Tilting at Windmills

...According to Jane Mayer of The Wall Street Journal, the French, Italian, and Spanish delegations occupied suites priced at $700 a night...

...On top of six weeks’ vacation and a week of personal time off,” reports The Boston Globe, the judges get three weeks of education leave...

...Could this inconsistency have anytlung to do, as an editorial in The Washington Times suspects, with the fact that the spotted owl lives in Oregon while the snail darter was back home in Tennessee and if protected might have halted construction of a dam much wanted by Gore’s constituents...

...Anxious to get an advance copy of the speech, my friend called the anchor’s secretary...

...Another publication we have beaten up on a good deal lately is Money magazine...

...But Michael Kinsley continues to say that the elite shouldn’t feel guilty about their absence from the Gulf: military service . . . out of a guilty conscience will take the place of someone who is there for some practical reasons...

...Carroll Hubbard Jr...

...But if it doesn’t, the president should not feel compelled to get into a ground war...

...The Los Angeles Times has looked into the matter and reports that those incumbents are using their campaign contributions as “giant slush funds-with the money going for...

...Meanwhile, the United States Supreme Court, which has long taken the summer off, is now revealing that the justices will also take off from December 3 to January 6. Remember how Warren Burger used to moan about the overworked judiciary...

...used $3,000 in campaign funds to pay for a portrait of his father...

...Airplane pilots have to pass a similar test...

...A l b e r t Gore, who recently led the fight to protect the spotted owl, is the same senator who 12 years ago led the fight against protecting the snail darter...

...If the voter says he is blind, otherwise handicapped, or illiterate, he can take anyone into the booth he wants except his employer or someone from his union...

...Amen...

...That person may not be grateful to be denied this opportunity so that some yuppie can enjoy an egalitarian moral frisson...

...That, you must realize, was on working days...

...This was the no-no that House leaders had agreed to a year earlier: No candidate would be financed by either party if he or she criticized the pay raise...

...I’m terribly afraid that time is growing short...

...His reward has been never to have a kind word said about him in its pages...

...J onathan Alter, Newsweek’s media critic, recently wrote about a heartening development in our trade: the critical examination newspapers and television stations were making of televised political commercials this fall...

...This could have been financed by raising the contributions the rich make to Social Security or raising the top income-tax rate to 33 percent as the House favored...

...The most governors can do is use their veto power as a bargaining tool in redistricting negotiations, but it is the legislators who will actually write the bills...

...b u have to admire the dedication with which Johnny Mann, the sheriff of Lee County, Kentucky, has persisted in carrying out his duties in the face of obstacles that would surely daunt most of us...

...He has been denied bail because federal agents allege that he has threatened to kill witnesses who might testify against him...

...If you doubt that this magazine’s concern with the competence of public employees is one you should share, consider two recent events: The captain of a California fire department was unable to put out a fire he himself had started by burning brush outside his house...

...These same judges get two and a half months completely off each year, not including sick time...

...Worley was given only a token $5,000 by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee because he criticized Gingrich for having supported the congressional pay raise...

...Yet Secretary of Transportation Samuel Skinner, who presides over the FAA, is constantly touted by administration insiders as one of the most capable men in Washington...

...But I have learned through a story by Ken Mingis in The Providence Journal that in Rhode Island, not only can the officials still enter the booths, even the candidates can...

...As one who has repeatedly criticized The Washington Post for backing Marion Barry three times in local mayoral elections, I must congratulate Meg Greenfield and Don and Katharine Graham and welcome them into the camp of redeemed sinners for their endorsement of Sharon Pratt Dixon, which came at just the right time and was probably decisive in her primary victory...

...His driver’s license had been revoked...

...Of course you can argue that this means things are getting better-only two senators opposed Tonkin Gulf...

...Thus it would not have increased the deficit...

...Remember those Massachusetts judges who were taking off for the day around noon...

...If a pilot doesn’t tell the FAA that he has been convicted of drunken...

...To get the license that permits you to drive your car, you have to demonstrate your competence by passing a road test, during which you actually operate the vehicle...

...In onlyfiur do the Republicans control both houses, and in two of those they don’t have the governor’s office...

...Rep...

...Of the parents of enlisted personnel, only 19 percent of the fathers and 14 percent of the mothers are college graduates...

...If you wondered why Phil Donahue’s audience was cheering its head off for convict Marion Barry, it is that Barry said he wouldn’t appear on the show unless he was given 200 tickets, with which he proceeded to pack the house with his loyal supporters...

...You don’t have to know much about the high art of running the meter to know that these firms are going to cost the government a sizable bundle...

...Just in case you thought those drunken Northwest pilots were an isolated case, consider Ronald Riley, who, when his car was stopped by a Michigan sheriff, explained in a slurred voice that he shouldn’t be arrested for drunk driving because he had to get to the airport in time to pilot a plane...

...One has to wonder what those fellows have done or are expected to do to justify such largess...

...I think most economists would concede that extra money would be more antirecessionary in the hands of the poor than in those of the wealthy, who would waste too much of it on luxury imports and foreign travel, neither of which helps the U.S...

