Letters to the editor

The writers strike: between the lines

Re “Hollywood writers strike as talks fail,” Nov. 5

The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers has been so arrogantly intransigent throughout the last four months of negotiations that the impasse was all but inevitable. As most of the writers I know are only too aware, the alliance chose to open the current round of contract talks by presenting Writers Guild of America negotiators with a set of draconian proposals that included, among other rollbacks, the virtual abolishment of the residual payment structure that allows writers to survive frequent bouts of unemployment.

Although the alliance did finally back away from its demand to dump residual payments, it has refused to even consider the guild’s own list of negotiating points. In the face of such counterproductive stonewalling, can you blame me if I choose to tell my side of the story from a picket line?

Vince Waldron

Eagle Rock

The writer is a member of the Writers Guild of America.

It’s sad that movie studio shareholders don’t call for the resignation of alliance President Nick Counter, given his obstinate, hard-line tactics that prompted the strike. Clearly, studios and their stockholders lose the most from resisting an equitable distribution of profits. Counter’s name-calling of his adversaries recalls the old-fashioned studio practice of nickel-and-diming on issues that really matter while profligately wasting resources at the expense of stockholders and, of course, the viewing public. If Counter doesn’t step aside and substitute a clearheaded negotiating team to resolve the writers’ issues, stockholders should demand his prompt termination.

Thom Taylor

Los Angeles

The writer is the author of two books about writing in Hollywood.

As a decades-long member of the Motion Picture Editors Guild, one of the many creative film guilds whose contracts do not guarantee residuals, I have a real problem with the premise that work-for-hire employees of the Writers Guild think they automatically deserve residuals because of their job description. Residuals should be reserved for those who have proved their talent and should not be built into the union contract as a basic provision. This demand is especially galling to me because when the writers go on strike over residuals, all the other members of the film workforce who earn hourly wages suffer, both through lost work and budget squeezes resulting from increased compensation paid to actors and writers. The residuals they take for granted are not available to us when they put us out of work and jeopardize our livelihoods.

Gary Gegan

Culver City

I see that writers for TV shows and films are on strike. With a barrage of mindless TV shows and graphically violent movies this season, I thought they already were. This could be the best thing that’s happened to the entertainment industry in years.

Herb Stark

Massapequa, N.Y.

Thumbs-down on the Mukasey vote

Re “Mukasey all but a shoo-in for approval,” Nov. 3

If senior senators have deep concerns about Michael B. Mukasey’s nuanced stance on torture and his expansive view of executive privilege, why do they feel compelled to confirm him? The tacit understanding appears to be that if they don’t, President Bush will nominate someone even worse.

Bush is a lame-duck president with an approval rating in the 20s, and yet he continues to succeed in intimidating Congress. Senate leaders would rather give up than explain to the public that after Abu Ghraib and six years of White House scandals, we need an attorney general who condemns torture, respects the Geneva Convention and understands the limits of presidential power.

Maeve Wolfenden

Sherman Oaks

Re “Judge Mukasey has my vote,” Opinion, Nov. 3

Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s approval of Makasey can only cause dismay to all who hoped that the United States would find a voice among Democrats for an attorney general who would take seriously the rule of law. When asked about “certain coercive interrogation techniques,” Makasey slips quickly into generalities and legal quibbles. Sen. Feinstein, torture is torture. When will we stop handing propaganda victories to the likes of Al Qaeda and awaken to the fact that our international standing for justice and fair play have by this time suffered almost irreparable harm?

Peter A. O’Reilly

Claremont

Feinstein is wrong: Mukasey is former Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales.

Like Gonzales, Mukasey thinks that waterboarding -- which the United States has prosecuted as a war crime -- might be legal, as long as the perpetrator is not in the military. Like Gonzales, Mukasey thinks that breaking the law is OK if the president orders you to do it, because the president’s order makes the lawbreaking legal. Mukasey abandons the idea that no one is above the law in favor of the idea that no law binds the president.

When Feinstein votes for Mukasey, she votes in favor of torture and allowing the president to create exceptions to the rule of law.

William Slattery

Los Angeles

Where are the Christian voices in regard to the waterboarding issue? We all agree that torture is unacceptable. But we have a regime in Washington that seems to think that if we don’t call it torture, it isn’t torture. And now we have a man nominated to be the top law enforcer in our nation who wants to continue these semantic games. For more than 100 years, our own tribunals have treated waterboarding as a criminal act when performed by our enemies. What part of the Gospel says this could be acceptable?

Richard Murphy

Whittier

The Senate Judiciary Committee’s consideration of Mukasey to become attorney general was handled poorly. Mukasey refused to regard waterboarding as torture for good reason: His nomination for attorney general would have been withdrawn because he would have put himself in the position of possibly having to prosecute people in the administration. What the committee should have done was to try to get him to promise to appoint a special prosecutor to investigate the matter, which would have taken him out of the loop. I believe that almost all Americans would agree that torture is un-American and illegal.

John Boyden

Sierra Madre

Now that Feinstein has explained why Mukasey has her vote, I’ll explain why she doesn’t have mine anymore. She votes the right way; she’s just representing the wrong party.

Elissa Tognozzi

Santa Monica

Should Carona wear the badge?

Re “D.A. calls on Carona to go on leave,” Nov. 3

Recent events clearly show that Orange County Sheriff Michael S. Carona’s judgment and ethics must be seriously questioned. Calls for his leaving office are appropriate. The Orange County Board of Supervisors should move forward with placing a proposal on the February 2008 ballot allowing voters to give the board the power to remove Carona from office, because he will never voluntarily step down.

But knowing the history of the Board of Supervisors, it is doubtful that it has the backbone to force his resignation. I hope the board members will refrain from altering rules to accommodate the desires of other elected county officials. Let’s not forget that it was a Board of Supervisors decision that allowed Carona to appoint alleged co-conspirator Donald Haidl as a senior member of the department -- a prime example of elected politicians accommodating other elected politicians at the expense of the public.

Bob Fitzgerald

Laguna Hills

Innocent unless proved guilty does not appear to apply in Carona’s case, for he is being asked to step down from his position as sheriff but has yet to be convicted. He has the right to fight the charges against him.

If Carona is proved guilty, he will obviously lose his position as sheriff. And because he has chosen to not step down, if he is proved guilty, he will look quite foolish, for he could have avoided some of the public humiliation that will follow if he is in fact guilty. Why deny this man his pride, or his humiliation?

Krysta Worthen

Las Flores

A warning sign for us all

Re “Weak case seen in failed trial of charity,” Nov. 4

All Americans should be wary of the tortuous journey that the Holy Land Foundation took through the American justice system. A simple declaration from President Bush froze its assets and closed its offices. A federal appeals court upheld a ruling against the foundation, citing secret evidence that would not be disclosed to the organization or its lawyers. The logic behind this ruling harks back to the adage: I would like to tell you what the evidence is against you, but then I would have to kill you.

The Bush administration, while extolling the glories of democracy and liberty, seems more inclined to dispense justice like the autocracies and theocracies it professes to deplore.

Jeffrey Stewart

Eagle Rock