For Butcher & Baker, Too

In connection with the steel impasse, TIME [Sept. 26] quotes U.S. Steel's Fairless as opposing noncontributory welfare programs as being "at the expense of someone else (i.e., management)" ... and in the next paragraph [you say]: "Such a program would cost the steel industry about $200 million a year and would lift the cost of steel as much as $3 a ton."

There is the crux of the matter. Already a very active contributor to the "noncontributory" coal miners' pension fund, and with prospects of shortly assuming similar paternalism in behalf of the steel worker I don't see how I can conscientiously fail to do as well by the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker . . .

If carried to its ridiculous conclusion, one visions a society in which each worker subsidizes the security of every other the individual meanwhile laboring blissfully under the delusion that this is social progress and it's all for free . . .

CHESTER A. SNYDER JR. Roanoke, Va.

. . . It wouldn't cost Mr. Fairless a nickel of his own to agree that every steelworker have a mansion, a yacht and an ulcer . . . The bill for the welfare plan will finally be passed along to that great body of shoppers (ie., consumers), including the steelworkers, who go out to buy a pound of nails, a spool of barbed wire, or a pair of roller skates for the kids. The subsidized and politically favored minorities will be able to afford it, and the rest will sit back on their thin billfolds and think how wonderful it is to have a Great White Father who promises plenty for all and work for none.

D. E. GOODYKOONTZ Alhambra, Calif.

Devaluation v. Savings

Sir:

"The $2.80 pound might work no miracles: but at least it was honest" [TIME, Sept. 26]. No devaluation of the monetary unit of value is ever honest ... It will always be stealing, or in other words confiscating, the savings of the thrifty, those who have denied themselves in order to invest in life insurance, government bonds, or in bank savings accounts.

W. F. BARBER The American National Bank Lawton, Okla.

D for G

Sir:

I was very happy to read the Sept. 19 article on Lisa Fonssagrives, till I came to the spelling of my name. I have been called Gravelneck, Drizzleneck, Dirtyneck and Hydranthead, but never has my name been so slightly misspelled [Gravneck]. The accompanying picture shows you how badly I feel about the grave injustice you have done me . . .

HENRY DRAVNEEK New York City

Fugitives from a Chain Store?

Sir:

The Fair Dealers seem consistent for their inconsistencies. A chimerical scheme has been cooked up by the Secretary of Agriculture whereby we all get food practically for nothing, yet farmers enjoy top prices, with taxpayers bridging the gap.

But the Attorney General wants to put the A. & P. out of business because it sells good food too cheap yet absorbs the difference out of profits. Maybe the American people do not necessarily feel like "fugitives from a chain store."

JULES KERSTEN New Orleans, La.

Expeditionary Force

Sir:

The Italians would stand a lot better chance of catching Salvatore Giuliano ["Probably the world's most eminent bandit, and certainly the most photogenic"&151#; TIME,

Sept. 12] if they would send 2,000 single women after him instead of 2,000 single men. There are a couple of ex-WACs in [my] office who would volunteer to lead an expeditionary force, providing we get to keep him when we catch him.

VIRGINIA SMITH North Richland, Wash.

Caruso as Basso

Sir:

The article in TIME, Oct. 3, describing how Enrico Caruso, tenor, sang for me, a basso, amused me very much . . .

In my book of memoirs, under the title Through My Monocle, soon to be published, my readers will find the exact version of it.

ANDRES DE SEGUROLA Hollywood, Calif.

Sir:

. . . May I state that, to the best of my knowledge, you are the first to present with absolute accuracy the story of Enrico Caruso's singing of the bass aria from La Boheme on the stage and on the celebrated recording . . .

EDWARD HILL New York City

P:The Alda-Caruso-Segurola performance of La Boheme is a story of many versions. Everyone remembers it differently. TIME'S was the Alda version. --ED.

Exception

Sir:

TIME'S PRESS SECTION OCT. 3 SAYS: "IN THEIR EARLY EDITIONS, THE NEW YORK MIRROR, THE DES MOINES REGISTER AND THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE EVEN RATED A LOVE BOMB OVER THE ATOM BOMB, PUT THEIR BANNERS ON THE STORY OF A MAN CHARGED WITH ENGINEERING AN AIRPLANE EXPLOSION TO KILL HIS WIFE." WE APPRECIATE IMPLICATION THAT WE HANDLED THE ATOM STORY WITHOUT HYSTERIA, WHICH IS TRUE, [BUT] THE DES MOINES REGISTER BANNERED THE STORY IN ALL EDITIONS EXCEPT THE CITY FINAL WHERE IT WAS SUBORDINATED BECAUSE ALL CITY FINAL READERS ALSO READ OUR DES MOINES TRIBUNE WHICH BANNERED THE NEWS THE PREVIOUS AFTERNOON.

KENNETH MACDONALD Executive Editor Des Moines Register and Tribune Des Moines, Iowa

One-Syllable Federalese

Sir:

Linguists consider the Chinese tongue as being in one respect the best of all possible languages. Its reduction of nearly all words to one syllable effects great economies of time and breath, penpoints, paper, and patience.

English is showing a tendency to do the same thing ... Of all places, this laudable trend is now showing itself in Washington, D.C. It should be encouraged. For example, a logical clipping of titles might be made on the analogy of the now official Veep; thus, Mr. President becomes Peep, Mr. Secretary of State becomes Steep, Mr. Secretary of Labor becomes Sleep, The Supreme Court becomes Skeet, The U.S. Senate becomes Sneet. Government economists (geeks) could easily estimate the huge savings these and similar clippings would make in paper and typewriter ribbon in the thousands of reports of the millions of federal officials. Perhaps even, by 1984, a tolerable federal prose might replace gobbledygook.

LEO L. ROCKWELL Hamilton, N.Y.

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