Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes — or “Kate” Holmes as she is now to be known because Mr. Cruise has reportedly deemed “Katie” too “juvenile” a name for a mother — now appear to have settled the financial aspect of their relationship.

\Tom and Kate


The London Daily Mail
reports Ms. Holmes will be given $19 million USD by Mr. Cruise for
giving birth to their baby. That money will also cover expenses over
the life of the child and it must be noted this “settlement” of sorts
was made public only after the live birth of the child. One wonders if
tragedy had struck instead of happiness and Ms. Holmes did not serve a
live birth if she would have still earned that large sum.

If Mr. Cruise and Ms. Holmes decide to marry — and then divorce — she
will earn an additional $33.5 million for a grand total of $52.5
million for her association with him.
Was the engagement and childbirth just a fantastical — and failed —
public relations ploy as a lead up to Mission: Impossible III?
Does anyone think Ms. Holmes and Mr. Cruise will actually marry
to try to help remove the “illegitimate” tag from their Suri offspring?

Why would Mr. Cruise want to marry after making a deal ensuring the
demise of his marriage and a larger suckling of his bank account teat?
After hearing reports yesterday alleging Mr. Cruise wants Ms. Holmes to
lose 20 pounds of her baby-bearing fat before they marry, one begins to
see the inevitable eternal delay in exchanging vows stretching into
weeks and then months and then into a final settling of a $19 million
bill as their engagement breaks and Mr. Cruise salvages the additional
$33.5 million payout that was seemingly never intended to be wagered,
let alone, won.

32 Comments

  1. I have read that some vegans do eat animal placentas because it involves something that the animal is giving off anyhow.
    Maybe it was a joke article. I feel dumb now.

  2. Gordon!
    Find the link for us about Vegans eating placentas!
    Are there any other “body discharges” we consume other than breast milk and placenta with onions?

  3. I think it’s strange that two people supposedly in love are making financial arrangements for the birth of a kid.
    Those types of lump sum cash settlements seem to be the types of things that are done in divorce court during the dissolution of a marriage. The whole thing seems like a sham because “real” people don’t make those types of financial arrangements.
    I could see an antenuptial agreement to protect the parties’ pre-marital wealth if the marriage breaks down, but not an agreement to produce offspring for money. It’s weird.
    Speaking of strange coincidences, Nicole Kidman says she still loves Tom. I wonder if Tom paid Nicole to say that she still loves Tommy Boy to increase his PR.

  5. Chris —
    I don’t think anyone believes they were ever in love. The fact it looks like they brought a child into the world to co-incide with the opening of MI:3 is sad.
    I am thankful Katie has an attorney father who smelled something foul and felt something fradulent from them minute his daughter was sniffed down. He has protected her every interest with the tip of a stinging, sharp, pen and he is the architech of these multi-million dollar protections for his daughter and now new granddaughter and I believe he has successfully made the price of a marriage failure so high for Mr. Cruise that he will never tempt that end and, so finally, the nightmare engagement for a prescient father is coming to an end.
    I believe there was some thought in the Cruise camp that — like Michael Jackson — “fathering” a child would in some way tamp down the rumors about his sexuality.
    The Nicole Kidman quote reeks of forced desperation!

  6. Gordon —
    If you wanted to eat the placenta of your child — would you be allowed to do that or is that an illegal mixing of milk and meat or something?

  7. I’m not a family law attorney, so seek advice from an attorney who practices in that area in your state, but it seems to me that as long as one didn’t consent to a child support order before having a negative paternity test or didn’t default by failing to appear for a hearing to determine paternity or a child support order, it would seem that justice would require a postive DNA test before someone could be made to pay child support.
    Once a child support order is issued, getting the order changed might be difficult, so it is important for fathers to always show up for their court hearings. I assume this must be the case where people were forced to pay for non-biological children. They must have waived some rights somewhere along the line.
    Here’s information from an Indiana prosecutor’s office regarding establishing paternity:

    Before a child support order can be established for a child, the alleged father must either admit or be proven to be the child’s father. A popular and effective tool used to prove paternity is genetic testing. Our office prepares all of the necessary paperwork and legal documents and handles all of the scheduling for blood-testing when the alleged father requests or when ordered by thejudge.
    The father can acknowledge his paternity by signing a written admission or consent agreement. While it is best to establish paternity soon after the child’s birth, our office is bound to try to establish paternity for any child up to the child’s eighteenth birthday.

