TILTING AT WINDMILLS
TILTING AT WINDMILLS The decline in concern for the family has been a much-lamented trend in our society. It is heartening, therefore, to know that the new acting mayor of Chicago, Eugene...
...The Post deserves praise for running the story, but a follow-up piece in The Washington Times brings us closer to the real trouble...
...The inflation ended because energy supplies increased...
...He may be deserving, but even if he is, does he deserve that much...
...I would bet that at least a fourth of the Post's staff are the progeny of marriages in which the concealment of premarital conception was involved...
...And to many disabled workers of both sexes, the freedom to work at home is essential...
...It is heartening, therefore, to know that the new acting mayor of Chicago, Eugene Sawyer, has stoutly resisted this trend...
...Israel is doing a terrible thing in expelling Mubarak Awad, a Palestinian-American who has preached nonviolent resistance to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank...
...But Washington's are not revenue bonds...
...In other words, great effort makes you a little crazy...
...The governor points out that the schools' case for needing money is not bolstered by the fact that they are raising the salaries of already generously paid administrators...
...Why did The Washington Post make such a big deal out of Pat Robertson's lie about his marriage date...
...She reports that the federal government and nine out of ten cities have some restrictions on such work...
...That the 'Pax Reform Act of 1986 left a stone or two unturned is indicated by the fact that, although a businessman who takes his client to a Broadway play is no longer able to deduct the total price of the ticket, he can still deduct the entire cost of transporting the client, even if it's by a $200-a-night limousine...
...Private sexual practices, even those as bizarre as the Mahatma's, should not be reported unless they reveal some other character defect such as cruelty or 7ecklessness...
...I think the freedom to work in one's home is important for everyone: if a couple wants to share the care of their children, they should be encouraged to work part-time at home so they can do so...
...The New York Times is making a mistake...
...All three were fluent in Korean and two of them also in Japanese...
...I could not relax...
...Harry Carson, a linebacker for the New York Giants has a problem, and I hope there is some wise person out there who knows the solution...
...Comparing his team's efforts in last year's playoffs to their effort in this year's regular season, he said, "I think it's extremely tough to maintain the same level of intensity during the season for long periods of time, the same intensity you have through the playoffs and the Super Bowl...
...I wonder why, now when we are all supposed to be trying to behave ourselves, the mini is fashionable once more...
...Not only is the city paying too much, it doesn't even need the advice...
...I want very much to think otherwise, but I have to confess that my experience offers no evidence to the contrary...
...On the latter test, for example, 62.9 percent of South Carolina fourthgraders scored above the national average even though the state ranks fiftieth in college entrance examination results...
...government representatives in each place...
...For example, the pay of the superintendent of Sacramento schools will go from $88,000 to $93,280...
...A typical day's wardrobe, including an Allen Flusser silk tie and a Ralph Lauren wool suit for the man and a Calvin Klein silk blouse and Judith Leiber crocodile pumps for the woman, costs about $3,000 for each sex...
...they are "general obligation" bonds, which are payable out of general tax revenues...
...It is worth reminding ourselves that the only double-digit inflation in this century has come from shortages or perceived shortages...
...The head of the West Virgina Education Association was recently quoted in the Charleston Gazette as favoring "tougher teacher evaluations...
...Lazard two to four times the rate other cities pay for comparable financial advice—over $2.8 million in fees since 1985...
...The mayor does have one point in his defense: the Bahamas vacation was purchased, he says, "with my own private money...
...Sensible Israelis understand this, but Shamir and the other hard-liners who want to crush Arab opposition even when it is reasonable appear to be winning the struggle for Israel's soul...
...According to newspaper reports, while Sawyer was a powerful alderman, the Chicago Transit Authority counted eight Sawyer relatives and associates on its payroll at one time, including two of his brothers, who were being paid salaries of $65,000 and $72,000...
...Flaunting success has become fashionable in corporate America...
...Lazard has not marketed its bonds through competitive bidding...
...Lazard Co., the firm that is supposed to be giving the city independent financial advice on the sale of hundreds of millions of dollars in municipal bonds...
...The seed money for the service and the rent for its offices are being paid by the American Association of Retired Persons, according to a recent news report...
...You doubt me...
...The AARP is a lobby, and the Times shouldn't be in bed with any lobby...
