As a nonprofit arts manager turned law student, I have seen this world from both sides, and I wholeheartedly approve of Simpson Thatcher's program. NFP's are constantly looking for ways that companies and individuals can do just what Gross decries: painlessly give to charity. Why? Because that makes them more likely to do it, of course. And because a modest program like this (though it would have been a major program for groups with whom I have worked) can lead to greater involvement between a charity and a new or low-level funder.

Really, Mr. Gross, should we be wasting our time crafting unlikely pitches that lead nowhere?

And of course we welcome and bolster the donor's so-called "smug" feelings of being glad they helped out. They should feel that way. And they should want to feel that way again. Just like the old canard of the schoolyard pusher: "First one's free."

It's just past lunchtime. Try it out, Mr. Gross. Please give 45 dollars to the following small New York charity: <link> by clicking on <link>

Now, didn't that feel good? You didn't do it? I guess it wasn't painless enough. I'll have to come up with a better approach.

This article has the idea of this charity all wrong. The purpose of the transaction is not to embiggen the soul of some large company, it's to fund the projects and help the people we are chartered to help. If it were the former, then your complaint about the amounts not being large enough to earn whatever benefits the donors derive might be valid.

But it's not. We don't give a damn if a corporation gives till it hurts or not. We just want the money.

The hungry do not care where the money came from . . . and besides, there are plenty of rich people out there who are not giving up their $60 per plate lunch so, if anything, the writer should rag on them.

Or he should take aim at the government that is not providing needed services. Or the truly bloated Gilded Age arrogance documented in another recent Times article about Sandy Weill, et al: <link>

But this lunch program? Small potatoes. Even this law firm is fairly a small organization compared to Uncle Sam or the behemoths in the article linked above.

Slate's article has, however, provided plenty of Fray posters with the opportunity to feel smug themsleves without even opening their wallets. That has to be worth something, right?

"We don't give a damn if a corporation gives till it hurts or not. We just want the money."

Thanks. I'll take acerbic honesty over martyrizing hypocrisy any day. :-)