I was watching the season finale of The Newsroom and one of the characters is being sued because he gave a bad job recommendation. The story goes like this. One of the main characters has to leave the news corp to go on the road with the Romney campaign because the person he replaced broke a limb jumping 2 stories into a pool. He also has to leave because he has feeling for one of the co-workers and just wants to leave town for a minute. His name is Jim Harper. So Jim tells the shows EP to bring someone up from DC to cover for him. This guys names is Jerry Dantana. So Jerry gets a chance to call a buddy and invite him to participate on their show where he is to talk about drones and war crimes. After the show, this person gives Dantana a story that the United States dropped Sarin gas to extract 2 marines in Afghanistan.
After the show goes on, Dantana meets with a 3 star general who tells him that they used Sarin gas, but on camera he denies it. So Dantana doctors the raw film footage. This causes the news corp everyone works for to report a false story. Dantana is fired and sues the news corp for wrongful termination. We later find out that Dantana applied to Kickstarter and another character named Don Keefer gives him a bad job recommendation because he doctored the tape.
This brings me to my point. Now in the season finale, Jerry starts to sue along side the news corp, Don Keefer for giving a bad recommendation. So Don decides to counter sue Dantana for “Intentional affliction of emotional distress”. When Don tells the news corporation’s lawyer, he brings up a great point. These are the lines from the show that I would like to point out.
Don: “I decided to counter sue Jerry. Are you ready? Intentional affliction of emotional distress. I found this out by Google-ing it.” Lawyer: “There are four elements to this. One, He acted intentionally…” Don: “He doctored the tape”. Lawyer: “Two, his conduct was extremely outrageous”. Don: “He doctored the tape”. Lawyer: “Three, You suffer in distress”. Don: “I am in extreme distress”. Lawyer: “Four, his act caused your distress”. Don: “He doctored the mother fucking tape Rebecca”. Lawyer: “You sound upset”. Don: “DO I? He doctored the tape and he gets to sue us? I gave him a bad job recommendation because he doctored the tape and he gets to sue me? The people who want tort reform have a point you know? The things you are allowed to sue for and be taken seriously. And so we come face to face with just how stupid lawyers worry we are. You know what it says on the side of a box of chocolate pudding mix? Caution, pudding will get hot is heated. Go to a hotel and you know what it says on the side of a shower cap? Warning, only fits one head.” Lawyer: “you wear a shower cap?” Don: “I read. I’m dying to know the suit the prompted lawyers the insist lawyers on the shower cap directions. Look at the box that your iron comes in. It says Warning, do not iron clothes why wearing them. DO WE REALLY HAVE TO SLOW DOWN FOR THEE PEOPLE?”
This is something that I’ve been yelling from the top of the mountains and building. I wished we could live in a society where there is some sort of real common sense. It says HOT on the side of coffee and you know damn well that you didn’t order an iced coffee. You know it’s hot. Dennis Leary has a good book where he brings up that point as well. Why is it that we have to spell things out for people. Oh, I know, because we would rather be interested in the Jersey Shore instead of what is going on in the world.
Here is a Youtube video I made of the Newsroom and I thought you might be interested in seeing. What are your thoughts?
