Everyone with whom my wife spoke about the surcharge told her not to bother appealing.  Several people claimed to have waged unsuccessful appeals when they were not at fault.  The prevailing wisdom seemed to be that the system is rigged against drivers.  Nevertheless, I insisted that she appeal and even ghost-wrote her affidavit (we chose to appeal in writing rather than attending the hearing).

Today we received a notice that my wife “did demonstrate a showing necessary to rebut the governing presumption of the applicable standard of fault,” and the surcharge was vacated.  Woohoo!

Here’s the affidavit I wrote for her which was successful at getting the surcharge overturned:

Commonwealth of Massachusetts
Division of Insurance / Board of Appeal
1000 Washington Street, 8^th Floor
Boston, MA 02118
Attn: Statement Section

To whom it may concern:

Thank you for the opportunity to present my case for your consideration.

The open door of my parked Honda Odyssey minivan was hit by another driver.

I checked that the roadway was clear immediately before opening my door. No cars were in sight.

I then opened my door all the way and placed one foot on the pavement before suddenly realizing that there was another vehicle about to hit my door. I had time to pull my leg all the way back in and partially shut my door before that occurred, such that I was not injured and the only damage to my minivan was slight damage to my door’s trim.

When you consider the time that it took me to open my door all the way at a normal speed (i.e., I didn’t throw it open quickly or anything), put one foot on the pavement, realize that a vehicle had “come out of nowhere” and was about to hit mine, pull my leg fully back into my minivan, and close my door more than halfway, it should be obvious that the other vehicle (a) could not have been close to mine when this sequence of events started and (b) was probably traveling at an excessive speed and possibly not paying attention.

Here is a satellite photo of where the accident occurred:

I have marked where my car was legally and properly parked, only a couple of inches from the curb, with a red rectangle. I would like to call your attention to two features of this scenario:

1. Note how wide the single traffic lane is on that part of Faneuil Street, which is one-way. In a traffic lane that wide, any car driving close enough to the parking lane to clip a door was being driven negligently.
2. As I noted above, I did not see the other vehicle when I checked the roadway before opening my door, nor do I have any direct knowledge of where it came from. However, it seems likely to me that the vehicle either turned right from Bigelow Street onto Faneuil Street as shown by the blue arrow in the photo, or left from N435 onto Faneuil Street as shown by the green arrow. In either case, it appears that the other driver made the turn too quickly and/or without paying sufficient attention and did not notice my already open door until it was too late for him to avoid colliding with it.

Given all these details, I think it is clear that I was not responsible for this accident.

Thank you again for taking the time to consider my appeal.

I received in the mail today a letter from E. Peter Mullane, the lawyer whom Village Automotive Group has apparently retained to respond to my Chapter 93a letter about their deceptive advertising practices.

It is worth noting that E. Peter Mullane’s chief claim to fame is that he is one of the lawyers who defended John J. Connolly Jr., the former FBI agent who was convicted in federal court of racketeering, obstruction of justice, murder and conspiracy to commit murder and will be spending the rest of his life in prison.  Nice!

I am not going to publish Mullane’s letter here, because there are all kinds of legal issues with that, and… well… Mullane is a lawyer, y’know?  I will, however, publish the response I just sent him, from which you can get a pretty good idea of the claims he made in his letter.  Enjoy!

E. Peter Mullane, Esq.
6 Bennett Street
Cambridge, MA 02138-5708

Dear Mr. Mullane,

I received your letter today concerning Village Automotive Group. Not Honda Village, because the deceptive practices about which I wrote are being used by multiple VAG dealerships, and because Honda Village is not a registered corporation but rather is part of Village Automotive Group, Inc. As such, any class action undertaken in response to these practices will name VAG as the defendant.

While agree with your characterization of the advertising industry as “primarily and unapologetically based upon the premises and goal of the advertisers trying to get people to buy things they perhaps do not really need, or to use products that have less value than is being represented and touted by the manufacturer,” the law views these objectives differently from intentional deception, i.e., knowingly misleading consumers into believing something that is completely and objectively false.

Concerning your example, “the pharmaceutical companies who spend billions of dollars advertising prescription drugs that commonly do not perform as advertised, and in fact in many cases have undisclosed side-effects that are actually harmful to the consumer,” in fact, drug companies are prohibited from knowingly making false claims and are required to disclose side effects. There have been several high-profile cases recently when drug companies have been fined and prosecuted for failures in this regard.

