Dennis Kucinich sues over a sandwich

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When I first saw this story about U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) suing over a sandwich, I thought what you probably thought: ‘This country is lawsuit happy.’ But I stopped snickering when I read some of the details:

WASHINGTON — U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) is suing the operators of a House cafeteria for alleged negligence stemming from a 3-year-old incident involving a sandwich he says left him with significant dental injuries.

Kucinich is seeking $150,000 in damages... A copy of the suit obtained by the Cleveland Plain Dealer documents the April 2008 incident, in which Kucinich purchased a sandwich wrap he says was ‘represented to contain pitted olives.’ After consuming it, Kucinich found the olives were not pitted, causing ‘serious and permanent dental and oral injuries’ that required ‘multiple surgical and dental procedures.’

Now, my first question is this: Don’t those fat cat politicians have Cadillac dental care? So is Kucinich actually out any dough? If so, how much? $150,000 is a lot of money. (But have you had any extensive dental work done lately, especially those involving ‘surgical...procedures’?)

I have no idea whether this suit is meritorious, as they say. But if you bought a sandwich that contained olives, would you expect them to be pitted? And if you crunched down on an olive with pits, and cracked a tooth or teeth or a bridge...would you just chalk it up to buyers’ remorse? Or would you be a little more peeved than that?

What do you think? Does Kucinich have a point? Or is he taking advantage of the system?

--Rene Lynch
twitter.com/renelynch