Subject: Newspaper Drops Lawsuit
From: [email-masked]
Date: Thu, 17 Jun 1999 18:33:57 EDT

Newspaper Drops Lawsuit

The Letter has decided to drop its lawsuit against Republican candidate 
Michael Dickerson, Peter Hayes, and Dr. Frank Simon.

Main consideration was economic: as the case proceeded, estimates of the cost 
of litigation tripled, placing the newspaper's financial health in jeopardy.  
A community fundraising drive succeeded in attracting only a minimal amount 
of money.

Those estimates increased even further in late May after a federal judge 
threw out a portion of the case dealing with copyright infringement.  A 
lengthy appeal would only have added to the costs.

The case stems from a fundraising letter sent by the Michael Dickerson for 
Alderman campaign last July.  It claimed that this newspaper was publishing 
personals ads from homosexuals seeking sex with children, and it reprinted 
marked-up photocopies from the March 1996 edition.

In actuality, two of the three ads in question clearly show that the men were 
seeking other men age eighteen or over.  A portion of one ad was cleverly 
obscured by a magic marker so that the age requirement appeared to be "8-38" 
rather than the actual 18-38.  In the third ad, an adult lesbian expressed 
the desire to meet a "baby dyke," slang for a young adult lesbian.

Preliminary interrogatories revealed that the letter was authored primarily 
by Dr. Frank Simon, an anti-gay activist from Northfield, a suburb of 
Louisville.  Dickerson apparently didn't even sign the letter.  Simon has 
been using the same photocopied materials on his television program for 
several years.

For an editorial on the decision to drop the lawsuit, see page three of this 
issue.

Why We Quit

by David Williams, Editor

I'm personally not a quitter.  I've seen many things through when they never 
seemed feasible at the start.  But sometimes you have to cut your losses and 
move on.  In warfare, it's called a strategic withdrawal.

Why did this newspaper decide not to pursue its lawsuit against Michael 
Dickerson any further?  One word:  money.

Earlier this year, Dan Farrell of the Louisville Fairness Campaign properly 
noted that the price of justice in America is often too high.  A minimum-wage 
worker who's fired from her job because she's a lesbian isn't likely to file 
a lawsuit to get her job back: legal fees would keep her in hock for years.

Not so such wealthy individuals as Dr. Frank Simon, who was a party to our 
suit.  Never mind that his idol, Jesus Christ, once reportedly said it's more 
likely that a camel could get through the eye of a needle than a rich man 
could get into heaven.  That's one more verse Dr. Simon hasn't paid much 
attention to in his lucrative career.

In short, his pockets are too deep, and so are his backers'; he can always 
find money somewhere.  Compare that to the corporation that runs this 
newspaper, whose annual profits might pay your way to Bucharest for a few 
days but couldn't guarantee your return.

Our only satisfaction comes in knowing how little respect he has left.  We 
may not be able to face him in court to answer our legitimate complaints, but 
no matter: he's already lost in the court of public opinion, and his 
political clout is waning.  Republicans don't care what he thinks:  they just 
want his mailing list.

We didn't do that to him:  he did it to himself.

That's a warm enough thought for us.