As for your other example, “companies advertising the social benefits of alcohol and tobacco use, while promoting the fiction and deception that the use of those products is the key to the road to happiness and having a fun time,” advertisements are permitted to employ exaggeration and hyperbole which a reasonable man would recognize as such, and the alcohol and tobacco advertisements to which you refer clearly fall into this category, and the law does not regard them as “deception.”

As for your assertion that the advertising industry is protected by the First Amendment, that is true to a large extent, but again, that protection does not apply to intentional, knowing deception. If that were not so, then the deceptive advertising elements of Chapter 93a would have been ruled unconstitutional long ago. For example, an oriental rug store may not repeatedly advertise fake “Going out of business!” sales to dupe customers into thinking that they are getting a good deal when they are not.

The envelopes which Village Automotive Group is using to mail its advertisements to consumers are designed to intentionally, knowingly deceive the recipients into thinking that their content is different and more important than it actually is. This is true for at least three different reasons:

1. The sender of the mailings is not identified on the outside of the envelopes.
2. The envelopes bear markings designed to make them falsely appear to be Certified Mail™, thus making the contents of the envelopes appear to be more important than they actually are.
3. The other markings on the envelopes, e.g., the printed year and the font used for the return address, are designed to mimic those of mailings sent by the federal government (most notably, the IRS and/or Social Security Administration), thus, once again, making it appear that the contents of the envelopes are far more personal and important than they actually are.

Unlike an alcohol or tobacco advertisement, a reasonable man would not recognize the deception being promulgated by one of these envelopes until he had already opened it. Indeed, the strategies employed by these envelopes are designed and intended to deceive a reasonable man.

According to Duclersaint v. Federal National Mortgage Association, 427 Mass. 809, 696 NE2d 536 (1998) “A practice may be deceptive if it reasonably could be found to have caused the plaintiff to act differently than he otherwise would have acted.” That is clearly the case here, as the entire purpose of these deceptive envelopes is to cause their recipients to open them rather than throwing them in the trash as they would have if they had recognized their real origin and purpose.

On the subject of damages, Chapter 93a does not limit itself to actual damages, but rather permits redress for incidental damages as well. Indeed, according to Leardi v. Brown, 394 Mass. 151 (1985). Chapter 93A can be used to redress any injury, defined as “invasion of a legally protected interest.” and “plaintiffs are entitled to nominal damages even where no actual damages are shown.”

For example, if a consumer sees a “Going out of business!” banner in the window of a rug store, enters the store thinking he is going to get a bargain on a rug, and discovers that in fact the rugs being sold are of poor quality and not worth even the supposedly “bargain” prices being asked for them, he may file a claim against the store under Chapter 93a even if he did not purchase a rug, citing as damages the lost of time spent determining that the store’s advertisement was deceptive.

I assert time damages resulting from lost time spent opening your client’s deceptive advertisements before realizing their deceptive nature, as well lost time spent attempting to get your client to stop sending me these advertisements. I further assert damages resulting from emotional distress: since purchasing a vehicle from your client, I have become disgusted by their deceptive and dishonest practices and intensely ashamed that I ever did business with them, and I am forced to relive these painful emotions every time I receive another advertisement from your client. I further assert damages from invasion of privacy resulting from your client’s failure to stop sending me the advertisements when I asked them to do so. By the way, thank you for confirming that your client received that request, thereby making it impossible claim that they did not, should this matter go to trial.

Even if you are correct that my request was passed on to a vendor who failed to act on it, that does not diminish your client’s liability. The vendor was acting as a paid agent of your client, and it was incumbent upon your client to ensure that the vendor had proper procedures in place to ensure that requests such as mine were properly handled. Furthermore, concerning the nature of the advertisements, your client obviously worked with the vendor to design them and is thus liable for the intentional deception. Nevertheless, you can be sure that if a class action is initiated against your client for employing these deceptive practices, the advertising vendor through which the mailings were sent will be named as an additional defendant.

I have now demonstrated that the actions of your client were both unlawful and injurious under Chapter 93a. I include here by reference, without modification, the demands I enumerated in my last letter. I look forward to your prompt reply.