...From our Only in California Department: An Oakland man who robbed a savings and loan has sued it and the city for $2 million for the emotional harm he suffered from the explosion of a smoke bomb hidden in the bundle of cash he had stolen...
...My friend James Fallows reports some heartening news about Lite's fellow United States Information Service employees in Korea: "I was in the three major provincial centers—Pusan, Kwangju, Taegu—and I met the local U.S...
...And commentators as respected as the usually sound Robert J. Samuelson continue to talk seriously about the danger of rapidly rising prices...
...I never thought I would agree with Phyllis Schlafly on anything, but I find myself sharing almost completely the concerns she expressed in a recent column about legal limitations on home-based work...
...Firms such as Lazard are necessary only when a municipality wants to sell "revenue" bonds...
...It has always seemed to me that this is the price that has to be paid whenever anyone tries to do his very best at any task...
...That this is a danger to be worried about was made clear a few years ago when our auto manufacturers raised prices and frittered away a similar opportunity to dramatically increase their share of the market while Japanese imports were restricted...
...All his high interest rates did was cause a recession in 1981-82...
...The good news is that there are a few splendid souls who uphold the finest traditions of the foreign service...
...But because the AARP is a lobby for the elderly and the elderly are considered deserving, it escapes the criticism other lobbies receive...
...It was the people who, by buying energyefficient cars and reducing their gasoline consumption, brought down prices, not Volcker, the high priest elitists love to credit...
...A researcher has discovered that at the elementary school level, no state is below average on six major national tests, including the Stanford Achievement Test and the Comprehensive Test of Basic Skills...
...It's unhealthy...
...The services of firms like Lazard are unnecessary when competitive bidding is used...
...Afficionados of the Barry administration will recall that the District's bond business is the subject of an ongoing grand jury probe...
...Women who for a long time wore outfits that made them look like scaled-down versions of men are now walking advertisements for Vogue...
...The main causes of single-digit inflation in recent years— Johnson's guns-and-butter policy during Vietnam and wage increases without productivity increases during the seventies—simply do not exist now...
...The bad news about our foreign service is that the U.S...
...They also recommend a Rolex watch, but that costs $2,500 and may have become optional since October 19...
...This was the case with the OPEC inflation of 1973 and 1979 and in the only other double-digit year, 1947, when prices rose because there was a severe shortage, due to wartime production restrictions, o' the cars, washing machines, and other consumer goods people wanted to buy...
...As you might have guessed, the District under Barry and W.R...
...I would wake up in the middle of the night...
...It turns out that the District is paying W.R...
...Certainly many of his fellow superintendents do not...
...The computer has given us new opportunities for work at home, adding to the traditional arts and crafts that can be performed just as easily in a house as in a formal work place...
...In California, Bill Honig, the superintendent of schools, whose efforts to improve public education I have long admired, is locked in a struggle with Governor George Deukmejian, whose career I have found less inspiring...
...It has created the Maturity News Service and is distributing the service's stories...
...On the reporting of sex matters generally, I hope you read our Gandhi satire a few months ago...
...The truth is, however, that most of the elderly are no longer deserving in the sense of being needy—they are better off than the rest of us...
...By the way, since Mario Cuomo has taken his lumps in this column, I should give him credit for being the only potential Democratic nominee for president, other than Bruce Babbitt, with the courage to come out for need testing of entitlements, including Social Security...
...My only disagreement with her is that she sees this as only a woman's issue...
...I am reminded of a 25th anniversary survey of a Yale class in which one-third of its alumni said they ranked in the top quarter of the class...
...In this case, however, I have some sympathy for the governor...
...And when their lobbyists protect the affluent elderly from full taxation on their Social Security benefits as they did last November, thus derailing one of the best ways of reducing the deficit, they are definitely not serving the public interest...
...Charles Peters...
...They are not at all hard to sell, usually being offered to underwriters through competitive bidding, which can be counted on to secure the most favorable interest rate for the city...
...Honig is trying to get Californians to donate their tax rebates to the schools...
...I wouldn't have believed it of an institution of Berkeley's reputation but the story revealing the practice appeared in a reliable paper, the San Jose Mercury News, complete with quotes from the professors who were in on the take...
...I could not stay still...
