So much for building consensus.

Or, to put it another way, if I were the foreman of a jury, we would be hopelessly deadlocked.

That pretty much describes my efforts these past few weeks to develop a better way to handle same-name letter writers.

Two weeks ago, as you may recall, I related a telephone conversation I had with a reader who was upset about a letter we published from someone in his community with the exact same name.

As a result, he had to deal with a handful of phone calls from people who mistook him for the actual letter writer, among some other inconveniences.