She responded and said that we could do it as long as we didn’t distribute any campaign literature.  She claimed that allowing us to distribute campaign literature would threaten her organization’s 501c3 status.

That didn’t sound right to me.  I was under the impression that the Allston-Brighton Parade was also organized by a 501c3, and the parade clearly has lots of politicians marching and handing out campaign literature.  However, I didn’t want to question Ms. Pasquale without first verifying my facts.  Therefore, I called the office of Rep. Michael Moran, which was organizing the parade, to confirm that the parade committee wa a 501c3.  I also contacted a lawyer I know who is an expert on this type of thing and asked him for his opinion.

He said that 501c3′s are allowed to have politics at their events as long as they do so in a non-partisan manner.  In this particular case, he said what that means is that if the street fair were to allow us to hand out Obama literature, they would also have to extend an invitation to the McCain campaign to participate as well.

Now that I had confirmation that PCBG could allow us to distribute campaign literature at the fair without threatening their 501c3 status, I wrote back to Ms. Pasquale as follows:

Thank you for your quick response.

I spoke about this with our lawyer, who is a nationally recognized expert on campaign finance law.  He says, “A 501 c 3 cannot engage in partisan politics. However, such a group can invite all candidates or parties to participate in events, and non-partisan voter registration is a major project of many civic oriented 501 c 3s.  If Jews for Obama sponsors voter reg, the fair organizers should also invite the Republicans. If the Republicans say they are not interested, the Dems can go ahead regardless.” He also suggested that I direct you to http://www.jcrcny.org/pdf/election/english.pdf.

Also, I just spoke with Rep. Moran’s office about the Allston-Brighton Parade.  He says that donations to the parade go through the parade committee, which is a 501(c)3.  Candidates for office appear in the parade and hand out literature every year, with no threat to the committee’s non-profit status.

In short, as long as a 501(c)3 is non-partisan and gives all major candidates’ supporters the opportunity to participate in its events, its 501(c)3 status is not in any way compromised by those supporters distributing campaign literature at those events.

Following through on our lawyer’s advice, you can contact the Massachusetts coordinator for John McCain’s campaign at Massachusetts@JohnMcCain.com.  If you would like, I can email them and let them know what we are planning on doing and carbon copy you.  Although frankly, I don’t think this is necessary — the parade and street fair are public knowledge, so if the McCain folks want to participate, they can find out about it and contact you just as I did.

Please let me know whether this addresses your concerns.

Ms. Pasquale responded and clarified that PCBG has made a conscious choice to be apolitical and doesn’t want any political campaigning at any of their events.  She also threatened to have my group removed from the fair if we showed up and tried to campaign for Obama.

I responded as follows:

Thank you for clarifying your policy.  I had misunderstood and thought you were saying that it would be illegal for any 501(c)3 to allow campaign literature to be distributed at one of its events.  It appears that what you meant was that your particular organization has chosen to restrict itself from such activities.  I can certainly understand why you would do that, and I appreciate that you took the time to explain it.

You have mentioned that we cannot distribute campaign materials from a voter registration booth.  Please clarify whether we would be permitted to have Obama signage and/or have our volunteers wearing Obama T shirts and/or pins.  Please also clarify whether we would be permitted to talk freely with people who approach us and initiate conversations, or whether you would expect us to actively decline to engage in political discussion.

We have no intention of attempting to violate your rules.  If we find them unacceptable, then we simply won’t participate in the fair.

Ms. Pasquale did not respond, so I resent my message six days later and asked for her to respond.

Ms. Pasquale sent a response in which she (a) declined to answer the questions I had asked about what we would be permitted to do at the fair, claiming that the “policy was clearly stated and re-addressed in previous correspondence” (when in fact her previous emails to me said nothing about the specific questions I had asked); (b) informed me, “your Politcal [sic] Group is Not Welcome to participate in the Allston Village Street Fair”; and (c) requested, “Please do not contact us again regarding this matter.”

I responded as follows:

If your policy had been clearly stated, I would not have felt the need to ask additional questions.

As I told you before, it would not even have crossed my mind to violate your rules.  If you had simply answered my questions politely, just as I was polite to you in all my correspondence, we could have reached a mutual understanding that participation in the fair by my group would not be appropriate.

