[TheCapn]

Its more of just a fallacy for those who dislike the law game. People shout out "only the lawyers win" type line when its pointless lawsuits going back and forth and is only ever true in cases where the lawyers are hired on a per-case basis, like divorce struggles.

In corporate legal warfare, such as this, the lawyers are just doing their assigned duties. To win or lose probably doesn't mean a bonus usually.

[jiggy2011]

True, but things like this going on at least allows the lawyers to justify their salary. The more important this stuff is, the higher that salary if likely to be.

[rayiner]

"This stuff" = people fighting with each other.

At the end of the day, that's what it comes down to. E.g. Apple didn't sue Samsung because of some arcane patents. They sued Samsung because Samsung released very similar designs to theirs, and they felt ripped off. If the patents weren't there, they would have sued on some other basis.

What ultimately allows lawyers to justify their salary is conflict, and in a big complex economy lawyers don't really need to game the law to manufacture that conflict. Indeed, people come to the US from all over the world to hash out their conflicts in American courtrooms.