...Democrat David Worley lost to the incumbent Republican Newt Gingrich...

...Try for a moment to think of more than one action that Skinner’s department has taken that protects the public but displeases the industries it oversees...

...But he has carried on, calling his office once or twice a day from his cell, making sure to take care of essential business such as personnel decisions...

...They merely pass a written test and present evidence of experience, which could have consisted of one barely avoided disaster after another...

...Guess where the Socialist International, which represents 9 1 socialist parties and organizations around the world, held its fist meeting in the United States in this century...

...T h e good news is that federal regulators are suing the fancy law firms that helped the crooked savings and loans get away with their misdeeds...

...D u r i n g election night, how often did you hear thai the party of the governors was important because of their power over congressional redistricting for the 1990s...

...Earlier this week,” for example, according to a report in the October 18 Lexington Herald-Leader, “he replaced a woman office employee with his wife...

...Found in it were an open can of beer and an empty quart-size beer bottle...

...It seems obvious that he hopes he can bluff Saddam Hussein into withdrawing from Kuwait...

...It points out that physicians’ fees in the United States are 133 percent higher than in Canada...

...Back in Washington, D.C., at the Pentagon, an Army medic whose job was to give emergency medical aid managed to electrocute himself while playing with a defibrilator...

...The latest glimpse into the Republican soul is provided by Maureen Dowd, who reports that as George Bush was campaigning in Tyler, Texas, for Clayton Williams, the GOP gubernatorial candidate, and trying to convince the voters that “Republicans are the party of the working class,” Mrs...

...Its 1990 Money Extra issue contains a tough attack on the greed of American physicians and what they are doing to escalate the cost of medical care...

...Yet, according to a Pentagon study, it is clear that the privileged elite is not doing its part...

...What do they do with the money...

...Our legitimate aims can be attained by the trade embargo backed up by the naval blockade...

...I have long advocated offering a book contract to the leading suspect as the best way of cracking unsolved crimes...

...What speech...

...economy...

...My one worry about Dixon is that she is so attractive to the media that she is in danger of becoming a star who will be invited to so many parties and conferences and conventions that she will not have time to govern the city...

...If you read our article in last month’s issue on real estate agents, you know that the National Association of Realtors is not to be confused with the Communion of Saints, and you will not be comforted to leam that for this year’s election, it spent more than $100,000 on each of five senatorial candidates and nearly that much on four House incumbents running for reelection...

...He is, in fact, another one of those types, of which fancy Washington lawyers are the prime example, who manage to appear professionally skilled as they time after time accommodate their views to the interests of the powerful...

...C. W. Young, for example, used his campaign funds to buy a $30,000 Lincoln...

...Some of them do valuable work, a few even deserve to be paid more, but many jobs at the GS-15 level have responsibilities that, in the words of our contributing editor and veteran civil servant, Leonard Reed, are somewhat less demanding than those of the average Safeway manager...

...This is very courageous for a city magazine heavily dependent on ads from the purveyors of luxury goods...

...Even three drunk-driving convictions in a year,” writes Ron French of Knight-Ridder, who reported this story, “doesn’t automatically ground a pilot...

...S ome measure of where the spirit of service stands in American society today is provided by the news that only 10,000 people applied for the Peace Corps in the past year, one-fifth the number who applied as national idealism peaked in 1964, the year after Kennedy’s death...

...Unlike politicians and CEOs, the anchor didn’t even plan on working with a speechwriter...

...And if you were out there, I would bet that your outrage against the troop commitment would be so eloquent that you would even make doves out of Martin Peretz, Morton Kondracke, and the rest of your colleagues at The New Republic...

...If you have ever worked for the federal government and therefore know what the job ratings mean, you have to be frightened to learn that as of January, GS-15s will be paid as much as $80,138...

...John Murtha spent more than $6,600 on professional football tickets...

...I hope this will prove to be a permanent role for the media, not just a 1990 fad...

...This may help explain why Vincent A. “Buddy” Cianci Jr., a convicted felon, was elected mayor of Providence in November...

...But to millions of viewers, it appeared that an objective studio audience was so moved by the mayor’s eloquence that it repeatedly burst into wild applause...

...I have a feeling that this city is full of would-be David Gergens who secretly view their public service as an opportunity to audition for media celebrity...

...Why at the Waldorf Astoria, of course...

...Williams showed up at the president’s side wearing a fulllength fur coat and two large diamond rings...

...I had assumed this practice had long gone the way of other colorful customs of the American political past that have fallen victim to reformers...

...The Washingtonian has run another story, this by Rudy Maxa in its November issue, advocating Cheap Chic and praising David Souter’s modest credit-cardless lifestyle...

...The danger is that Bush will see himself trapped by the land forces he is deploying, that he will feel he has to use them soon or lose the chance to use them because of disagreements with our allies, antiwar protests back home, and declining morale among the troops themselves...

...Speaking of lack of opposition to American involvement in a Middle Eastern war, only three senators opposed the October 2 resolution that was the equivalent this time to the Tonkin Gulf resolution that gave LBJ the green light in Vietnam...

