Scott wrote:

> In article >,
> "Bob (this one)" > wrote:
>
>>Let me state this gently. This is bullshit. Industry standards are in
>>absolute agreement with McD's actions. There wasn't anything shady
>>going on, it's how restaurants have made coffee since they started
>>making coffee. It's how coffee is still being made pretty much everywhere.
>>
>>I'd like a good citation for your assertion here. I flat out don't
>>believe it.
>
>
> <http://www.vanosteen.com/mcdonalds-coffee-lawsuit.htm>
> from The Wall Street Journal
> "When a law firm here found itself defending McDonald's Corp. in a suit
> last year that claimed the company served dangerously hot coffee, it
> hired a law student to take temperatures at other local restaurants for
> comparison.
>
> After dutifully slipping a thermometer into steaming cups and mugs all
> over the city, Danny Jarrett found that none came closer than about 20
> degrees to the temperature at which McDonald's coffee is poured, about
> 180 degrees."

I note that you haven't refuted: " Industry standards are in absolute
agreement with McD's actions." In fact, your citations bear that out.

And I wonder several things about that intrepid law student and his
noble efforts, and the boneheads who sent him off on his essay:

1) did he compare apples and apples? Were the "steaming cups and mugs"
the same sort of container as the McD's? The answer from the words
above is "NO." Pouring hot coffee into a ceramic mug will drop the
temperature in the mug by a good 20 degrees. The coffee comes out of
the pot at the same temperature, but the mug is a heat sink. Instead
of "steaming cups and mugs," he should have been measuring the
temperature in other take-out containers. Is that what he did...?

2) What kind of thermometer did he use? Unless he used one with a tip
probe, it won't be accurate if the "steaming cups and mugs" were of
different depths because of the way thermometers take the temperatures
of what they're stuck into.
<http://www.hi-tm.com/Documents/Bimet-pic.html>
"The companies that make these thermometers provide no guarantee of
accuracy at 150F or higher, because the coil, after perhaps as little
as a week of use, can corrode in the stem, causing it to malfunction."

3) Did he record these temperatures within the time frame that would
have been the case with Stella? No way to know. But if he didn't take
the temp of take out containers, it doesn't matter.

The lawyers who sponsored this "research" were just as inept as the
ones who defended McD's in Stella's case.

>>>They'd also
>>>received over 700 complaints about burns, including third degree burns
>>>like this woman's.

See, here you say "complaints." Later on you transform it to lawsuits
based on the Reno newspaper story.

The Wall Street Journal story says:
"Company documents showed that in the past decade McDonald's had
received at least 700 reports of coffee burns ranging from mild to
third degree, and had settled claims arising from scalding injuries
for more than $500,000."

They say "reports.

>>700 - or to put it into a perspective, one out of every 7 MILLION cups
>>of coffee burned someone.
>
> Clarification:
> <http://www.newsreview.com/issues/reno/2004-10-21/cover.asp>
> "Liebeck, who had no wish to go to court, reluctantly turned the matter
> over to lawyers, who arranged to test McDonald's coffee throughout
> Albuquerque and found it was hotter by 20 degrees than any other
> restaurant's (temperature policies were imposed on local stores by the
> McDonald's corporation).

See above about the temperature readings. The reality is that the
lawyers for Stella managed to back McD's into a corner where their
normal functioning that was essentially the same as everybody else's
appeared to be callous and deliberately malicious. It's more a case of
lawyerly skill than dealing with the truths in coffee making.

From the first citation above:
"McDonald's [...] requires that its coffee be prepared at very high
temperatures, based on recommendations of coffee consultants and
industry groups that say hot temperatures are necessary to fully
extract the flavor during brewing."

And:

"A spokesman for the National Coffee Association says McDonald's
coffee conforms to industry temperature standards. And a spokesman for
Mr. Coffee Inc., the coffee-machine maker, says that if customer
complaints are any indication, industry settings may be too low - some
customers like it hotter. A spokeswoman for Starbucks Coffee Co. adds,
'Coffee is traditionally a hot beverage and is served hot and I would
hope that this is an isolated incident.'"

> They also learned that McDonald's had ignored
> warnings from burn centers for years

It also says they didn't talk with burn experts.

This isn't supported by any data I've seen anywhere. It's third-party
reporting, after the fact, to make a point.

Try this for unbiased tone:
"The jury, which was initially disgruntled to be put on such a trivial
case, ended up outraged at the testimony by McDonald's officials. One
of them, McDonald's quality manager, Christopher Appleton, said he
knew perfectly well that the coffee was injuring people, that
McDonald's didn't bother consulting burn experts, that the company
decided not to warn people about the searing coffee, and that he had
every intention of continuing to sell it."

"...perfectly well ... didn't bother... decided not to warn... every
intention." So it wasn't really the temperature of the coffee, it was
the perceived attitude of the McD's people. Their coffee was
essentially identical to everybody else's by industry standards, but
the jury based it on something else. Fine job of jurying and fine job
of reporting.

It goes on:
"It became apparent to jurors that McDonald's considered the frequent
injuries and out-of-court settlements part of the cost of doing
business--a small price to pay for being known for the hottest coffee
in town."

"Frequent injuries" to the tune of one in 14 million (revised number
based on Stella's coffee costing 49 cents rather than a dollar). And
"...known for the hottest coffee in town..." By whom?

What pure shit. Stick a reliable thermometer into the coffee pot
(that's where the issue really lives, not in some "steaming cup or
mug") in any 7-11 and see what the temperature is. But the temperature
doesn't appear to have much to actually do with it. This reporter was
just as outraged as the jurors. Lousy reporting.

> and had been sued for coffee
> injuries and settled 700 times for amounts up to a half-million dollars.
> (A retired judge who tried to mediate the Liebeck case recommended that
> the company settle for $225,000, but McDonald's refused.)"
>
> It seems that there were 700 lawsuits and settlements, not 700 notices.

The big, magic word here is "seems." You're a bit too willing to
uncritically accept what's written as the absolute truth. No place
else reports that the 700 cases were all lawsuits and all settlements.
Each story cited in this thread makes McD's brewing and serving coffee
within industry standards more and more like a callous conspiracy to
deliberately burn people.

> Most of the rest of your responses are also addressed by these citations.

A very fine capsule of this case comes directly (out of context) from
that newspaper article from Reno. It says, "Matters of debate are
regularly described as matters of fact." No case better exemplifies
that than this one.

Pastorio