Dear Editor
Dear Editor Astonished I was astonished to find that The New Leader shared and approved of the now overwhelming American contempt for politicians ("Between Issues," March 24). Are politicians...
...But the law of supply and demand—if it works at all—works as well with nominal dollars as with real marks or anything else...
...The venial sins of politicians, thanks to the polemical context, are made more visible, feeding the extravagant cynicism both of the general public and, to my surprise, of The New Leader...
...In the market, nominal dollars are legal tender, and no fooling...
...his rather craggy face, with its dark eyes brooding above the heavy mouth and brutal chin, was already the face of an invalid...
...Los Angeles Dominic Vesey Lying Man Three cheers to Walter Goodman and Bennet Goodman ("When Poker Chips Meet Microchips," NL, June 2-16) for subtly underlining the central miracle of human conciousness: deceit...
...To the extent that our theory and our practice are in conflict, to that extent we have a hollowness somewhere...
...Katz says that I was referring to nominal dollars in "The Lie of Supply and Demand" (NL, March 24...
...Here is Dangerfield on Sir Edward: "He suffered from a bad digestion, bad nerves, insomnia, and melancholy...
...This marked a low point in the history of Tory rabble-rousing and helped bring about the demise of the Liberal Party as described by George Dangerfield in his classic historical work The Strange Death of Liberal England...
...Adam Smith gives two theories of price in a span of three or four pages...
...Chappaqua, N. Y. George P. Brockway Ulster-ed Up Readers of Stefan Kanfer's excellent review of the play Gross Indecency, about Oscar Wilde's libel trial ("Feasting with Panthers," NL, June 216), might be interested to know that after prosecuting the haplessly witty Wilde, Sir Edward (as he was by then) Carson placed his demagogic powers at the service of the Ulster unionists who opposed home rule for Ireland...
...The conventional theory rums economics into a "natural" world in which prices are set automatically by the invisible hand...
...His was a nature which will often succeed in the courtroom, which is welcome on platforms, and at home in dissenting pulpits...
...Whatever supply is measured in, demand also must be measured in, and so of course will be price, the alleged dependent variable...
...Red Bank, N.J...
...Perhaps in coming decades when computers such as Deep Blue surpass Homo sapiens in cognitive power we'll rename the species—anyone for Homo mendaci...
...In To Be a Politician, the Seattle lawyer Stimson Bullitt describes the sense of civic responsibility that drew him to his (unsuccessful) runs for Congress...
...The nominal/real question has nothing to do with the latter...
...David Riesman Henry Ford II Professor of Social Sciences Emeritus Harvard University No Fooling Please forgive me for not replying sooner to Melvin Katz' letter in the May 5 issue...
...Are politicians who seek power to be more despised than businessmen or others who seek wealth, or academicians, rarely immune to wealth, who seek visibility, clinging to Political Correctness to avoid or deflect any criticism...
...It was well after eight in the evening before Fulbright had a chance to talk with us about a modus vivendi with the USSR, a hazardous topic for a politician at that time...
...Katz, he is arguing that Big Tobacco's price increase is justified because of inflation...
...Why should politicians, who directly seek and sometimes make good use of power, be disparaged, in contrast, for example, to those who seek power by accumulating wealth, or by entering academia or journalism...
...I was reminded of going to see the late Senator J. William Fulbright of Arkansas, to talk about a conceivable modus vivendi at the time of the crisis with the Soviet Union over Berlin, now nearly four decades ago...
...One is that "natural" price is set by "natural" costs, the other that price is set by competition in the market...
...My colleague and I waited in the Senator's office while he talked endlessly with constituents, including a few chicken farmers, concerned with tariffs and agricultural subsidies...
...It would not have surprised Wilde, tireless student of the way of the world that he was, to hear that his nemesis served as First Lord of the Admiralty in 1916-17 and died in 193 5 having been ennobled as Baron Carson...
...but a nature, also, which ought never to be allowed within the walls of a parliament, so long as parliaments remain the interesting playgrounds of democracy...
...Maybe it is, and maybe it isn't, but the law of supply and demand has nothing to do with it...
...Walter F. Costello...
...My argument, stated more fully in my book, The End of Economic Man, is that price is always the independent variable, set by either buyer or seller and accepted by the other...
...The New Leader welcomes comment and criticism on any of its features, but letters should not exceed 300 words...
...As I read Mr...
...no one acts freely, and so no one is responsible for what happens...
...Cambridge, Mass...
Vol. 80 • June 1997 • No. 11