...Did you hear any of the pundits say that state legislators have even more power, so even though Republican Pete Wilson may be governor of California he’s not going to be able to dictate redistricting to the legislature...

...You haven’t scripted her yet...

...The FAA relies on the pilots to report themselves...

...A cynical deal between House Republicans and Democrats may have defeated at least one challenger for a congressional seat in the November election...

...Many incumbent congressmen who don’t face a serious challenge in the next election nevertheless raise huge campaign chests...

...such personal indulgences as expensive cars, real estate, tuxedos, club memberships, and even personal travel...

...But what about merchant mariners who operate giant ships like the Exon Valdez...

...that if you offered to trade places “Anyone who enters the Do you really believe, Michael, with a soldier in the Gulf right now that you wouldn’t have a taker or two...

...Phil Donahue should be ashamed of himself for not disclosing the truth about the 200 tickets frequently during the airing of the show...

...Jay Rockefeller was the first investor in this magazine...

...TILTING AT WINDMILLS Charles Peters A lmost no one has commented on Congress’s failure to give the social security tax relief to the working poor and lower middle class that Daniel Patrick Moynihan had so wisely urged...

...But he could still fly a plane...

...As veteran readers of The Washington Monthly know, that “education” time is devoted to con games politely known as continuing legal education seminars, which are invariably held in such centers of scholarship as Acapulco, Honolulu, and San Juan...

...He had three drunk-driving convictions...

...So, even more significant than the Democratic control of 28 governorships is their complete control of 31 state legislatures and control of one chamber in at least 13 other states...

...She just expected “her” speech to appear magically at the appointed hour-just like her TV scripts, apparently...

...the secretary indignantly replied...

...No objective the administration has stated for its Iraq policy, least of all restoring the emir to Kuwait, is worth the thousands of casualties a ground war would cause...

...Now I have a similar tip for television journalists: As a way of getting Washington sources to go on the record, indicate, to the extent your 4 The Washington MonthlyDecember 1990 conscience permits, that the interview will lead to appearances on talk shows...

...The fire ultimately cost $500,000 to extinguish...

...If you feel the same way, please write the president, your congressman, and your senators now...

...Another way the failure to discriminate between the deserving and the undeserving inflates the federal personnel budget is through a new law that will increase the pay of federal employees in highcostof-living cities but, as we predicted, will not lower it in the many places where present federal salaries are still generous compared to the local scale...

...I n connection with James Bennet’s article on the press’s failure in the Gulf crisis (see p. 8), I am heartened that the Monthly has been joined by Mark Shields in The Washington Post, John Kenneth Galbraith in The New York Times, and a number of others in the media in our concern that only the poor and the lower middle class are risking their lives...

...One reason primaries tended to be a good deal more corrupt than general elections in the West Virginia of my youth was that the precinct officials from one party would permit the official from the other party to enter the booth with a voter, so that the faction of each party that controlled the selection of precinct poll clerks was likely to emerge victorious in close elections...

...Bill Green spent $12,500 on tickets to Broadway shows...

...I’m going to violate this long tradition by praising his recent stand in favor of raising the top income tax rate to 33 percent and levying a 10 percent surcharge on annual incomes over $1 million...

...The bad news is that the regulators are hiring some of the same firms to do the suing...

...The bluff could work...

...Why not hire instead, as short-term government employees, bright, young lawyers in the $50,000 to $100,000 annual salary range and let them make their reputations by beating the bigshots...

...Not only is Bush unconvinced by our case, but in November he announced a drastic increase in the size of these forces...

...But it too may be on the road to redemption...

...driving, it is unlikely the governing agency will find out...

...These 30second spots that can be so devastating-remember Willie Horton-need to be exposed...

...Mann was one of four eastern Kentucky sheriffs arrested in an FBI sting operation and charged with accepting a total of $85,000 in payoffs from drug gangs...

...As he told Jack Deutsch of The Charleston Daily Mail: “People of my income level have gotten tax breaks they don’t deserve throughout the eighties...

...The fact is that there are not enough cases to fill the days the Court usually schedules for argument...

...And Rep...

...Six weeks later, on September 28, Riley’s plane crashed...

...To the best of my knowledge no major papers have taken this stand in their own editorials...

...As Chief Justice Rehnquist remarked to Ruth Marcus of The Washington Post: “Well, the emperor has no clothes, I guess, and there’s no way of concealing it...

...I n each of three issues of The Washington Monthly that have come out since Iraq invaded Kuwait, we have argued against the involvement of American ground forces in the Gulf...

...Neither the master nor the helmsman, according to E Eugene Guest of Marine Safety International, have to demonstrate their competence...

...And while few of the soldiers could write a column as well as you, I do think they would enjoy sitting in your comfortable climatecontrolled office, with Washington’s best restaurant I Ricchi just downstairs, and they would surely spare us such toneyisms as “egalitarian moral frisson...

...Speaking of TV celebrities, one of the better-known women anchors was recently scheduled to speak for a group with which a friend of mine worked...