LETTERS
LETTERS Nader in history Congratulations on the fine article about Ralph Nader ["Ralph Nader Reconsidered," Jonathan Rowe, March]. In fact, the article makes the valid point that Nader has...
...I conclude they are not...
...CYRUS F RILEE JR...
...How about: "40 percent [of all smokers] don't know it causes most lung cancer!' If there is anyone in America who hasn't heard or read that by now he is either deaf and blind or living under Mt...
...That truly reckless charge questions the credibility of the whole antismoking campaign...
...In fact, the article makes the valid point that Nader has stood for much more than simply consumer advocacy...
...I'll make a bet that the judgment of history will be far kinder to Nader than to Calvin Coolidge and his modern-day clone, Ronald Reagan...
...The Supreme Court has affirmed that guarantee...
...The culprit in the municipal marketplace is private-purpose financing...
...You err, however, in suggesting the elimination of the tax exemption of municipal debt...
...The Constitution guarantees separation of powers between the federal and local governments...
...The most efficient method with which to end the abuse of "innovative" revenue bonds for hospitals, housing, pollution control, and other questionable purposes is a more responsible, narrow view of public purpose by officials of municipal governments...
...The antismoking crusade is awash in exaggeration and statistical obfuscation, but Owen's article is state of the art...
...For instance: "smoking now causes .. . 30 percent of all cancer cases!' That is a sweeping statement, totally without proof, not to mention unprovable...
...CONNIE JOHNSON Syria, Virginia Plain vanilla and you As an investment banker who deals in "plain vanilla" bond issues, I feel compelled to respond to your essay regarding local government debt ["The Government Debt Racket," Paul Glastris, February...
...Exemption" is an improper term...
...Rushmore...
...however, it is the business of local government to make these decisions, and the Constitution gives those rights to the states...
...First, the praise...
...There is no public purpose justification for the tax exempt financing of corporate America...
...JOHN F. BYE Dade City, Florida That was a great article by David Owen on cigarette murder, but he overlooks one good argument against the Tobacco Institute's contention that the tobacco industry benefits the economy because it employs 393,000 Americans directly and 1.6 million indirectly: If smokers didn't buy cigarettes, they could spend their money on other (more useful) things and thereby employ about the same number of people that way...
...After years of weekly cancer scares that later studies refute, 40 percent of smokers may not believe smoking causes cancer, but they certainly have heard about Then there is my favorite: "as many as 5,000 deaths [every year] among nonsmokers who breath in smoke that others exhale...
...I must both praise and criticize your article...
...Such financing has indeed forced borrowing costs to be higher for all other traditional financing needs and has clouded the true nature of the credit which supports traditional debt...
...Albuquerque, New Mexico Smoking debate I'm disappointed you had to indulge in yellow journalism by printing David Owen's antismoking tirade ["The Cigarette Companies: How They Get Away with Murder," March] because I subscribe to The Washington Monthly for its open-mindedness...
...Just as interest income on municipal debt is not taxable for federal purposes, neither is interest income on debt of the federal government taxable by the states or their political subdivisions...
...as Rowe points out, Nader not only has saved countless thousands of lives, he has also done what he could through example and education to make the public more aware of its responsibilities as citizens in a democracy which claims to stand for social justice...
...The issue really is a matter of judgment as to what constitutes a "local government public purpose!' Can you conclude that decent housing, clean air, a college education, and health care costs are not human needs which are the responsibility of local government...
...Your grasp of the problems caused by "private-purpose" tax exempt bonds cannot be challenged...
...STEVEN CORD Indiana, Pennsylvania...
...Naturally, as Rowe quotes Lewis Powell as saying, Nader is considered "perhaps the most effective antagonist of American business ." What American business leaders need to consider is this: what will be the price for the kind of corporate irresponsibility and greed which is pervasive today in this nation's boardrooms, and who will pay the price...
...Much better that local officials make a "wrong" decision than federal officials make that decision...
Vol. 17 • May 1985 • No. 4