  8. Hi Chris!
    Thanks for sharing that super information!
    I think the example Dave and I are talking about that grieves us most is when a man and woman marry. They have a child. A year later they get divorced. There are rumors the woman cheated during the marriage. A DNA test is done on the baby. The “husband” is determined not to be the father. The courts make him financially responsible for the child anyway even though he is not the biological father.
    Would something like that be allowed to happen under the law in Indiana?

  9. Hi David,
    The Indiana Supreme Court has held that: “If the direct, clear, and convincing evidence is present, Indiana cases show that entering a support order against a husband who is not the child’s father is generally improper.” Fairrow v. Fairrow, 559 N.E.2d. 597 (Ind.1990). The evidence must be established by medical proof that the person isn’t the father of the child to challenge a child support order.
    However, in the case Tirey v. Tirey, 806 N.E.2d. 360 (Ind.App.2004), transfer denied, Tirey v. Tirey, 822 N.E.2d. 971 (Ind.2004), the court affirmed the trial court’s decision to impose child support on a man who had volunteered to pay child support for child he was neither the biological or adopted parent.

    Dallis knew he was not A.L.’s biological father, as did the court when it entered the child support order. Therefore, the child support obligation was not imposed on the ground that Dallis was A.L.’s biological father. Rather, it was entered because Dallis insisted upon it. Thus, Fairrow is inapposite. In fact, Dallis does not address the critical fact that we consider to be dispositive of this appeal, i.e., that he volunteered to subject himself to a court-ordered support obligation. Thus, Dallis’s argument suffers the infirmity of being unmoored from the critical fact of this case.

    Tirey at 364, emphasis added.
    The lesson seems to be: don’t default and/or don’t volunteer!
    Also, parties can’t contract their rights to pay child support. See Schrock v. Gonser, 658 N.E.2d. 615 (Ind.App.1995). “An agreement to forego child support is unenforceable because the parent has no right to contract away the child’s support benefits.”
    The same disclaimers apply as always — this is just for educational purposes and advice from an attorney in your home state show be sought.

  11. Excellent stuff, Chris!
    I have read and heard about several cases where the non-father was forced by the court to continue the father role even in the light of “freeing” DNA evidence against his fatherhood.
    One of them was in New York state, I believe, and the “father” said to the court, “But I am not the baby’s father! My wife cheated on me. The baby has a father, go find him and make him pay. I want out!”
    The judge replied with, “The court has determined you are the ‘father of option’ and you will continue to serve your role in providing for the welfare of the child.” The “father of option” may not be the exact phrase but it was something similar with an identical nonsensical sting.

  12. Hi David,
    I can see a judge forcing a non-biological non-father to pay.
    A judge subscribing to a philosophy of legal realism might determine that it is in the best interests of the child and society to require the non-biological father to continue to pay. This might be because the judge determines that it is in the best interests of the child to have someone who is in a position to pay, rather than a missing biological parent who might never be found.
    See the Indeterminancy Thesis in Legal Theory:

    The indeterminacy thesis, in its strongest form, is the proposition that a judge can “square” any result in a particular case with the existing legal materials through the use of legitimate legal arguments. In the 1990s the indeterminacy thesis came under heavy attack by liberal and conservative defenders of the rule of law, and the debate, though its mantle is in the process of being taken up by a new generation of scholars, has left the intellectual spotlight for the time being.

  13. For more fun in trying to figure out how cases get decided, see also Critical Legal Studies:

    The claim that, contrary to the common perception, legal materials (such as statutes and case law) do not completely determine the outcome of legal disputes, or, to put it differently, the law may well impose many significant constraints on the adjudicators in the form of substantive rules, but, in the final analysis, this may often not be enough to bind them to come to a particular decision in a given particular case.

  14. Chris —
    Ah! The “Indeterminacy Thesis in Legal Theory” sounds just like the beast that was being loosed in our examples.
    I do like this sort of ultra-flexibility in the law that sort of allows courts to make it up as they go along…

  16. All this hoopla over having a kid, eating placenta, announcing financial arrangement for child support sadly proves David’s point that there is no “love” but there is “business”. The idea might be Tom Cruise-ly, but it definitely is not very noble – to say the least. I think it nothing but a desperate effort to encash the attention of media. It seems Cruise and co. was successful at it. I feel for the kid.

