In the Public Interest

The election is over and so is the national Democratic era in American politics. The pundits and the pollsters are analyzing the voters who rejected the Carter administration after having brought it to power in 1976 in order to find out why. Brock Adams, former secretary of transportation, came closest to the reason. He told…

ATLANTA, Ga.—Billy Lovett could scarcely believe what he was reading. Here was the state com­missioner of natural resources, Joe Tanner, telling a civic club in Tifton, Ga., “If we are going to continue enjoying anything resembling the lifestyle you have today we are going to have to have nuclear power in this country for the…

As the presidential election campaign comes to a close on decision day, Nov. 4, one point stands out clearly. Campaigns are not run on more than two or three substantive issues, and even they are pursued at a vague level of generality. Military defense, inflation and unemployment, of course, are the current issues that provide…

The presidential campaign has turned into a race to see which candidate can quarantine himself more completely from the press and the people. So far, Ronald Reagan is winning. He moves around the country with his staged events. 3-by-5 memory cards and his aides who seal him off from spontaneous contact with reporters and voters.…

HACKENSACK, N.J. — It drizzled at the gas station but not in front of the supermarket a few minutes later. Congressman Andrew Maguire, D-N.J., hardly noticed either weather pattern. He was busy handing out to motorists and consumers material on his congressional record and asking for their votes. Twice he pumped gas and talked politics…

Dennis Kucinich, former mayor of Cleveland, must feel vindicated. During his controversial tenure, which ended in 1979, he frequently charged that the powerful private electric utility, Cleveland Electrical Illuminating Co. (CEI), was trying to drive Muny Light, a city-owned retail competitor, out of business. The city’s attorneys filed a massive antitrust suit against CEI a…

Members of the media have long been accustomed to confronting politicians with their past statements and asking for a present explanation. The same treatment is not accorded executives of large corporations. Politi­cians are chided for exaggerating or dissembling. Not so with corporate executives. Could it be that the latter do not engage in such practices?…

In the tradition of nuclear industry euphemisms, Carl Walske, president of the Atomic Industrial Forum, calls the Three Mile Island accident of March 1979 “a valuable learning experience.” He also has referred to it as an “incident” — a common corporate substitute for “accident.” Well, this “incident” will cost the nation’s con­sumers and taxpayers at…

Anyone who thinks practical solar energy is too expensive or is “Buck Rogers stuff” is not keeping to date. All over America the do-it-yourself people discovering the sun and applying it to their homes. This approach brings the cost down dramatically when compared with oil, coal or nuclear energy. Around the country, community action groups…

The law never seems to phase Transportation Secretary Neil Gold­schmidt. Within weeks of taking the Cabinet post last year, he was off and running, telling city officials their federal aid applications would not be handled expeditiously if they supported anyone other than Jimmy Carter for president. Playing political reelection hardball with the taxpayers’ money happens…