Correspondence
Correspondence (Continued from page 322) that they had no records on file to verify my claim. Since employees of the church are often paid at or near a subsistence level, this kind of...
...In one case, as jury foreman, I tried to steer deliberations in what I considered a logical course from point to point...
...This is clearly a moral issue...
...MICHAEL GALLAGHER The author replies On the canary, Mr...
...Since employees of the church are often paid at or near a subsistence level, this kind of inefficiency is a glaring hole in what might be considered our own safety net...
...Yes, guidelines for this purpose should be high on the bishops' agenda...
...On a less lofty plain, the hero of Birdy [January 25] becomes obsessed with a canary — a plain yellow canary — not a parakeet as O'Brien would have it...
...The essay has been reprinted several times in religious journals because of its strong criticism of the glaring tfi/s-worldliness of science fiction...
...I apologize for the possible misinterpretation that I meant traditional belief in God...
...we were soon hopelessly deadlocked...
...March 13,1982...
...There is no reason why I should profit from another person's punishment...
...To the Editors: Isidore Silver's proposal ["Defame Game," February 22] struck me at first as one of those legal absurdities that outrage the layperson...
...Like E.T., 2010 badly substitutes some sentimental simplicities for a genuine belief in Spirit...
...To the Editors: In the midst of his review of 2010 [January 11], Tom O'Brien gives a cri de coeur, always a perilous thing for a critic to do: "Why do we persist in the sentimental myth that something up there will solve all our problems down here...
...In another case (pedestrian v. bus), although the plaintiffs plight was tragic, I and other jurors thought her evidence was weak...
...When all were assured that the jurors sympathetic to the lady would not demand too much for her, it didn't take long to find for her and the two other plaintiffs...
...And it can be brought about by the enactment of suitable laws...
...And, whatever the failings of Mass Appeal, it's puzzling to have your critic take the playwright to task for putting the collection after the sermon...
...O'Brien will have to find some other place to write his reviews since Commonweal will be out of business...
...One of my first pieces for Commonweal was an essay on science fiction and its quasideification of biological extra-terrestrial life in E.T...
...Those notions are too subjective...
...LEON LUCKASZEWSKI Myth & fact Ridgewood, N.J...
...If this quality of management is typical — and McCarthy suggests it is — then the mote in our own eye needs to be removed...
...In libel cases, Dr...
...That had nothing to do with the defendant's responsibility for a rear-end collision that led to a four-car smashup, so I proposed that we first consider the amount of damages...
...With regard to damages, the legislature should set up payment scales for different categories of cases, just as the government now does with regard to Medicare payments to hospitals...
...If it does not, the question of intent vanishes and I am free to bring suit, in which my only obligation is to prove the fallacy of the newspaper story...
...Thinking back, though, to my own greater-than-average experience as a juror in auto damage suits in Los Angeles, I think Dr...
...The court should be concerned with the truth...
...That the media can put out an untrue story about someone and yet not be obliged to retract, simply because the person cannot win a libel suit against it, is an odd situation for a justice system that is supposed to be concerned with justice...
...Whatever the pain, a hard look at how we treat our own employees is indispensable...
...Silver wrote, a jury should first consider the maximum damage award, and only after that should the determination of libel be considered, and by another jury...
...If someone runs a red light and smashes my fender, I get compensation for the damage...
...it's my mistake...
...In the review of 2010, when I mentioned "the sentimental myth of something up there" not saving us, I emphatically meant the sci-fi motif that extraterrestrial life will bail humans out of their problems...
...When was the last time O'Brien went to Mass or has he himself given up the sentimental myth...
...Gallagher is absolutely right...
...If the guilty party is fined at the same time for a traffic violation, I don't get the money...
...I would like to make a few suggestions, even at the cost of seeming simplistic, about libel and damages...
...To the Editors: I share Isidore Silver's concern ["Defame game," February 22] over the large damage settlements in libel suits against the media...
...2010 vaguely uses an idea of God but subordinates him to a typical sci-fi process of redemption...
...Silver may be right...
...On Mass Appeal: of course the collection follows the sermon, as I observe in Mass (nearly) every Sunday...
...JOHN CLANCY Paying for libel Rensselaer, Ind...
...Learning from this, in another case I sensed that some jurors didn't want to Commonweal: 350 find for one plaintiff because they thought she was exaggerating her disability...
...If punitive damages are imposed, the money should go to the public, not to the defendant...
...TOM O'BRIEN 31 May 1985: 351...
...The likely size of the award may have kept us from finding for her, or deadlocking, out of sympathy...
...His solution seems complicated...
...My point in the review of the film was that Jack Lemmon's claim that the collection follows the sermon '' like a Nielsen rating'' is inexact...
...the collection follows the sermon because it introduces the Offertory, and is representative of our offerings to God and his church...
...CHARLES J. ROBBINS Experience speaks Walnut Creek, Calif...
...We need to take an honest look if we are to light the way as an examplary economic agent...
...My focus was on Lemmon's analogy of liturgy to media marketing, typical of Mass Appeal's cuteness, but not depth...
...When we stop, Mr...
...If I feel that a medium, let us say a newspaper, has published an untrue story about me, I present the facts and ask it to print them and to retract its own story...
...The other jurors rejected this, but in fact they were soon discussing just that point...
...This may seem like a simple approach, but I think it has the benefit of common sense...
...The court should not be concerned about the intent of the media or whether there is reckless disregard for the truth...
Vol. 112 • May 1985 • No. 11
