In the Public Interest

I wonder how Seymour Melman feels these days. For over half a century, this Columbia University industrial engineering professor (now emeritus) has been researching, writing and speaking about the massive overspending on the military portion of the federal budget and how this waste is de-industrializing America, costing millions of jobs and starving the investment in…

There was time when specialists in time-and-motion would take great pride in shaving five minutes off a production line in a factory. Time was money and time saved was money saved. Clearly, these time-saver experts would not have any idea of what to do about the billions of hours Americans have to waste every year…

There was time when specialists in time-and-motion would take great pride in shaving five minutes off a production line in a factory. Time was money and time saved was money saved. Clearly, these time-saver experts would not have any idea of what to do about the billions of hours Americans have to waste every year…

Have you been watching the TV news or the TV newsmagazine shows lately about the sharp increase in medical malpractice insurance premiums and agitated physicians walking off their jobs in some states? If you have, didn’t they leave you with the impression that lawsuits against bad doctors were the cause? And these poor old insurance…

Republicans were in a mad scramble earlier this month in a desperate effort to disassociate themselves from Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott’s reiterated endorsement of the racist campaign of Strom Thurmond as a candidate for President in 1948. The public suggestion by their Senate leader that the “country would be better off” if Thurmond’s segregation…

George W. Bush has this thing about laws — domestic or international — that disagree with him. He likes to operate outside their embrace or withdraw from them or try to repeal them. It is not just personal — as when he costs taxpayers millions to pay for his political trips on Air Force One…

George W. Bush wants to transfer some 800,000 civilian jobs in the federal government to private business. That is about half of the civil service and such a move is urged in order to save the government money and do the work more efficiently. Whatever you call it — contracting out, outsourcing, privatizing or corporatizing…

Walking down a busy street in downtown Washington recently, I began to hear interesting words coming from an excitable conversation between two gentlemen briskly walking behind me. “Do you have any idea what is emerging?,” one said to the other. “We’re perfecting the robo-candidate from Washington, DC and making it seem like it’s local.” It…

Washington is in the midst of its biennial guessing game about what legislation will get the green light when the 108th Congress convenes next month. Many Committee chairpersons, of course, are just waiting to get their marching orders from the White House and their friends among the army of lobbyists (aka campaign contributors). But at…

Subprime lenders have been marching up to state legislators around the nation with a stern warning-“enact protections for borrowers and you will trigger a quick and certain reduction of credit for thousands of low, moderate and middle income borrowers.” But, the hard facts coming out of the states with the courage to stop predatory and…