Instead, you were peremptory and rude, and I will be letting the mayor, the city council, and the CDC know about your disrespectful and inappropriate manner.  While I’m at it, I might just write a letter about it to the Globe, the Herald and the TAB.

Why you felt the need to treat me with such disrespect, when the outcome would have been the same had you been polite, is beyond me.

Ms. Pasquale sent me another message in which she claimed that my group was the first that had ever been refused participation in the fair (a claim which I suspect is not true, and in any case not terribly significant since as far as I know this is only the second event that her group has ever organized, the first being last year’s fair), and that we were refused participation, “based on your correspondence statements, tone, and what was determined as unprofessional behavior.”

In other words, Joan Pasquale decided that my group couldn’t participate in her fair because she doesn’t like me (and, by the way, the claim that my behavior was in any was unprofessional is completely and utterly specious).

Subsequent research has revealed that Ms. Pasquale has a history of trying to steam-roll over people with whom she disagrees.

In the end, I decided it wasn’t worth writing to the papers about, but I did send a letter to the mayor and a number of other individuals and organizations whom I thought were relevant:

Dear Mayor Menino,

I am writing to complain about the conduct of Ms. Joan Pasquale, co-chair of the Allston Village Street Fair.

I contacted Ms. Pasquale to arrange for a group of volunteers to operate a voter registration table at the fair. Ms. Pasquale initially agreed. However, after an exchange of several email messages in which I attempted to obtain clarification of the rules Ms. Pasquale wished for us to follow, she reversed her initial approval and declared that we would not be allowed to participate.

During our exchange, I stated explicitly that I had every intention of following Ms. Pasquale’s rules. There was no legitimate reason for our group to be excluded.

Throughout our exchange, I was unfailingly polite; in response, Ms. Pasquale treated me with rudeness. For example, in the message in which she informed me that we were being barred from the fair, she demanded that I not contact her again. This is simply unacceptable.

My family has lived in Brighton for over a decade. We are blessed to be raising our five children in a wonderful community. We have been civically active throughout our time here, supporting local organizations with both our time and our money, and we have always been impressed with the warmth, openness, and selflessness of the volunteers and non-profit organizers who help to make Boston a great place to live. Through her conduct, Joan Pasquale has shown herself to fall far below that gold standard. I ask you to think twice before allowing her in the future to exercise control over a public event, held on public property, intended to showcase the best of what our city has to offer.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Kamens

CC: Councilor Mark S. Ciommo
Councilor John R. Connolly
Councilor Michael F. Flaherty
Councilor Stephen J. Murphy
Councilor Sam Yoon
Representative Michael J. Moran
Allston Brighton Community Development Corporation
Friends of Ringer Park
Allston Brighton Family Network

For some Jews, this is not a difficult challenge to overcome. The Torah may have been inspired by God, but it was written by men. Its intolerance toward homosexuals can be written off as the outdated bigotry of a bygone age.

For others, it is not a challenge at all. The Torah is the unchanging word of God. Since it describes homosexuality as an “abomination,” then that is how it should be treated.

And then, there are the rest of us, who try to take from the best of both worlds and are faced with the challenge of reconciling the seemingly irreconcilable.

I believe that the Torah is the word of the living God. I believe that every word in it has meaning, and that we don’t get to pick and choose which parts to believe. I believe that the Sages who have interpreted the Torah throughout history, while they are not infallible, have transmitted our tradition to the best of their ability, and we cannot simply dismiss the teachings we don’t like.

It is difficult for people outside of this belief system to understand the scope and complexity of the laws and traditions followed by observant Jews. They are referred to collectively as halacha, which literally means “the way.” Halacha weighs in on everything from the prohibition against murder to instructions for how to put on one’s shoes in the morning. Halacha is hierarchical in nature, with some parts (e.g., the shoe-donning instructions) less important than others, and with some parts more amenable to adjustment. The prohibition against homosexuality lies within the category of halacha that is important, stringent and unchangeable.

I believe that I am enjoined by God to follow halacha. I believe that following halacha makes me a better Jew, a better person, and a better citizen of the world. I believe that by following halacha, Jews make themselves a holy people and a light unto the nations.

