e.g., liberals) will backlash and regulate even more, thereby driving up costs.

It's the "bad is good to stop more bad" argument well-known to us debate types. But rarely have I seen it in a judicial opinion. As I recall, the argument similarly went that a nuclear war would be good because it would forestall the development of doomsday weapons that would obliterate Earth.