In the Public Interest

The words were not circumscribed enough to be associated with a corporate executive. But on May 21, 1984 in a letter to Donald D. Engen, the new head of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the chief of Pan Am, C. Edward Acker was blunt: “The Air Traffic Control problem,” he declared, “has gone from bad-to-worse-to-horrible-to-intolerable.…

What has been considered politically impossible for nearly two decades occurred in just a few days at the New York state legislature. A mandatory seat belt use law was passed, effective December 1, 1984. The precipitating event was the failure of legislation in May to enact a minimum 21 year old drinking age. A vacuum…

The Reaganites have found a new bugaboo and, together with a number of exporting corporations and right-wing ideologues, are whipping up a storm. The object of their hysteria is a mild set of consumer protection guidelines proposed by the United Nations Economic and Social Council for adoption later this year. These voluntary principles are, in…

Washington –So far the signs are not auspicious for much media coverage of Ben Bagdikian new book (released June 1) “The Media. Monopoly”, (Beacon Press, Boston). As the most penetrating, specific and reflective book on both the electronic and print media in many a year, the industry of journalism should be buzzing over its arrival.…

The fish processing ‘industry got away in the late Sixties when stronger federal health laws were passed regarding red meat and poultry products. Lively, graphic hearings were held before Senator Warren Magnuson’s Senate Commerce Committee on diseased and contaminated fish. But the result was a standstill between consumer advocates of mandatory inspection of fish plants…

Sometimes revolutions are neither heard nor seen; they are only felt. Looking at the placid processions during the graduation ceremonies of the nation’s largest universities in recent days, there is no hint of the convulsive changes going on at these institutions. But the American people will feel the consequences of the increasing corporate control over…

Think of the images associated with the modern semiconductor industry, most prominently associated with Silicon Valley in California. Workers with white gowns, head coverings and gloves manufacturing chips in a well-lighted, dust free workplace replete with the latest ventilation systems are the pictures which come to mind. Now a report has just been published in…

Senator Jennings Randolph (D-WV) has one more wish before he completes his four decades in the U.S. Congress at the end of this year. He wants to see the Congress enact legislation establishing a United States Academy of Peace. The burly lawmaker started in the House of Representatives in 1933. He has seen the effects…

All over the country the Bell operating companies want you to pay for your local telephone service on the same basis that you pay for long distance telephone calls. Instead of the “flat rate” monthly bill that most residential customers receive, these telephone companies are planning for local calls to be measured according to how…

The House Judiciary Committee is in the midst of hearings inquiring about the low quality of competition in the insurance industry. Forty years ago this powerful industry rushed through Congress a law called the McCarran-Ferguson Act, without any public hearings, to exempt the insurance industry from the federal antitrust laws except for actions of industry…