And yet, at the same time, I believe that homosexuality is inborn and not an “aberration,” that gays deserve to be treated with dignity and respect and to be allowed to live as full members of society, and that discrimination against gays is utterly and completely unacceptable. Furthermore, I believe that justification for these beliefs can be found within halacha.

If you see a contradiction here, then you are beginning to understand the challenge that I and the many Jews like me face when grappling with this issue.

The situation is not completely hopeless. The idea of a law in the Torah being so problematic that there must be a “loophole” is as old as our tradition of halachic interpretation. The best example of this is the law of the rebellious and disobedient son (Deuteronomy 21:18-21):

If a man has a stubborn and rebellious son, which will not obey the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and that, when they have chastened him, will not hearken unto them. Then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city, and unto the gate of his place. And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he will not obey our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard. And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die: so shalt thou put evil away from among you; and all Israel shall hear, and fear.

The Sages of the Talmud, who no doubt had sons of their own and were familiar with just how “stubborn and rebellious” they could be, were just a little bit concerned about this halacha. Their solution was to “interpret” it out of existence, to place so many caveats and restrictions on its enforcement that the likelihood of its ever being carried out was virtually nil. At the end of their discussion, in the Babylonian Talmud, tractate Sanhedrin, page 71a, Rabbi Shimon declares, “there never was [a child who met all the criteria] and there never will be in the future.” However, it is important to remember that the core concept that the rebellion and disobedience of a son against his parents is a sin so grave that the Torah considers it a capital offense remains.

Modern rabbis and halachic scholars seeking tolerance of homosexuality within observant Judaism employ a similar strategy. The Torah law against homosexuality is a prohibition of the homosexual sexual act, not against homosexual feelings or a homosexual “lifestyle,” whatever that is. Furthermore, a conviction for a capital offense such as this one can result only from the testimony of two reliable male witnesses to the actual offense, and only if the witnesses warned the accused before the offense was committed that it was a capital offense, and only if the witnesses can confidently testify that the accused fully understood the nature of the offense before committing it. Finally, there is an overarching requirement in halacha to give people the benefit of the doubt, very similar to the “innocent until proven guilty” concept in American jurisprudence. Oh, and by the way, the Torah law against homosexuality doesn’t apply to women (it does, however, apply to non-Jews, one of only seven Torah laws that do).

The core concept that God does not approve of homosexuality and therefore neither should we remains. However, by interpreting away the ability to know that someone is guilty of violating the Torah law, and at the same time setting against it the requirement to give our fellow Jews the benefit of the doubt and to treat all Jews with respect and dignity, we seem to have solved the problem.

Well, almost. The gay-rights battle currently at the fore, at least in America, is gay marriage. To understand the challenge this presents to observant Jews, even those who have come to grips with the other aspects of gay rights as described above, you must first understand the traditional Jewish view of marriage.

According to halacha, the primary purpose of marriage is procreation. Every Jewish man is obligated by the Torah to produce and raise children (note well that the obligation is on the man, not the woman, because halacha is not supposed to put one’s health or life at risk, and pregnancy and childbirth are inherently dangerous). This obligation is so strong that there is a law, albeit one that is nowadays rarely enforced in practice and perhaps never was, that if a man discovers after he is married that his wife is unable to bear him children, he is obligated to divorce her and take a new wife.

The two challenges which halacha places on supporting gay marriage are now in sight. First, overt support for gay marriage transgresses the core concept that God does not approve of homosexuality and therefore neither should we. Second, a gay marriage (between two men as noted above, the halacha against homosexuality does not apply to women) is a public declaration by two men that they intend to ignore their obligation to procreate, and halacha does not look kindly (to say the least) upon public declarations of disobedience to Torah law.

Since the second of these is applicable only to Jewish men, if it were our only concern, then we would have no problem with endorsing civil gay marriage, although we would remain unable to support gay marriages performed in a Jewish setting. However, the first challenge affects our stance on civil gay marriage as well, since as noted above, the prohibition against homosexuality is one of the few which halacha considers binding on everyone, Jew and non-Jew alike.

