In the Public Interest

“Product of a proud land. Tobacco. It’s as proud a part of the American tradition as the Statue of Liber­ty.” These words are from a recent advertisement for L&M by a cigarette compa­ny which knows no shame. The cigarette industry has 60 million Americans hook­ed. It can manipulate their psychology in many direc­tions. One series…

Little street urchins playing in the dust and the dirt are often pitied for their poverty and the squalor of their slum surroun­dings. Now, public health studies are adding horrible dimensions to the dangers of that dust and the dirt which swirl or float around urban neighborhoods. These dangers are lead, asbestos and other kinds…

A few times a year, a tall bearded man in his late thirties is seen in front of the main building in down­town Washington of the De­partment of Housing and Urban Development offer­ing a newsletter called IM­PACT to emerging employees. He is Al Louis Ripskis, a veteran HUD employee him­self, and the editor-producer of the…

In searching for models of superior consumer perform­ance across this land, I have come across two con­sumer cooperatives in Michigan. One deals with auto repair and the other with optical services. Both are nonprofit but are run on a “businesslike” basis to keep competent staff oper­ating efficiently. As many consumer-com­plaints about auto repair shops and…

The word spread like wildfire throughout the community of professional thieves: Fords are easier to steal than other recent car models. NOW, in response to questions, the Ford Motor Co. admits it. William Brown of Ford’s Washington staff says, “There’s no denying the numbers. The ratio is some­what higher on Fords . . . .…

How often have you heard politicians support “tax reform”? Almost everybody in Washington wants some form of “tax re­form” — so much so that the phrase itself has be­come a semantic coverup for carving further loop­holes in the tax laws. CONSIDER what is transpiring in Congress with the so-called Tax Re­form Act of 1975 (H.R.…

Question: Who is a lead­ing candidate for the title of “The Best Friend of the U.S. Shareholder”? Answer: Stanley Sporkin. chief of the Enforcement Division of the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is Uncle Sam’s watchdog against corporate financial manipulations. SPORKIN? Who ever heard of Sporkin? Ask a growing number of big busi­nessmen and their…

Attention William Simon, William F. Buckley, Milton Friedman, American Enter­- prise Institute and other economic conservatives! Why are you so calm before the gathering storm of atomic socialism? WHERE IS your ideological fervor for free-market enterprise when giant mis­managed corporations are pushing Uncle Sam (alias the small taxpayer) to bail them out by socializing their…

On the morning of Nov. 6, prior to final House of Representatives debate on the Consumer Protection Bill (H.R. 7575), two White House agents sat in the of­fice of Congressman Pete McCloskey, R-Calif. THEY WERE trying to persuade McCloskey to drop his amendment to the bill that would have consoli­dated consumer advocacy efforts in the…

For over 100 years the slogan, “the bigger, the bet­ter” has guided the busi­ness community. Even today, few execu­tives would question the validity of such a slogan. Banks with assets exceed­ing $30 billion, oil compa­nies with sales over $30 bil­lion annually and insurance companies with millions of policyholders are believed to be big because they…