Now, if we could only get them off TV

Ever mention the word "lawyer" to a techie? They made a face, right? One of the common themes of Engineer Politics -- along with a devotion to Ayn Rand matched only by College Republicans -- is that lawyers spoil everything.

Funny how this country, with lawyers out the wazoo, has a more smooth-running economy than Japan, where filing a civil lawsuit is generally a less effective business tactic than committing seppuku.

The state of Georgia regularly goes through rounds of what Molly Ivins calls "tort deform," intended to thwart the evil lawyers by ending the supposed explosion of civil tort cases, insane jury awards, and other basilisks and chimera that threaten the Republic.

With any luck, that sort of legislative nonsense will be discouraged by a recent UGA study (financed by trial lawyers, of course, but persuasive). Among other things, it showed that between 1994 and 1997, the rate of tort cases (only 6.5 percent of civil suits to begin with) fell as a percentage of the population (study area was six Georgia counties, including the core of Atlanta).

Judges were more likely to side with plaintiffs than juries, and $1 million judgments were "extremely rare."

So ease off on the shysters, Dilbert. After all, you want to negotiate your own contracts?