Our response to this challenge is that although we cannot endorse the idea of civil gay marriage, we can not only endorse but actively promote making civil unions available to same-sex couples, with all of the same legal and civil rights that accrue from marriage. Because a civil union between two men is not necessarily a declaration of intent to engage in the prohibited homosexual act, we can, halachically, give the benefit of the doubt to those who enter such unions, and thus not violate the letter of the halacha. We may be stretching the spirit just a bit, but this is an acceptable trade-off when weighed against our halachic obligation to seek justice for all, to ensure equal treatment under the law, and to treat our fellow man with respect and dignity.

As I’ve explained above, we cannot actively support changes in the law to permit civil gay marriage. However, neither are we under any halachic obligation to oppose efforts by others to enact such laws. Furthermore, since we are obligated to respect and obey the laws of the land in which we reside, if gay marriage were to become legal, we would be under no obligation to work for its repeal. It is for these reasons that most American Jews have planted themselves firmly on the sidelines of the gay marriage debate. You can draw your own conclusions about which side Jews like me are cheering for.

The coping mechanisms I’ve described above will no doubt be perceived as too little by some gay-rights activists. Some, no doubt, will decry that we can only welcome gays into our communities by maintaining the illusion that we don’t actually know they’re gay and will brand this as no better than the universally despised “don’t ask don’t tell” policy of the American military. Others will declare that nothing less than full recognition of the rights of gays to marry is acceptable.

They’re right. These are not ideal solutions, and those of us who believe, as I do, that gays are entitled to equal treatment in our society, are not entirely happy with them. Nevertheless, we hope that the gay community will make an effort to understand that for us to go further would be to challenge the very bedrock of our faith. Just as we are doing our best to legitimize and recognize the rights of the gay community, we ask for the members of that community to respect the limits placed upon us by our faith. By meeting each other halfway, we will all benefit.

To the editor:

It is unfathomable to me why the Boston Herald thinks that how Louise Woodward is living her life is, or should be, news to your readers.

Every bit of Woodward’s conduct since Matthew Eappen’s tragic death has made it clear that even if she was responsible, it was nothing more than a tragic mistake. She is of no danger to anyone and thus should be of no interest to anyone.

It’s truly appalling to watch an unscrupulous reporter attempting to ruin Woodward’s life by spreading her past around to people who had no need to know it.

Please, leave Louise Woodward alone.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Kamens

Fortunately, I didn’t end up having to figure out how to use either of these options, which would have been difficult since the CEO of Sprint and its corporate headquarters are in Virginia, because I received from Sprint yesterday via DHL a check for $823.62, the total amount of the judgment in my favor.

Now, since then, the judgment was increased to $834.72, because the court awarded me additional interest for the time between the judgment and the payment hearing. In fact, interest theoretically continues to accrue on a daily basis until the defendant pays. However, that’s all water under the bridge, since as noted previously, the day before the judgment was issued, Sprint sent me a check for $262.49, which means that they’ve now overpaid their debt to me by more than $200.

If you think I’m going to waste more of my time trying to get them to take back the overpayment, you’ve got another think coming. Have you ever tried to get a major corporation to take back money they shouldn’t have given you? Well, I have, and believe me, it’s a nightmare. I’ll gladly give back the extra money just as soon as they actually ask for it. I won’t make them ask me for it for nine months, like they made me do when I was trying to get back the money they owed me.

I am once again faced with the situation of having to take my vacation days for the Jewish High Holidays. Instead of passively standing by, I plan to take this issue up with my company and human resources department, as I am tired of corporate America assuming everyone is of a Christian faith. I am looking for some advice on how to handle this situation, if anyone has dealt with this before and would not mind sharing that would be greatly appreciated.

I think my response is worth blogging:

The best indicator of whether you are likely to come out of this with a reasonable arrangement with your company is your attitude going into it. If the people with whom you discuss this feel like you understand their side of the issue and are just trying to come to an agreement which will be acceptable to both sides, they will be much more cooperative than if you’re all up in their faces about how corporate America is unfair to Jews. Whether or not you believe that is not the point; the point is that it is not a basis for discussion that is likely to yield the result you want.

Your company has a legal obligation to make it possible for you to observe the Jewish holidays, but they’re under no obligation to make it easy. If you are lucky enough to work for a particularly enlightened manager or company, one that understands that you will be a better, more productive employee if you aren’t stressed about missing work for the holidays, then they will find a way to make it easier (for example, the best manager I’ve ever had offered me five extra days of vacation per year, off the books, for Jewish holidays). However, offers for accommodations that will cost the company money need to come from the company, rather than being demanded by you.

