One of the more consternating decisions to some ERISA practitioners is the case of Halliburton Company Benefits Committee v. Graves, 463 F.3d 360 (5th Cir. 2006). There, the court essentially held that a provision in an M&A-transaction document relating to ERISA plans could essentially become provisions that are a part of the plan document itself, thereby effectively giving participants and beneficiaries the right to enforce the provisions, notwithstanding the presence of ubiquitous no-third-party-beneficiaries language in the transaction document.
Some might view the decision as a result-oriented decision written by a court desperate to confer rights on individuals under provisions that otherwise might be unenforceable as a practical matter. Well, there it be; and much of the market reacted. Now, in transaction document after transaction document, there is so-called Halliburton language, which is language that expressly states that nothing in the document is to be construed as a plan amendment or provision. Silly sophistry implemented to parry away an overreaching decision? You decide. Does Halliburton language even work? Will courts acquiesce to Halliburton language and abide by third-party beneficiary language? Maybe it depends on the language and the court. Regardless, though, gotta give the plaintiffs' bar credit for some pretty clever approaches.
And it turns out that the case involved the same Halliburton that was headed up by Dick Cheney. Dick was quite the whipping boy for Democrats who seemed to have (at least at one time) utterly despised him. And then there was the time he shot his friend in the face in a hunting accident. While obviously the ERISA aspects of the Halliburton litigation are far more important than the role in America and the world (and Cheney's friend) of Halliburton and Mr. Cheney (haha), I didn't want to ignore completely here the relevance of Halliburton and Cheney (and Cheney's friend) to the country and the world.
So now, speaking of controversy and what you "gotta" do, we have a new Hal[l]iburton development. No matter which team you prefer, the NBA Finals have been electrifying, in no small measure as a result of Tyrese Haliburton. He seems kind, he's smart and he's quite an incredible impact player. Look, I don't usually care much about professional basketball (aside from Michael Jordan), but this guy is really something. On the controversy side, my guess is that some Knick and Thunder fans may view him more like some Democrats may have viewed Cheney back in the day. (I note that he did do that disrespectful and premature (and quite hilarious) choke thing to the Knicks.)
And now he's given all of us some words to live by. In his post-game interview with ESPN's Lisa Salter, Haliburton dropped this little gem: "You know, you gotta control the controllables, and let the cards fall where they may."
Hey, I get it that he didn't make up the "controllables" phrase. But I never heard it before. It's quite the powerful instruction to all, whether or not you're an ERISAn. For me, it's a a new citation to Haliburton.
On to Game 7 . . .
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