...Its point was that a public man should not be destroyed on the grounds of his sexual practices alone...
...The legitimate concern of unions—that workers might be exploited through, for example, underpaid piece work—could be guarded against by a program of random inspection...
...The unions, which have been the major opponents of homebased work, have, in this regard at least, earned the contempt that right-wingers like Schlafly bestow upon them...
...Their new zeal for reform may be motivated by the fear that they are just a half step ahead of the sheriff, as was suggested by a recent headline, this one from The New York Times: "More Non-Catholics Using Catholic Schools—Parents are seeking better education and stricter discipline...
...But were you aware that professors participate in the scandal by accepting royalty fees based on the number of sets of notes sold...
...When the miniskirt first appeared in the late sixties, the prevailing morality was sexually permissive...
...The sin of the concealment is so minor and so understandable in light of the morality of those years that it's hard to understand how anyone these days could take it as seriously as the Post did...
...On that terrible Sunday in Haiti one was Jeffrey Lite, who, according to Preston, "took his bulletproof van several times into areas where Ton Tons Macoutes snipers were gunning for American journalists and pulled out the reporters...
...What makes this incredible is that the WVEA has for decades, along with its parent organization, the NEA, stubbornly resisted any kind of evaluation of teachers' classroom performance...
...The only real danger of inflation I see is in American manufacturers' response to the devaluation of the dollar, which could be inflationary if they attempt to raise prices instead of seeking a larger share of the market...
...They were the directors of the American Cultural Centers, run by the Information Service, and the remarkable thing is that they were all very impressive young people...
...In other words he was telling the chickens to seek the help of those nice foxes...
...It is a sad fact that public school administration in the United States is for the most part in the hands of a selfperpetuating group of overpaid, marginally competent bureaucrats who lack the courage, the drive, and the imagination to do what is needed to reform the institutions for which they are responsible...
...I don't either, but unless he has condemned the concealment of premarital pregnancy, and I have seen no evidence that he has, he can't be accused of hypocrisy, and that would have been the only justification for this item...
...Often a couple will need to make similar arrangements so that they can care for elderly parents...
...In a briefing only two days before the disrupted vote on November 19, an embassy political officer said, according to Julia Preston of The Washington Post, that there was "no indication" that either the government council or the army would fail to respect the balloting...
...Every pupil a genius...
...You probably knew there were services like Black Lightning at Berkeley that take notes for students too lazy to go to class...
...Because such bonds are paid off with revenue from the project they fund—a stadium, for example—professional help is often essential in peddling them to wary buyers who fear the stadium may be a loser...
...One of the nuttier causes of last fall's stock market decline was the fear of inflation...
...Another embassy official, when asked for help in rescuing Americans trapped under the Ton Tons Macoutes' gunfire, advised going to the Haitian police...
...The only hope of ending the insane explosion of terrorism in the world is showing aggrieved people that there is another way to achieve justice—following the example of Mahatma Gandhi...
...Washington's mayor, Marion Barry, with resounding redundancy, said it was "an invasion of my personal privacy" for The Washington Post to assign a reporter to follow him on his Thanksgiving holiday to the Bahamas, where the mayor spent the weekend with a woman not his wife...
...People would be stressed out ." Carson said that, after the Super Bowl, "it took me a month and a half to two months to come down because I was hyped...
...If you tried to do it, you'd have ulcers...
...embassy in Haiti, headed by Ambassador Brunson McKinley, supported the National Government Council headed by General Henri Namphy, whose thugs are every bit as bad as the Duvaliers...
...One other error made by people like Samuelson and others whom I admire, like Alan Murray (see page 51), is that they credit Paul Volcker with having ended the 1979 inflation by raising interest rates...
...Perhaps the Post doesn't like Robertson...
...And perhaps it would have been, had the woman not been Bettye L. Smith of W.R...
...Lite is the embassy press officer in Port-Au-Prince...
...They were typically in their early thirties, and all of them had already invested a lot of time in Asia...
...Such marriages were that common in the thirties, forties, and fifties...
...According to "The Winning Edge," a syndicated column written by Thomas Burdick and Charlene Mitchell, "Men who once wore drab, baggy business suits are suddenly looking as if they stepped out of Gentlemen's Quarterly...
Vol. 19 • January 1988 • No. 12