You should go into the discussion with a proposal for reasonable accommodations you would like the company to make, using some combination of the following approaches:

• Borrow against vacation to be accrued later.
• Work on some company holidays, in exchange for compensatory time off for the Jewish holidays. I love working on Christmas day – the office is completely quiet, and with no interruptions I get a huge amount of work done. I also frequently work on Memorial Day and Labor Day.
• Work extra hours at night or on Sundays in exchange for compensatory time off for the Jewish holidays.
• Take unpaid leave for some of the holidays.
• Take a reduction in pay in exchange for more annual vacation days.
• During the next compensation adjustment period, ask for extra vacation days in lieu of part of the raise you are offered.

When presenting your proposal, you need to make it clear that you understand that the company is entitled to a certain level of productivity, and you are looking for a way to maintain that productivity level while still allowing you to observe your religion. It’s important that the people with whom you discuss this don’t get the impression that you’re trying to take advantage of the company.

If you work a lot of extra hours already, and if you’ve got a smart manager who knows that, then your manager will almost certainly offer to let you take off some of the holidays off the books. However, in a year like this one, when there are 12 Yomim Tovim on weekdays, any manager is going to be hard-pressed to justify letting you take off all of the holidays without any sort of make-up. Next year isn’t much better, with 10 missed days, but 2009 has only 6, which just about as good as it gets.

Which of these approaches you use, and in what combination, depends on your personal preferences and on what your company is willing to accommodate. Use your best judgment to decide on the initial proposal you present when entering the discussion, and be prepared to adjust your proposal based on the feedback you receive.

If you have a good working relationship with your manager, you should discuss the issue privately with him/her first, rather than going directly to HR. if you don’t have a good working relationship with your manager, then find a different job where you do. That sounds flippant, but I’m serious. If you’ve got a good manager with whom you get along well, it will be easy for the two of you to come to an understanding. If you don’t, it’ll be difficult to impossible. The job market is hot right now, so if this is a serious quality of life issue for you, you shouldn’t be adverse to the idea of finding a job where it won’t be a problem.

Finally, keep in mind that there is still ignorance, intolerance and outright anti-Semitism out there, and you may bump into it when you start down this path. I’ve had to transfer out from under at least one manager because of this. Be aware that the end result of asking for special accommodations because of your religion may be that you end up finding it necessary to switch managers or switch jobs. It’s not fair and perhaps not even legal, but that’s life.

Take a look at http://jik3.kamens.brookline.ma.us/cgi-bin/holidays.cgi. You may find it useful in this endeavor.

Good luck!

The law varies from state to state.  I knew that Massachusetts regulated direct shipments from wineries and other merchants, but I did not realize that said regulations also apply to personal shipments.  Actually, it’s possible that they don’t, and that FedEx and UPS simply refuse to ship them at all because they don’t want to be in the business of figuring out which shipments to allow.

*sigh*

To the editor:

Concerning the tragic, fatal car crash in Leicester, high school principal Tom Lauder said, “It’s not like they did anything wrong.” Unfortunately, he’s wrong… dead wrong.

The speed limit where the crash occurred was 30 mph. Police believe that the driver was traveling as fast as 70 mph, over double the limit.

To find out where teen drivers learn to speed, most parents need only look in the mirror. The majority of Massachusetts drivers ignore speed limits as a matter of course. Is it any surprise that their teen-aged children, who have watched their parents speed for 16 1/2 years, emulate their behavior?

The recent changes to the Junior Operator License law will do little to reduce tragic accidents, as long as adult drivers continue to perpetuate a culture of disregard for the rules of the road. Perhaps rather than showing teens in driver’s education classes videos of horrific accidents caused by speeding, the videos should be shown to their parents.

Sincerely,

Jonathan Kamens

“In purchasing kiddie porn, users abuse children who live in distant countries.  Who really cares about incarcerating U.S. citizens for looking at pictures on their computers, when the pictures ware taken thousands of miles away?  Are we not sick of the argument that the United States is responsible for nation-building?”

Apparently, as far as Mr. Nathan is concerned, consuming child pornography produced by abusing American children is wrong, but hey, if it’s those darn foreigners who are being abused, go for it!

Unbelievable.