  17. Hi Katha!
    You make some interesting points!
    There are some who claim a marriage is nothing but a business proposition and love has no role in a marriage.
    When you look back through history, a woman who became a wife had a dowry and in some cultures cows or other valuables were given to the man who was “taking the woman off her father’s hands.”
    It sounds crude, but women had value beyond their body and their minds — the richer the father-of-the-bride, the greater windfall for the husband.

  18. Yes, it’s true some people tend to see “marriage” as a “business proposition”. But this is not even marriage! You are right about women having value beyond their body and minds; sometimes the opposite is true too. The richer the “father of the groom/ or the groom himself…”

  19. Hi David,
    Indiana pays for the tests conducted by the prosecutors’ offices under Title IV-D. Here’s a copy of the state authorization form.
    If the parties do their testing privately, I assume each party pays 1/2 of the test.

  20. Katha!
    You’re right it is no marriage — only an engagement — and it is strange and sad “association” as you suggested earlier. I am certain the child will do well. I just wish the mother had more sense. The rumor was the “offer” made to Katie and accepted was previously offered and turned down by, I believe, Scarlett Johansen. I have great admiration for Ms. Johansen if that rumor has any validity to it.
    You are right the groom brings money to the table, too! Love is for teenagers and marriages are for business people!
    😀

  21. Chris!
    I am glad Indiana pays for DNA testing! That is equitable and fair.
    I think you can get a DNA test for around $180 through the mail now. Or is that an AIDS test I’m thinking of at that price?
    DNA testing in New York State used to be around $800 — and who paid for the test to determine paternity was always a contentious issue. Usually the man paid all of it to save himself.

  22. Then what is there for the “fluid” people like us? Something in between love and marriage? What kind of concoction would that be? How will it taste??? 😀
    You are right about the mother having more sense, sometimes the idea of having Tom Criuse as a partner is so overwhelming that it becomes a hindrance of the normal thought process.
    The kid would do well if she can avoid the unwanted attention for which she is not responsible. That‘s what creates an impotent rage in me.

  23. For us, Katha, there is only love and donuts!
    For the others — let them rot in court! All marriages start with an offer and an acceptance, right?
    😀
    I think Tom was accepted as a partner because, as a little girl, she had a poster of him on her bedroom — Eww! — and always dreamed of “marrying” him — Double Eww!
    Her princess fantasy was played into and exploited and nine months later she begins to pay the price.
    The child, being born into it all, won’t know any better so she should be the most fine in the mess.
    If they do break up it will be interesting to watch if Tom tries to get sole custody of the child. Don’t you think he’d try?

  24. It is good to know that there is some hope for us! If not love, the donut will surely be there!!! 😀
    Tom might seek to get the sole custody of his child but I would doubt the purity of his intention.

  28. Does anyone know if Tom is learning how to fly an airplane like John Travolta, the other famous Scientology practitioner?
    Supposedly, airplanes figure into Tom’s religion.
    Travolta owns several planes, according to Wikipedia:

    Travolta is a qualified pilot and owns five airplanes, including a former Qantas Boeing 707-138. The plane bears the name Jett Clipper Ella in honor of his son Jett and his daughter Ella.

    Maybe the little TomKitten will learn to be a pilot one of these days if Tom gets full custody.

  29. Hi Chris!
    I don’t know if Tom is into flying planes. Aren’t boats also big in his religion?
    Travolta lives in a community where everyone’s backyard is a runway. He can take off in any of his planes right from the comfort of his own home. Now that’s truly the only way to fly!
    😀
    I think Nicole Kidman was deep into the religion as well. She reached quite a high power level. I don’t know if she’s still involved or not. Mimi Rogers was smart enough to get out of her relationship with him when he dug too deep into the religion. Here’s an interesting page:
    http://www.factnet.org/Scientology/celebrities_con.html
    I immediately get the feeling some of those people have much too much free time!

  31. I agree Chris!
    Think what Greater Good things they could do with all that time and money instead of wasting it on airplanes and landing strips and propping up a curious religion.

  32. How right you all are!
    “too much of everything is as bad as too little!”

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